Resident Questions for Housing Area Panel

Reference Number: C2.3

Department	Housing
Date question raised	23/08/2022
Date of Area Panel	11/10/2022
Area in city	Central Area
Star rating applied by residents	2 Star
Deadline for officer response	19/09/2022
Name of officer responding	Hilary Edgar
Officer job title	Housing Service Operations Manager

Resident Question

Title of Question	Free laundry room at Essex Place
Issue:	Charges for the laundry room in Essex Place were stopped during the COVID lockdown. These have not been reinstated, so the laundry room is free or those who use it but subsidised by all tenants through their rents.
Background:
Action requested by residents:	charges for the laundry room at Essex Place to be reinstated.

Officer Response

Officer contact details:	Hilary.edgar@brighton-hove.gov.uk Tel: 01273 293250
Officer Response:	The current contract for laundry provision ends next year. We are currently reviewing the options for future provision.  Arrangements for the sale and collection of tokens had run into difficulties before the pandemic; some of the shops who sold the tokens lost the income and there were health and safety issues relating to staff collecting the tokens from machines and income from the shops.  If we are to reinstate charges, we would need to change from using tokens and install card payment machines and charge via debit or credit cards.  The charges would also need to be raised to cover the installation of card readers (£5,000) and increased running costs.  We therefore propose to keep the laundries free to use for the remainder of the extended contract period.   A report on the future of laundries will come to Area Panels early in 2023. Each laundry is restricted to a specific catchment area.  If residents have concerns over their misuse, please contact Housing Customer Services on Tel: 01273 293030 or Housing.CustomerServices@brighton-hove.gov.uk
Action:	A report on future options on laundries to come to Area Panel meetings.
Start date:	N/A
End date:	N/A