Reinventing service charges at Thirteen Group
Since 2019, the Thirteen Group has been implementing Trace’s BlueBox service charge solution for housing associations.
BlueBox for Housing Associations
Ending the nightmare of service charge spreadsheets
The accurate allocation of service charges has long been a major difficulty for housing associations, leading to deficits between income and expenditure.
Traditionally, service charges have been managed using large and complex spreadsheets, which lack robust controls and are prone to error.
Other housing associations rely on the very basic service charge modules that come with traditional housing systems.
Neither solution is satisfactory.
That’s why so many have now turned to Trace Solutions. Our BlueBox software provides a ‘best of breed’ approach to service charges, developed over many years experience within the private sector.
BlueBox integrates easily with all the common housing and accounting systems to provide the transparency, control and analysis you need to automate the service charge process and maximise recovery.
BlueBox is approved under G-Cloud 13. Alongside service charges, it can also be used to automate rental uplifts, the section 20 process, and more.
Call us on +44 (0)20 7825 1299, email us at hello@tracesolutions.co.uk, or read on for more details.
KEY FEATURES
Handles all your service charge calculations
Bring precision and rigour to your service charges. Once set up, BlueBox effortlessly handles all the complex calculations that control who pays what, and what can be recharged.
Gives you confidence and control
BlueBox gives you the confidence to let the computer manage all the hard stuff for you, with sophisticated management reporting, full audit trails and the transparency your customers demand.
Automatically generates tenant outputs
BlueBox effortlessly generates personalised tenant outputs. These can be exported directly to external print services, allowing you to send all your customers detailed breakdowns of what they’re paying for and why.
Facilitates budget setting
Import your service charge budgets into BlueBox and then manage the approval process. The system automatically compares budgets against actuals every year.
Helps manage customer queries
Customer engagement teams can quickly locate the unit-level information they need to answer customer enquiries about their service charge bills, instantly.
Provides data security and full audit trails
BlueBox is a secure system that safely stores all your service charge data, as well as managing it. Full audit trails are provided so any input errors can be quickly tracked down and corrected.
Ends manual data input
Staff who in the past may have spent endless hours entering data into spreadsheets are freed by BlueBox to do more important work. Manual tasks can’t scale, so if your housing association is growing, you need a system like BlueBox to allow you to take on more customers without having to increase your team.
Provides all necessary management reporting
BlueBox offers over 200 standard reports which cover the majority of requirements, but a report writer means that additional bespoke reports are easy to generate. At any point you can compare budgets versus actual expenditure in real time.
Provides sophisticated service charge accounting
BlueBox contains full general ledger accounting. Most housing associations use the system to handle all service charge transactions, automatically feeding summary data back and forth to corporate accounts systems (such as Oracle) on a daily basis
What else can BlueBox do?
Alongside the management of service charges, BlueBox can also be used to automate rental uplifts, the section 20 process, and more.
It can ensure that all Section 20 consultations are carried out according to statutory timescales, sending the necessary correspondence automatically.
And it can also set rents across your portfolio, with the uplift determined by tenancy type.
"Marvellous. Absolutely marvellous!"
Claire Vasey,
Thirteen Group
"A huge help"
Roisin Vallely,
Together Housing
"So much better"
Martin Watson,
PA Housing
"Makes a massive difference"
Rob Thompson,
Thirteen Group
Why you need BlueBox
Why are service charges so important to housing associations?
And why are spreadsheets such a problem?
In a wide ranging series of video interviews, we discussed these issues with some of our clients.
Implementation
In this video, some of our clients discuss their experience of implementing the BlueBox service charge system, and the lessons they learnt.
We’ve also produced a free guide to implementation, written by independent industry expert Dan Oehlman. You can download it here.
If you’d like to know more about BlueBox for Housing Associations, please call us on +44 (0)20 7825 1299, email us at hello@tracesolutions.co.uk, or use the contact form below.
We can provide demonstrations online or in person, at your convenience, and can introduce you to reference sites if you prefer to talk directly to other housing associations.
