The Sovini Group operates a unique model in the social housing sector. Created in 2010 it brings together commercial activities with social and not-for-profit businesses. Based in North West England, it manages and maintains more than 14,000 homes. It also operates several companies in the property and construction supply chains.
We now have complete visibility of each operatives’ progress, as well as the progress of the property itself.
David Cater
IT Operations Director, The Sovini Group
The Challenge
Over the last decade Sovini Group has been one of the social housing sector’s success stories. Its core not-for-profit housing business has expanded, while new commercial businesses have been created offering building and construction services to other housing associations.
That growth story has created increasing demands on the business to operate more effectively and efficiently. The company’s IT department has been at the forefront of efforts to utilise technology to improve performance and customer satisfaction. From the company’s creation in 2010, the ambition has been to move away from paper-based systems and embrace data rich field service management software combined with mobile working.
The group wanted to maximise the opportunities presented by Oneserve’s software to improve all aspects of workflow visibility. It also needed to simplify data management with its initial emphasis focused on repairs and voids services. Compliance and risk management were also an area of focus. A crucial objective was to create a highly visible, and fully digitised, job management system which would give the IT team rich data sets to drive performance improvement.
The Solution
Using Oneserve’s field service management software, Sovini Group has been able to transform all aspects of its repairs, voids and more recently risk and compliance services – both for its in-house teams and those of its third-party clients in the social housing sector.
Crucial to Sovini’s success has been the adaptability and flexibility of Oneserve’s software.
With support from the Oneserve team, Sovini has been able to create job management systems for repairs, voids and compliance (e.g. gas safety) work which reflect its specific needs and requirements – and those of its customers.
In repairs, for example, a bespoke Oneserve solution has been created to manage every aspect of repairs services. Scheduling teams and field-based operatives share the same data rich system which allows constant real time monitoring of job progress and status: from first contact, through scheduling, completion and invoicing.
A suite of intuitive reports and dashboards has also given Sovini rich datasets to facilitate major improvements in efficiency and performance.
The Result
Sovini Group’s use of Oneserve over the last decade has delivered transformational performance improvements for the business.
The system’s ability to track and monitor every aspect of operative activity in the field has meant the firm can measure productive and unproductive time – and identify areas for improvement. Enhanced job status visibility and transparency has improved customer satisfaction (more “fixed first times”) and overall business performance.
For example, improved route and stock management means operatives now spend more of their working day carrying out repairs or compliance checks. Drive time between jobs has been reduced from an average of 53 minutes to 18 minutes, while the average number of jobs completed in a day has risen from 4.3 to 7.1.
The great thing about Oneserve’s software is its adaptability and flexibility. We can create workstreams, workflows and processes which are unique to us and our customers. And we can do so ourselves without having to constantly ask Oneserve to make the changes we need. It’s this “self-service” element which has enabled us to transform so many of our services over the last decade – from voids and repairs through to all aspects of compliance and risk.
David Cater
IT Operations Director, The Sovini Group
