The Guinness Partnership was Highly Commended in the Innovation category at the Housing Technology Awards 2025. Steve Torley, the housing provider’s technical programme manager, outlines how The Guinness Partnership’s bold adoption of a contact-centre-as-a-service (CCaaS) solution has completely transformed its residents’ experience.
In today’s housing landscape, resident expectations are constantly evolving – they expect speed, convenience and clarity when contacting their housing provider, and rightly so. Yet for many housing providers, outdated systems have hampered their service delivery.
That was the situation facing us several years ago. With over 160,000 residents, our legacy contact centre was behind modern service standards. There were many drivers for improvement but at its heart was our commitment to improve our residents’ experience and services.
We therefore made the bold move to redesign our entire contact management strategy around our residents’ needs and ‘digital first’ principles, implementing first-class contact-centre-as-a-service (CCaaS) technology to elevate service quality, reduce complaints and future-proof our resident engagement.
Fragmentation & legacy applications
Before the transformation, our contact-centre systems were a patchwork of legacy applications that reduced our ability to provide a high-quality service.
Internally, there were inefficiencies associated with multiple keying and the real-time insight into our performance wasn’t where we needed it to be. First-point-of-contact (FPoC) resolution could be inconsistent and few proactive tools were available to help with troubleshooting our residents’ problems. In short, this was neither suitable nor sustainable.
A seamless, resident-centric platform
Our ambition was clear: create a seamless, resident-centric experience by streamlining our contact channels, empowering self-service and personalising support. Partnering with 8×8, we implemented a modern CCaaS solution to unify our communications and enable intelligent automation of our processes.
The project was underpinned by three goals:
- Enhance our residents’ experience by streamlining pathways so that they could engage more easily and intuitively.
- Accelerate the resolution of problems by routing our residents to the right support quickly and increasing our level of FPoC resolutions.
- Support our residents with more tailored interventions to build trust and satisfaction.
The new platform, powered by 8×8’s CCaaS, integrates voice, video, chat and email, giving residents multiple options to engage with customer services. More importantly, it puts them in control through self-service options, intelligent automation and sentiment-aware interactions.
From self-service to quality management
Delivery was complicated, with input needed from many areas of The Guinness Partnership, including customer services, repairs, sales and our internal IT service desk. The project was designed with an MVP approach to deliver benefits to our residents and the organisation at the earliest possible point, followed by a series of release drops.
With an excellent team underpinning delivery, execution has been smooth, with minimal disruption to our frontline operations. Our staff were engaged early to help with the design alongside targeted training and business-change support, all complemented by robust business sponsorship. As a result, adoption is high and performance has remained strong throughout.
Among the standout features already delivered:
- Omnichannel engagement – Whether via phone, live chat or email, our residents enjoy a consistent experience, backed by shared data and a single source of the truth.
- Video consultations for repairs – Residents can now share live videos during repair queries, allowing our staff to assess problems remotely. This boosts our first-time fixes and reduces unnecessary follow-up visits.
- Workforce management – Alongside 8×8’s CCaaS, we introduced an integrated Calabrio workforce management solution, revolutionising our resource management.
Through a series of release drops, we’re continuing to deliver improvements:
- Smart self-service via IVR – Our residents can now access key information, such as their rent balances or payment dates, through an automated phone system. This reduced call volumes and gave residents 24/7 access to routine support.
- Intelligent call routing – Voice analysis determines the nature of a query and directs it to the most suitable team. Complex or repeat problems are automatically escalated, ensuring that the right expertise is available at first contact.
- Proactive case management – Real-time detection flags potentially dissatisfied residents. These are then routed to specialist agents trained in issue resolution in order to deal with problems before they become formal complaints.
Efficiency, empowerment & satisfaction
Since going live, our contact management transformation has delivered measurable results across key service metrics.
- Shorter waiting times – Intelligent routing means residents get to the right person even faster.
- More first-contact resolutions – With better insight through videos, problems are resolved faster and more accurately.
- Fewer complaints – Proactive analysis has helped to reduce complaints at their source by resolving dissatisfaction before it escalates.
- Greater accessibility – Video and digital options have improved services for residents with accessibility needs or non-standard working hours.
- Reduced call volumes – More routine queries will soon be resolved through self-service, freeing up our agents to focus on more complex queries.
Future-ready & scalable
Crucially, the 8×8 CCaaS platform’s constantly-evolving product set provides a foundation for ongoing innovation. Our future plans include:
- Multi-language support – Allowing residents to interact in their preferred language.
- AI and analytics – Enabling the safe use of AI and improved reporting to increase the efficiency of our call-centre teams.
- Predictive contact – The system can proactively make suggestions before problems arise.
- Service personalisation – Using historical data to tailor residents’ journeys.
- Increased self-service – Introducing more self-service options which benefit both our residents and our business.
- More digital channels – Allowing residents to interact with us in their preferred way from any device in any location.
By building with scalability in mind, we can adapt to residents’ needs today and tomorrow.
Putting people first, powered by technology
Our journey offers powerful insights for IT and business leaders across the housing sector. The key takeaway? Technology alone doesn’t drive transformation; clarity of vision and resident-centric design do.
The project is succeeding not just by modernising our infrastructure but also by understanding and addressing the real pain-points our residents and the wider organisation face. By aligning our digital strategy with residents’ priorities, we delivered a solution that is intuitive, responsive and inclusive.
As housing providers aim to balance cost efficiency with service quality, The Guinness Partnership’s model shows what is possible.
Steve Torley is the technical programme manager at The Guinness Partnership. The housing provider was Highly Commended in the Innovation category at the Housing Technology Awards 2025.
