The Building Safety Act 2022 (BSA) brought with it a cultural shift in how residents of high-rise buildings must be treated. Resident engagement is no longer a matter of good practice alone: it is a legal obligation. At the same time, the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) has strengthened its consumer standards framework, adding further obligations around transparency, communication and accountability. For social housing landlords managing higher-risk buildings (HRBs), the two regimes overlap, and understanding both is essential.
We thought a run down on what is expected and some best practice pointers would be timely.
Who is affected?
The basics
As anyone who is involved in building safety will know, the building safety regime applies to HRBs: buildings in England that are at least 18 metres or seven storeys high and contain at least two residential units. For every HRB, there must be a principal accountable person (PAP) who is legally responsible for the building’s external structure and common parts. There may also be one or more accountable persons (APs) responsible for other parts of the building. The duty to prepare and maintain a resident engagement strategy falls primarily on the PAP, though APs also have responsibilities to distribute it and support its delivery.[1]
The RSH’s consumer standards apply to all registered providers of social housing in England, including housing associations and local authorities. They came into force on 1 April 2024, following the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023, and are actively enforced through a programme of regulatory inspections.
| Further reading BSR guidance: Preparing a resident engagement strategy |
The resident engagement strategy: a legal duty under the Building Safety Act 2022 (BSA)
Under the BSA, the PAP must prepare a resident engagement strategy for each HRB they are responsible for. The strategy sets out how residents and owners of residential units will be involved in, and informed about, building safety decisions. This duty arises as soon as the building is occupied and does not depend on any prior survey or assessment being completed. Importantly, the obligation to assess and manage building safety risks, and to engage residents accordingly, is ongoing: PAPs should not wait until the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) directs them to apply for a building assessment certificate before getting their strategy in place.
The strategy must be specific to the building and must cover:
- what information will be provided to residents about building safety decisions, and how
- what residents will be asked about, and what they will not be asked about, and why
- how residents’ opinions will be collected, used and fed back to them
- how participation will be measured and reviewed
The PAP must consult all residents and APs on the strategy the first time it is issued and whenever it is changed. Each consultation period must last at least three weeks. The strategy must be reviewed at least every two years, or sooner following a mandatory occurrence report or significant material alteration to the building. Every review must be recorded, whether or not changes are made.
Understanding your residents’ communication needs
APs must take all reasonable steps to know who lives in their part of the building and understand their needs, including accessibility requirements and communication needs such as language. Methods for gathering this information include surveys by post or email, or visits to residential units. This duty to understand residents, shapes how the strategy is delivered: it is not a legal precondition for having a strategy, but it is essential to making one work effectively in practice.
The BSR guidance suggests asking whether anyone needs communications in a different language or alternative formats such as large text, easy read, braille or audio. Strategies should describe how communication needs have been considered and how the approach will be adjusted where necessary.
The building assessment certificate and your strategy
The BSR is working through a programme of building assessment certificates (BACs) for occupied HRBs, calling in buildings in priority order. Currently it is focused on buildings over 30 metres, buildings between 18 and 29.99 metres with more than 378 residential units, and buildings with specific structural or cladding risk factors. When directed to apply, a PAP has only 28 days to submit the application. The application must include a copy of the resident engagement strategy. Landlords who have not prepared their strategy in advance will find themselves under significant pressure within a very short timeframe. Preparing and maintaining the strategy as part of ongoing BAC readiness is strongly advisable.
The RSH’s Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard
Alongside the building safety regime, social housing landlords must comply with the RSH’s Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard (TIAS), which came into force on 1 April 2024, replacing the previous Tenant Involvement and Empowerment Standard. The TIAS significantly extends what is expected of landlords in their relationships with residents.
Under the TIAS, registered providers must:
- treat tenants with fairness and respect and take action to deliver fair and equitable outcomes
- take tenants’ views into account in decision-making about how landlord services are delivered, and communicate how those views have been considered
- communicate with tenants and provide information so they can use landlord services, understand what to expect, and hold their landlord to account
- provide accessible support that meets the diverse needs of tenants so they can engage with opportunities to influence decisions
- regularly consider ways to improve and tailor their approach to tenant engagement and implement changes as appropriate
The RSH actively enforces the TIAS through inspections of larger landlords (those with 1,000 or more social homes) at least once every four years. Regulatory judgments are published, and landlords can be rated between C1 (fully compliant) and C4 (significant failure). Evidence from early inspections suggests that the RSH expects landlords to demonstrate not just that they have engagement structures in place, but that residents’ views are meaningfully shaping decisions and services. As will be evident from the flurry of recent C3s, there is a bit of work to do to embed these standards into operating practices.
How the two regimes work together
The BSA regime and the RSH’s consumer standards are complementary. The BSA requires a formal strategy and specific consultation processes focused on building safety decisions. The TIAS requires a broader culture of transparency, responsiveness and resident influence across all landlord services. For social housing landlords managing HRBs, the resident engagement strategy required under the BSA is one component of a wider engagement framework that must meet both sets of obligations.
It is important to note, however, that the BSR guidance is explicit that the building safety complaints system should be kept separate from general engagement processes. The PAP must operate a dedicated complaints system for building safety concerns, distinct from the resident engagement strategy itself.
Best practice: going beyond compliance
The strongest organisations are treating the resident engagement strategy as a living document rather than a compliance exercise. Based on the RSH’s early inspection findings and the BSR’s guidance, the following approaches reflect good practice:
- Prepare a separate strategy for each building rather than relying on a single portfolio-wide document. Each strategy should reflect the specific profile and needs of that building’s residents.
- Invest in understanding who lives in your buildings. Good resident data, including protected characteristics and communication preferences, underpins effective engagement and is increasingly scrutinised by the RSH.
- Use a range of engagement methods. Tokenistic consultation with a small group does not meet the standard. Effective engagement uses multiple channels, from digital communications to in-person visits and community events.
- Close the feedback loop. Tell residents what you heard and what you did as a result. Both the BSR guidance and the TIAS require landlords to communicate how residents’ views have been taken into account.
- Record everything. Reviews, consultations, participation rates and changes made must all be documented. This evidence will be essential for BAC applications and RSH inspections alike.
Common pitfalls to avoid
- Treating the strategy as a one-off document: it must be reviewed at least every two years and updated as circumstances change but it makes much more sense to review more regularly to ensure it stays current.
- Conflating the building safety engagement strategy with broader tenant involvement work: the two should be distinct, even if they share infrastructure. This isn’t to say that internal teams should work separately. Quite the contrary, but the outcomes should be recorded distinctly.
- Assuming the project stages for producing the strategy are progressed in a linear format: For example, don’t assume that a baseline survey of residents’ needs and preferences has to be completed before a strategy can be produced or safety information shared: there is no such precondition in law or BSR guidance. It is tempting to think of the process as step by step. In fact, better practice is for the strategy to reference the engagement required to set up the baseline resident data. Understanding residents’ needs and preferences is one of those clear areas where BSA and TIAS requirements are aligned.
- Failing to prepare ahead of a BAC direction: with only 28 days to respond, the strategy and other key documents must already be in good order.
What to do now
If your organisation manages HRBs, the starting point is a straightforward audit.
- Do you have a resident engagement strategy for each building?
- Has it been consulted on and distributed?
- Is it due for review?
- Is it building-specific, or is it a generic document that could apply to any property in your portfolio?
- Are you collecting and recording resident communication needs?
- And is your broader engagement framework aligned with the RSH’s TIAS?
If you would like support reviewing your resident engagement
strategy and how your obligations to engage residents under the building safety
regime and RSH consumer standards interact, please get in touch with the team
at Keeble Brown.
[1] Came into force on 16 January 2024 under the Building Safety Act 2022 (Commencement No. 6) Regulations 2024,
