Maintaining the safety of your building

How we're taking action

• Fire safety works to our taller blocks: Over the past year, we’ve begun fire safety works in homes and communal areas in two of our taller blocks in Gravesend and Erith and are planning works in two blocks in Crawley and Brighton. 

• Introducing extra checks: If you live in one of our 20 buildings over 11 metres in height, we now follow new fire safety regulations for your building; this includes checking your communal fire doors every three months to make sure they’re working as they should. If you live in a flat that faces a communal area, your front door will also be a fire door and we will check these annually.

• Ensuring safety in all homes we manage: We continue to work closely with managing agents and freeholders to keep you safe. Thirty one of our agent-managed blocks are classed as high risk because they are seven floors high or more. Of these, 16 have identified fire safety remediation work is needed and we’re working closely with those managing agents and freeholders to make sure they are progressing with these works and keeping our customers informed.

• Consulting with you: We’ve followed new requirements to register our buildings that are over 18 metres high with the new Building Safety Regulator. In July 2023, we visited each of these buildings to speak with the customers who live there about building safety and our approach to managing the safety of these buildings. We’ll be visiting these buildings again this year to make sure you feel confident in our approach and to allow you to have your say in how we manage building safety. We’ll also be looking at our digital approach to explore ways to provide instant information for our customers via your mobile phones.

• Completing outstanding checks: Where gas safety checks are missed because we can't gain access to homes, we’re following our internal procedures so we can carry out those checks and ensure the safety of our customers, their homes, and neighbouring homes. We continue to work closely with our contractors to ensure all lift inspections are completed when they should be. We'll always ensure a communal lift has been isolated if we're waiting for parts or a repair.