Digitising the Social Housing Tenant Experience

Social housing tenants expect the same digital convenience they get everywhere else. You can manage your bank account at 2am on your phone. You can switch energy suppliers in three clicks. Why should managing your home be any different?

Two groups of tenants exist in every Housing Association. One group demands online self-service and gets frustrated when it doesn't exist. The other group faces digital exclusion, struggling to access education, employment, and benefits because they lack digital skills.

A tenant portal solves both problems. Digital-first tenants get the service they expect. Digitally excluded tenants can focus on building skills rather than battling inefficient processes. And your organisation cuts costs whilst meeting rising regulatory expectations.

Most Housing Associations understand this. What they struggle with is connecting their housing management system to a functional customer portal without creating data chaos.

Your Housing Management System Can't Sit in Isolation

Your housing management system holds property data, tenant records, rent payment history, repair workflows. It's essential to your operations.

When it sits disconnected from other systems, problems multiply. Staff bounce between platforms to answer simple tenant questions. Customer service teams can't see what finance knows. Marketing campaigns target the wrong people because nobody updated the system.

Siloed working drains money and frustrates tenants. Every time a tenant has to repeat information they've already provided, satisfaction drops and complaints rise. Modern collaboration tools can break down these silos, but only if they connect to your core systems.

What Tenant Self-Service Delivers

Give tenants online access to manage their home and three things happen.

Contact centre volume drops significantly. When tenants can check rent balances, view payment history, and update personal details themselves, they stop calling for routine information. Your team focuses on complex issues that need human judgement.

Operating costs fall. Less time answering basic queries means lower staffing costs. You can demonstrate return on investment, meeting the 2026 Value for Money Standard requirements.

Satisfaction improves. Digital-first tenants get instant answers. Digitally excluded tenants receive targeted support to build skills. Online Universal Credit applications become manageable instead of overwhelming.

The financial case is straightforward. But execution requires connecting disparate systems without breaking what already works.

Integration: Where Most Housing Associations Struggle

A customer portal isn't useful if it can't talk to your housing management system. Tenants logging in expect to see accurate rent balances, repair status, tenancy length. If that data lives somewhere else, you've built a pretty interface with no substance.

True digital transformation comes from integration. Your CRM connects to your housing management system. Customer service sees finance data. Finance sees service history. Marketing knows who's approaching renewal. Everyone works from the same information.

mhs homes integrated Dynamics 365 Customer Voice with their housing management system. Repair completions automatically trigger satisfaction surveys. Response volumes doubled. The Housing Association now meets Tenant Satisfaction Measures without manual survey campaigns, all whilst maximising return on existing Microsoft 365 licences.

What Works in Practice

Tenants log into their 'manage my home' portal. They see tenancy details, rent payment history, financial information. They can update personal details without calling your office.

If you need to communicate urgently, create a message in your CRM. It displays the next time the tenant logs in. If the tenant has a question, they log it in the portal. Your CRM creates an alert for the relevant team.

This isn't about replacing your housing management system. It's about connecting it to tools that extend its value.

For Housing Associations that also build and sell properties, integration delivers even more. Property information and imagery flow from your housing management system to your sales site. Two systems work as one.

Making it happen

Most Housing Associations can't implement this alone. About 10% have the internal expertise and resources. The other 90% need a partner who understands both the technology and the housing sector's specific requirements.

We work with housing management system providers to ensure our CRM solutions integrate properly. This isn't about forcing Housing Associations to replace systems that work. It's about making those systems work better through connection.

The tenants demanding digital services won't wait. The tenants struggling with digital exclusion need help now. And regulatory pressure keeps increasing.

Tenant satisfaction depends on how well your systems work together. Get the integration right, and you'll reduce costs whilst improving service. Get it wrong, and you've spent money on technology that nobody uses.

Thinking about tenant portals and system integration? Get in touch. We'll walk you through what's possible for Housing Associations.