Adactus Annual Reports – survey results

click on the pdf icon below to view our new style report

In October 2010, we published 4 Annual Reports. One each for Adactus Housing Association, Beech Housing Association, Chorley Community Housing and Miles Platting.  The Tenant Services Authority (TSA – who regulate all social housing providers) require Housing Associations to produce an Annual Report. The TSA do not specify what format the reports come in, but reports must cover how the Association is performing under each of the National Standards:

• - Tenant Involvement & Empowerment
• - Home
• - Tenancy
• - Neighbourhood & Community
• - Value for Money
• - Governance & Financial Viability

As we look ahead to producing our Annual Report for this year, we asked the Adactus500 for their views on how we can improve our report. We also asked Adactus500 members to look at five other Annual Reports (Regenda Group, Liverpool Housing Trust, Soha Homes, East End Homes and Salix Homes) which had rated highly in a recent survey carried out by national tenant groups. We wanted to see how well our report compared to these good practice examples.

What we learned from the survey:

Our Annual Report rated very well against the other examples of good practice, with an average rating of just over 4 out of 5. Our report scored joint top out of all six reports.

Nearly 6 out of 10 tenants thought that the report contained everything they expected to see.

4 out of 10  thought that the report was a bit long.

The most common comment about our Annual Report was asking us to use simpler language.

The full results of the survey can be viewed by clicking on the pdf icon below. We are now using a new report style making use of “infographics” and “wordclouds” to display the results in a more user friendly fashion. We welcome your comments on the new report style as well any comments you may have on the Annual Report in general.

What we will do with the results:

With the encouraging results from the Adactus500 consultation, we will now start work on the 2010/11 Annual Report which will be published by the end of September 2011. We will use the same overall design, with some small tweaks.

We will aim to make sure the language we use will be kept simple, with shorter sentences and fewer syllables used in each word. We will also use more pictures and images.

We will be aware of the comments about the length of the report. The report will be no longer than the 2009/10 report, and will be shorter if it’s at all possible.

Over the summer, we will consult further with our Tenant Editorial Panel on the content & design of the Annual Report. We will also blog the “big story” articles as they are written prior to the full report being published in September.