Assets record maintenance overview

Asset management pertains to the function within a housing organisation that is responsible for the long term management of social housing stock, and aligns with the principle aim of social housing to provide decent homes that are affordable to people or tenants on low incomes. Specifically, there is a responsibility to make sure that asset resources are used in the most effective way, ensuring value for money and sustainability in the long term. The decent homes standard also sets out expectations on the condition of asset stock, comprising four key elements:

• The property is free of category one hazards i.e. those that could result in death, permanent paralysis, malignant lung cancer, regular and severe pneumonia, etc.
• The property is in a reasonable state of repair
• The property has reasonably modern facilities and services
• The property has a reasonable degree of thermal comfort.

Civica Cx Housing aids in the strategic planning of availability, condition and management responsibility of all asset stock, together with the controlled issuing of keys to tenants, contractors, inspectors, and the like. Maintaining accurate and comprehensive asset records, in terms of the individual characteristics and hazard alerts, provides a clear picture on the adherence to this standard. Each asset is identified with a unique reference number, the syntax of which is controlled by the end user, in terms of the number of digits, any prefix and suffix requirements, as well as the desired starting point (to take account of system implementation overlaps). Where a housing organisation monitors specific asset attributes that are not already catered for as standard, any number of user defined fields can be created and linked to each asset to enable this additional data to be recorded. The transfer of management and ownership responsibility over the lifetime of an asset can also be captured, creating individual and chronological episodes. Where a housing organisation transcends multiple companies, a standard function is provided to transfer assets from one to the other.

Separate help articles have been created for each key aspect of asset record maintenance, including:

• To add a new asset
• To update the characteristics of an asset
• To upload an asset photograph
• To view the hierarchy of an asset
• To create asset alerts
• To add a new asset group
• To update user defined fields for an asset
• To view rent agreement episodes for an asset
• To issue keys for an asset
• To create a management episode for an asset
• To create an ownership episode for an asset
• To assign an asset to a company
• To add a new asset reference
• To view the service charge group memberships for an asset