Following the publication of the Housing Corporation's Design and Quality Standards and Strategy (April 2007), Housing Quality Indicators (HQI's) have been revised to incorporate the design standards that are required of affordable housing providers receiving grant through the National Affordable Housing Programme 2008-11.  Please see the revised HQI's v4.

HQI assessments are required to be undertaken at various stages of developments and aid the Corporation to evaluate, compare and monitor the quality of housing developed. HQI assessments are recorded within a module of the Corporation's Investment Management System (IMS).

In order to assist our Investment Partners and relevant consultants in completing HQI assessments we have developed a HQI calculator. This is a self contained Excel spreadsheet and has been developed to be used as a stand-alone evaluation tool, and will not require IMS security assess. It should be noted that the calculator provides an indicative score, is not linked to IMS, and does not replace the full HQI v4 system. HQI assessments have to be completed through IMS prior to funding draw-down from the Housing Corporation.

We recommend that you right click on the file and then select 'Save Link As...' or 'Save Target As...' in order to save a copy to your computer and then open it.

If you have any difficulties with the file, please email our enquiries team - enquiries@housingcorp.gsx.gov.uk.

Any queries regarding the operation of the calculator should be sent to tom.lloyd-smith@housingcorp.gsx.gov.uk

Q & As - Last Update 16/09/08

Issue
The Spreadsheet does not allow the sections on Sustainability and/or Accessibility to be fully completed.

Resolution
Macros must be 'enabled' to allow the spreadsheet to function fully. Adjust security settings to "Medium" or "Low".

Macros have been enabled but the spreadsheet still does not allow sections on Sustainability and/or Accessibility to be completed.

If Macros are enabled after values have been inputted to boxes where the macro should be triggered the macro will not have run. Select another option (e.g. EcoHomes if you are looking to do a Code assessment under the sustainability tab, or "No" for Question 8.3.1 under the accessibility tab) and then reselect the correct option.

Input for schemes greater than 30 units for 6.1.1 - 6.1.12 - unit layout is not provided for.

An updated version made available, which resolves this issue was published on 05/10/07. Please ensure that you are using the latest version.

Problems experienced when trying to use the spreadsheet with Apple Macs.

There are compatibility issues when using the HQI spreadsheet with Macs. We do not have a specific Mac version and therefore Mac users should negotiate access to IMS (either as an investment partner or a consultant) and use the primary tool for undertaking HQI assessments in IMS.

There are no NA options provided in section 8 - Accessibility.
 
An updated version made available, which resolves this issue was published on 04/03/2008. Please ensure that you are using the latest version. Further information on this standard can be found at www.lifetimehomes.org.uk 

Question 7.4.1 in the spreadsheet should read "Hot water taps to fittings to have a thermostatically controlled supply" as per the HQI v4 document.

An updated version made available, with the correct wording on 25/10/07. Please ensure that you are using the latest version.

An updated version of the HQI calculator (HQI Calculator (updated Sept 08), below) was published on 16/09/08. Updates are based on comments received since the publication of the original version of the calculator, to mirror changes made in the IMS version of the HQI tool designed to improve the quality of the data generated, and to clarify areas of ambiguity. This updated calculator provides additional flexibility and clarity but the scoring within the calculator itself has not changed.