Your Home Better Customer Research

Sherriff, Graeme

Abstract

Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) wished to gain insights into issues that might be affecting uptake of their Your Home Better (YHB) programme of support for householders interested in making energy efficiency improvements to their homes.

YHB was launched in March 2022, the result of a consortium tender in GMCA for a limited amount of set up costs. Its remit continues to be to provide a retrofit delivery service for householders willing to pay for the works to their homes. This service ranges from carrying out initial surveys according to customer preference and providing support to the customer on their choices of measures through to seeking quotes for works and offering a retrofit co-ordinator and technical support service alongside any works the householder might commission from those contractors. The programme website promotes retrofit through the four Cs: Cost, Cold, Comfort, and Carbon. These relate to financial savings, avoiding cold homes and the associated health implications, achieving more comfortable and stable indoor temperatures, and reducing carbon emissions.

The research comprised two stages: an online survey followed by a set of qualitative interviews with a subset of survey respondents. The online survey was emailed to a list of people who had in some way expressed an interest in receiving support or information from Your Home Better, whether via the website or telephone support line.

The online survey was launched on 16th June 2023 with a response deadline of 2nd July. Invitations to the survey were sent to 342 people. In order to incentivise participation, respondents were offered the opportunity to be entered into a prize draw to win £50. 46 people responded to the survey and 29 of these were willing to take part in a follow-up interview. All of these were invited to an interview and 11 interviews were subsequently completed. Table 1 gives the dates on which the interviews were conducted.

The interviews were conducted as semi-structured conversations based around a topic guide. They included questions on motivations for retrofit, reasons for interest in Your Home Better, their retrofit experiences to date, their plans for the future, and the factors that might deter them from retrofitting their home. We were interested in understanding the decision-making processes that householders follow and understanding the relationship between different categories of barrier, whether financial, social, or practical. This report draws on the interviews to provide an overview of the range of perspectives and experiences.

Citation

Sherriff, G. (2023). Your Home Better Customer Research. Salford: Greater Manchester Combined Authority

• Report Type: Project Report
• Acceptance Date: Nov 20, 2023
• Online Publication Date: Nov 20, 2023
• Publication Date: Nov 20, 2023
• Deposit Date: Dec 20, 2023
• Publicly Available Date: Jan 25, 2024
• Pages: 18