Merriott Lyle Distribution / BB-Demo – Proposal
Callcompleted
Merriott Lyle Distribution: documents · 2026-08-17 09:45
On 17 Aug 2026 Lewis Kerr walked the CFO and Head of Commercial Systems through a £4,548 expansion, co-termed to the renewal. Malcolm Ridgway challenged it against falling usage and wants evidence before signing.
What was said
What this says
Current to 11 Oct 26On 17 Aug 2026 Lewis Kerr walked the CFO and Head of Commercial Systems through a £4,548 expansion, co-termed to the renewal. Malcolm Ridgway challenged it against falling usage and wants evidence before signing.
What happened: On 17 Aug 2026 Lewis Kerr took Deepa Chauhan and Malcolm Ridgway through a £4,548 expansion proposal, total value with VAT on top and co-termed to the renewal. Lewis said it is not more seats.
Customer view: Malcolm, the CFO, set the price against 200 licensed users, mid-forties active and falling. Deepa gave three reasons: branch managers never got going, summer absence, and tickets that made people doubt the data was current.
Commercial: The proposal is an open item, not executed paper. The 14 Sep 2026 signing date was a target, and the evidence does not show whether it was met.
Watch: Question volume leans on a few people, a key-person risk Malcolm named. He wants ticket times, usage by team and a way to measure credit control impact before signing.
Themes
Current to 9 Oct 26Theme
Expansion proposal, adoption doubts
Importance
upsell
Sentiment
mixed
Voice
decision-maker
Who was there
BB-Demo
CRMmade from
Them
CRMmade from
Follow-up
Next steps
Current to 9 Oct 26- Lewis Kerr sends Malcolm Ridgway the written quote, the full schedule and the renewal clause on the day of the call.
- Amara Obi sends the ticket times against the Enterprise schedule and the usage by team.
- Deepa Chauhan sends Lewis the date of the next account-data review so Amara can attend.
Risks
Current to 9 Oct 26- The CFO reads a falling active-user count against £127,500 a year as poor value, so the proposal may slip or stall.
- Questions asked lean on a few people, a key-person risk that could take the value with them.
- Tickets about data currency have made some users doubt the numbers, and response times against the Enterprise schedule are still to be shown.
Opportunities
Current to 9 Oct 26- The £4,548 extension would give credit-control and key-account teams the same account view the branches have.
- An adoption plan with named owners per area could widen use beyond the current few askers.
Transcript
Lewis Kerr NoneMorning, Deepa. Can you hear me alright? I've got you on screen but I'm not getting any sound.
Deepa Chauhan NoneSorry, one second. Is that better? I had the headset on the wrong output again.- Lewis Kerr NoneMuch better. Morning. How was the weekend?
- Deepa Chauhan NoneQuiet, thankfully. I needed it. Malcolm's just joining, I can see him coming in on the other screen. He says the lift is out.
Malcolm Ridgway NoneMorning. Apologies. Four flights of stairs and I've got the lobby wifi. Can you both hear me?- Lewis Kerr NoneWe can, Malcolm, morning. Thanks for making the time. I know Monday mornings are never kind to a finance diary.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneThey are not. Right. What's changed since we last spoke?
- Lewis Kerr NoneFair question, and I'll answer it straight. On the contract, nothing. You're on Enterprise, you're on the order form you signed back in February 2025, and the invoices have all been paid on time. What's new is that Deepa asked me for a written proposal on the expansion, we've scoped it between us, and I want to use this call to confirm what you want to buy and by when. My notes say you'd like it signed by Monday 14 September 2026. Is that still right?
- Deepa Chauhan NoneThat's still the plan. The one thing I need from today is for Malcolm to see the shape of it, so it doesn't go round the houses in the next few weeks.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneAnd the cost of that is?
- Lewis Kerr None£4,548. That's the total value of the deal, and VAT is on top of it. I'll put the split between what's one-off and what recurs in the written quote, so nobody's guessing. It's co-termed to your renewal, so there's no new date for you to diarise.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneFour and a half thousand. That's small. Which makes me more suspicious, not less. What are we actually buying?
- Lewis Kerr NoneIt's the extension Deepa and I scoped a few weeks ago for the credit-control and key-account side, so those teams are working from the same account view the branches already have. I'd rather not describe it from memory, so the quote will list it line by line. What I will say now is that it isn't more seats. You have plenty of headroom there.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneHeadroom. Let's talk about that, because it's the bit that's bothering me. Deepa sent me the usage pack last week. We're licensed for two hundred users. How many are actually in there?
- Lewis Kerr NoneLet me be exact, because I don't want to round it in my favour. You're licensed for 200 users, at £127,500 a year. The thirty-day average of active users is in the mid-forties, and that's down by about a quarter on the previous quarter.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneA quarter down. So we pay £127,500 for 200 users, we use less than a quarter of them, the number is falling, and you'd like another £4,548.
- Lewis Kerr NonePut like that, yes, I understand why it reads badly. And I'd say you're right to put it like that.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneGo on then.
- Lewis Kerr NoneTwo things. First, I wouldn't sell you users, and I'm not. If this proposal were about seats I'd tell you to stop. Second, a falling active-user number tells me something is wrong with adoption, and it's not something I want to paper over with a quote. So I'd like Deepa to tell us what she's seeing on the ground, and then we decide whether the expansion still makes sense on the date we pencilled in.
- Deepa Chauhan NoneCan I come in there? Because I've been looking at this for a fortnight and I don't want it to become a blame question. Which account, which branch, that's what I keep asking myself.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneNobody's blaming anybody. I want to know the reason.
- Deepa Chauhan NoneRight. So, honestly, I don't have one single reason. I've got three things I'd put on the table. One, some of the branch managers never really got going. They were shown it once at the roadshow and they went back to the old spreadsheets. Two, it's been the summer, we've had people away, and the regional directors' reviews were thinner than usual. And three, we've had a few tickets recently that made people nervous about whether the numbers were current.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneTickets. How many?
- Deepa Chauhan NoneThree in the last month. Two of them were marked high priority.
- Lewis Kerr NoneI've seen them. Amara owns those on our side, as your customer success manager, and I'm not going to speak for her on the detail. What I can say is that they're being worked and I'll make sure she's on the next conversation, because I'd rather you heard the root cause from the person who has it.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneWere we inside the response times in the contract?
- Lewis Kerr NoneI don't want to answer that from memory. Enterprise has its own first-response commitment, and the timestamps decide it, not anybody's recollection. I'll ask Amara to send you the times against the schedule, with the tickets listed.
- Malcolm Ridgway NonePut it in writing. Both of those.
- Lewis Kerr NoneWill do. That's the first thing I'll send over today.
- Deepa Chauhan NoneCan I add something, because I don't want Malcolm hearing only the bad half? The people who do use it are using it for the thing we bought it for. Credit control look at the account view before they put a trade account on stop. Sales see the disputes sitting next to the orders. That's the part that's working.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneWhat does that do to debtor days?
- Deepa Chauhan NoneI can't give you a figure today, and I won't make one up. What I can do is show you where we'd measure it. Which accounts, which period, what we'd compare against.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneThat's the answer I wanted, to be fair. I've had suppliers give me a number with no base under it. I don't take a percentage without the base.
- Deepa Chauhan NoneShow me where that number comes from. That's what I say to my own team, so I'll hold us to it too.
- Lewis Kerr NoneCan I suggest how we'd do that, to put a number on it without inventing one? You pick a handful of trade accounts that went on stop or were close to it over the last few months. We look at what the credit controller could see, and when. If the brain showed it earlier than the old route, there's your case for the board. If it didn't, you'll want to know that before you spend anything further.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneThat's a more honest pitch than I expected.
- Lewis Kerr NoneIt's the only one I'm comfortable with. I don't push an expansion the usage doesn't support. If the numbers say wait, I'd rather lose a quarter than lose your confidence.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneMm. Okay. Let me ask the contract question, since you've mentioned renewal. Where are we on dates?
- Lewis Kerr NoneYour term runs to 27 Feb 2027, and the renewal date in our system is 28 Feb 2027. The expansion would be co-termed to that, so it ends when the rest does. The renewal notice and the conversation sit with Amara, and that comes well ahead of the date, not in a rush.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneAnd at renewal, what happens to the price?
- Lewis Kerr NoneI'm not going to quote that from memory, Malcolm. Your order form is what decides it, and I'd want to read it with you rather than recite it. I'll include the relevant clause in what I send, so you can see it in black and white.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneGood. I won't sign anything without reading the schedule. Not a summary of it. The schedule.
- Lewis Kerr NoneUnderstood. You'll get the full schedule and the quote together, and I'd suggest nobody signs on the strength of a call.
- Deepa Chauhan NoneWhile we're on the schedule, there's one thing I want to get right on our side. The monthly account-data review. Credit control are in it, the regional directors are in it, but the branch managers who've dropped off aren't. I think that's where the usage went.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneThen get them in the room.
- Deepa Chauhan NoneThat's exactly what I'm going to do. Let's get credit control in the room, and the branch managers who've gone quiet, and look at it together. If Amara could come to the next one, even for twenty minutes, I think it would help.
- Lewis Kerr NoneI'll ask her. I'd expect a yes. She'll want to see who's asking the questions as well, because it matters whether it's spread across the teams or leaning on two or three people.
- Deepa Chauhan NoneIt leans on a few. I'll be honest about that. Myself, for one, and a couple in credit control.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneThat's a risk, isn't it. If Deepa gets hit by a bus.
- Deepa Chauhan NoneThank you, Malcolm.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneI mean it kindly. It's a key-person problem, and I've got a few of those in my own department. What would reduce it?
- Lewis Kerr NoneMore people asking, from more teams, and a couple of named owners per area, so it doesn't sit on one desk. That's an adoption plan rather than a sale, and Amara is the person for it. I'd rather she drafted it than I did.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneRight. Let me play it back, and tell me if I've got it wrong. The expansion is £4,548, VAT on top, total value, co-termed. It isn't seats. You'd like it by Monday 14 September 2026. Before then, I get the ticket times against the schedule, the usage by team, and a way to measure what it does for credit control. Is that the lot?
- Lewis Kerr NoneThat's the lot. One addition: the written quote will say what's one-off and what recurs, so nobody finds out later.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneGood. And if the evidence doesn't land by then?
- Lewis Kerr NoneThen the date moves. I'd rather that than have you sign something you haven't read. The 14th is a target, not a condition. The renewal in February doesn't change either way.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneI'm happy with that. Deepa?
- Deepa Chauhan NoneYes. I'd rather it was slower and right. And I'll be straight with the regions. I'm not promising them anything that doesn't exist yet. If the extension isn't live, I won't tell them it is.
- Lewis Kerr NoneThat's sensible. When it does go live I'll give you the date in writing and not over the phone.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneAnything else from your side, Lewis? I've got another call at ten past ten.
- Lewis Kerr NoneOnly logistics. I'll send the quote and the schedule today, together with the clause on renewal. Amara will follow with the ticket times and the usage by team. Deepa, if you can let me know the date of the next account-data review, I'll get her in.
- Deepa Chauhan NoneI'll send it this afternoon. Thanks, both.
- Malcolm Ridgway NoneThanks. Speak soon.
- Lewis Kerr NoneCheers, Malcolm. Thanks, Deepa. Speak soon.
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