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Sales at Persimmon fell in 2019 as the housebuilder took action to improve its build quality in the wake of damaging revelations about the quality and safety of its homes.

In a trading update for 2019 released to the City today, Persimmon said revenue in the year was 拢3.65bn, down 2.4% on 2018. This reflected 鈥渢he action being taken to ensure the group delivers improved levels of quality and service to its customers鈥�.

The fall included a decline of 3.5% in sales of new homes. It said the number of sales completed in the year decreased by nearly 600, to 15,855, down 4%.

Before Christmas the results of an independent review into Persimmon鈥檚 build quality were released, which revealed a 鈥渟ystemic nationwide problem鈥� on safety-critical build issues such as the installation of cavity fire-stops on timber-frame homes.

The company last year became the first housebuilder to introduce a customer retention scheme, and invested, in the first half of 2019, over 拢140m in additional work to improve build quality, and an additional 拢15m in annual quality and service costs.

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This week it told 好色先生TV that it was inspecting 500 homes per week to deal with the cavity barriers issue.

The business also revealed that Claire Thomas, a non-executive expert in human resources appointed to the board last spring as part of its drive to 鈥渂uild a new Persimmon鈥�, had resigned. Thomas, a veteran of GlaxoSmithKline, said her time on the board had 鈥渕ade clear to me my preference for working in a large-scale complex global business environment鈥� 鈥� hence her decision to leave.

Persimmon chair Roger Devlin said he was disappointed to see Thomas leave. Last April he said that the firm was 鈥漛uilding a new Persimmon with progressive changes being made to our customer care, governance and remuneration鈥�, and that Thomas鈥� appointment was part of the plan.

The independent review into Persimmon identified significant human resource failings at the business, including the lack of any system of performance review, and only limited staff training.

Persimmon said in today鈥檚 trading update that the business remained in a strong position to take advantage of the spring selling season, but gave no comment on trading in 2020 to date. Rival Vistry said this morning that consumer confidence was returning following the decisive election result.

Full results for the year will be released by Persimmon on February 27.