About us at Hounslow

We’d love you to join us at the London Borough of Hounslow! Our people are deeply committed to providing excellent services to our residents, doing all we can to make lives as good as they can be.

We are an outstanding council, serving an outstanding borough. With brilliant, visionary leadership, a dynamic Cabinet and a can-do culture, we’ve built strong partnerships which have transformed how we serve one of London’s most diverse boroughs. Hounslow is the world in one place and full of potential. We are stepping up for our residents like never before.

About our Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion

We live by five core values: Lead with Heart, Do New, Pass on the Power, Harness the Mix and Be a Rock. All our work has equality, diversity and inclusion at its very heart, best articulated in “Harness the Mix”. It's about breaking down barriers between our parts and people and unlocking the problem-solving power of our amazing mix of minds. We serve a diverse community, we have a diverse workforce and we are committed to being an inclusive employer.

We work hard to create representation across our workforce and leadership community, we have thriving employee network groups and our learning and development programmes help us lead, model and breathe ways of working that eliminate inequality, inequity, injustice and bias.

As part of this and under our commitments as a Disability Confident Employer, we make reasonable adjustments to accommodate our candidates. There’s space for you to tell us what you need within our application form.

Our Benefits

If you join us, you’ll have access to a range of employee benefits. Read more about these here.

About The Role

You are a frontline professional delivering a first class, modern and flexible rent account management and income recovery service for Housing and Tenancy Management. You are highly organised, able to deal with high volumes of information daily with excellent attention to detail. You are compassionate in your approach, but outcome focussed and highly motivated to ensure income collection targets are achieved. You build up trusting relationships with tenants, identifying those who need additional support to help them pay their rent, service charges and any arrears.

You monitor rent accounts and income recovery, taking action where early intervention may prevent arrears escalating. You have a good understanding of welfare benefits to help tenants maximise their income. You work collaboratively with others to ensure accounts are set up correctly and action is being taken to address arrears. Your ultimate goals is for tenants to manage their money and pay their rent on time but you will need to work with others to ensure this aim is achieved. You are proactive in reviewing and evaluating your own performance and acting on your own initiative to improve and develop.

About The Team You’ll Be Working In

1. Work collaboratively with your colleagues and partner agencies to ensure that the council maximises income recovery alongside tenants getting the very best service and opportunities to live independently and safely in their homes. Monitor all aspects of income recovery, taking decisive action to implement solutions to prevent the escalation of debt owed to the council.

2. Work proactively to identify potential loss of income and adopt early intervention practices to prevent the escalation of arrears, prevent tenancy breakdown and prevent escalation of need.

3. Proactively engage with tenants to build up trusting, professional and caring relationships.

4. Work in a person-centred way, identifying unmet needs and working proactively with other agencies to ensure those needs are met.

5. Make timely referrals to internal departments and external agencies and proactively follow up to ensure referrals are acted on.

6. Co-ordinate work with others across the service to ensure cross cuttings issues are not considered in isolation, and solutions are joined up borough wide.

7. Work effectively in a changeable environment to achieve targets and service objectives with competing priorities, while continuously improving our service offer to tenants to meet changing needs and integrate digital solutions.

8. Keep up to date with key legislation, policies and procedures, and maintain a high awareness of issues that can cause legal, reputational and financial risks to the council, taking action to mitigate or prevent risks arising and ensuring value for money service delivery.

9. Adopt safe working practices to comply with legislation, policies and procedures, while mitigating risks posed by challenging behaviour, identifying and recording accurate information to minimise risks to others.

10. Participate in out of hours rotas and emergency cover as required. Undertake other duties commensurate with the purpose of the post.

About You

Essential Knowledge:

• Understanding of rent collection and arrears recovery processes
• Knowledge of tenancy agreements and housing management practices
• Understanding of welfare benefits, including Universal Credit & Housing Benefit
• Knowledge of relevant housing legislation and best practice
• Awareness of safeguarding and supporting vulnerable residents

Essential Skills:

• Strong communication skills, both written and verbal.
• Excellent negotiation and influencing skills.
• Ability to build positive relationships with tenants while maintaining professional boundaries.
• Strong problem-solving and decision-making skills.
• Good organisational and time-management skills.
• Ability to manage a caseload and prioritise competing demands.
• Accurate record-keeping and attention to detail.
• Competent IT skills, including Microsoft Office and housing management systems

Desirable Experience:

• Experience working within a local authority or housing association
• Experience serving legal notices and support possession proceedings
• Experience using housing management systems such as NEC
• Experience of working with vulnerable tenants and signposting to support services

Essential For This Role:

Basic DBS is required for this role.

When Interviews Will Be Held And Who To Contact

The key information you need about the role should be in the role profile, but if you have any further questions about the role, please contact:

Email: Ailleen.Coffeycolgan@hounslow.gov.uk

Telephone: 0208 583 2379

Interviews for this job will be held during week commencing 31/08/2026