Housing Options Assistant

COVENTRY CITY COUNCIL; Coventry; On-site; GBP 22,000 - 28,000; Full time

Job summary

Coventry City Council is seeking a Housing Options Assistant to help tackle homelessness and respond to residents in need. You will listen, assess needs, and help people access the right support at the right time, through face-to-face, phone, or online channels.

You’ll gather essential information, carry out initial assessments, and provide clear advice to customers. This new team offers an exciting opportunity to shape support from the very beginning for Coventry’s vulnerable residents.

Qualifications

• Strong interpersonal skills with a calm and understanding manner.
• The ability to communicate clearly with a wide range of people from different backgrounds.
• Confidence in using ICT systems and writing clear case notes and client correspondence.
• The ability to work in a busy environment and adapt to changing needs.
• Strong organisational skills with the ability to prioritise your workload.
• A team player who can also work independently when required.

Responsibilities

• Assess people’s housing and support needs to understand the intervention required.
• Manage enquiries, referrals, and appointments for homelessness assessments.
• Carry out initial assessments to ensure customers receive appropriate help, at the appropriate time.
• Work with partners across the public, voluntary, and community sectors to signpost effectively.
• Keep accurate records and ensuring data is entered correctly into our systems.
• Support the delivery of homelessness prevention work and assist the team in delivering a high quality service to residents.

Skills

Interpersonal skills

Clear communication

ICT systems

Organisational skills

Team player

Multichannel communication

Experience supporting vulnerable

Job description

In line with our One Coventry Values, we want to ensure that our communities are represented across our workforce. A vital part of this is ensuring we are a truly inclusive organisation that encourages diversity in all respects, including diversity of thinking. We particularly welcome applicants from minority ethnic, LGBT+, disabled and neurodiverse communities to make a real difference to our residents so that equity and respect remains at the heart of everything we do.

Our Values are:

• Open and fair: We are fair, open, and transparent.
• Nurture and develop: We help and encourage everyone to be their best and do their best.
• Engage and empower: We talk and listen to others, working together as one.
• Create and innovate: We embrace new ways of working to continuously improve.
• Own and be accountable: We work together to deliver the best services for our residents.
• Value and respect: We put diversity and inclusion at the heart of all we do.

We value diverse perspectives and experiences and are striving to create a workplace culture that is inclusive, is accepting of all and is free from discrimination and bias.

The Housing and Homelessness Service is a very busy environment and faces several challenges to meet the housing needs of citizens of Coventry. The team have grown significantly during the last 12 months and this reflects the fact that Housing & Homelessness are now a key council priority.

The team are responsible for the delivery of the following service functions:

Provision of the statutory homeless service

Provision of temporary accommodation

Management of the housing register

Co-ordination of support to citizens rough sleeping

Commissioning of homeless services, and

Responsibility for housing strategy

The Council has a strategic vision that is clearly set out in both the Homelessness and the Rough Sleeping Strategies which was approved in 2025.

By becoming part of an expanding team who are focused on preventing households from becoming homeless as well as providingtailored support and interventions when someone does become homelessthis is a fantastic opportunity to make a real difference to some of the most vulnerable people in our city.

What is the job role?

We’re looking for Housing Options Assistants to help us tackle homelessness in Coventry and respond to residents in need. You’ll listen, assess needs, and help people access the right support at the right time.

You’ll gather essential information, carry out initial assessments, and provide clear advice to customers – whether face‑to‑face, over the phone, or online. Your work will directly contribute to preventing homelessness and supporting some of Coventry’s most vulnerable residents.

This is a new team, offering a very exciting opportunity to help shape the way we support customers from the very beginning. Its a great time to join us and be part of something new and ambitious.

As a Housing Options Assistant, you will:

• Assess people’s housing and support needs to understand the intervention required.
• Manage enquiries, referrals, and appointments for homelessness assessments.
• Carry out initial assessments to ensure customers receive appropriate help, at the appropriate time.
• Work with partners across the public, voluntary, and community sectors to signpost effectively.
• Keep accurate records and ensuring data is entered correctly into our systems.
• Support the delivery of homelessness prevention work and assist the team in delivering a high quality service to residents.

This post is exempted under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and as such appointment to this post will be conditional upon the receipt of a satisfactory response to a check of police records via Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS).

All candidates must have the Right to Work in the UK. We are currently not offering sponsorship for this role.

Who are we looking for?

You don’t need specific experience of homelessness legislation – we’ll support you to learn that. But we do need someone who can bring the right skills, approach and values from day one:

• Strong interpersonal skills with a calm and understanding manner.
• The ability to communicate clearly with a wide range of people from different backgrounds.
• Confidence in using ICT systems and writing clear case notes and client correspondence.
• The ability to work in a busy environment and adapt to changing needs.
• Strong organisational skills with the ability to prioritise your workload.
• A team player who can also work independently when required.
• Experience using multiple communication channels (phone, email, letter, face to face).
• Experience working within a team and supporting vulnerable people

Guaranteed Interview Scheme - As part of our commitment to inclusion, we offer guaranteed interviews for specific groups of people. To qualify, you'll need to meet the minimum requirements for the role and identify with one of the below criteria:

• Members of the Armed Forces and veterans
• Are currently in care or have previously been in care
• If you consider yourself to be disabled or if you have a long-term health condition

Provisional Interview date(s): Week commencing 30th November

About Coventry

Coventry has a proud, innovative and creative spirit that throughout its history has seen communities come together to tackle problems and bring about real social change.

We are cutting-edge, challenging, youthful, vibrant and diverse.
At Coventry we are committed to excellence in everything we do. With around 5100 staff from a range of different backgrounds, our aim is to recruit and develop talented people who will focus on our customers, take responsibility, work together and find better ways of doing things.

To deliver the best services to our residents, we need the best people working for us to make a difference to our communities.

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