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Repair reporting for student letting agents

Student houses aren't like other lets. Five or six people share one kitchen, one bathroom and one boiler. When something breaks you might get five messages about the same fault, or none at all because everyone thought someone else had reported it. Hauz is a WhatsApp assistant built for exactly this.

Why repairs in shared houses are hard

Lots of tenants, lots of channels. Calls, texts, emails and messages to the landlord, often about the same problem.
Vague first reports. "The shower's broken" doesn't say which house, which bathroom or since when.
Tricky access. Lectures, shifts and weekends away mean nobody's sure who's in, or whether a contractor can use a key.
Turnover every summer. Void works and inspections pile up before new tenants arrive in September.
International tenants. English may not be their first language, so details get lost.
Records to keep. Accreditation schemes like Snug in Sheffield and Unipol expect repairs to be handled within set times, and you need to show what happened when.

How Hauz handles a repair

The tenant messages one WhatsApp number. No app, no login, no portal password.
Hauz replies straight away and asks what you would: the address, the room, what's wrong, a photo, when someone's in and whether a contractor can use a key.
It sorts the job as Emergency, Urgent or Routine. For a gas smell, flooding or a home that can't be locked, it gives the tenant safety advice first and flags the job immediately.
Your team gets one clear ticket on the dashboard, with the property, room, photos, access notes, the full conversation and a note on who to call.

Room-level detail, not just the address

In a shared house "the bathroom" might mean one of three. Hauz asks which room, such as "top-floor bathroom" or "bedroom 4", so the contractor goes to the right place first time and you know who's affected.

From report to done

Assign a contractor with their name and number, then send them a private job link. They don't need a login. The link shows the address, room, problem, photos and access notes, but never the tenant's phone number or the conversation. The contractor adds before and after photos and taps "Mark job done". You check the photos and close the job. Tenants get a WhatsApp update when the job is assigned and when it's done.

Jobs you find yourself

Spotted something on an inspection, or took a phone call? Add the job from your phone with photos. It sits in the same list as the WhatsApp reports, tagged with where it came from, so nothing lives in a notebook or an inbox.

Every step is time-stamped

Each message, photo and status change is saved with the time. You can show what was reported, when you acted and when it was fixed. That helps with accreditation, and with the record keeping that Awaab's Law is planned to bring to private renting.

Simple to start

Hauz costs £50 a month plus £1 per property, with no setup fee, and the first month is free. We set up your number and add your properties for you. Letting in Sheffield? See Hauz for Sheffield letting agents, or read the full pricing.