Natalie Eze

Calderbrook Housing Group / BB-Demo – Renewal

Callcompleted

Calderbrook Housing Group: documents logo Calderbrook Housing Group: documents · 2025-06-20 11:00

Helen Marsden said the board pack arrears and repairs figures did not reconcile, and that IT is scoping an in-house build. She tied the renewal to whether the figures hold. About ten of forty licences are active.

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What was said

What this says

Current to 11 Oct 26

Helen Marsden said the board pack arrears and repairs figures did not reconcile, and that IT is scoping an in-house build. She tied the renewal to whether the figures hold. About ten of forty licences are active.

What happened: Helen said the arrears and repairs sections of the board pack differed from the housing management system. Natalie Eze put forward a day-behind refresh as a hypothesis and promised side-by-side reconciliations.

Customer view: Helen disclosed that IT is scoping an in-house build on the group's own data platform. She said it is not her plan, and asked BB-Demo not to go over anyone's head.

Commercial: Helen is on Growth with forty licences and about ten active users. Tom Ashdown quoted the price from memory and promised to confirm it against the executed order form, with 11 Aug 2025 as a target for the paperwork.

Watch: Most questions come from Helen's team, a key-person risk. She wants the figures to reconcile before anything else.

AI · claude-sonnet-5-5 · 11 Oct 2026

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Themes

Current to 9 Oct 26
Theme
Figures dispute, in-house threat
Importance
renewal
Sentiment
mixed
Voice
champion
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Who was there

BB-Demo

CRMmade from

Them

CRMmade from

Follow-up

Next steps

Current to 9 Oct 26
  • Natalie Eze sends the arrears reconciliation by the middle of the following week and the repairs one by the end of that week.
  • Tom Ashdown sends the executed order form copy and a renewal note, confirming price and licences against it.
  • Natalie drafts the value summary and offers a training session for the repairs and complaints teams.
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Risks

Current to 9 Oct 26
  • IT is scoping an in-house build and will ask what Calderbrook pays and what it gets.
  • Only about ten of forty Growth licences are active, with most questions from Helen's own team.
  • Two high priority tickets were answered with explanations rather than figures, and the second answer was slow.
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Opportunities

Current to 9 Oct 26
  • Training for the repairs and complaints teams could widen use beyond the BI team.
  • A one-page value summary with every figure sourced gives Helen evidence to take to IT.
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Transcript

  1. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Morning, Helen. Can you hear me alright? I've had the headset on the wrong input all week, so shout if I sound like I'm in a tin.
  2. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    You sound fine. Good morning, Tom. Is Natalie joining us?
  3. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    I'm here, morning both. Sorry, I was hunting for the right window. Can you both hear me?
  4. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Yes, thank you.
  5. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Grand. How's your week been, Helen? It's Friday, so I'm hoping you're nearly out the door.
  6. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Not quite. It's been a week of chasing figures, to be honest. The board pack is in draft and the arrears section still doesn't reconcile to the housing management system, which is really why I wanted the two of you on this call together.
  7. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Right, no, that's fair enough. And we'll get into it, I promise. Natalie and I just wanted to frame the call, because the renewal's coming up at the start of September and I'd rather we talked about it properly now than in a rush in August. No drama, but let's make sure we've got it right.
  8. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    I appreciate that. But I'd like to be clear that I can't talk about the renewal in isolation. If the numbers going to the board are wrong, then the renewal is really a conversation about whether this is working.
  9. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    That's completely reasonable, Helen. Why don't you tell us what you're seeing, and we'll go from there. Which section is it?
  10. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    The arrears section of the board pack. The count of households in arrears from the brain is different from the figure that comes out of the housing management system. Not wildly, but it's different, and the board will ask. They always ask. Last quarter one of the trustees went through that table line by line.
  11. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Mm. And that's the one that came through on the two tickets last month, is that right? The two high priority ones.
  12. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Yes. One was the arrears count and one was the repairs section, where the open jobs didn't match what the repairs team were telling me. Both got answers, but the answers didn't give me the figures, they gave me an explanation.
  13. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Okay. I've read both of them and I'll be honest with you, I don't think the replies were good enough. You asked for numbers and you were told about timing.
  14. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    That's it exactly. I can accept that there may be a timing difference. What I can't do is put timing difference in front of the board without the figures that sit behind it. Can you show me the source?
  15. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Yes, I can. Let me share my screen and walk you through what we think is happening, and then I'll be straight about what we don't yet know.
  16. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Please.
  17. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    While Natalie's pulling that up, Helen, can I just say, if there's anything on our side that's been slow, that's on us. I'd rather hear it from you on a call than find out in a renewal email.
  18. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    I'm telling you now, Tom. It's been slow. Not the first response, that was fine. It was the second answer.
  19. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Fair. Noted.
  20. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Right, can you see that? That's the arrears table as the brain holds it, with the housing system extract next to it. So on the left, the brain's count, and on the right, what came out of the housing system on the day you pulled it.
  21. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    I can see it. Those are different. Which day is that?
  22. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    That's the day you raised the first ticket. And what I think I'm seeing, and I want to be careful here, is that the extract from the housing system was taken after our nightly refresh had finished, so on that morning the brain was holding the previous day's position. The difference would be a day of movement, which on arrears is what I'd expect.
  23. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    So you're saying it's a day behind.
  24. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    I'm saying that's what it looks like, and I haven't proved it yet. I want to run it line by line against the extract, not just wave at it. If it's a day of movement, I can show you by rolling the brain's position forward, and it should land on your number.
  25. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    That's what I need. In the pack, the arrears section is the one the trustees go to first. If I tell them it's a day behind and then it turns out to be something else, my team's credibility goes with it.
  26. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Which is why we don't say it until it's proved. Natalie, how long would that take?
  27. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    I can do the arrears one by the middle of next week. The repairs one is more fiddly, because the job statuses are mapped differently between the two systems, so I'd like a bit longer on that. Say the end of next week for both.
  28. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    The first draft of the pack goes out before then, but the final version is later, so the end of next week works. Just not later than that.
  29. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Understood. I'll write it up as a short note with the figures side by side, so you can lift it straight into the pack if you need to.
  30. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Thank you. That's helpful.
  31. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Good. Can I ask something a bit different, Helen? Because I think there's a bigger conversation sitting behind the tickets.
  32. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Go on.
  33. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    When we first spoke, you said the brain was the thing that finally got the tenant calls, the repairs tickets and the complaints into one picture. Is that still how it's seen at Calderbrook? Because I'm getting a sense that something's shifted, and I'd rather you just said.
  34. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Right. Yes. I should say this plainly, because I don't want you hearing it second-hand. There's a piece of work going on in IT, looking at whether we build something in-house on the group's own data platform. It's not my plan. I want to be clear about that. I was asked to give input on what it would need to do, and I've done that, honestly, because that's my job.
  35. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Okay. I appreciate you telling us. Really. And no drama from our side, it's a perfectly reasonable thing for a group your size to look at.
  36. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    I'm not saying it's decided. I'm saying it's being scoped, and the people scoping it will ask what we pay and what we get.
  37. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Which is a fair question, and one we should be able to answer. What would they be comparing, do you know? The brain itself, or what your team does with it?
  38. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Mostly what we get out of it. The board-ready picture. And, if I'm honest, how many people use it, because that comes up too.
  39. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Right. So the forty licences against how many are actually active.
  40. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Yes. I know it's about ten of us. I've seen the usage. I'm not going to pretend it's more.
  41. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    It's about ten active people on average, and it's been steady, a touch up on the quarter rather than down. But you're right, that's about a quarter of the licences. I'd rather say that out loud than have someone find it in a spreadsheet.
  42. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Thank you. That's the sort of directness I appreciate.
  43. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    And that's something we can do something about, whichever way it goes. Can I be careful, though? I'll talk about the contract in general terms, and anything specific I'll confirm against the order form, because I don't want to quote you something from memory.
  44. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Understood.
  45. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    So you're on Growth, forty users, and as I remember it the order form has you at £44k a year. I'll check that against the executed copy and send it over so it's in writing. The renewal's due at the start of September, and what we'd normally do is have the paperwork settled well ahead. I've got 11 Aug 2025 in my diary as the target, but that's a target, not a deadline you've agreed to.
  46. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Can I ask a direct question? If we only needed fewer people on it, is that even possible?
  47. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    I'd have to look at what the options are, and I'll leave that with me so I don't guess. What I'd want to avoid is you paying for something that sits on a shelf and resenting it. What I'd rather do is look at whether the other teams, the repairs people and the complaints people, should be using it more.
  48. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    They've had access. They don't use it. They ask my team, and my team ask the brain. Which is probably why it's ten.
  49. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    That's actually useful to know. It means the questions are being asked, just by a small group. Which is a value story and a risk, because if two or three of you were away it would go quiet.
  50. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Yes. I've thought about that. I built the team, and most of the questions come from us.
  51. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    So one thing I'd suggest is a short training session for the repairs and complaints teams, on their own data, so they can ask directly. I'd run it myself. Do you think that would land, or is it a bad time given the in-house piece?
  52. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    It's not a bad time. If anything it's a good one, because if the repairs team can show they use it, that's evidence. But I can't promise it changes anything upstairs.
  53. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Understood. I'm not asking for a promise.
  54. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Can I ask who's making the call on the in-house work, so we know who we ought to be useful to? I don't mean go over anyone's head.
  55. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    I'd rather you didn't go over anyone's head, to be honest. A colleague in IT is leading the scoping, and there'll be a steering group. I'll tell you when I know more. I'd rather be the one who brings it back to you.
  56. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    That's fair. Leave that with me, then. We won't go anywhere near them unless you say.
  57. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Thank you.
  58. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Can we go back to repairs for a minute? I've still got the screen up.
  59. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Please. The open jobs count is the one the board will ask about.
  60. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    So the housing system treats a job as closed when the contractor marks it complete, and I think the brain is reading closed from a later signed-off status. That would leave some jobs showing as open in ours for a few days longer. That's a hypothesis, and I'll check it before I say it again.
  61. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    That would make the open count higher in the brain than in the housing system. Which is the way round I'd prefer to be wrong, but I'd still like it fixed.
  62. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Agreed. If that's the cause, then it's a mapping change, and I'll tell you before I touch anything, because it will move your historic figures and I know you'll want to be able to say that to the board.
  63. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Yes. Please don't change a number in the pack's history without telling me. That's the thing I couldn't bear.
  64. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Understood. Nothing moves without you saying so.
  65. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Coming back to the renewal, so we're not leaving it vague. Here's what I'd suggest. Natalie gets you the reconciliation by the end of next week. I send you a copy of the order form and a note on the renewal options, no pressure, ahead of that target. And we find a time in the diary for the three of us once your steering group has met. Let's get something in the diary.
  66. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    I'm not sure the steering group will have met by then, so I may not have anything for you. But I'll take the paperwork, and I'll tell the people in IT it's in hand.
  67. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    No drama. You don't need to decide anything today.
  68. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    I wasn't going to.
  69. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Can I say one more thing on value, Helen? I'd like to put together a one-page summary of what the brain has been used for since you joined, so whoever's comparing options has something concrete in front of them, whatever they decide.
  70. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Yes. With the questions by team, and the board-pack sections it's fed. And each figure with its source, please. If it's going to IT, they'll ask the same thing I do.
  71. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Of course. Every figure with its source.
  72. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Then it's something I can take upstairs, whatever happens.
  73. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Whatever happens, we want you to have what you need. It's been a good relationship and I'd like to keep it that way.
  74. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    I'd like the figures to reconcile first, Tom.
  75. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Fair point. Fair point. Message received.
  76. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Let me read back what I've got so we're all agreed. I'll send the arrears reconciliation by the middle of next week and the repairs one by the end of next week, side by side with the housing system figures. I'll tell you before any mapping change that moves history. I'll draft the value summary, and I'll look at a training session for the repairs and complaints teams.
  77. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    And I'll send the order form copy and the renewal note, and I'll confirm the price and the licence position against the executed copy rather than going from memory.
  78. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    That's right. And I'll let you know what comes out of the IT scoping as soon as I'm able to. I'll be honest with you both, it's an uncomfortable position, but I'd rather you heard it from me.
  79. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    We appreciate that, Helen. Genuinely.
  80. Tom Ashdown
    Tom Ashdown None
    Cheers, Helen. Have a good weekend, what's left of it.
  81. Helen Marsden
    Helen Marsden None
    Thank you both. Speak soon.
  82. Natalie Eze
    Natalie Eze None
    Bye for now.
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