Story Homes
As one of the premier developers in the north of England and Scotland, Story Homes faced the growing need to standardise its supply chain management processes by meeting new compliance requirements. The company worked with Veriforce CHAS to help its contractors and subcontractors achieve CHAS Standard, CHAS Advanced and CHAS Elite membership.
Background
Founded in 1987 by Chairman Fred Story, Story Homes is a housing developer headquartered in the north of England with a heritage of building beautiful and well-built homes. The company’s mission is to challenge the conventions of mass produced houses by designing homes that people aspire to live in that bring something different to the areas in which it operates.
For more than 30 years, the Story Homes name has been associated with aspirational high-specification homes throughout Cumbria, the North East and North West of England, and Scotland. Each home is set a little further back from the road and generously spaced apart, featuring different finishes that give each structure a distinctive character.
In 2021, Story Homes built over 800 homes across its three operating regions — a significant increase from the 600 homes built the previous year. Despite the challenges of the pandemic, as well as supplier and material shortages, the company’s ambitious growth plans are on track, and the business is performing well.
The Challenge
Despite significantly growing in size and status over the years, Story Homes takes pride in staying grounded and true to its ethos of “doing the right thing” — the driving force behind the company’s track record of doing quality work.
This includes adhering to high levels of health and safety (H&S) and ensuring that the contractors and subcontractors that support their supply chains follow these standards.
The developer’s contractors also have to adhere to clear environmental requirements that improve the sustainability of construction projects and reduce their impact on the environment.
For many years, Story Homes relied on a manual system for selecting contractors. This set-up involved an internal pre-qualification questionnaire (PQQ) process that varied between its regional offices. A new and more efficient system was needed.
Campaign Approach
“For us, Veriforce CHAS are the clear leaders in safety schemes and partnership organisations.”
— Paul Drysdale, Story Homes SHEQ Director
Following a tender process involving multiple compliance providers, Story Homes ultimately selected CHAS as its preferred partner.
In January 2021, CHAS started a six-month campaign to bring contractors with fewer than five employees in line with CHAS Standard or above, and those with more than five employees in line with CHAS Advanced or CHAS Elite. Fortunately, nearly all of Story Homes’ contractors were already members of an SSIP scheme, primarily with CHAS. They simply needed to be upgraded to a higher level of compliance.
However, helping Story Homes’ smaller contractors in achieving CHAS compliance proved more challenging. These small businesses were less likely to have an in-house safety professional who could guide them through the compliance process. The experts at CHAS collaborated with Story Homes to provide hands-on support to these contractors as they completed the PQQ process and demonstrated their adherence to industry standards and regulations. All that Story Homes had to do was provide its subcontractor database — CHAS took care of the rest.
The Solution
Streamline Procurement Process
Consistent Compliance Levels
Achieve CHAS Verification
Supply Chain Management
The complex challenge of meeting Story Homes’ high H&S and environmental standards meant the developer had two primary objectives: Story Homes had to streamline its procurement processes and Story Homes required consistent compliance levels across its 500-strong contractor base. To meet these targets, Story Homes worked with CHAS to standardise its supply chain management processes and guide contractors through our three compliance packages: CHAS Standard, CHAS Advanced, and CHAS Elite status.
Story Homes’ Key Campaign Takeaways:
Before the campaign, 58% of contractors had achieved CHAS Standard, 41% CHAS Advanced and 1% CHAS Elite.
After the campaign, 39% had achieved CHAS Standard, 58% CHAS Advanced, and 3% CHAS Elite.
Consistent supply chain compliance levels improved the speed and efficiency of Story Homes’ procurement processes.
Story Homes continues to maintain its supply chain compliance levels with new contractors.
The campaign’s success is testament to the hard work of Story Homes and CHAS, combined with the willingness of the developer’s supply chain to recognise the benefits of achieving assessment compliance.
Benefits Of Working With Veriforce CHAS
By becoming a Veriforce CHAS client, Story Homes automatically unlocks the following benefits of our supply chain services:
Compliance Levels
Veriforce CHAS helped Story Homes’ contractors achieve higher and more consistent levels of compliance.
Time Savings
Veriforce CHAS saved hundreds of hours in manual and administrative work.
Portal Training
All Veriforce CHAS clients get Client Portal training to maximise use of their dashboards and reports.
Dedicated BDM
Like all Veriforce CHAS clients, Story Homes has access to a dedicated Veriforce CHAS Business Development Manager, who assists in onboarding new contractors and helps define the company’s business requirements.
Client Portal
As standard, CHAS provided Story Homes quick and easy access to the CHAS Client Portal to improve project visibility and supply chain management. Clients can view individual project information, including an overview of its supply chain, its list of CHAS contractors and each contractor’s compliance status.
The Outcome
I would strongly recommend that any organisation turn to CHAS if they are looking to improve the quality of their subcontractors and the consistency of the selection process, as well as strengthen overall supply chain risk management.
For us, CHAS are the clear leaders in safety schemes and partnership organisations
Paul Drysdale – SHEQ Director | Story Homes
CHAS’s assessment campaign was a success. By the end of the six-month campaign to bring Story Homes’ contractors to its targeted compliance levels, fewer than a dozen still needed to complete the process.
39%
Contractors achieved CHAS Standard
58%
Contractors Achieved CHAS Advanced – up from 41%
3%
Contractors achieved CHAS Elite – up from 1%
