At a Glance
- Tasks: Help residents manage rent and overcome financial challenges while ensuring essential housing services.
- Company: Join the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea Council, dedicated to community support.
- Benefits: Competitive salary, supportive team, and opportunities for professional development.
- Other info: Dynamic role with a focus on community impact and career growth.
- Why this job: Make a real difference in residents' lives while managing your own caseload.
- Qualifications: Experience in income recovery and excellent communication skills required.
The predicted salary is between 27522 - 33638 £ per year.
Help residents manage their rent, overcome financial challenges and keep essential housing services moving forward. As an Income Officer, you'll support residents to resolve financial challenges, sustain their tenancies and recover the income that powers essential services across our borough.
Working Style
You'll be based in the Borough for three days a week, playing a key role in serving the local community. Whether you're working in the office, remotely or out meeting residents in the field, you'll be part of a dedicated team making a real difference to residents' lives.
What you'll be doing
Your focus will be taking ownership of a caseload of rent accounts, collecting accommodation charges and taking proactive action to manage arrears. Your day will involve regular contact with residents by letter, telephone and home visits, taking time to understand the root causes of non-payment, agreeing practical payment arrangements and guiding people to access welfare benefits or financial support so they can sustain their homes. Alongside day-to-day account management, you'll manage complex cases in close partnership with our Legal, Benefits and Housing Needs teams. Where necessary, you'll issue notices, prepare possession cases, attend court and oversee eviction proceedings with care and professionalism. You'll also contribute directly to service initiatives aimed at improving income collection and refining processes following a recent cyber incident, ensuring high standards of customer care, clear record-keeping and compliance with Council policies.
What you’ll bring
You’ll bring experience in income recovery, rent arrears management or Housing Benefit recovery. You have a practical understanding of public sector housing issues, homelessness agendas and welfare reform. You're an excellent communicator who can balance empathy with firmness when handling difficult financial conversations. You bring strong negotiation and record-keeping skills, with the confidence to manage a demanding workload independently, write clear reports and use finance and IT systems accurately. Most importantly, you’re someone who demonstrates our core values in every interaction - Putting Communities First, Respect, Integrity and Working Together - and who brings a calm, supportive approach to helping residents sustain their tenancies.
Why join us
At RBKC, we’re all in - investing in our people, our communities and our future. You’ll join a friendly, collaborative and supportive team where colleagues look out for one another to achieve the best outcomes for residents. This role offers a rewarding balance between income recovery and tenancy sustainment, giving you full ownership of your caseload while contributing directly to service improvements. We will invest in your development, offering opportunities to broaden your expertise across public sector housing, legal processes and welfare benefits. You’ll also receive a competitive salary alongside the support of a dedicated team that takes pride in delivering quality services for our community.
About us
Kensington and Chelsea is home to diverse communities, thriving businesses and unique local places. Everything we do is focused on supporting our residents, strengthening our approach and creating a fairer borough. As a competent and caring Council, we take pride in our work every day, ensuring our services are delivered with care and competence. We listen to our residents, act with integrity and work together to build a borough that is greener, safer and fairer for all. In this role, you’ll bring a real sense of care and commitment to supporting residents while safeguarding Council income. Navigating complex cases and helping our team reduce arrears following a recent cyber incident isn’t always smooth sailing, but your efforts will play a vital part in keeping essential housing services running and making a positive impact on our community every day.
Interview Details and role requirements
Interviews will be held week commencing 7th September at Kensington Town Hall. This role will require a standard DBS.
Other details
We reserve the right to extend or close this vacancy early without warning subject to the volume of suitable applicants. We are committed to promoting equality and respecting diversity and welcome applications from all sections of the community. We are a Disability Confident Employer - committed to ensuring that our recruitment and selection process is inclusive and accessible. We are committed to fair, transparent, and consistent pay practices. New hires will start at the minimum of the advertised salary range. Employees receive annual salary increases until they reach the top of the pay scale. In addition, employees will receive any agreed cost of living pay rises.
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