Automating Tenancy Letters with Microsoft & SharePoint

Irwell Valley Homes is a not-for-profit housing association that provides affordable homes and services to over 20,000 people across Greater Manchester. With a mission to help people live well in their homes and communities, they have been supporting residents for more than 50 years. Their focus is on providing safe, quality housing, investing in neighbourhoods, and creating opportunities for people to thrive.

The Challenge

As part of their housing services, Irwell Valley Homes regularly issues tenant communications, such as overdue rent letters and tenancy letter. Previously, this process was heavily manual:

• Running queries in the housing management system to identify tenants (e.g., overdue rent).

• Exporting results to CSV/Excel.

• Manually creating mail-merged Word letters.

• Sending large volumes of letters to a print-and-post organisation.

• Uploading each individual letter back into the tenant record in the housing management system.

This process was not only time-consuming and error-prone, but also created challenges in record-keeping and accessibility. With thousands of tenants and hundreds of letters generated at a time, the inefficiencies impacted both team productivity and the tenant experience.

The Solution

Having worked with Irwell Valley Homes for many years, HappyWired was asked to help streamline this process. The solution combined their existing housing management system with Microsoft technologies they were already using, particularly SharePoint. The automated process included:

• Automated letter generation: Queries from the housing management system automatically generated tenant letters from standard templates.

• SharePoint integration: Letters were stored in a dedicated SharePoint library, with metadata such as tenancy reference, tenant ID, address, and letter type.

• Search and access: A parameterised SharePoint search link was embedded in the housing management system, allowing staff to access all letters for a tenant with one click.

• Document tagging and filtering: Metadata enabled quick filtering by type, such as overdue rent letters or tenancy letter.

• Secure distribution: Letters were automatically sent to the print and post service via secure transfer, without manual handling.

The Results

The automated tenancy letter solution delivered significant benefits:

• Time savings: No more manual mail merges or document uploads, freeing up staff for higher-value work.

• Improved accuracy: Reduced risk of human error in generating and handling tenant communications.

• One-click access: Tenant management teams could instantly view all related documents directly from within the housing management system.

• Organisation-wide visibility: Secure access in SharePoint meant colleagues outside the housing management team could view tenant communications, where appropriate, without needing system licenses.

• Better tenant experience: Faster, more consistent communications improved service levels for tenants.

Ongoing Partnership

By working closely with Irwell Valley Homes, HappyWired delivered a solution that transformed a key operational process. Building on this success, the partnership continues to explore new ways Microsoft technologies can support Irwell Valley Homes’ mission to create sustainable communities and improve tenant services.