Framework published · Data collection in progress · No findings released yet
Emergency Accommodation Index
A recurring measurement of how UK emergency accommodation actually performs: how fast households are placed, what whole stays really cost, and how often placements hold.
Programme lead: Katie Richardson, Operations Director · Last reviewed June 2026
No synthetic data. This page publishes the framework only. Figures will appear here exclusively when genuine, aggregated operational evidence meets the sample requirements below. Public-source context is always attributed.
Scope & purpose
The Emergency Accommodation Index measures the operational reality of emergency placements across the UK — for housing providers, insurers, local authorities and the loss-adjusting community. It exists because the sector's most consequential decisions (who to contract, at what SLA, at what cost model) are routinely made without published operational evidence.
The Index covers placements triggered by property incidents (fire, flood, escape of water, unsafe conditions), statutory duties and safeguarding-driven relocations. It excludes planned business travel and event accommodation. Geography: England, Scotland and Wales, reported at national and regional level where sample thresholds allow.
Definitions
- Emergency placement
- A placement instructed with less than 72 hours between instruction and required occupancy, triggered by displacement from a permanent home.
- Instruction to first option
- Elapsed time from written or telephone instruction to the first suitable accommodation option presented to the buyer.
- Instruction to placement
- Elapsed time from instruction to the household in occupation.
- Whole-stay cost
- The complete cost of a displacement stay: nights × rate, plus meal allowances where applicable, re-placement costs and administrative charges — as distinct from the headline nightly rate.
- Placement breakdown
- A placement ended before the planned return date for suitability reasons (not works completion), requiring re-placement of the household.
- Suitability-matched placement
- A placement preceded by a documented household assessment covering composition, catchments, accessibility, pets and vulnerability.
Metrics to be published
| Metric | Measured as | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Median instruction-to-first-option time | Hours, by region and by incident type | Collecting |
| Median instruction-to-placement time | Hours, by region and by household size | Collecting |
| Hotel vs serviced apartment whole-stay economics | Indexed whole-stay cost by stay-length band | Collecting |
| Placement breakdown rate | Percentage of placements requiring re-placement, with cause coding | Collecting |
| Extension rate | Percentage of stays extended beyond the initial booking, and median extension length | Collecting |
| Out-of-hours share | Percentage of instructions received outside Mon–Fri 9–5 | Collecting |
Methodology & collection process
- 1
Source
Anonymised operational case records from Jigsaw-managed placements, captured in the normal course of delivery — no surveys, no self-reporting.
- 2
Aggregation
Records are aggregated to metric level before analysis. No household, client or property is identifiable in any published output.
- 3
Validation
Each quarterly extract is reconciled against invoicing and case-file records; outliers are verified against the source case before inclusion.
- 4
Public-source contextualisation
Findings are contextualised against official statistics (GOV.UK statutory homelessness returns, English Housing Survey) — always cited and never blended with operational data.
- 5
Review and sign-off
Each release is reviewed by the operations team for accuracy and by the editorial lead for methodology compliance before publication.
Sample requirements & update frequency
- No metric publishes with fewer than 100 qualifying placements in the reporting period.
- No regional breakdown publishes with fewer than 30 qualifying placements in that region.
- Cost metrics publish as indexed values or ranges — never as single averages that could misrepresent dispersion.
- Update frequency: quarterly, within 6 weeks of quarter end, with the sample size stated on every published figure.
- Methodology changes are versioned and disclosed alongside the affected release.
Jigsaw Operational Insights — coming soon
Findings will publish here, clearly labelled as Jigsaw operational data, once every threshold above is met. Until then, use the verified public sources listed on the research programme page for sector context.