Working in partnership with LiveWest

LiveWest is a housing association with a portfolio of over 37,000 social housing properties across the South West, stretching from Cornwall to Gloucestershire. LiveWest has a mission to help alleviate the housing shortage in the region and offer homes for affordable rent and shared ownership and outright sale.

In order to maintain heating for its residents and stay gas compliant, LiveWest runs an extensive planned programme of annual new boiler installations as well as regular servicing and emergency works across its properties in Somerset and the West of England.

Gregor Heating has been the boiler installation, repair and servicing partner of LiveWest, for over six years and for many years previously as Knightstone HA (in excess of 15 years in total).  

Gas servicing programme

Our dedicated service team is responsible for carrying out gas servicing for over five thousand LiveWest properties with around 450-650 service appointments for us to complete each month.

Together the two organisations developed a shared IT system interface to keep booking information and engineer progress up to date in real time.

The main logistical challenge is seeking access to properties. This is a three step process that we are also involved with but working closely with the Gas Safety Team Leader, we manage it well and look to maintain a good track record of zero overdues.

Boiler installation programme

With planned boiler installations, there are around 175 properties each year including urgent replacements. LiveWest sends the programme at the start of the year then our dedicated installation team plans which properties they’ll go to each month. We also provide a health and safety plan including all relevant training to support the contract.

“Gregor Heating is a family-oriented business – very friendly, that’s also very professional. The administration team is very good at answering any queries. Their customer service is top notch and they always go out of their way to help when they can. They’re a really nice company to have working for us.”

Richard Humphries, Project Manager, LiveWest

Providing a fast response service

As a boiler can break down at any moment, emergency heating repair works are less predictable. LiveWest takes the calls in their customer contact centre and then hand them over to our team to arrange the emergency appointment with the resident.

To maximise the engineers’ ability to complete a first-time fix, our vans are all stocked with common parts. We also check with the planned install team to check where a boiler is close to needing replacement, to choose the most economical option for LiveWest.

Boiler replacements include a full survey and they are able to turn properties around quickly, fitting the new boiler within one day in most cases to ensure vulnerable residents are not left without heating or hot water.

LiveWest’s Resident Satisfaction Survey monitors our performance regularly so we can address any challenges or issues quickly.

• Customer service – 96%
• Quality of work – 94%
• Completions within agreed timescales – 96%

“We originally chose Gregor Heating because of their track record and reliability. We have a really open and honest relationship with them, with common objectives for great customer service and a strong safety ethic.  They are locally based, know our customers well and they share our value of working together in partnership for the long term.”

David Greenhalgh, Executive Director Property Services, LiveWest