Minister for Housing Premila Kumar [Left]

The Housing Authority will soon merge with the Public Rental Board.

Minister for Housing Premila Kumar highlighted this in parliament as part of the ministry’s reforms.

Kumar says the amalgamation will make services more effective and efficient.

“First the cost will come down, secondly certain activities which is being undertaken by the PRB is also being undertaken by Housing Authority so by merging those two things it means a huge reduction in the over-head cost.”

She says also part of the reforms is the digitization of services provided by Housing Authority.

“When people put in their application, it gets lost within the system, there is no proper tracking system, so by having a automated system, customers can track their application, they can pay online, and as i said earlier on they can check their balance and their families who live abroad want to help their relatives, they can also pay online.”

The Housing Authority has already signed a Memorandum of Understanding with relevant stakeholders for information sharing to help in the processing of all applications.