Heating and Ventilating

Rok, the property repair and maintenance specialist, reports that its response maintenance operations continue to perform well.
In its latest trading update, the board said 'The market for response services is largely unaffected by the current economic climate and we are continuing to gain new customers'.

It added:'Social housing improvement, where we are active on 38 frameworks across the UK, remains a strong market for us and we have a significant order book ahead for repair and maintenance work. Our plumbing, heating and electrical (PHE) businesses have been successfully integrated and we expect further opportunities in 2010 in this activity'.

However, Rok said the new build regional contracting market 'remains challenging and the expected cut backs in public sector capital spend will, we believe, serve to exacerbate this in 2010. Our decision to scale back these activities in 2009 is therefore enabling us to be more selective in the projects we undertake and, as a result, margins have held up relatively well'.

The board said social housing new build activity (where the company is active on 35 frameworks) recovered well after a slow start to the year. Rok continues to secure long term frameworks for new build social housing. Rok said its forward revenue visibility under secured orders and framework agreements is 'healthy' at £2.0bn (2008:£2.3bn).

Rok was recently appointed as the preferred service provider as part of the Inspiral Consortium on the Oldham Gateway's PFI project, expected to be worth £110m for new build, planned repairs and response maintenance over 25 years.