Awaab’s Law Phase 2: Advice for Social Landlords

With Awaab’s Law directly applying to UK social landlords, the law now creates legally enforceable deadlines for investigating and fixing hazards in homes to keep tenants safe. Guidance from the Government currently indicates Awaab’s Law Phase 2 is expected to include significant hazards, such as “excess hot and cold,” and an extension of strict investigation and repair timeframes.

In this blog, we’ll discuss what social landlords should be focusing on during this time, such as addressing reputational risk, tenant trust, auditability, operational strain and proactive engagement. Additionally, we will provide advice on Awaab’s Law Phase 2, what to expect with the rollout and where our Voicescape Engage technology can come in to support operations.

Contents:

• How does Awaab's Law Phase 2 address "excess hot and cold" in social housing?

• How long do social landlords have to deal with these matters?

• Awaab's Law Phase Timeline

• Operational challenges brought by Awaab's Law

• Which services help landlords comply with Awaab’s Laws regarding temperature control?

How does Awaab’s Law Phase 2 address “excess hot and cold” in social housing?

Looking beyond damp and mould bring “excess cold” and “excess heat” formally into the scope of hazards that social landlords must investigates and address. No one should be forced to live in a home that is unsafe, and the new measures aim to make this right a legal responsibility for social landlords. It applies in circumstances where a social housing property is either too cold or too hot to live in safely presents a significant risk of harm to the tenants.

• Operationally, “excess cold” is not just linked to issues such as broken heating. In practice, this can be any condition where the home cannot maintain a safe indoor temperature for the occupant. This could include boiler failures, inadequate insulation, draughts, poor-quality windows, insufficient heating capacity or recurring condensation linked to under-heating. These conditions can be exacerbated by winter conditions and time of year.
  
  
• In contrast, “excess heat” is the opposite side of the same issue, which includes poor ventilation, lack of shading (e.g. tower block building facing the sun), or building design that creates an unsafe environment during warmer periods. This creates a major operational shift for landlords because temperature-related complaints are often subjective, seasonal and behaviourally influenced. This is because there may be instances where there is rarely a sign of a visible issue. Nowadays, tenants expect stable warmth, fast responses from landlords and reassurance that their home is safe. Currently, energy affordability pressures mean households may underheat homes to manage bills, blurring the line between building performance, occupancy patterns and vulnerability. Monitoring tenants during these seasonal times will therefore be critical for compliance success.

Moving forward, landlords will need to use an evidence-led approach rather than simply logging a repair order. This is where tenant engagement and technology can become strategically important. Awaab’s Law pushes landlords away from a purely reactive repairs model toward more proactive environmental risk manage. Providers will need increasingly clearer evidence of how risks were identified, how tenants are being supported and if they are vulnerable.

In addition to damp, mould, and cold issues, Awaab’s Law Phase 2 covers additional hazards such as extreme temperatures and significant hazards that pose a risk to the health and safety of an occupier.

The government relates significant hazards as:

• Damp and mould
• Excess cold and heat hazards (to be covered in Awaab's Law Phase 2)
• Falls on service levels and stairs between levels, structural collapse and explosions, fire and electrical hazard (to be covered in Awaab's Law Phase 2)
• Domestic and personal hygiene and food safety (to be covered in Awaab's Law Phase 2)

They are all to be introduced in 2026. After 2026, it's just the remaining hazards that are prescribed under the HHSRS.

Where does Voicescape Engage come in with the new areas covered? It provides:

• Earlier automated engagement
• Visibility on vulnerabilities and vulnerable residents sooner
• A clear auditable trail

Awaab’s Law Phase 2 requires housing teams to prepare a significant increase in operational complexity, as “excess cold” and “excess heat” complaints are subjective, seasonal and closely linked to vulnerabilities. Compliance and tenant engagement will rely on coordinated working across housing, repairs, compliance, asset management, customer service and safeguarding teams to ensure consistent communication and evidence gathering – and considering technology is a critical part of supporting this transition to the new law.

How long do social landlords have to deal with these matters?

Once a social landlord becomes aware of a potential hazard, they must investigate within a strict timeframe to determine whether a hazard exists. A written summary of the findings must then be provided to residents shortly after the investigation concludes; where a non-emergency hazard is identified, remedial works must begin promptly and be completed within a reasonable period. As a result, evidencing compliance, managing timelines and handling rising case volumes will become a much bigger operational challenge, requiring housing teams to provide regular updates and reassurance to tenants while maintaining a clear auditable trail and avoiding manual administrative bottlenecks.

Awaab’s Law Phase Timeline (2025 - 2027)

Awaab’s Law Phase 2 covers additional significant hazards where there is significant risk of harm that were not covered in Phase 1.

Operational challenges brought by Awaab’s Law

• Reputational risk
• Staffing challenges
• Reporting complexity
• Providing regular tenant updates and reassurance
• Communication risks and responding consistently
• Maintaining a clear and auditable trail of actions and resident communication
• Demonstrating compliance and responsiveness to regulators and the Housing Ombudsman

As Awaab’s Law Phase 2 increases the volume, complexity and scrutiny of cases, many social landlords are recognising that relying on manual processes alone to manage timelines, evidence, vulnerable residents and ongoing tenant communication is unlikely to be sustainable long-term and build tenant trust. Particularly during periods of peak demand such as winter, where operational strain is most likely. This is driving interest in technology that can support earlier intervention, better coordination across teams and a more proactive, responsive resident experience.

In practice, the organisations best prepared for Awaab's Law Phase 2 are likely to be those that combine property intelligence, tenant engagement and operational responsiveness into a single evidence-led approach.

Which services help landlords comply with Awaab’s Laws regarding temperature control?

Ultimately there is a need for action and inevitably there will be an increased workload and potentially increased funding in order to comply with the new Awaab’s Law Phase 2 requirements incoming; especially with extreme temperatures.

One aspect we would encourage social landlords to think about with the new phase is reporting, such as section 11 claims, since there has to be a report which details a lot of information on hazards to thoroughly protect tenants. With this challenge in mind, it is worth considering implementing a comprehensive solution to have the data necessary for auditability, reporting and automated engagement, reducing failed contact attempts/access, freeing officer time.

Voicescape helps support multiple organisations facing Awaab’s Law and keeping tenants safe in their home with Voicescape Engage; a compatible technology which can follow strict deadlines and maintain compliance with the law. Transforming tenant engagement with timely, tailored communication, Voicescape Engage can help teams deliver proactive, scalable and responsive tenant communication in a consistent evidence-led way – improving reporting, strengthening engagement and releasing vital operational resources.

Voicescape Engage additionally enables teams to quickly and efficiently. In practice, this helps housing teams…

• Reduce the need for call backs by over 50%
• Automatically identify where support was no longer required
• Maintain a clear audit trail of contact attempts for the Housing Ombudsman
• Free up staff capacity for meaningful interactions with vulnerable or high-priority residents

For housing leaders, Awaab’s Law Phase 2 is becoming as much as an operational and organisational challenge as a compliance one: requiring faster coordination, evidence and more proactive resident engagement at scale. Many providers we’ve spoken to are assessing how technology can help create a more responsive, preventative and data-informed housing service that reduces risks while improving outcomes for residents.

In due course, Awaab’s Law could be a practice across all housing to protect all residents. With Awaab’s Law Phase 3 to follow in October 2027, now more than ever is the time for trialing new tools to harness greater organisational efficiency and play a bigger part in keeping communities safe and in homes they are happy to live in. The landlords who succeed under Awaab’s Law won’t simply react faster, they’ll build more proactive, connected and accountable housing services.

If you are interested in learning more about how we can help you and your organisation meet the new requirements of Awaab’s Law, contact a member of our team today for support on how leveraging technology can help.