Who’s Keeping Track of All These Service Charges?
Who’s Keeping Track of All These Service Charges?
Usually, I leave my wife to handle service charge matters—and for that matter, all our financial arrangements. While I’ve suspected for some time that these charges are extortionately priced—especially given the poor service we receive—I hadn’t looked too closely. Frankly, I don’t enjoy dealing with figures, and if I wanted to work with numbers, I’d have become an accountant.
GreenSquareAccord 2024 The Ministry of Truth
In the novel 1884 by George Orwell, there's a scene where the Party announces that chocolate rations will be reduced. Despite the reality that chocolate rations were already meager, the Party presents the reduction as if it were an increase.
This announcement is made through the telescreen, a device that broadcasts propaganda and surveillance throughout Oceania.
Winston Smith, the protagonist, recalls the true history of chocolate rations. He remembers that the rations were already at a low level, and the announced reduction is merely a manipulation of the truth. However, the Party expects citizens to accept the new information unquestioningly, demonstrating the extent of its control over the population's perception of reality.
GreenSquareAccord Continued Misuse of Legal Force
In a concerning turn of events, GreenSquareAccord has chosen to again escalate a seemingly minor issue to unnecessary legal heights. It appears that GreenSquareAccord has enlisted the services of PicRights, a company specialising in copyright claims resolution, to address the use of their logo on our resident support website.
“Let’s just pay the fines, it’s cheaper!”
Despite clear instructions from the Housing Ombudsman's investigation to rectify these issues, the lifts remain faulty, posing a continued risk to the lives of residents and contractors. This not only jeopardises the safety of the community but also adds an extra layer of inconvenience for residents, especially the elderly and vulnerable, who now navigate flights of stairs for routine tasks like bringing in their shopping.
Why Does This Website Persist?
In this blog post, we delve into the intriguing question: Why is the GreenSquareAccord Resident website still up and running? The answers might surprise you; some are glaringly obvious, while others might be less so.
‘Silencing’ - The Alarming Tactic of GreenSquareAccord
In our homes, where we seek solace and security, a disquieting trend has emerged: the deliberate silencing of residents by housing providers. GreenSquareAccord, my own housing provider, has been accused of employing various tactics to silence residents, denying them a voice and disregarding their concerns.
Toxic Culture II - Still Toxic?
One year has passed since we published the blog titled "Can any company afford to have a toxic culture?" on the GreenSquareAccord Accord Residents website. In that blog, we questioned whether companies could bear the costs of maintaining a toxic culture. However, it's worth asking if anything has truly changed since then.
One significant change is the departure of nearly all the individuals who took part in the celebration of National Customer Service Week 2019, including Rachel Crownshaw. The reasons behind their exit remain unclear.
Were they considered the 'deadwood' that hindered the customer experience, or did they simply give up on attempting to change a deeply entrenched behaviour within the walls of GreenSquareAccord Accord?
The GreenSquareAccord Conspiracy
GreenSquareAccord made a bold promise in 2021 to be a "simply brilliant landlord" by improving customer experience, delivering quality homes and places to be proud of, making the company a great place to work, and providing value for money for customers. However, it seems they are falling short of this commitment. Are #GreenSquareAccord using service charges to generate revenue without providing the promised level of service? Are they selling off unviable properties due to this neglect? Is just a conspiracy theory or a real issue that needs to be addressed?
Service charges and further failures to communicate…
GreenSquareAccord don’t want to engage with residents - The new Director of Corporate Affairs and Communications, Steve Hayes has blocked me on Twitter and now LinkedIn (I’ve got a whole article about him that needs to be shared). The reason Steve joins Ruth Cooke and Rachel Crownshaw in blocking me isn’t because what I share is incorrect or untrue (if it were they’d take legal action) it’s because they don’t want to legitimise me (fair enough). They don’t want someone sharing their failures online, and worse still — it’s because they want to be able to claim they didn't know. This is really worrying when you consider that I've raised many issues that will hinder the growth and successful implementation of the GSA Way, and even more worrying when you consider that I raised concerns about their failure to provide proper gas boiler services.
Look out team GreenSquareAccord, the senior leadership team are going to ensure any blame doesn’t stick to them, it won’t affect their careers, it won’t hinder them at all, they can claim they didn't even know about it.
Both sides of the GSA Way…
It’s important to remember that GreenSquareAccord want to ‘pump up the voice’ of the customer. This might not seem obvious to all as they keep pushing their own carefully curated narrative.
With the recent release of a glitzy new video that was funded by the residents of GreenSquareAccord (but without them being permitted to take part) I thought it was time to show both sides.
So here is a more balanced look at the GSA Away.
And the real loser is…
How much will it cost the residents of GreenSquareAccord to send them to this years UK Housing Awards? Is it worth it? Are they award winners in your opinion? Could the £5k be better spent elsewhere? And is there anything you can do about it?
Allowed to build more homes!
With GreenSquareAccord failing so many of their current residents it is worrying that they be allowed to build new homes. Here we look at the risks, the views of their residents, and how in GreenSquareAccords own words they are at least four years off being able to provide what should be their core level of service.
Reputation management: there’s an award for that!
In the ongoing battle to improve GreenSquareAccord’s public image they have moved on from being experts in the field (although I doubt we’ve seen the last of this) to becoming award winners! Here we look at what they claim to do and what they merely hope to achieve.
What’s the opposite of proactive?
Here we ask why GreenSquareAccord can’t and won’t adopt a proactive approach that would save money, restore faith, and show a commitment to their new corporate message of ‘being brilliant together’.
Whilst this is another trick GreenSquareAccord seem to miss, we compete them to PA Housing who have nailed customer focus and clearly build better communities with a proactive approach to housing.
Can any company afford to have a toxic culture?
An article published on the 11th May 2022 in Inside Housing focused on the concern that half of social housing employees plan to move jobs in next 12 months. A worrying figure indeed. With the sector facing such a drought in staff can a housing associations such as GreenSquareAccord afford to have a ‘toxic culture’?
Celebrate the wins, hide the faults!
Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan. A quite often attributed to President John Kennedy (from him televised account of the Bay of Pigs invasion).
I’ve used it here as this very public and humble apology by JFK caused his numbers to soar, confidence was restored, and for the first time this young president was seen even by his doubters as presidential. Scholars and historians (and conspiracy theorist) can (and will) continue to argue about his merit as a president for decades more to come, he will always be remember for what he might have archived; but his very public and sincere apology to the American people ( and the free) world can not be denied. Perhaps it was his finest moment in office.
You’d think over fifty years later we would have all realised the benefits that can be achieved by the simple act of acknowledging or short falling. An apology frees us from the our mistake and allows us to correct our course enabling us to regain the faith of the people we’ve wronged.
What a shame that in this litigious age an apology is seen as an acceptance of fault, as such companies will do all they can to avoid apologising. In short of an apology and with a need to keep their public persona in good tact these companies must shout about their wins, whilst keeping their faults hidden. Which brings us on to GreenSquareAccord.
And we are back!
My site continued to generate traffic even without posting on social media!
Other GreenSquareAccord residents continued to reach out to me (whilst being understanding to me taking a breather) - thank you!
GreenSquareAccord finally published their version of our meeting minutes and quietly put out the results to their own internal survey - Hoorah!
They also continued to show how toxic their culture is… very sad.
I’ve made some more contacts and will launch a great new section later this month!
A Simply Brilliant Landlord Vs The Truth
Either GreenSquareAccord are struggling to remember what they’ve agreed to or they’re telling fibs. This happens when they don’t release timely minutes to their meetings, but it also hides a darker motive, perhaps this is why GreenSquareAccord don’t want a record of these meetings.