The challenges in creating effective handover information between builders and homeowners

In this blog, Oliver Perry, Co-Founder of The Guid3d Home outlines the main challenges faced by home builders and homeowners in the handover process.

The construction industry is traditionally - by its very nature - more comfortable with the tangible, the bricks and mortar rather than the intangible, the digital world.

In recent years digital innovators in the construction industry have emerged and delivered substantial benefits to early adopters, but barriers to adopting new technologies often mean only the very large, complex sites have embraced digitization. Furthermore, little innovation has occurred in the area focused on the experience for a new homeowner and the need for critical information about their new home in an easy-to-consume digital format.

Why is this important?

The Grenfell Inquiry and subsequent Hackitt report highlighted the need for greater standardization and digitization of the golden thread of property information. The message was that the industry must act now to embrace digitization and apply best practices to residential buildings - of all sizes - from individual homes to complex high rises. Here are the key challenges the industry must act on:

Accuracy at every stage

The need for accurate as-built design and property records. They are essential for building operators and homeowners to effectively – and safely – maintain and operate the property. -The possibility to track construction products as they arrive onsite and any necessary product substitutions. There are barriers for some home builders, to adopt technology to digitise the construction site and property records: the digitization process may not be cost effective, or they may lack the technical expertise required to implement such a solution.
More and more regulations on Building Safety are calling for digital records to promote product traceability. Builders must act now to ensure future compliance and at the same time deliver the benefits of digitisation to homeowners.

Transparency at completion

Knowing what products are in the final completed building versus what was originally specified often takes time to collate and reconcile - further delaying the completeness of handover materials. As a consequence, the handover ‘package’ may have missing information and isn’t available until after the building is occupied.
The challenge for builders to collate the as-built golden thread of property information is magnified by the number of different stakeholders responsible for the information, a manual collation process, and multiple different data formats.
While the burden to prepare the completion handover documentation falls on the builder; the perceived beneficiary is the homeowner or property manager who want to receive as much information as possible in an accessible format. Builders often overlook the long-term benefits to their sales journey and customer care efficiencies that come with a comprehensive property handover pack – including less customer queries, improved customer satisfaction, trust and better reviews.

Customer satisfaction

From the first customer interaction with the sales agent to the home handover and after sales care; builders must not underestimate the power of keeping the homeowner informed and up to date with timely updates and easy access to the right information at each stage of the journey.
Some builders are fearful of the residents’ voice and making themselves open to online attack from unhappy customers. The reality is a digital experience delivering smooth, open communication and information sharing throughout the customer journey is key to delivering client satisfaction and turning customers into advocates.
Those builders that engage with their home buyers and proactively embrace a digital handover and customer journey will strengthen trust, long term relationships and reputation.

How can product traceability help your business?

Do you know what products are in your home; or the buildings you own or operate?

This is a simple question but one that so many cannot answer - and don’t know where to go to find accurate and up-to-date information.

The solution to this is creating a Golden Thread of information. Helping you to bring together different data sources in a centralised way providing a single-view of information.

The construction industry calls for unifying standard product identifiers for easier product identification. Combining this, with an universally-adopted traceability software will be transformative for the industry - allowing operators in the built environment to tag products to individual buildings and dwellings.

Digitization of property records and handover is a win-win-win for all involved. Here’s why:

Builders can streamline handover and customer care operations; and have an invaluable digital record for future issue and dispute resolution.
Homeowners get accessible digital property records that they can maintain themselves and handover to future owners and tenants.
Property owner/ operators know what products are in the building they are responsible for and how to effectively operate and maintain it to keep residents safe.

About BSI Identify and The Guid3d Home

BSI Identify was born out of the need to be able to provide unbroken traceability of construction products from manufacturer / supplier and installation. BSI Identify’s partnership with Guid3d Home provides the traceability from construction to completion and handover to the homeowner and property manager, enabling not only a digital twin of the built environment, but an easy way to manage the property for the future.

Find out more at Guid3d.co.uk and BSI Identify.