Leaseholder Services research

This is an overview of the service improvement work that Leaseholder Services and the Strategy and Design team conducted from November 2023 to July 2024.  

In January, we spoke with leaseholders to learn about their experiences with Camden Council and understand what has been working well and less well. We used what we heard from these conversations to identify key problems that needed to be addressed to improve leaseholders’ experiences.  
 
In March, we held a collaborative session where a group of leaseholders came together to think of practical ideas for addressing challenges identified from the conversations we had with leaseholders in January. Ideas from this session fed into 2 key improvement areas that were brought forward: 

• Providing leaseholders with proactive, clear and consistent information 
• Expanding functionality and improving usability of the Camden Account  

In April, we went back to leaseholders and got feedback on some things that we hoped will help us achieve these improvements, including mock-ups of: 

• A paper and web version of a step-by-step guide to Major Works  
• A new version of the Notice of Intention letter pack that you receive when major works are due to happen 
• A new version of the Final Account letter pack that you receive when major works have been completed and the bill for the works has been finalised.  

New functionalities on the Camden Account relating to major works, including being able to view name and contact details of Contract Managers, status updates for major works in progress and a more granular breakdown of costs for major works 
Internally, we also worked on a third improvement area focusing on supporting the collaboration between Camden services that deliver services to leaseholders, such as Leaseholder Services, Repairs and Capital Works. 

In our conversations with you and other leaseholders, you told us that our mock-ups were helpful in achieving some of the improvements needed. You gave us lots of helpful feedback on ways that we could improve the letters and Camden Account further. For example, you expressed a desire for timescales (especially relating to major works). While there is an understanding that timescales may be uncertain, you told us that you would appreciate being provided with time estimates, nonetheless. You also spoke about wanting personalisation where possible, for example; letters that only contain or highlight information relevant to the type of property that you live in. 
 
Based on everything you told us, we have made changes to the mock-ups and made updated versions that have been handed over to leaseholder services. Some of these changes have already been implemented and you will be able to see them as part of the service:   

• Major works step-by-step web guide, as part of wider redesign of the Leaseholder Services web pages on Camden Council’s website 
• Letter version of the step-by-step guide, which you will receive along with letters relating to major works 
• New letters for Notice of Intention and Final Accounts, which you will receive with information about major works  

Other improvements are being tested and finalised by Leaseholder Services as part of ongoing service improvement work. While we haven’t been able to do everything straight away, your ideas and experiences will continue to feed into this work. 
 
We hope that the overview and outputs shared above reflect your experiences. If there is anything you disagree with or have further thoughts on, please do get in touch via [email protected].