At PHS Solutions, ensuring our frontline teams are trained in basic damp and mould identification and diagnosis has been of critical importance to determine the extent of works that are required to be undertaken in a client’s property.
Our project Customer Experience Advisors are often the first point of contact for a resident who has been included in a programme of works. With the introduction of Awaab’s Law this year, there is even more emphasis on landlords to investigate and resolve damp and mould issues within strict timeframes, rather than diagnosing the issue as a direct result of resident lifestyles in their homes.
The intrinsic link between health and housing has been explored in many forms and I believe a holistic approach to asset management and health is the only way to ensure we have healthy homes that work for our residents in the future.
Advancements in technology has facilitated in-depth monitoring of environmental aspects and building fabrics to provide a data-driven approach that can identify early risks. The opportunities to create detailed action plans, based on real-time data, in a timely manner, whilst rectifying building defects, has never been easier to formulate.
As a Principal Contractor, we have our role to play in ensuring compliance to the new legislation. We have reviewed our products and services to help provide a painkiller to the headaches of our clients. By blending and coordinating our products for our clients and taking action within our early interventions with residents, we can help to empower customers with suitable solutions to the problems.
Moving away from stereotypical stigmas of behavioural impacts of damp and mould, we use workshops and education to help remove the blame and empower residents to make changes or support them in reporting building fabric issues through clear escalation routes, agreed with our clients.
It is our responsibility to ensure we are utilising breathable and moisture resistant insulation materials, ventilating right and installing within the compliance guidance of PAS2035:2023 and PAS2030:2023 (guidance to the retrofitting and installation of energy efficiency measures in domestic dwellings) to ensure the building assessments through to evaluations are completed and documented correctly and the right measures for the right customers and properties are installed to a high standard.
We have the opportunity to maintain a golden thread of data management to help track and report issues and maintenance and implement the systems required by our client.
In hindsight, the untimely and tragic death of Awaab Ishak could have been avoided if the never-ending conflicting priorities of social housing had focused on the problem of damp and mould earlier. As an industry, we must provide all of our educational and technical solutions to clients and their residents to ensure the untimely tragic ending to anyone’s life won’t happen again.
Kirsty Tweddell
Head of Sustainability