Customer Report 2017

Customer report

Our 2016/17 Customer Report has been published, and is available to read on the Publications page in the About Us section of our website.

The report keeps customers up to date on Advance’s news with highlights of the past year (April 2016- March 2017) from across our housing, support and employment services. Also included is a financial overview for the year and an outline of our Strategic Plan. We have provided a breakdown of results from our recent customer survey (see below) and information on how customers can get more involved in Advance through regional and national forums. Alongside this are some inspirational stories from a range of our customers. 

Highlights from the customer survey include: 

91% of customers reported that they were ‘very‘, or, `quite’ happy with the service that they get from Advance and 87% said that they would recommend our services to someone else.   This is a considerable improvement from our 2016 survey with results of 78%.

Advance customers were consulted at a national forum on the style and type of questions for the survey so that their responses would be meaningful and provide a clear picture of where we were doing well and where things could be improved. 

While 81% of customers felt that Advance staff always, or, nearly always do a good job (compared to a figure of 74% in 2016).  81% of customers said they knew how to complain, a third said that they only ‘sometimes’ or ‘never’ feel comfortable making a complaint (this compares favourably to the 2016 result of 62%).

Of those customers who receive housing support from Advance 91% were happy with the quality of their home. Although a very positive result, we are not complacent and have teams of surveyors and contractors, all of whom have received safeguarding training from us, who ensure our properties are kept in good repair and meet current legislative standards.

Overall we are delighted with this year’s customer survey results.  However, there is always room for improvement and more work needs to be done in producing accessible information, as only 67% of respondents said that they often or always understood the information they get from Advance.  We take meaningful customer involvement and engagement seriously and have set ambitious targets in our Strategic Plan 2017-20. 

If customers would like a printed copy of the report, they can request one by emailing a member of staff, or contacting customer engagement at customerengagement@advanceuk.org

An easy read version of the report is also available.