At Places for People, we hire People, not numbers. If you're an experienced customer service leader who is passionate about delivering an outstanding customer experience and developing high-performing teams, we'd love to hear from you.

We're looking for a Customer Service Manager to join our Places Developments team in South East. This is a fantastic opportunity to lead our regional customer service function, improve the customer journey and ensure issues are resolved professionally, efficiently and to a consistently high standard.

Location

2 days per week (Wednesday and Thursday) based at our Grays Inn Road office, London, WC1X 8QR. The remainder of your week will be spent supporting developments across the South East region through a combination of site visits and home working. This is a field-based role, so you must be willing and able to travel regularly throughout your designated area, with home working available on days where site visits are not required.

More about your role

Reporting to the Head of Customer Service, you'll lead and motivate our Customer Service Technicians and Co-ordinators, ensuring customers receive an excellent service across phone, email, social media and in person. You'll embed our People Promises across the team and create an environment where colleagues are supported, coached and empowered to succeed.

You'll oversee the regional customer journey, taking ownership of complex or long-standing complaints and ensuring post-occupation remedial works are completed to the required standard and within agreed timescales. You'll work closely with internal teams and contractors to maintain a strong focus on first-time fixes and compliance with NHBC warranty requirements, guidelines and technical standards.

Using customer feedback, service data and performance measures, you'll monitor Customer Satisfaction and Customer Effort scores, manage KPI and SLA delivery, identify trends and recommend improvements. You'll also keep up to date with industry developments, apply best practice and help develop our customer service procedures, policies and standards.

More About You

To be eligible for an interview for this role, you must have experience managing an operational customer service team within the property development, housebuilding or construction sector, alongside at least three years of team management experience.

• You have a strong track record of delivering customer service improvements and achieving performance targets.
• You're an engaging leader who can recruit, coach, motivate and develop colleagues while addressing underperformance constructively.
• You have experience managing complex customer complaints and resolving issues within agreed timescales.
• You understand the customer journey within new-build homes and can confidently oversee defects and post-occupation remedial works.
• You're confident analysing customer interactions, defects data and service statistics to identify trends and recommend improvements.
• You have a strong customer focus and a clear understanding of customer service best practice, regulatory compliance and risk.
• You're highly organised, adaptable and able to manage multiple priorities across a varied regional workload.
• You communicate clearly and professionally, build strong relationships and are confident working with colleagues, customers and contractors.

A leadership qualification and HBF Site Visitor Card would be beneficial but aren't essential.

What does Places for People have to offer you?

We are a large, diverse, and ambitious business that offers excellent opportunities for career development and progression. We know there's always more we can do to make life easier and more rewarding for our colleagues, which is why we offer a comprehensive benefits package that includes:

• Bonus scheme
• Company pension with matched contributions up to 7%
• 35 days annual leave, including bank holidays, increasing with service
• Buy and sell holiday scheme
• Life assurance
• Extra perks including huge discounts and offers from shops, cinemas, and much more
• Ongoing training and development opportunities
• Access to wellbeing and support initiatives

What's next?

If you meet the criteria and are ready to make the next step in your career then apply following our simple 5 minute application process, upload a CV and a supporting statement which demonstrates how you meet the requirements of the role. If you have any questions please email the recruitment team recruitment@placesforpeople.co.uk 

As part of our commitment to diversity and inclusion, we offer a guaranteed interview to candidates who are disabled, neurodiverse, or have served in the Armed Forces, provided you meet the essential criteria for the role. If you would like to be considered under this scheme, please indicate this in your application. 

We are committed to creating an inclusive and accessible recruitment process. If you require any reasonable adjustments to support your application or interview experience, please let us know. We're happy to work with you to ensure you have the opportunity to perform at your best.

If you are a Places for People customer and you're looking for support with your application, please contact our skills and employment team on skillsemployment@placesforpeople.co.uk. 

Please note that we may bring the closing date forward, if we receive a large number of quality applications. If you are interested in this role we would advise applying immediately to avoid disappointment.

If you are using a mobile device such as an iPad then ensure your CV is stored in the cloud, we currently support Google Drive, OneDrive and Dropbox.

We understand the importance of a supportive and inclusive work culture so please talk to us at interview about flexibility you may need. We can't promise to give you exactly what you want, but we promise not to judge you for asking. For this role we are open to discussing the possibility of reduced hours, flexible start and finish times or compressed hours.  

If you are a recruitment agency please note we operate a PSL and do not take cold calls

Safeguarding

At Places for People, safeguarding is everyone's responsibility. We are committed to creating safe communities for our customers and colleagues by protecting children, young people, and adults at risk from harm, abuse, and neglect. 

We follow robust safeguarding policies and procedures, ensuring all employees, volunteers, and contractors uphold the highest standards of safeguarding and accountability. Our recruitment process includes pre-employment checks, including Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks where applicable, to promote a safe and secure working environment. 

By joining Places for People, you are expected to contribute to our safeguarding culture, following our policies and reporting concerns to protect those in our communities