Job title: Homelessness Data Analyst
The HL1 Upload System
Andrew designed and built the IT system used to handle the revised homelessness HL1 data. The system now in use processes around 50,000 new cases per year from all 32 local authorities in Scotland. It also provides data validation checks and performance management reports. The key advantages of the new system are:
- ■ Data from multiple local authorities can be loaded simultaneously.
- ■ Processing time for data is significantly reduced. Errors in the data can be reported to authorities on the same day that the data has been submitted. For the largest local authority, load time is reduced from a weekend to around 10 minutes.
- ■ Comprehensive reports automatically produced so that local authorities can understand the data they have submitted.
- ■ Cost savings to local authorities , one central analytical system instead of 32 individual systems.
- ■ Greater automation of the HL1 data upload procedure, reducing human error and time spent on associated tasks such as emailing and producing error reports on the data.
The core of the system was written in SAS with a visual basic interface.
Andrew developed the Waugh Model to advise Scottish Ministers on the impact of the abolition of the priority need test across all 32 local authorities. The work influenced the Affordable Housing Investment Programme 2009-10 . Read more about the Waugh Model.
