Calderbrook Housing Group / BB-Demo – Check In
Callcompleted
Calderbrook Housing Group: documents · 2026-05-12 16:45
Helen Marsden raised an arrears total that does not reconcile to the housing system, and said a new director is steering data onto an in-house Microsoft platform. Use has fallen and the renewal is on 2 Sep 2026.
What was said
What this says
Current to 11 Oct 26Helen Marsden raised an arrears total that does not reconcile to the housing system, and said a new director is steering data onto an in-house Microsoft platform. Use has fallen and the renewal is on 2 Sep 2026.
What happened: Helen Marsden opened with the brain's tenant arrears total not matching the housing system figure in section four of the board pack. Marcus Bell offered a ledger comparison for the last two month ends and did not promise a fix.
Customer view: Helen said daily active use is down and that some of her team were told to hold off building anything new in the brain. She said the new director of digital and data wants one in-house platform on the Microsoft estate.
Commercial: Contract end is 1 Sep 2026 and the renewal date is 2 Sep 2026. Tom Ashdown will want the exit position and the shortest commitment in writing.
Watch: Board reporting is not in the first phase of the in-house plan, which keeps the brain in place for now. Helen's bar is a pack that reconciles.
Themes
Current to 9 Oct 26Theme
In-house platform threat
Importance
renewal
Sentiment
mixed
Voice
champion
Who was there
BB-Demo
CRMmade from
Them
CRMmade from
Follow-up
Next steps
Current to 9 Oct 26- Marcus Bell to send the arrears and repairs comparison, the board pack view, a data ownership note, the user list and a definitions note by the end of the following week.
- Marcus to brief Tom Ashdown and book half an hour with Tom and, if willing, Helen's director.
Risks
Current to 9 Oct 26- The in-house platform plan could replace the Growth subscription at the 2 Sep 2026 renewal, and new building in the brain is already on hold.
- Daily active use is around four or five against 40 licensed users, and most questions come from Helen's team.
- The arrears and repairs totals do not reconcile to the housing system, which weakens trust in the board numbers.
Opportunities
Current to 9 Oct 26- Helen values the early dashboards and the board work, so a value case built around board pack sections gives Tom Ashdown something structured.
- A clean-up of unused logins and a note on where definitions sit would build goodwill whatever is decided.
Transcript
Marcus Bell NoneHi Helen, can you hear me alright? I've got you on screen but no sound for a second there.
Helen Marsden NoneYes, I can hear you now. Sorry, I've just come out of another meeting and I'm a minute or two behind myself.- Marcus Bell NoneNo bother at all. I've been back to back since lunchtime, so I'm glad of the breather. How's your week been?
- Helen Marsden NoneBusy. The board papers go out soon, so everything in my team is about reconciling at the moment. Which is partly why I wanted to start with something, if that's all right.
- Marcus Bell NoneOf course, go for it. I was only going to share my screen and run through usage. That can wait.
- Helen Marsden NoneThank you. It's the arrears figure in section four of the board pack. The total the brain gives me for current tenant arrears and the figure out of the housing management system don't reconcile. They're close, but they're not the same, and the board will ask which one is right.
- Marcus Bell NoneRight. And is the gap consistent, or does it move around?
- Helen Marsden NoneIt moves a bit. It was smaller in the last pack. That's what bothers me. If it were a fixed difference I could explain it away, but I can't explain a moving one.
- Marcus Bell NoneOkay. Mm. Have you got a sense of when the housing system report is cut?
- Helen Marsden NoneMonth end, the last working day. Our reporting team run it that evening.
- Marcus Bell NoneSo my first thought, and it is only a thought, is timing. The nightly refresh finishes early the next morning, so what the brain shows on the first of the month would include a night's postings that an evening report wouldn't. Could that be it?
- Helen Marsden NoneIt could. But I'd want to see it rather than assume it. Can you show me the source? Which table is the arrears figure read from, and when was it last loaded?
- Marcus Bell NoneFair. Give me a second, I'll share my screen. Right, can you see that?
- Helen Marsden NoneI can see the page list, yes.
- Marcus Bell NoneGood. So this is the arrears page your team built. If I open the source panel on the total, it tells you the connector, the object and the last load time. It's reading from the rent ledger, and the last load says early this morning, so it loaded overnight like it should.
- Helen Marsden NoneAnd is that the same ledger the housing system's report reads from?
- Marcus Bell NoneI believe so, but I don't want to say yes without checking with our data team. I can see our side. I can't see how your report team's extract is filtered.
- Helen Marsden NoneMm. That's the part I can't see either, to be honest. It's a report someone built a long time ago and nobody likes to touch it.
- Marcus Bell NoneThen here's what I'd suggest. I'll take the last two month ends, pull the ledger as it stood at each cut-off, and put it side by side with what you reported. If it's timing, it'll show. If it isn't, at least we know it isn't.
- Helen Marsden NoneThat would help. I'd want it split by section so I can set it against section four. And the repairs total, I think, has the same smell.
- Marcus Bell NoneArrears and repairs, okay. I'll be careful not to promise a fix, because if it turns out to be something in how a connector reads a field, that's an engineering conversation and I'd rather not give you a date I can't stand behind. But I can get you the comparison.
- Helen Marsden NoneThat's fair. I'd rather have an honest answer than a quick one.
- Marcus Bell NoneRight. Shall I carry on with usage, then? I've pulled the numbers.
- Helen Marsden NonePlease.
- Marcus Bell NoneSo, you're on Growth, forty licensed users. Over the last month the average number of people active in a day has been around four or five. That's down on the quarter before by more than a quarter, and I wanted to say so out loud rather than let it sit in a chart.
- Helen Marsden NoneYes. I thought it might be. I won't pretend otherwise.
- Marcus Bell NoneDo you mind if I ask what's behind it? I don't want to guess.
- Helen Marsden NoneNo, it's a fair question. Some of it is simple. A couple of my team have been pulled onto other work, so they're not in it day to day. The operations managers who used the repairs pages were never heavy users, they looked before their meetings. And some of it is, well. You'll know our new director of digital and data joined in November.
- Marcus Bell NoneI've seen his name on the account, yes.
- Helen Marsden NoneHe came with a clear mandate: bring our data onto one platform that we build and run ourselves, on the Microsoft estate. I want to be straight with you about that. It isn't something I proposed, and I won't pretend it was. But it's the direction, and it changes how people use things. A few of the team have been told to hold off building anything new in the brain.
- Marcus Bell NoneI appreciate you telling me straight, Helen. That's genuinely useful. Do you know the timeline?
- Helen Marsden NoneNot firmly. There's a plan and it's phased, and board reporting isn't in the first phase. That's what I keep saying. Until the in-house platform produces a pack that reconciles, I can't switch off the thing that does.
- Marcus Bell NoneThat makes sense. And it's why I'd like your arrears question properly sorted, whatever happens later.
- Helen Marsden NoneThank you.
- Marcus Bell NoneCan I show you a couple more things? Questions asked is the number I care about most. It's come down too, though not as sharply as people. And nearly all of it comes from your team, which tells me the value is in the BI work rather than wide use.
- Helen Marsden NoneThat's right. We use it to answer why a number has moved, usually the week before the board meets. The wider users came in more at the start.
- Marcus Bell NoneMm. And the dashboards your team built early on are still being opened, especially near board time.
- Helen Marsden NoneThey are. I'll be honest, those are what I'd miss.
- Marcus Bell NoneGood to know. On the plumbing: every connector is still loading, nothing flat that I can see, and records indexed are still growing. So the brain is current. It's just being asked less.
- Helen Marsden NoneThat's a fair summary.
- Marcus Bell NoneOne ticket in the last month, a how-to about a filter on one of the dashboards. Closed quickly, nothing urgent.
- Helen Marsden NoneThat was mine, actually. It was fine.
- Marcus Bell NoneAnd the invoices are all paid, nothing outstanding. I only mention it because it's a clean picture, no admin getting in the way.
- Helen Marsden NoneRight. Yes.
- Marcus Bell NoneCan we talk about September, then? Contract end is 1 Sep 2026 and the renewal date sits on 2 Sep 2026. I'll be sending the formal renewal notice in the next few weeks so it doesn't land as a surprise. The commercial side goes through Tom Ashdown, your account executive, so I'd want to bring him in.
- Helen Marsden NoneYes. I should tell you now that he'll want to be part of that conversation. He doesn't sign anything without looking at the exit position.
- Marcus Bell NoneThat's completely reasonable. What would he want to see? I'd rather bring it than have him ask twice.
- Helen Marsden NoneWhat happens to the data and the configuration if we stop. And what the shortest commitment would be. I don't want to put words in his mouth, he'd tell you himself.
- Marcus Bell NoneSure. What I can say is the brain runs inside your own Snowflake account, so the data is yours and stays there whatever you decide. The pages, the chat set-up and the connectors are what would stop. Tom can take your director through the contract detail, because that's his side, not mine.
- Helen Marsden NoneThat's useful. He'll want it written down, though.
- Marcus Bell NoneI'll put it in writing. Is there anything on the value side you'd want me to bring? If there's a renewal discussion I'd like it to rest on what the brain does for the board pack, not on a general pitch.
- Helen Marsden NoneThen show me board pack sections. Which sections of the pack are fed from the brain, and how many of the questions went to each. That's what I can take to him. He responds to structure.
- Marcus Bell NoneI can do that. Let me just note it down. Arrears, repairs, complaints, those first?
- Helen Marsden NoneYes, and the tenant calls section if you can. That one leans on the call transcripts more than the ledger.
- Marcus Bell NoneGot it. Another thing while I've got you: forty seats and a handful of people using them. If there are names that have moved on, I can tidy that up so you're not carrying logins you don't need.
- Helen Marsden NoneLet me think about that. I'd leave it until after the renewal conversation. But send me the list of who's logged in over the last quarter and I'll mark it up, it'd be useful either way.
- Marcus Bell NoneActually I can pull it up now, one moment. Right. So I can see your team, a few names from operations, and a handful of logins with no activity at all.
- Helen Marsden NoneMm. Can you scroll down a little? That name left us in the winter, I think. And these two, the repairs managers, I believe they've gone back to their own spreadsheets for the weekly numbers. I'd need to check the rest.
- Marcus Bell NoneThat's fine, I'll send the full list so you can mark it up properly. No changes from me until you say. So that's four things then: the arrears and repairs comparison, the board pack view, a note on data ownership, and the user list. Is that right?
- Helen Marsden NoneThat's right. I'd also like to understand one thing for myself, if it's not a bother. When the in-house platform is ready, what would the handover look like? Not for him. For my team.
- Marcus Bell NoneNot a bother at all. Honestly I'd want to think about it with Tom before I say too much. But the practical point is that your tables, your joins, your definitions of arrears, they live in your Snowflake, so a good chunk of the thinking your team has done is yours to keep. I can write down where those definitions sit so nothing's trapped in a page.
- Helen Marsden NoneThat would be a real help. It's the definitions I worry about. Someone will ask in a year why arrears is counted the way it is, and I'd like to be able to answer.
- Marcus Bell NoneThen I'll add that as a fifth, a short note on where definitions are held. Shall I say end of next week for all of it?
- Helen Marsden NoneEnd of next week is fine, provided the comparison is right rather than quick.
- Marcus Bell NoneUnderstood. Right rather than quick, I'll hold myself to that. And then shall we book half an hour with Tom and, if he's willing, your director? I'd suggest the week after the comparison lands, so there's something real on the table.
- Helen Marsden NoneHalf an hour is realistic. I'll ask him, but I can't promise he'll say yes. He may prefer to hear it from Tom directly.
- Marcus Bell NoneNo pressure. If it's easier I'll send Tom a note this evening so he has the background before he speaks to either of you.
- Helen Marsden NonePlease do. And tell him I mentioned the platform plan myself. I'd rather it came from me than from a usage chart.
- Marcus Bell NoneI will. And for what it's worth, the usage reads to me as a team doing a focused job, not a team that's lost interest.
- Helen Marsden NoneThank you. That's kind. It's not far off.
- Marcus Bell NoneAnything else before we finish? I've got the time.
- Helen Marsden NoneOnly the arrears. Section four. If you find it's the housing system and not the brain, I want to know that as much as the other way round.
- Marcus Bell NoneAbsolutely. Whichever way it falls, you'll have the figures.
- Helen Marsden NoneThen that's all. Thank you, Marcus.
- Marcus Bell NoneBefore you go, is it still grey in Leeds? It's been raining here since this morning.
- Helen Marsden NoneGrey and drizzling. I'll walk to the station and regret not bringing a coat.
- Marcus Bell NoneSame here. Right, I'll let you go. Thanks, Helen, speak soon.
- Helen Marsden NoneThank you, Marcus. Goodbye.
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