Newry Housing Executive’s Paddy Rooney-White shortlisted for ‘Excellence in Customer Service’ | Latest Newry News, Newry Sport and Newry Business for Newry City

Newry Housing Executive’s Paddy Rooney-White shortlisted for ‘Excellence in Customer Service’

A member of the Housing Executive team in Newry has been short-listed for the ‘Excellence in Customer Service’ category at the Chartered Institute of Housing-NI’s annual awards.

The Housing Executive’s Paddy Rooney-White, short-listed for ‘Excellence in Customer Service’ at the Chartered Institute of Housing-NI’s annual awards

Paddy Rooney-White is the area’s Sustaining Tenancies officer who supports those experiencing difficulties in keeping their tenancies.

After the need was recognised, the Housing Executive’s Sustaining Tenancies initiative was piloted in Newry and Paddy was charged with its design and implementation.

The development of Supporting Tenancies meant changing the approach to signing someone up to their tenancy so housing officers can, more readily, identify tenants who would be most at risk of their tenancy breaking down.

The project has involved creating a support network of organisations tenants can be referred to or contact for appropriate help. This approach, support and referral has made the difference to keeping the roof over some tenant heads.

The pilot scheme Paddy ran in the Newry area proved highly successful and the follow-on evaluation showed tenants did not get into debt as advice was given at an early stage, very few tenancies ended with a termination and almost half of all new tenants received some form of appropriate support.

As a result of this success, the scheme was rolled out throughout the Housing Executive’s South Region and the new approach has been implemented across the rest of Northern Ireland.

One of the people Paddy has helped through the Supporting Tenancies project was delighted with the support she received and commented, “Paddy’s been terrific helping me to get furniture from a variety of places.

“She also took the time to speak to our local St Vincent de Paul and they gave me a cooker and some oil to get me started. I’m now very settled in my home, it’s nicely decorated and I am in a much better place.”

Paddy’s manager who nominated her, Loma Wilson, said, “Paddy took the Sustaining Tenancies initiative from inception through to standard practice within the Housing Executive.

“Her commitment and determination to promote the service along with many personal interventions has made a significant difference to many living in the Newry area and now across Northern Ireland. I am delighted she’s been recognised through short-listing for the CIH-NI Awards 2015.”

Paddy said she was ‘just pleased to be nominated for the award in the first place’ in recognition of the initiative and her role in it. She described making the short-list as ‘the icing on the cake’.

Short URL: https://newrytimes.com/?p=48625

Posted by on Feb 2 2015. Filed under Community. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

1 Comment for “Newry Housing Executive’s Paddy Rooney-White shortlisted for ‘Excellence in Customer Service’”

  1. Paddy Parr

    Well done!

Leave a Reply







Find us on Facebook

Log in | Designed by Gabfire themes