About the repairs service

Reporting a repair

There are three main ways to report a repair.

1. Phone our Customer Contact Centre on 0845 600 0830, 8.30am – 8.30pm Monday to Friday, 8.30am – 12.30pm Saturday
2. Email: repairs@east-thames.co.uk
   Please make sure you include as much information as possible about the repair as well as including a contact number.
3. Visit our head office and speak to one of our front of house team during our opening hours: 8.30am – 6.00pm Monday to Friday.
   Our head office is located at: 29-35 West Ham Lane, Stratford, London E15 4PH
   The office is less than a 10 minute walk from Stratford station.

What service do you offer?

As your landlord, East Thames offers a repairs service to ensure your home is well maintained. The service is divided into four parts:

1. Reactive repairs completed as and when they are needed. These are sometimes called responsive repairs or 'day to day' repairs.
2. Planned minor repairs which are larger one-off repairs such as dealing with repairs following a fire or flood.
3. Planned programmes of repairs or improvements such as the Decent Homes programme.
4. Cyclical programmed maintenance and servicing works, such as gas servicing and other scheduled repairs like redecoration.

The Repairs Handbook

The Repairs Handbook for Residents provides you with lots of useful information about the repairs service, reporting your repairs and some handy hints and diagrams to help you diagnose your repair.

Download the Repairs Handbook for Residents (695 KB PDF).

Our repairs categories

As not all repairs are the same, we need to make sure we prioritise the most urgent repairs in order to ensure residents' safety. We have three repairs categories for reactive repairs - emergency, urgent and routine - and we have standards for how quickly we will complete each of these types of repairs.

Regardless of the category of the repair, we aim to complete the repair right the first time.

• We aim to respond to emergency repairs within 24 hours (as quickly as possible). An emergency is when there is a problem which puts a person or property in danger. If there is a fire or explosion, contact emergency services on 999 straight away.
• If your repair is urgent, we aim to complete your repair in five calendar days. This includes things such as, a blocked toilet or no hot water.
• If your repair doesn’t present a danger to you or the home, we’ll complete this within 21 working days. This includes things such as, plastering repairs and some communal repairs.

Find out more about the types of repairs we deal with on page 11 of the Repairs Handbook for Residents.

More repairs information

The Repairs Handbook for Residents also contains information on the following:

• The contractors code of conduct and what you can expect when a repairs contractor visits your home (page 8).
• The home improvements and planned programmes of repairs or improvements such as the Decent Homes programme (page 13-14).
• What to do if you need any special equipment or adaptations done to your home if you have mobility issues or a disability (page 15). You can also find out more by reading our Aids and Adaptations Factsheet (2.14MB PDF)
• The annual gas safety programme (page 16).