[William Clemmey]

Dear All
Its just taken me less than 10 minutes to complete the annual submission once we had all the relevant paperwork on our website
Just a lot of “Comply” ticks

William Clemmey
Chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk

[William Clemmey]

We use APCS and it works well as its all online and easy to administer

https://www.onlinecrbcheck.co.uk/Home.aspx

William Clemmey
chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk

[William Clemmey]

We offer an auto enrolment compatible pension scheme and staff are auto-enrolled into this upon completion of their probationary period. This will be back dated to their start date. The Charity’s current contribution rate is 6% of salary and the minimum contribution rate is 6%. The Charity will also match contributions up to 8%.
Staff can also undertake a salary sacrifice into their pension and the Charity will pay 10% of this figure as it is saving on National Insurance contributions. These amounts are calculated on the full salary plus any overtime pay received for being on call or for when covering the duties of another member of staff. Staff have the right to opt out of this pension scheme at any time.

All of the staff have taken the 8% matched option and 2 staff have also undertaken the salary sacrifice option

William Clemmey
chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk

[William Clemmey]

We have a monthly cashflow which is projected for a year ahead. Interestingly a new member of our Finance and Risk committee has suggested a 5 year plan. We could simply extend the cashflow for another 4 years but not sure how useful this is going to be.
So thoughts from others welcomed on this
thanks
William Clemmey
chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk

[William Clemmey]

We also use Canva – it works really well
Happy to share our latest version
William Clemmey
chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk

[William Clemmey]

Anne
Very happy to share our Independent Living Policy

William Clemmey
chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk

[William Clemmey]

Laura
We tend to consider the September CPI plus 1% figure we use for WMC increases, also Google for average salary increases in the charity sector. We have used the Wessex Almshouses list in the past (though it can be difficult to compare the posts).
We then consider a maximum payrise at our November Finance and Risk meeting which is then approved by our Board. This helps to set our budget . The final pay rise is then agreed at the People and Governance meeting in March.

In order to raise the inadequate levels we were paying our Scheme Manager and Deputy Scheme Manager when I arrived we initially benchmarked against NJC scales. We also brought in an external consultant (pro bono) We have subsequently managed to improve on this and they have had pay rises of 87% for the Scheme Manager and 117% for the Deputy Scheme Manager over the last 4 years to bring them up to a realistic figure.

It would be really helpful if the Almshouse Association could undertake a survey which would help us all to benchmark.

Meanwhile we would be very happy to share salary levels for our Chief Officer, Finance Officer, Scheme Manager, Operations Manager, Handymen and cleaner

William Clemmey
chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk

[William Clemmey]

Tina
We started by Googling other housing Associations to see what they charged in their service charges for example Clarion Housing
file:///C:/Users/Home/Dropbox/My%20PC%20(DESKTOP-7M2A18S)/Downloads/service-charge-faq-2024-25-final.pdf
and others

We then drew up the list of items as shown in our paper. We had a zoom meeting with Michael Patterson from New Thinking in Supported Housing who was recommended by the Almshouse Association . He agreed that our list was correct. His charges are 15% of the increase achieved.
Our Finance Officer then realised that she could calculate it all herself with the excel spreadsheet that we circulated.
So we did it all ourselves so saving £17,700 in fees
Our Housing Benefits officer was very happy with the result and wondered why we had not done this before!

Hope that helps
William

[William Clemmey]

Sally
They both count – all maintenance can be included

Repairs
Maintenance sinking fund, handyperson services, ERF and CMF and white goods depreciated over time, Wi-Fi service eligible, depreciate the capital on this
Eligible

On the worked example on the excel spreadsheet line 36 shows our expenditure for different almshouses
Routine Maintenance £3,622.40 £1,024.85 £2,597.55 £1,537.27 £2,049.70 £10,831.77

I think the easiest way to see the difference is as follows
Treat the WMC as the “rent” paid to live in the property. Treat the Service Charge as the cost to the resident of providing the maintenance and servicing cost
To quote One Vision Housing https://ovh.org.uk/understanding-service-charges/
What is a service charge?
A service charge is your contribution towards the costs of additional services which are beyond the benefit of occupying your home.

Service charges can include the provision of security (CCTV monitoring, equipment depreciation and maintenance), cleaning, heating and lighting in communal areas, as well as grounds maintenance and other services.

Hope that helps
William

[William Clemmey]

Dear Sally
As the person who ran the webinar I hope I can be of help

The webinar is on the Almshouse Association website under
Maximising the WMC through Service Charges – November 2024
webinar recording
It has the link to the paper explaining what you can include labelled as pdf
It also has our Service Charge spreadsheet showing what you can include and which you can use to calculate the service charge. It also includes worked examples for our 5 almshouses see
excel spreadsheet – referred to in webinar

I am happy to send you these papers and also to chat about implementing the Service Charge

Here is the summary of what you can include and maintenance is one of those criteria. You can put the figures from last year into the spreadsheet plus a n amount for inflation. Then for next year you check whether or not you are in deficit or surplus. If a surplus then you can reduce the next year’s budget by theat amount for residents. If in deficit then they need to be charged more

Aerials
Asbestos survey / inspections and remedial work
Audit Fees
Bins and Rubbish
Boiler Servicing
Building Insurance
Boiler Insurance
Caretaking – scheme managers = 25%
Other staff costs – Chief/Clerk/Finance officer = 15%
CCTV
Communal Areas Electric
Communal Areas Gas
Communal signage
Communal telephone (lift)
Concierge (access and monitoring)
Contract servicing – fire safety
Contract cleaning
Contracted works – paths, parking, gardening equip
Controlled door entry – costs of repair and maintainenance
Electrical maintenance – inc inspections
Gas maintenance – inc inspections
Fire alarm test and maintenance
Communal areas – furniture, white goods, décor
Gardening and Grounds Maintenance
Laundry Facilities
Lift maintenance and repairs
Lighting – communal inc lightbulbs
Management Fee (12% of WMC at 95% occupancy)
PAT testing
Pest control
Routine Maintenance
Void costs – Actual 2022/23
Water testing and hygiene
Water pump and sewerage
Window Cleaning
WIFI – Monthly charges
Stair Lifts
Health and safety –
Gardener/Handyman
Hope that helps

William Clemmey
chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk 07922508913

[William Clemmey]

We use Burgis and Bullock in Leamington Spa

[William Clemmey]

Under the policy we have with Grouts its £250000 management protection policy.
However we appear to have covered this 5 times as we have 5 separate policies – I am trying t sort this out.
I have always thought that Trustees insurance is a waste of money if your charity is run well
William Clemmey
Chief Officer@municipal-charities.org.uk

[William Clemmey]

Emails from the Housing Ombudsman do come across as abrupt and just giving a week to action. They are however, open to delays if you respond to them.
Initially we were in trouble for not completing a Performance Compliance review which we put together and put onto the website.
Then over Christmas they asked why we had not also submitted our Housing Ombudsman Complaints self assessment. We had fortunately completed this 24 page document last March so were able to ask for a delay and then put it onto our website and we are now compliant.
This year we have until the end of September to submit all the updated documentation which means that it can go through our committees.
The irony is that we do not receive any complaints.

[William Clemmey]

Trevor,
As Debbie says the report needs to be signed off by your Board of Trustees

Also do remember to put the report onto your website along with your complaints policy and also your Housing Ombudsman Complaints self assessment document which details how you will respond to the Complaints policy (all 27 pages of it) We got caught out in not having this document on our website even though we had produced it eight months before internally
All on our website now if you want to check or borrow https://municipal-charities.org.uk/policies/
William Clemmey
chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk

[William Clemmey]

Elaine
We discovered from another Almshouse who had had a complaint from their resident that got raised with the Housing Ombudsman that we needed a Complaints policy on our website so you can see it here
https://municipal-charities.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Complaints-policy-and-procedure-March-2024-.docx.pdf
also our complaints form
https://municipal-charities.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Municipal-Charities-Complaints-leaflet-March-2024.docx.pdf

Then in July we received an email stating we had not complied with having our annual retrun sent to them by 30 June – which sadly we were not even aware was needed
We have now produced this – it includes our Board’s response – see
https://municipal-charities.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Annual-Complaint-Performance-and-service-improvement-report-June-2024-Google-Docs.pdf

We would be happy to send you our 26 page response to the Housing Ombudsman self assessment form – this link may work
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fnGhwQCiOcQzCPCO4tzsnQk7qeLknoWE/edit#heading=h.chfb9ydpswpw

If you need anything else then do get in touch
William Clemmey chiefofficer@municipal-charities.org.uk

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