Rent will increase by 2.7%. You will receive a letter reflecting this increase in your rent charges. You can expect to receive these in early June.

Women’s Pioneer residents will face a rent increase in January or July 2025. For most of our residents, this annual rent increase will take place in July 2025.

Women’s Pioneer is a not-for-profit housing association and the rent increase will enable us to continue delivering high quality homes and services.

The rent you pay is directly reinvested in your homes and our services, this includes day-to-day repairs to your home, tenancy management, and major works to make long-term improvements such as replacing bathrooms, kitchens, windows, and roofs.

We always aim to ensure your rent is affordable while also funding essential maintenance and service to your homes.

Service charges cover the cost of services we provide to help look after your home and surrounding area. This charge covers services that are not covered by your rent.

Service charges cover the maintenance of communal areas, including cleaning, grounds maintenance, pest control, and communal electricity.

A breakdown of the individual costs which make up your service charge is included in the rent increase letter you will receive in early June.

Your service charges are recalculated each year to ensure you are paying the correct amount for the cost of services provided. This will take place in July for every resident, even if your rent charges are increased in January.

We operate a variable service charge, which means the cost will go up or down each year. The amount of your service charge is based off what was estimated to be spent against the actual costs in your building from the previous year.

Women’s Pioneer review the level of each service charge each year. We look at the actual cost of providing services and how much we expect the service will cost in the next 12 months. Service charges go up or down depending on what it has cost in the past and the estimated future costs.

When we estimate the costs of services for the year ahead, we can over or under estimate.

If we overestimate how much something will cost in the year ahead, then a surplus is generated. This is because you have paid us through your service charge, but the cost of services provided cost us less. The surplus generated then reduces the service charge bill for the next year.

A deficit happens when we have underestimated the costs of services, or unexpected costs have arisen in the year. This means services have cost more than we received from you in service charges. When there is a deficit, we add this to the next years’ service charge.

We work hard to ensure our service charges are as accurate as possible, however there may be a surplus or deficit as it is difficult to forecast what services will cost exactly or will be needed in each building.

A management fee is included within the service charge to cover the administrative costs of managing the service provision. It is normally calculated at 15% of the cost of the services provided. However, due to the high costs for heating and hot water, we have capped the management fee to a lower fee.

If there is a charge for communal or personal heating and/or hot water, this means there is a communal boiler attached to your property. We use an energy broker to negotiate the best energy prices for the communal boilers. The energy costs from the communal boiler are recharged through your service charge.