New column on housing benefits kicks-off With our new column appearing regularly in OffBeat, we hope officers can find the answers to some of their most common queries concerning housing benefits," said Peggy Wong, Superintendent/Quarters/Personnel Services Branch. Headed by an Superintendent, the Police Quartering Division comprises five teams, each specialising in a particular area such as: matters relating to the maintenance and control of all departmental quarters, monitoring the supply and demand of quarters to ensure available resources are effectively and efficiently utilised. The implementation of Force policies as well as co-ordinating officers' applications under different types of housing schemes. "Our work covers the processing of applications for quarters, monitoring quarters in different regions as well as formulating policies such as parking facilities. We go out to see if there are any abuses of Police quarters and other housing benefits," Ms Wong said. Chief Superintendent (Personnel Services) Martin Samson, SP Peggy Wong and Quartering Division staff outside Chai Wan Junior Police Officers' married quarters "We are also responsible for co-ordinating officers' applications for the wide variety of housing benefits ranging from the Civil Service Public Housing Quota, the Home Financing Scheme, Home Purchase Scheme, Housing Loan Scheme as well as the Private Tenancy Allowance scheme and many others," she said. As requirements and application procedures for these schemes vary, officers might be confused and the Quartering Division ends up handling a tremendous number of enquiries each day. "Many of these queries are typical ones which I think should also be relevant to other officers in similar situations," Ms Wong said. "That's why we're going to have a regular column in coming issues of OffBeat to inform officers as to what housing benefits they're entitled to, how they should apply as well as the application procedures. Should officers have other queries after reading the column, they are most welcome to send in their questions by fax and we will provide an answer in the following issue." Subjects to be covered in the coming issues include quarters for married Junior Police Officers, Home Financing Scheme and Home Purchase Scheme. For general queries on Force housing benefits, please call Mr C.K. Lo at 2804-1430 and Mr Ken Lai at 2804-1427 for enquries on quarters for Inspectorate and above. << Back to Index >>