Have Your Say

Customer satisfaction is important to us. We want our tenants to be happy with the quality of our service.

We know that the best way for us to learn is to listen to what our customers are saying. If you have something to say, we want to hear it!

It could be about:

• Rent payment arrangements
• Leaseholder's service charges
• Repairs
• Improvements to your home
• Empty houses
• Services for older people, or people with disabilities, or people from the ethnic minority community
• The area where you live
• Dealing with nuisance neighbours or harassment
• Dealing with rent arrears
• Housing options appraisal

How to Get Involved

You don't have to come to lots of meetings at the Council offices. There are plenty of other ways you can get involved.

How much time you give is up to you. Please think about what time you have available, and then match it with an involvement option.

We have produced a booklet called Ways to Have Your Say... Your Way (pictured, right), which explains the many ways you can help. It's available as a downloadable pdf file:

Ways to Have Your Say...Your Way (317Kb)

Residents Panel

The Residents Panel is a contact list of people who live in Swindon, who are interested in being consulted about issues relating to their homes or the area where they live.

Once registered, we will contact you occasionally to:

• Complete a mini survey (by either phone, post or e-mail)
• Discuss a specific issue on an individual basis (this could be a phone or e-mail conversation, or a meeting)
• Take part in a focus group to look at a particular problem or proposal in more depth
• Ask if you would like to be in a ‘reading’ group to give a view on policy documents, information leaflets, forms etc, before they are published
• Ask you if you are interested in help organise community events in your area

You will be able to choose how you would like to be consulted, and what particular topics you are interested in commenting on - e.g.:

• Repairs and Improvements
• Antisocial behaviour
• Estate inspections
• Rent setting

Further information (including how to register) is contained in a leaflet (pictured, right), which is available as a downloadable pdf file:

Residents Panel leaflet (2.4Mb)

Swindon Tenants Voice

If you're interested in a more intensive level of involvement, you might be interested in joining:

• Swindon Tenants Voice (STV)
• Tenants Association for Sheltered Housing (TASH)
• Leaseholder's Link.

Getting involved will only cost you time, not money. The Council will provide a taxi or pay a mileage rate, and cover the cost of dependent care for people attending meetings.

Application Forms

To set the ball rolling, please fill in our online enquiry form to register your interest:

Getting Involved Enquiry Form (online version)

The form is also available as a downloadable pdf file:

Getting Involved Enquiry Form (85Kb)

Further Information/Contact

For details of how tenant involvement is helping to improve Housing Services, please see Tenant Participation Agreement.

If you would like to discuss anything in more detail, please contact the Council’s Housing Participation Team:

Paul Wilkins
Tel: 01793 463677
E-mail: pwilkins@swindon.gov.uk

Shelley Slater
Tel: 01793 463673
E-mail: sslater@swindon.gov.uk

We look forward to hearing from you!