Kier ready to help Sheffield residents through bad weather

Published by Elizabeth Pokorny for Kier Services in Housing and also in Communities

As snow, ice and freezing temperatures return to Sheffield this week, Kier continues to keep the city moving thanks to its bad weather action plan implemented across the city. Providing repairs and maintenance to around 42,000 council-owned properties, Kier Sheffield is determined not to let bad weather interfere with its invaluable service, keeping residents’ homes maintained.

Working in conjunction with Sheffield City Council and Sheffield Homes, Kier Sheffield has implemented a number of measures to minimise disruption to services during expected bad weather. Measures include fitting snow tyres to 95 high priority vehicles, putting provision in place for customer services staff to work from home if snowed in, and equipping each of Kier Sheffield’s 400 operatives with an emergency snow pack containing de-icer, ice scrapers and snow grip shoes.

Kier Sheffield will regularly update both residents and staff with information on handling the extra pressure that bad weather can put on service delivery and a staff geographical profiling exercise is in place to enable personnel to work in their local area during periods of extreme bad weather. Kier Sheffield has also undertaken a project to identify vulnerable customers to ensure they are given priority.

Kier regional managing director, Simon Bullen, said: “On average our team answers more than 20,000 calls per month and we expect this to rise dramatically when weather conditions worsen. Our action plan has been designed to encompass every member of our team, 98% of which come from the local area, to ensure residents experience minimum disruption. It is vital for us to provide our customers with an excellent and efficient service, and we won’t let the weather change that.”

In 2010, when Sheffield experienced extremely bad weather conditions, Kier received 450 requests for urgent gas repairs from residents and Kier operatives were able to attend every one within 24 hours of it being reported, despite the severe weather.

For more information on Kier Sheffield visit www.kierservices.co.uk