Housing options case progression management overview
Comprehensive and personalised housing advice plays a key role in preventing homelessness, and a proactive advisory service can offer tangible improvements in the long-term sustainability of people's housing options, not just amongst existing customers but also appealing to new groups of service users. A housing options case is the framework by which enquiries received into the local authority are managed through Civica Cx Housing. Typically, a member of the housing organisation would generate a new housing options case following direct contact with a tenant or other stakeholder wishing to understand their housing opportunities, as a starting point for a subsequent interview and follow-on information gathering. A housing options case is structured into a combination of sequential and parallel tasks, which define how a case will be progressed from initial contact through to a successful outcome, often culminating in the creation of a personalised housing pack.
A housing options case is inextricably linked to the associated tasks that constitute the workflow path. Therefore, a case cannot exist in isolation but instead comprises a series of inherent tasks that define the end-to-end progression steps to be conducted by the owner. Hence, in reviewing the progression status of a case, it is important to take a holistic view in the context of the individual task elements. From an end user perspective, all assigned cases - at individual and role level - can readily be viewed and progressed via the 'cases and tasks' Home pane. This is in essence a 'to do' list, with real time information presented on the status of each case. Simply by double-clicking on an entry included within the list, an end user can launch and progress the case. To keep track of progress, any number of notes can be appended to each case, appearing as discrete entries within the event log. Similarly, any number of file attachments can be linked in order to provide contextual background, and serve as a single point of reference for all related progression activities.
Defined at task level, the timeline for a housing options case can be controlled by a Service Level Agreement (SLA), in line with the housing organisation's advisory service standards, calculating the required target completion date for each progression element of the case. All task components of the case therefore contribute to the overall timeframe i.e. the individual SLA target for each inherent task forms the overarching SLA for the parent case. Any task within a housing options case can be placed on hold in circumstances where no action can be taken for a set period of time. For instance, it would be legitimate to place on hold a task where a follow-up interview has been scheduled with a customer who is known to be on holiday. As part of the process, a future release date would also need to be specified for the task, ensuring that no open customer interactions remain static without a set progression point.
Separate help articles have been created for each key aspect of housing options case progression management, including: