Your views matter – Housing Plus Group and The Wrekin Housing Group to merge

Read the full story here.

Read the full story here.

The boards of Housing Plus Group and The Wrekin Housing Group have decided to take the next steps towards a formal merger.

Read the full story here.

To see the answers to frequently asked questions, please see our dedicated page or the document below.

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Customer-FAQs-08-October-2024.pdf

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Over 3,500 customers from Housing Plus Group (HPG) and Wrekin Housing Group (Wrekin) took part in a survey, over the summer, to provide feedback on the proposed merger. The survey asked customers to tell us what they thought about our plans and importantly, what the priorities of the new organisation should be, such as whether being able to build new homes was important. The responses from customers were broadly similar and included:

• Seeing repairs, major improvements and feeling safe in their home as the top 3 priorities for the newly merged company
• Agreeing that the top things that make a great repairs service are, ease of reporting a problem, quick response, range of dates and times of appointments and completing the work on the first appointment (first time)
• Telling us that the main ways they want to get involved is by responding to surveys or attending meetings
• Selecting apprenticeships, work experience, digital skills training and employment advice as the best ways to support customers through skills and training.

We set out several commitments to make our plans for the new merged company clear for our customers. We were pleased to find that the majority of both HPG and Wrekin customers who took part in the survey, agreed that the following aims are important to them.

As well as shaping the HPG and Wrekin Boards’ decisions about the merger, this information will be used to shape how the two organisations join together over the next two years. Many customers also told us that they would like to get more involved and help develop the services we deliver as the new Housing Plus Group. This work will start in 2025, and we will contact customers who expressed an interest at the appropriate time.

During the past few months, we have been looking at how we might bring our two organisations closer together to create a stronger presence that would benefit our customers, our employees and the wider community.

The new merged organisation would be:

• More resilient and able to invest in your home, while also building more new homes
• Larger, but remain fully connected to, and invested in, the communities we serve across Shropshire, Staffordshire and Telford & Wrekin
• Able to provide even better services, while creating more opportunities for our staff
• Be able to provide even better services for our customers

These changes will not affect our customers’ right to live in their home. There will be no changes to existing tenancy or lease agreements. Customers will continue to access the services they need by contacting their landlord the same way and dealing with the same teams they do now.

In the longer-term, both housing associations believe that coming together would let us do more for all our customers and further increase our resilience to future change. The merger would allow us to balance keeping costs down while investing more in better services, doing more to make homes energy efficient and building more new homes. We would have a stronger and more influential voice in the region, creating a positive impact on the local economy.

We want to hear our customers’ views and opinions on the proposed merger.

We are committed to listening to our customers and working with them to shape the services they receive from us.

• Burton Square Community Hub – Burton Square, Stafford, ST17 9LT
• Castlefields Community Hub – 69 New Park Street. Shrewsbury, SY1 2LE
• Meole Brace Community Hub – 25 Maesbrook Road, Shrewsbury, SY3 9NL

This customer survey is now closed. 

To see the answers to frequently asked questions, please see our dedicated page.