Social housing asset management glossary

A plain-English reference for the terms that recur across stock condition surveys, compliance and asset management. Where a term has a precise statutory meaning, treat this as an explanation, not a legal definition.

UPRN

Unique Property Reference Number — the stable, official identifier for an addressable location in Great Britain. The anchor key for joining property data across systems.

Stock condition survey (SCS)

A structured inspection of a property's components and condition, used to plan investment and evidence decency and safety.

HHSRS

Housing Health and Safety Rating System — the risk-based approach under the Housing Act 2004 for assessing hazards in residential property.

Category 1 / Category 2 hazard

HHSRS hazard severity bands. Category 1 hazards are the more serious; landlords have a duty to act on them. Category 2 are less serious but may still warrant action.

Decent Homes Standard

The minimum standard social homes are expected to meet — covering the statutory minimum (hazards), state of repair, modern facilities, and thermal comfort.

Awaab's Law

Provisions requiring social landlords to investigate and act on certain hazards, notably damp and mould, within prescribed timescales, with proper records and resident communication.

Compliance denominator

The count of properties a programme applies to. A controlled denominator treats 'unknown' applicability as an exception rather than assuming compliance.

TSM

Tenant Satisfaction Measures — a set of measures social landlords report to the Regulator of Social Housing covering quality, safety and service.

SOR

Schedule of Rates — standardised codes and prices for repair tasks, used to cost and analyse repairs activity.

Void

An empty property between tenancies. Void management covers inspection, works, compliance checks and re-let readiness.

Maker-checker / QA gate

A control where work captured by one person (the maker) must be accepted by an independent reviewer (the checker) before it updates the live record.

No silent overwrite

A conflict-control principle: if the master record changed since a device pre-loaded it, the field update is blocked and logged rather than overwriting the master.

Snapshot vs live record

A survey is a point-in-time snapshot. It only updates the durable, live asset record after it is QA-accepted — keeping history distinct from current state.

Required-vs-observed

A capture rule where an expected answer (e.g. a working CO alarm) that is not observed prompts the surveyor to raise a linked issue.

PWA

Progressive Web App — an installable, offline-capable web application that runs from the home screen with no app-store distribution.

Effective dating

Recording when a fact became true, so the asset record can be reported 'as at' any past date — essential for stock movement and assurance.