Discussion

Due to the fact that mechanisms in the housing market do not lead to a gen- erally accepted equilibrium, public tasks cannot be achieved in the absence of 1. 2.

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š ;n[Ykj_edh[gk_h[c[djiif[Y_\_YWj_edi š Ik_jWX_b_joh[gk_h[c[djiikffb_[hi[b[Yj_ed Yh_j[h_W š 7mWhZYh_j[h_W š 9edjhWYj#h[bWj[Z_dY[dj_l[i 9ecceZ_joijhWj[]o

institutional interventions. At the same time, private parties, housing asso- ciations, carry out these public tasks.

What can be concluded from this chapter is that the performance of main- tenance services appears to be a means of fulfilling essential aspects of these tasks: providing housing services to tenants, contributing to liveability in a neighbourhood and pursuing sound financial policies. In this thesis, we pri- marily focus on the first aspect, the provision of housing services to tenants.

The influence of maintenance services on the realisation of the above- mentioned tasks is not the same for each service, however, and further re- search should investigate how all types of services influence customer value, value in terms of the total costs of ownership and the market value of the properties, and liveability. Moreover, the extent to which housing associa- tions’ current commodity strategies take the particularities of different main- tenance services into account is unknown. Further research should explore these issues in order to support further professionalisation of purchasing within the social housing sector.

As we have seen that the three tasks for housing associations with respect to maintenance services are a more elaborate version of the three main objec- tives of buildings in general, the conclusions and implications of this research may be applied to comparable situations relating to other social enterprises, such as hospitals, in order to realise optimisation of purchasing.

Commodity strategies should differentiate on the basis of characteristics of building components and the accompanying maintenance services. Com- modity strategies should cover different means of enabling high performance service delivery. These can include execution requirements (specifications), suitability requirements (supplier selection criteria), award criteria, and con- tract-related incentives. The more important the component and the service are for tenant satisfaction, for instance, the more award criteria could take the tenant’s opinions and experiences into account. Relevant criteria in this respect are, for example, the completion of maintenance activities in a sin- gle visit, accessibility, and sticking to execution planning agreements (Straub

et al., 2005). The same applies to the liveability of a neighbourhood and rev-

enues on real estate. Additional research is needed to explore the current use of performance criteria for different types of service suppliers, and to explore the impact of maintenance services on the realisation of public tasks. For ex- ample, how important are different maintenance services for customer satis- faction? In the remaining parts of this thesis, steps will be taken to fill these gaps.

In order to be able to treat suppliers as extensions of housing associations when delivering services to residents, the function of purchasing mainte- nance services needs to be more closely connected to the strategic level of organisations. The function of purchasing is currently underdeveloped. At present, purchasers simply realise what is stated in housing associations’

maintenance strategies – assuming that there is in fact a link between the maintenance strategy and the purchasing strategy. The buying centre for a certain commodity should preferably be organised in alignment with the contribution to the public task of that commodity. For example, from the per- spective of increasing customer satisfaction, it is advisable to have market- ing professionals in the buying centre for those services that have a high im- pact on customer satisfaction. As more and more suppliers play a role in the development of maintenance solutions (Straub and Van Mossel, 2005) rather than merely realising specifications, the role of purchasers within housing as- sociations is expected to become more strategic in future. In this way, the ef- fectiveness and efficiency of housing associations’ policies will be secured at a higher level.

Award criteria and contract-related incentives, other than those relating to price, are seldom used in practice, which may indicate deficiencies in the use of potential tools for producing effective commodity strategies. The poten- tial of incentives to assist with the improvement of service suppliers’ perfor- mance appears to be undervalued. In Chapter 9, more attention will be given to ways of rectifying this. Purchasers from Dutch housing associations cur- rently predominantly use selection criteria and specifications. Chapters 7 and 8 will focus on the contents and organisation of maintenance service specifi- cations. First, Chapter 4 will examine the specific position of the tenant as a customer in the Dutch social rented housing sector.

This chapter is based on an article that was published in the journal Property Man­ agement, under the title: Purchasing of Dutch housing associations’ technical management services (Van Mossel and Straub, 2007).

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4 Comparing housing