Custom software and workflow automation for service businesses

Who this is for

Businesses where the work is good but the back office runs on re-typing. Hours collected by text and entered into payroll by hand. Bookings copied from one system into a calendar and a spreadsheet. Invoices that wait for someone to remember. Reports assembled every Monday from four different places.

The common thread is that people are doing, by hand, work that a system could do reliably. Usually the business has already tried a general-purpose tool and found it almost fits.

What we build

Purpose-built tools. Small applications that do one job well and work on a phone, because that is where your crew is. A crew time clock with PIN sign-in that exports straight to payroll. A scheduling board that replaces a group chat. An intake form whose answers land where they are needed with nothing re-typed.

Ready-made tools, configured for you. Some problems come up in business after business, so we build the solution once and configure it for each client rather than starting from scratch. A financial dashboard that pulls your numbers into one view, set up around the metrics your business actually runs on, is the kind of thing we mean. You get something proven, faster and at lower cost than a bespoke build, and it keeps improving across every business that uses it.

Integrations between the tools you already have. Your booking system, accounting software, calendar, payroll, and email can usually talk to each other. We make them. When a booking comes in, the calendar entry, the invoice, and the confirmation happen on their own.

Automation of the weekly grind. Reports that build themselves. Reminders that go out on schedule. Data that flows from where it is captured to where it is needed without a person in the middle.

We favour boring, well-supported technology over clever technology, and we build on hosted platforms so there is nothing to install on your side.

What you get

• Working software your team actually uses, tested with the people who will use it
• Documentation written for your team, not for developers
• Training for a named person on your side, so you are not dependent on us to operate it
• A clear answer to "who runs it and who fixes it," agreed before we start

How it runs

We start by agreeing exactly what the tool does, what it does not do, and what "done" looks like. You see working versions early and we adjust based on real use rather than a specification. The people who will use it try it in their real week, and what confuses them gets changed. Then we hand over with documentation and training.

How it is run afterwards is your choice. We can set up hosting in your name and hand you the keys, or you can keep us on a retainer and we handle hosting, maintenance, and updates. Ready-made tools can work either way too. Scope, price, and the hosting arrangement are all agreed in writing once we have talked through what you need.

What this is not

We do not take on long-running software projects with open-ended budgets. If what you need is a large platform built from the ground up, we will tell you and point you to the kind of firm that does that well. We also do not recommend a custom build when a well-configured existing tool, ours or someone else's, would do the same job; that is the cheaper answer, and it is the one you will get when it is true.

Questions people ask

Who owns the software? Your data is always yours, and you can export it at any time. Custom builds are yours to keep, whether you run them on your own hosting or leave them with us on a retainer. Ready-made tools are licensed as a supported product, with the same export guarantee.

What happens if you disappear? Everything is documented, built on mainstream platforms, and handed over to a named person on your team. Hosting can be moved into your name, another competent developer could pick up a custom build, and your data exports in standard formats. We design for that on purpose.

Can you work with the software we already have? Almost always. Most modern tools have ways to connect to other tools. The exceptions are old desktop-only systems, and even those usually have an export.