Efficiency Savings: Tenants Identify £6,000 p/a of Savings in Customer Newsletter

Article taken from Carrick News, November 2010

Carrick News Review

               
Introduction

Earlier this year, a review was held of the tenant and leaseholder newsletter, Carrick News.
Since 2003, when Carrick Housing took over the management of council homes, it has been
sent to all tenants and leaseholders in Carrick, three times a year. Before this, it was sent by
Carrick District Council.
 

Survey

Every three years, a review for Carrick News is carried out. This year it took place in the
summer and began with a ‘readers satisfaction survey’ being sent to 500 tenants (of mixed
ages, properties and areas to ensure we got a fair representation of all tenants) asking
questions about what they thought of Carrick News and how they would like to receive it in the
future. We received a good response with 202 tenants returning the survey.
 

96% said they read Carrick News sometimes or all of the time.
93% said Carrick News was a good way to communicate with tenants and leaseholders.
98% found Carrick News informative and 92% found it helpful.
73% thought ‘information about new services’ was the most important part of Carrick News.
72% thought ‘information about changes to services’ was the second most important part.
43% felt that mailing 3 newsletters a year to all tenants was not a good use of rent money
 

For a copy of the questionnaire or for full survey results and comments please click on the links on
the Carrick News page of our website.
 

Working Group
 

A working group of District Forum of Tenants (DFT) members then collected and analysed the
results. The group looked closely at all aspects of Carrick News. They spent many hours
looking at different format options and costs; including black and white printing, various sizes
and the number of pages. They also looked at tenants views from the returned surveys on
content to see what tenants like to see in the newsletter.
 

Results & Changes Proposed
 

Although various options were explored the working group concluded that it would be wise to
keep Carrick News in its recognised format (a4, colour) in order to retain readers. Costs for
small (a5) and black and white formats were also looked at, however, it was agreed that
because the survey results showed a high percentage of tenants read Carrick News and most
did not wish to receive newsletters electronically then the current format of an a4, colour printed
newsletter should be kept.
In the survey, almost half of the tenants who responded thought that producing the newsletter
three times a year was not good use of rent money. Therefore, the working group
recommended that the newsletter should be produced twice a year and be sent out with rent
statements. This new arrangement will save significant costs in printing and mailing. The
savings of up to £6000 a year on printing and mailing costs will now be invested in other
services.
 

The newsletter helps me feel part of the Carrick Housing community.”
 

“I feel Carrick News is essential to me as it is so interesting and informative and keeps me in touch with what is going on in Carrick Housing.”