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Anti-Social Behaviour

Our Service Standards – what you can expect from Hexagon if you report anti-social behaviour to us.

If you are affected by anti-social behaviour these are the standards of service you can expect from Hexagon. We are committed to trying to resolve problems of anti-social behaviour and to ensure that residents can enjoy their homes in peace. We are signatories to the Respect Standard for Housing Management and will develop our strategies for dealing with anti-social behaviour in line with current best practice.

Reporting and Investigation

In general
 If you telephone us to report a complaint of anti-social behaviour our Customer Services staff, your Housing Officer or the Duty Housing Officer will take details from you straightaway.
 All complaints which we receive will be logged on our computer database.

When no action is needed

 If we consider that it is not appropriate for us to take any action or, if you ask us not to take any action about your complaint we will confirm this to you in writing within 10 days and send you a copy of our Anti-Social Behaviour Information Pack. We will keep a record of your complaint for future reference.

When one-off action is needed

 We will confirm by letter, within 10 days of your initial report, that you have reported anti-social behaviour to us, summarise your complaint and the action which we have agreed to take. We will also send you our Anti-social Behaviour Information Pack.
 We will not disclose your identity to the person you are complaining about without your agreement.
 If you agree to our approaching the alleged perpetrator about your complaint we will write to them within 5 days of your report to make them aware that a complaint has been made and the nature of the complaint. We will ask them to ensure that it does not happen again. Sometimes this will be all that is required.

When the anti-social behaviour is of a more serious nature and requires further action

 We will confirm by letter that you have reported anti-social behaviour to us and summarise your complaint and the initial action which we have agreed to take within 10 days of your initial report. We will also send you our Anti-social Behaviour Information Pack.
 We will visit you at home to take full details within 5 working days.
 We will not disclose your identity to the person you are complaining about without your agreement.
 If you agree to our approaching the other person about your complaint we will write to them within 5 days of our meeting with you, to make them aware that a complaint has been made and the nature of the complaint. If the complaint is of a serious nature and therefore urgent, we will arrange to visit the alleged perpetrator within 2 days and, if less urgent, within 10 days.
 If there were witnesses to the anti-social behaviour we will arrange to meet with them and take statements.
 Once we have gathered information from all the parties we will agree an action plan and discuss this with you. We will confirm the action plan in writing to you and the other party within 5 days of the completion of our investigation
 We will supply you with Diary Sheets if the anti-social behaviour is ongoing and if appropriate.
 We will contact other agencies who may have information regarding your complaint or may be able to help e.g. local authority Noise Teams, multi-agency anti-social behaviour forums, police.
 We will be signatories to information-sharing protocols with the police where this option is available.
 If your complaint is about the tenant of another landlord we will notify the other landlord of your complaint and work in partnership with them to try to resolve the problem
 Where appropriate we will make a referral to a mediation service to facilitate an agreement between you and the other party. We will seek your agreement first.

Legal proceedings

 We will consider legal action when all other methods of resolving the situation have failed and where there is sufficient evidence to support such action. We will consider the full range of legal remedies available to us and choose the remedy which we consider most likely to ensure that the anti-social behaviour ceases.
 We will discuss any proposed legal action with you and get your agreement.

Witness Support

 If you appear as a witness in any legal proceedings we will take steps to ensure your safety.
 We will arrange for you to visit the court before the hearing, if you wish and will explain what being a witness entails.
 We will arrange for transport for you to and from the court hearing or pay your travel expenses.
 We will make sure that you have someone with you at all times in court.
 We will ask the court to set aside a room for your use while waiting for the hearing to start, if appropriate.

Monitoring and Review

 We will keep a record of the anti-social behaviour and the action taken on our computer database.
 Where we take one-off action, we will monitor the situation for one month before closing the case.
 We will contact you at least once a month while a case is ongoing.
 Once we have agreed an action plan we will monitor it every month to ensure that it is progressed.
 If there are no reports of further incidents for three months, we will write to you before closing the case.

Feedback

 We will telephone you for your feedback once the case has been resolved, or closed, or after 6 months (if the matter is ongoing).
 We will use feedback which we receive from residents to enhance the service we provide.

If we receive a complaint about you

 We will write to you within 3 days of receiving the complaint to let you know what ?it is about.
 If the complaint is straightforward we will give you an opportunity to remedy the problem. If you do, we will take no further action.
 If the complaint is more serious we will make an appointment to meet with you within 10 days to discuss the allegation.
 We will notify you of our action plan within 5 days of the completion of our investigation.
 If we feel that you and the other party could resolve the issues by mediation, we will refer you to a Mediation Service. We will get your consent before doing this
 We will ensure that you are offered appropriate support if we identify with you that you have support needs which are not currently being met and which may be contributing to the anti-social behaviour.
 Before starting any legal proceedings we will consider whether there are any implications under the Disability Discrimination Acts.
 If a legal remedy is considered necessary we will consider the full range of legal options open to us and choose the one most likely to ensure that you desist from the anti-social behaviour.

 Analysis of data

 We will analyse statistics from our computer database on the types and locations of complaints annually to ensure that we identify any ‘hotspots’ and focus our resources on these areas.
 We will report these statistics to our Board of Management.

Complaints about our service to you

If you do not think we have met our standards, or have any other complaint about the service, we want to know.  You can complain using the informal or the formal complaints process.  Further details of how to complain are available in the Anti-Social Behaviour Information Pack, on our website or from the Customer Services Centre .

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