Tenant Money Advisor

In this role, you will be working in a high quality Support Service and your responsibility will be supporting residents who live in Swindon Borough Council owned properties, with advice and assistance, with a focus on maximising income, whilst supporting to improve and avoid rent arrears for the customer.

Your next role

You will have experience with engaging with customers on sensitive matters, and have a sound knowledge of the welfare benefit system, to make solution based decisions

This role is supporting our customers housed by Swindon Borough council, prospective customers, and those housed in our temporary supported housing buildings, who may be experiencing financial difficulty, suffering with rent arrears, or requiring benefit support to improve their financial situation. Working closely with our lettings teams, you will be part of the team that assess and contact  each new prospective resident, giving welfare benefit advice and assistance ensuring that they are moving into their new property in the set up to maintain a healthy rent account

You will be required to have an in depth knowledge of the welfare benefit system identifying any benefit caps, changes in benefit entitlements and the  full understanding of management of migrations from legacy benefits to Universal credit.

You will swiftly act on referrals mainly from our Neighbourhoods and Rent teams, you will be supportive, in finding solutions to reduce and avoid rent arrears in order to sustain tenancies, which can include assisting with benefit applications, backdating, discussing affordable repayment agreements, or referring for specialist debt advice.   

On occasion, you will work closely with our supported Housing team, supporting residents to ensure they are successfully preparing to move into general needs properties and are tenancy ready from a financial point of view.

In addition, you will be responsible for the management of the landlord’s Universal Credit portal, verification of new and existing Universal credit claims and annual rent increases.

You will be the main source of contact to liaise with the DWP and the Housing benefit department, where there are discrepancies with benefit claims.

As a small team, it is paramount that the successful applicant can work closely as a team, and on their own initiative, whilst managing demanding caseloads in a fast paced environment.

You must be fluent in the English language (as a requirement of Part 7 of the Immigration Act “for the effective performance of a customer-facing role”).

Your next package

Please see our Rewards and Benefits offer for more details.

As an employee, you will receive a diverse and exciting environment in which to work, encouraging creativity and innovation whilst recognising the need to support ongoing personal development and a flexible work life balance.

For Swindon to thrive in the future, we need to lay the foundations now. It’s why our regeneration and transformation programmes are already underway. So, you’ll be joining us at an exciting time on our journey. We’ll look to you to share your knowledge, influence decisions and drive real, positive change. With your contributions, we’ll achieve our vision of a prosperous, re-vitalised Swindon together. And you’ll be proud to say it was made better with you.

Please see our Vision and Values page for more details and our new Swindon Plan.

Your next steps

Read the role profile and select the Apply button, where you will be redirected to the Swindon Borough Council website to complete our online application process. Clicking the ‘Apply’ button on this job website is not an application, you must register on the Swindon Borough Council website in order to be considered for the role.

Potential applicants are sometimes put off if they don’t meet 100% of the requirements. We think individual experience, skills and passion make all the difference, so if you meet the majority of the criteria, we’d love to hear from you.

For further information about the role, please contact Jon Keating at jonkeating@swindon.gov.uk

If you are experiencing technical issues submitting your application please email resourcing@swindon.gov.uk