London
Housing, Revenues & Benefits
Contract
02-03-2026
31-03-2026
Kingston
£neg
Community Housing Triage Officer - Fixed Term Role until end of March 2026, based in Kingston Role purpose The Council is focused on delivering the best possible outcomes for its communities. To do this the Council needs employees who thrive in an agile and networked organisation and who can support continuous improvement within a constructive organisational culture. As the Housing Triage Officer you will be the first point of contact for residents approaching the Council for housing assistance, providing early intervention and advice to prevent homelessness. Your role will be to triage all initial housing presentations, determine if we are likely to owe the household a housing duty, provide tailored advice, enter applicants to the case management system, collate paperwork and documents to assist the Housing Solutions Officer to complete homeless decisions. The role will involve dealing with the Community Housing inbox, scanning paperwork onto customers files, entering notes on the case management system, responding to queries and offering advice on housing solutions either face to face, over the phone or by email. It will be the responsibility of the post holder to ensure that all performance targets are met, promote the profile of the Council’s services and ensure high levels of customer satisfaction and support the Team Manager by contributing to the overall development of the service. You will report directly to the Housing Solutions Team Manager. Important relationships include: - Customers/Clients - Community Housing Colleagues - Landlords & their agents - Registered Providers and other housing providers - Social Services - Finance - Housing Management - Other statutory (Probation Service, Police, etc) - Voluntary agencies (Mind, Womens Aid, etc) Key activities Performance - Works with manager and colleagues to define outcomes, set targets and monitor performance, within a culture of continual improvement - Supports operational plans to ensure that the resources within the teams are used to best effect and impact Customers and Partners - Builds strong internal and external working partnerships to enable the service to be delivered in an outcome-focused and efficient way - Supports Kingston’s commitment to community cohesion and valuing diversity and social inclusion Digital/New Ways of Working - Uses new technologies, particularly Google, to adopt modern, agile working practices, improve customer service and eliminate paper-based processes wherever possible. Delivery 1)To be the first point of contact for all new enquiries into the service, provide advice and assistance on housing/homelessness issues and to conduct an initial assessment of households. 2) To co-ordinate and provide responses to general housing/homelessness enquiries, this includes emails, phone calls and in person presentations. 3) To ensure that all aspects of the Community Housing Service are delivered effectively in line with legislation and statutory guidance, policies, procedures and protocols. 4) To ascertain a household’s homelessness / risk of homelessness at first point of contact and provide high quality advice and assistance to ensure homelessness is prevented wherever possible by providing effective advice. 5) To assess and respond to all referrals received under the ‘Duty to Refer’ arrangements, ensuring that appropriate advice and support is provided, or the referral is escalated to the Housing Solutions Team. 6) To ascertain whether a household should apply to join the Council’s Housing Register or if there is a risk of homelessness and make referrals to the Housing Solutions Team if the household is at risk of homelessness within 56 days. 7) To keep accurate, timely and comprehensive records of all action in relation to casework on our Housing Management system. 8) Maintain an extensive, up-to-date, in-depth knowledge of housing allocations and homelessness legislation, codes of guidance, case law and share learning with colleagues to ensure that the Council meets its relevant statutory obligations towards households approaching the service in terms of opportunity to join the Council’s Housing register and/or any homelessness duties owed to them. 9)To identify and raise safeguarding alerts and to attend multi-agency meetings regarding applicants' needs refer residents to support services including those to maximise income and employment opportunities and manage debt as applicable. 10)To provide responses to enquiries related to applications under Housing Act 1996 from applicants, their advocates and elected representatives. 11) To undertake home visits to verify an applicant's residence and circumstances in undertaking investigations. 12) To work to meet and exceed performance targets, and to submit to the Team Manager information and performance statistics relating to the work of the service and to identify trends in homelessness and applications for housing. 13) To assist with the identification and implementation of best practice and innovation. 14) To contribute to the preparation of a draft annual Team Plan for the service and to assist with the review and development of performance targets. In order to successfully deliver the responsibilities of the role you will have: - Knowledge of the causes of homelessness and best practice in preventing and relieving homelessness. - Knowledge of social housing allocation, private rented sector and supported accommodation. - Experience of working in a housing, customer service or advocacy and advice setting. Excellent communication skills including active listening and negotiating. Ability to work with others, and the ability to deal with a range of customers with differing needs. Has the ability to understand and interpret assimilate complex case law, and to think creatively about problems and identify solutions and translate that information into innovation in practice and management. - Has excellent communication administration including the ability to write detailed case notes and technical letters and is able to produce reports and other information for a variety of audiences. -Ability to work unsupervised, prioritise workloads and achieve targets and deadlines. Good IT skills sufficient to utilise software applications, case management systems, spreadsheets, emails, and the ability to learn new IT systems. Knowledge of the Housing Act 1996 and the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017. Along with an understanding of the terms and conditions contained in the range of tenancy agreements across - Experience of working with client groups with a history of trauma, including, mental health, domestic abuse, homelessness and/or alcohol / substance use.