NHT wins inaugural public sector productivity competition

The National Housing Trust (NHT) was announced as the winner of the inaugural Public Sector Productivity Competition at a special awards ceremony on Friday 21 June.

The competition, organized by the Jamaica Productivity Center (JPC) with support from the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, aimed to encourage public bodies to implement innovative strategies to improve productivity and service delivery.

The NHT Special Assistance Program was selected as the competition project. The Special Assistance Program is intended to provide assistance to active NHT loan beneficiaries who, due to unforeseen circumstances, are unable to meet their monthly payment obligations but wish to retain their mortgaged property.

Dr Suzanne Wynter, general manager of loan management at NHT, said the team has made several improvements to the program to improve the overall customer experience.

“We have designed a model to identify the most appropriate special support option for a customer once the required information has been entered. This tool eliminates the need to conduct extensive manual analysis of a customer’s situation to identify the appropriate special support option,” said Dr Wynter. The initiatives implemented have been hailed as a welcome addition to the NHT customer experience. Senior General Manager of Customer Relationship Management, Dr Lanie Oakley-Williams, said the award reflects NHT’s overall, deliberate efforts to improve the delivery and awareness of customer service.

“We are committed to providing our customers with the best possible service, and this recognition from the Jamaica Productivity Centre is a testament to the hard work and dedication of our entire team. This win underscores our ongoing efforts to improve the customer experience through product reviews to make them more relevant to our customers’ needs, incorporating technology into key business processes, and continually training our staff,” said Dr. Oakley-Williams.

She also expressed gratitude to JPC for initiating the competition, which she said was a driving force for positive change in public sector bodies and other entities.

In 2022, NHT won three major awards at the Public Bodies Corporate Governance Awards and received the International Organization for Standardization certification, ISO certification, an internationally recognized quality management standard.