Income Recovery Officer/Admin – Housing

Temporary Income Recovery Officer/Admin – Housing

Reference no:  Cambridge 5228694

Pay Rate: £11.52 per hour PAYE

This opening assignment is for 4 months

Enhanced DBS disclosure required for this role

The purpose of the role is to maximise the collection of all rental income and other monies, by taking proactive action with tenants and leaseholders or residents of the temporary housing service to maximise their income, minimising their outgoings and enabling them to pay their rent effectively and, where this is not possible, to instigate court action to minimise rent arrears.

Key Responsibilities:

• Responsible for the collection of rental income and other Housing monies due, using appropriate methods to prevent rent arrears, including providing advice and guidance to tenants in respect of Universal Credit Housing Costs and different payments methods in order to help them meet their rental liabilities effectively.

• Follow appropriate procedures and policies over the collection of rent and to work with the tenants to prevent rent arrears by ensuring that all stages of the rent arrears procedures are followed.
• Negotiate and monitor repayment agreements, and carry out any necessary recovery action including legal action to maximise our income and minimise debt.
• Initiate legal action to recover unpaid rent including the personal serving of legal notices; preparation of court papers and, if necessary, attendance at County Court and attending eviction appointments at the tenant’s home with the Bailiffs.
• Interview customers/tenants (if necessary in their home) in order to discuss rent arrears; other debts or to collect/take copies of Housing Benefit verification paperwork, or help with providing proofs for a Universal Credit claim, in order to maximise their income and sustain their tenancy.
• Proactively contact tenants in arrears with their rent by letter; email, text, telephone, skype (or equivalent), or face to face to maximise rental income and sustain their tenancies.
• Promote the Financial Inclusion advice service, Housing Support Service and the various payment methods which will enable tenants to manage their tenure.
• Respond to customers (internal and external) across a variety of channels and services on behalf of the Council in a consistent, positive and efficient manner & resolve as many issues as possible at first point of contact.
• Ensure that tenants receive their full Housing Benefit or Universal Credit entitlement in order to maximise their income and thus prevent arrears. If necessary, negotiate/liaise with Revenues Section or DWP about a tenants Housing Benefit or Universal Credit claim, additional entitlement to benefit, benefit overpayments or refer to the Financial Inclusion Officer if more complex assistance is required.
• Advise or assist tenants of the appeals procedure in relation to Housing Benefit or Universal Credit, and reductions in overpayment claw back arrangements, to maximise benefit entitlement.
• Set up recharge accounts and invoice charges according to information received from the Estates & Facilities Team.

“Role Requirements” – to give yourself the maximum chance of success please try and ensure your CV addresses the following essential criteria:

*** Qualification details and any other experience/skills relevant to the job role to help support your application (and help us to help you!) – please give full details within your CV document.

Experience:

1. Minimum of 12 months recent experience in a similar role, or context and ideally within a public sector organisation.
2. Experience providing customer focussed services and working with difficult or vulnerable customers on the telephone & face-to-face in a busy & often stressful working environment.
3. Experience of working in debt recovery and giving benefit advice, including working with Universal Credit claimants, or be able to demonstrate the ability to acquire specific knowledge through training.
4. Experience of visiting customers in a face-to-face service setting, including within their own homes, which may be outside of normal working hours.

Knowledge:

1. Knowledge and understanding of the difficulties faced by people with debt problems.
2. Knowledge of Universal Credit including it’s housing costs element and of welfare benefits.
3. Knowledge of benefits legislation.
4. Knowledge of financial procedures and process e.g. debt recovery.
5. Operational understanding of relevant Housing Law.

Skills & Abilities:

1. Ability to respond positively to change and support new ways of working.
2. Good standard of numeracy and the ability to do arithmetical calculations.
3. Ability to negotiate debt repayment plans with tenants.
4. Ability to understand or interpret complex information, legal issues or legislation, and reproduce the information in easy-to-understand formats for customers.
5. Ability to communicate verbally and in writing in a clear, concise and open manner to a wide range of people.
6. To develop & maintain an expert knowledge of welfare benefits
7. Excellent administrative and organisational skills.
8. Strong people skills, including the ability to build rapport and empathise with customers.
9. Strong IT skills including Microsoft packages or equivalent (e.g. G Suite).

NB: Please feel free to apply to us direct via [email protected] by quoting the job reference and job title exactly. SEE DETAILS AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS AD.

If you have previously applied to one of our vacancies and have already sent the required supporting documentation to us, please make this clear when you re-apply as this will help speed up your application.

To help speed up the process of uploading your CV to the client we would suggest that you send us your CV in Word format (or equivalent) if possible, rather than as a PDF

If you are successful in securing this role, please note that for the entire duration of this contract, regardless of extension you will be working this role at the PAYE rate that has been advertised. For absolute clarity, we only work on a PAYE basis, rather than entertaining umbrella pay terms, we do not offer Ltd/umbrella or outside IR35 rates. If you wish to understand PAYE vs Umbrella more, please let us know and we can send you some additional information for clarity.