Speeding up estate inspections from 1 day to 3 hours with scalable mobile solution

Moat Housing Association is based in the South East of England, building high-quality, affordable homes for those in housing need. It is proud to be one of the top 30 housing associations in the UK, managing over 20,000 homes in South East London, Kent, Essex, and Sussex.

We reduced a Tenancy Audit visit times from 40 to approximately 20 minutes. And whilst an Estate inspection could take in excess of 1 working day, the equivalent inspection now takes approx. 3 hours with Resco.

Dani Copeland, Moat Housing Association

Business Challenge

Moat has long prioritized giving frontline staff access to conduct their work while out in the field, but they found it challenging to find the right solution. They started using Microsoft Dynamics 365 as their core CRM system four years ago, and as such, they have been looking for a fully integrated mobile solution.

Like many housing associations, their stock is widespread. The staff had to prepare paper packs for visits, carry tenant data to sites, which resulted in security concerns, and return to the office to write up visits and inspections.

Moat had a partial mobile capability via an in-house application. However, it did not integrate with Microsoft Dynamics 365 and offered limited functionality. The licenses were due for renewal.

Solution

Moat engaged with RedKiteCRM, a seasoned Resco implementation partner, who demonstrated the Resco Inspections+ solution for Microsoft Dynamics 365 and its capabilities to the association. Since then, with the help of RedKiteCRM, Resco has enabled Moat to consolidate its data into one secure, central system – providing visibility across its entire business. Paper-based estate and property inspections have been digitized. Housing staff can quickly complete forms, upload photos, and raise repairs with the data automatically flowing to their Microsoft Dynamics 365 in real time.

Starter tenancy visits and audits have been digitized, meaning meeting outcomes and actions are clearly logged and traceable in the system. They’ve enabled staff to manage anti-social behavior cases, log calls and visits, view customer and property data, and receive actions from the monthly fire risk assessments conducted by their third-party contractor—all via Inspections+ on their iPads.

With RedKiteCRM’s support, Moat approached the project in two phases. Phase 1 included branding the Resco  Inspections+ app with the Moat colors and logo, estate inspections, fire risk actions, repair reporting, ASB case management, and access to essential customer and property information.

Phase 2 focused on digitizing additional paper-based forms and bringing in functionality provided by their previous in-house mobile solution – including cleaning and gardening surveys and integration with their Proactis purchasing system. This allowed their Neighborhood Response teams to raise orders for materials remotely via Inspections+ and manage their repairs as well.

Benefits

Moat now has a mobile solution that is easy to use, available offline, and allows frontline staff access to customer and asset information at their fingertips. The Resco Inspections+ for Dynamics 365 has delivered significant time savings, including decreasing travel times and the length of various inspections and audit visits.

Having customer information available on a mobile device reduces paperwork and administration overheads and allows staff to react faster to issues logged in the field. Additionally, being able to upload photos to their CRM makes it easier to hold contractors accountable when the need arises.

Tenancy audits and estate and property inspections are now completed via digitized forms, seeing the average duration of each visit drop by half. With further savings achieved by staff not having to spend time on preparing paper packs and returning to the office to write up visits.

The Resco Inspections+ mobile app is easy to use due it’s similarities to Microsoft Dynamics 365, which has meant Moat had the added benefit of requiring minimal staff training.

Looking to the future, Moat now plan to roll out Resco to other areas of the business, with Inspections+ Property being the next area of focus.

• Estate inspection time reduced from 1 day to 3 hours
• Property Inspection & Tenancy audit visit times reduced by 50% – from 40 to 20 minutes
• Travel back to the office to write up visit outcomes entirely removed, saving up to an hour a day
• Administrative support to frontline staff to raise repairs reduced from 1 hour to 10 minutes a day
• FRA and H&S concerns flagged instantly
• GDPR issues removed as customer data is handled by an fully encrypted mobile solution, not paperwork
• Savings on in-house development and license costs of previous mobile solution

To any organizations that use Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM, we feel Resco is the obvious choice.

Moat Housing Association