Custom Software

Is this you?

• Your real operating system is a spreadsheet, and only one person understands it.
• You pay for software that does 60% of the job and you work around the rest.
• Staff retype the same data into two systems.
• Growth is capped by how many things a person has to remember.

If more than one of those is true, the problem is usually the system around the work rather than the people doing it.

What we build

Internal business systems, operations platforms, admin dashboards, client portals and workflow tools. Typically for companies who have outgrown spreadsheets and found that a generic product forces them to change a process that was working.

How we scope it

We map the current process first — including the parts that only exist in someone’s head — then design the smallest system that removes the most friction. It ships in stages, so value arrives before the final milestone.

Custom is the right answer less often than vendors admit

Most operational problems are better solved with configured off-the-shelf software than with a custom build. Custom earns its cost in one situation: the process is how you compete, and no product models it without forcing you to change it.

We will tell you which situation you are in before you commit a budget, and we have talked clients out of builds that would have been profitable for us.

What we build

• Internal operations platforms — jobs, scheduling, resources, approvals
• Admin dashboards and reporting over data that currently lives in spreadsheets
• Client portals — statements, documents, requests, status
• Quoting, pricing and configuration tools with your rules encoded
• Compliance and audit systems where a record of who did what matters
• Integration layers that make existing systems behave as one

Built so it can be handed over

Software that only its author can maintain is a liability dressed as an asset. We build with conventional frameworks, document decisions, write tests around the logic that matters, and hand over a repository another competent team could take on.

That is deliberate. You should be able to leave.

Replacing a spreadsheet without losing the business in it

The spreadsheet usually encodes years of hard-won rules, exceptions and workarounds. We read it properly before replacing it, because the exceptions are normally the business, not the mess.

How the work runs

01 — Discovery

We sit with the people doing the work and map what actually happens, not what the process document says happens.

02 — Decision

A written recommendation: build, configure something existing, or integrate what you have. With costs for each.

03 — Phase one

The narrowest slice that replaces something real. In production, in use, usually inside six to ten weeks.

04 — Iteration

Two-week cycles against a prioritised backlog you control.

05 — Handover

Documentation, admin training, and the repository.

What it costs

Custom software is quoted by phase, not as one number, because a single number for a system nobody has used yet is a guess with a decimal point. Phase one is fixed price against a fixed scope; later phases are quoted as the backlog firms up.

What moves the number

• Number of distinct user roles and what each can see
• How much existing data has to be migrated and cleaned
• Integrations with systems you already run
• Whether the rules are documented or have to be excavated
• Audit, permissions and compliance requirements
• Hosting and support once it is live

Every proposal is a fixed price against a written scope. We do not quote by the hour for work we have specified.

What's included

• Internal business systems
• Custom management platforms
• Operations and workflow software
• Admin dashboards and reporting
• Client and partner portals
• Role-based access control
• Data migration from existing tools
• Documentation and team training

Common questions