Within the first six months of the partnership, 65 properties have been reclaimed from tenants who have been illegally sub-letting their homes, double the number recovered in 2012. Tackling this illegally activity ensures homes can be given to the rightful tenants.
Circle Housing Circle 33, which is part of the Circle Housing Group, manages properties across several areas of London including its key driver boroughs Camden, Islington, Haringey, Hackney & Waltham Forest. Circle Housing Circle 33 is working closely with Experian to filter and screen current tenancy records of its general needs housing stock using a data-matching technique to flag potentially fraudulent records or properties which are a high or very high-risk of fraud.
Circle Housing Circle 33 also plans to implement Experian’s Rental Exchange, a secure and compliant way to include up-to-date rental payment information on tenants living in social housing. By sharing this information Circle Housing Circle 33 will be able to detect unlawful occupancy across multiple housing associations.
Experian’s housing fraud expertise, combined with Circle Housing Circle 33’s experienced investigators, have so far identified six per cent of properties under management as high or very high risk, all of which required investigation. For these cases, Circle Housing Circle 33 investigators need to prove that the registered lawful tenants are not using their social housing properties as their main and principal home, living at a separate location, or that someone other than the registered tenant is occupying the social home and that they have parted with possession of the property.
Jamie Branch, Investigator at Circle Housing Circle 33, added:
“Experian has been working in partnership with Circle Housing Circle 33 for only six months but has already achieved significant results with more to come. Experian was an obvious partner of choice due to its data matching capabilities, the breadth of its data and fraud prevention expertise. Experian’s systems provide robust data and flag strong matches, pulling out discrepancies among tenancy records to produce a high number of leads for investigation. As a result of our partnership, we’re expecting between 80 and 100 properties to be recovered by the end of the year – double last year’s target. We’re not only tackling the criminal offence of sub-letting, but also ensuring homes are given to rightful tenants.”
Nick Mothershaw, Director of Fraud and Identity services at Experian, comments:
“Latest figures suggest that £900 million a year is lost on social housing tenancy fraud. Sub-letting is a significant issue contributing to this problem, and the most common type of fraud faced by housing associations across the UK. Although housing associations have no financial gain in preventing sub-letting, as housing is left unoccupied for periods after recovery, many associations, such as Circle Housing Circle 33, recognise the importance of claiming back properties for those who are in genuine need of them.”
Due to the success of the current partnership, Circle Housing Group is considering the roll-out of Experian’s data matching services across their other eight housing associations Mercian, Merton Priory, Mole Valley, Old Ford, Roddons, Russet, South Anglia and Wherry.
