Housing Benefits Manager

Head of Housing Services Job description

At St. James's Management Ltd, is part of a group of companies servicing the Social Housing needs and we owe our success to the reputation and efficiency of our niche business. To help maintain and grow this standard, we are seeking an experienced Housing Manager to execute and deliver high quality housing management support across the Gypsy and Traveller community and to support the wider team by developing and coaching on procedures that will guide the team and the Housing Officers to excel in their roles.

This post requires close working with a range of agencies such as Housing Services, Housing Benefits, Housing Associations and Councils.

Responsibilities:

• Ensure that a high-quality property and tenancy management service is delivered across all locations and supporting the Housing Officers in executing housing management functions in line with management agreements and service level agreements.
• As a first point of contact you will signpost and support travellers to access council services to facilitate their inclusion and entitlement and to access advice, assistance and information and to give assistance with completion of forms e.g. Housing Benefit and drafting letters. You will act as a critical link between the Site residents and various Council Departments (e.g. housing, education, welfare, legal etc).
• Put in place service contracts for new services and monitor ongoing performance, providing quarterly reports to senior managers.
• Be the first point of contact to guide and advise Housing Officers on more complex housing management issues.
• Be directly responsible for the management of properties which will include, ASTs rent, ASB, council tax, repair escalations, ad-hoc/quarterly scheme inspections, lettings, pyramid database functions in their respective patch.
• To undertake a range of income collection duties relating to rent and service charge income.
• Achieve and maintain lowest possible levels of current rent and former tenancy arrears and ensure we maximise income recovery
• Ensure all incidents and complaints are reported and dealt with in line with organisations processes
• To be the main source of benefit information, advice and guidance to residents.
• Working closely and cooperatively with the maintenance team, ensure that repairs are reported in a timely manner
• Identify and develop talented employees, to meet the organisations commitment to employee succession planning and management development

Requirements:

• Experience of delivering a high-quality housing management support in the Housing Sector and implementing new housing initiatives
• Excellent knowledge and understanding of UK housing policy and law (housing law / landlord and tenant law)
• A good knowledge of current affairs and UK public policy
• Ability to collate complex, technical material, relevant to a subject and to analyse, interpret and present it clearly and accurately for a non-specialist
• Housing rental income and arrears control processes, rent collection databases/systems, dealing with HB/DWP/UC office on rent issues and court procedures
• You must have experience of working with Traveller and Gypsy community groups and have excellent interpersonal skills.
• Good all-round knowledge of tenancy management, management agreement and Service Level Agreement and leading on them
• Knowledge of current housing law and housing benefit welfare reforms
• Minimum of 2 years’ experience working in rent income collection for a housing Association or local authority
• Have excellent communication and negotiating skills.
• Have good IT skills generally and specifically in relation to Outlook and Excel.
• Working knowledge of legislation around tenancy management
• General understanding of service charges and rent calculations
• Demonstrable experience in issuing Court proceedings and advocacy

Benefits:

• Employee discount
• Referral programme

Ability to commute/relocate:

• London, W1U 3RY: reliably commute or plan to relocate before starting work (required)

Experience:

• Management: 3 years (preferred)

Work authorisation:

• United Kingdom (preferred)

Reference ID: SJM Benefits