NHBC, the leading warranty and insurance provider for new homes in the UK, has announced the roll-out of Joint Virtual Meetings. It represents the second stage in the evolution of NHBC’s technical risk management strategy, following a successful pilot.
On new sites, Joint Virtual Meetings (JVMs) will be delivered virtually via MS Teams or another appropriate platform, to enable NHBC to work collaboratively with its builder customers without the need to be in one physical location together.
These meetings will improve communication between NHBC and the builder customer at key points in a project, allowing all those who attend to obtain a greater understanding of the project and its requirements.
JVMs will be more effective and collaborative, allowing a wider group of people to attend and facilitate the resolution of any design issues quickly together rather than via conditions or emails.
There will be three types of meetings including: Pre-start at the onset of each project; Inflight once the project has commenced – the timing and required attendees of which will be specific to each project and Consultation for complex sites that have planning approval but that are not yet registered with NHBC. Pre-start and Inflight meetings will be introduced from 1 November and Consultation meetings from 1 January 2022.
Commenting on the launch, Diane Marshall, NHBC’s Operations Director said:
“We are confident that these meetings which will be held with our technical experts at key stages during a project will increase collaboration to help our customers build right first time.
“In addition, these meetings give our customers the opportunity to discuss design and construction issues at an earlier stage, identify any areas where we can provide additional support; speed up project assessments and acceptance, as well as the clearance of conditions.
“We are working with our registered builders and developers to evolve our technical risk management strategy which will maintain focus on quality control (defects detection) whilst developing new services to enhance our quality assurance (defects prevention). The overall aim is to improve the construction quality of new homes.
“Following a successful pilot, Joint Virtual Meetings will enable our registered builders and developers to work more efficiently on site, reduce the significant costs of remedial works and further improve new home quality for the benefit of home buyers.”
For further information please visit www.nhbc.co.uk/inspection.