A platform which enables procurement officers from London boroughs to upload centrally procured properties to VESTA. VESTA completes checks of relevant safety certificates, inspections and fulfilment of Capital Letters criteria. Inline errors direct users to complete mandatory information and on successful upload of all details, automatically allocates the property to a borough-based on a set of applied logic. The logic combines a needs assessment against a needs target, financial viability, proximity and the workload of a borough.

On successful allocation to a borough, the boroughs are able to accept or reject the property and advise of occupied / unoccupied status. Notifications are shared with the relevant users, regarding the change of status of the property upon user actions. Financial liability for the properties are tracked and a property history is available for users to cross-reference. A snapshot of borough fulfilment of targets against needs is available on a dashboard view. More detailed reporting is provided via CSV exports for assessment.

Background

With the creation of the Homelessness Reduction Act of 2017, Local authorities were under pressure to intervene sooner when people are threatened with homelessness and to do more to help anyone without a home, not just those classified as a priority in need.
In response, a pan-London approach to jointly procure properties to improve the approach towards preventing homelessness and fulfilling local authorities statutory duty was initiated.
The key enabler of this was VESTA, a singular register of accommodation that allows greater visibility of accommodation across London.