Social housing refurbishment and maintenance specialists, Connaught Partnerships Ltd has carried out 25,000 repairs on DGHP homes over the past six months and has presented Mrs Patterson with a Christmas Flower arrangement and £50 of M&S vouchers to mark the milestone in the repairs service.

Mrs Patterson of Sorbie, Newton Stewart was presented with the gift by Billy Coupland, Connaught service delivery manager for the West, after calling to have the handle on her front door repaired.

She said: "The service has definitely improved since Connaught took over the repairs service. In the past we waited a long time for things to get done but now its much sooner and we get an appointment, I was very happy with the service."

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Connaught started work on the £27m reactive maintenance programme in April 2008 and has carried out over 5,000 emergency jobs as well as 3,000 urgent jobs during that period.

The team has worked on a range of critical repairs including window board ups, loss of power or hot water as well as less critical works like small leaks, loss of one heater or electrical circuits in a property since beginning the partnership.

Mark Paton, Connaught partnership manager, said: "We have had great feedback from the DGHP customers over the past six months and a recent poll showed that customer satisfaction is 96 per cent which is a fantastic achievement for the team here."

Connaught was appointed to deliver the reactive maintenance partnership over a five-year period and has seen the company take up sole responsibility for day-to-day maintenance of more than 10,000 homes dealing with everything from electrical faults to plumbing issues.

DGHP chairman John Potts said: "Since Connaught took over the housing repairs service tenants have been benefiting from faster response times for emergency repairs and the convenience of pre-arranged appointments for other work.

"Their feedback shows that they are very happy with the improved customer care, high quality of work and enhanced communications"

(GK/JM)