Calderbrook Housing Group / BG-Demo – Check In
Callcompleted
Calderbrook Housing Group · 8 Apr 2026 13:00
Check-in on 8 Apr 2026: Helen Marsden found the brain's repairs figure well below the housing system. Records from that connector are flat, and an in-house platform is being scoped, with the subscription's value questioned.
What was said
What this says
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Check-in on 8 Apr 2026: Helen Marsden found the brain's repairs figure well below the housing system. Records from that connector are flat, and an in-house platform is being scoped, with the subscription's value questioned.
What happened: Daniel Okafor found records indexed from the housing management system connector flat for a couple of weeks. Helen said IT applied a housing system update a few weeks earlier.
Customer view: Helen said no decision has been made, but her director compares £44k with the cost of two developers. A related sync ticket was closed too early, which Daniel acknowledged.
Commercial: Growth, term to 1 Sep 2026, renewal 2 Sep 2026, paid up to date. About five of forty users are active, and Helen asked for a value note before Tom Ashdown joins.
Watch: The board pack is due in a few weeks. The evidence does not show the connector cause or the renewal outcome.
Themes
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Theme
Stalled connector, value questioned
Importance
renewal
Sentiment
mixed
Voice
champion
Who was there
BG-Demo
CRMmade from
Them
CRMmade from
Follow-up
Next steps
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Daniel Okafor sends the connector status and last record date in writing, today or tomorrow.
- Daniel reports what the engineers find by the end of that week and reopens the sync ticket, linked to the connector work.
- Daniel writes the value note, including the complaints case notes, and brings in Tom Ashdown only after Helen has seen it.
Risks
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- The housing management system connector has stopped growing, so the repairs figure in the board pack is understated.
- The IT directorate is scoping an in-house platform and the director compares the Growth fee with two developers.
- Only about five of forty licensed users are active, and questions come mostly from Helen and one colleague.
Opportunities
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- A sourced value note with usage, questions asked and dashboards built gives Helen something to put before the director.
- A short dashboards session could bring the wider team back once the connector is loading again.
Transcript
Daniel OkaforHello Helen, can you hear me all right? I think my headset was playing up earlier.
Helen MarsdenYes, I can hear you fine. Afternoon, Daniel. Can you hear me? I've moved to the small meeting room because the open-plan floor is dreadful today.- Daniel OkaforLoud and clear. Thank you for making the time, I know the diary is tight at your end. Just to check, is it only the two of us today, or is anyone else from your team joining?
- Helen MarsdenJust me. I did ask one of the analysts but she's buried in the board pack, so it's me and my notes.
- Daniel OkaforThat's fine. How was the rest of your week, by the way? You mentioned a conference last time.
- Helen MarsdenOh, that was a while ago now. It was fine, a lot of talk about data quality, not much about how to actually do it. Look, before we get into the agenda, can I start with the thing I'm chasing? These don't reconcile.
- Daniel OkaforOf course. Go ahead, which figure is it?
- Helen MarsdenThe repairs completed figure in the arrears and repairs section of the board pack. The brain gives me one number for the quarter and the housing management system report gives me another, and the gap is bigger than I'm comfortable explaining. The board will ask, and I need to be able to say where the difference comes from.
- Daniel OkaforRight. And is the brain the lower of the two or the higher?
- Helen MarsdenLower. Quite a bit lower. So my first thought is that it's missing records, not double counting.
- Daniel OkaforMm. That's a sensible first thought. Let me pull up the connector page for your account while we talk, if you don't mind a bit of silence.
- Helen MarsdenPlease do. I'd rather you looked than guessed.
- Daniel OkaforOkay, I'm in. So I can see the housing management system connector, and the number of records indexed from that source has been pretty flat for a couple of weeks. The other sources are moving as you'd expect, the call recorder and the helpdesk and so on, but that one has more or less stopped growing.
- Helen MarsdenFlat. So it's not that the numbers are wrong, it's that the brain stopped taking the new repairs.
- Daniel OkaforThat's how it looks from here, yes. I don't want to say the cause before I've checked it properly, but a source going flat usually means something changed on the customer side, a field renamed, an export moved, a permission altered after an update.
- Helen MarsdenHm. Our IT team did apply an update to the housing system a few weeks ago. I wasn't told the detail, I only saw the change note afterwards.
- Daniel OkaforThat would fit. Would it be possible to ask whoever owns that system to tell me what changed, and whether the service account for the connector was touched? Then I can get our engineers to look at it with them, rather than me guessing.
- Helen MarsdenI can ask. Can you show me the source for the repairs number, so I can say to the board which records are in and which are not? Can you show me the source, I mean, line by line?
- Daniel OkaforI can give you the list of what the brain holds from that connector and the date of the latest record it took in. That will at least tell you where the cut-off sits. Whether it reconciles after that is something we need to re-run once the connector is loading again.
- Helen MarsdenGood. That's useful. And can you say it in writing? I'd like it in an email, with the date of the last record, so I can paste it into my note to the director.
- Daniel OkaforYes, of course. Just to close the loop on that one, I'll send you the connector status and the last record date in writing, and I'll come back to you by the end of this week on what our engineers find. Is that all right?
- Helen MarsdenThat's all right. Thank you.
- Daniel OkaforCan I ask, is the board pack due soon? Does that change how urgent this is?
- Helen MarsdenIt's the next cycle, so a few weeks. I'd prefer not to put a number in front of them that I then have to withdraw. I've done that once in my career and I don't intend to do it again.
- Daniel OkaforUnderstood. Then let's treat it as the first thing, and if we can't get it loading in time, we can at least give you a clear footnote on what is and isn't included.
- Helen MarsdenA footnote I can live with. A silent gap I can't.
- Daniel OkaforAgreed. So, moving to the rest of what I had. Usage first, if that's all right, and then tickets, and then I'd like to talk a bit about the renewal. How is the team finding it, generally? Not only this issue.
- Helen MarsdenHonestly? Mixed. The people who use it every week still rate it. The arrears dashboard in particular, the housing officers rely on that. But it isn't the whole team using it any more.
- Daniel OkaforThat matches what I see. You're licensed for forty users on the Growth plan, and in a normal month about five people are actually active. That's down a little on the previous quarter, not dramatically, but it is down.
- Helen MarsdenYes. Two of the analysts who were heavy users moved to a different project, the tenant satisfaction work, and they don't really have a reason to be in the brain at the moment. And one person left the team altogether before Christmas.
- Daniel OkaforI'm sorry to hear that, I remember her, she asked very good questions in the training sessions. Is there anyone newer who's taken on her work?
- Helen MarsdenNot formally. I've picked up some of it myself, which is not ideal, since I'm meant to be managing people, not building the queries.
- Daniel OkaforNo, quite. One thing I notice is that a lot of the questions asked in the brain come from you and one other colleague now. When it was a wider group, it was a more robust pattern. I'd like to help you widen it again if that's something you want.
- Helen MarsdenI'd want to, yes. I'm just not sure I can promise the people. There's a lot going on at the moment, and I'll be honest, there's a conversation at director level about platforms.
- Daniel OkaforWould you like to say a bit more about that? Only as much as you're comfortable with.
- Helen MarsdenThe IT directorate has been asked to scope an in-house platform for reporting, built on what we already own. It's early. I want to be clear that it wasn't my idea. I was asked for my view on requirements, and I've given it, but I didn't propose it.
- Daniel OkaforThank you for telling me directly, I appreciate that. And I'd rather hear it from you than guess. Do you know what the director wants to see out of it, whether it's cost, control, or something about the data staying in-house?
- Helen MarsdenMostly cost, I think, and a sense of control. The data already sits in our own cloud account, and I've pointed out that the brain runs inside that account, but the question that keeps coming back is what the subscription actually gets us.
- Daniel OkaforThat's a fair question and I think we owe you a proper answer to it. Can I say what I'd suggest? Before the renewal conversation, I put together a short note for you with the usage over the last year, the questions the team has asked, the dashboards you built, and the things that couldn't have been done without the joined-up view. Something you could hand to the director.
- Helen MarsdenThat would help. But it has to have figures that reconcile. If there's a number in it that doesn't tie back to a source I'll be asked about it for an hour.
- Daniel OkaforUnderstood. Every figure will come with where it was taken from, and where we don't know something I'll say so, rather than round it into something that sounds better.
- Helen MarsdenGood. That's what I'd want.
- Daniel OkaforShall we have a quick look at tickets? There were four in the last month, none of them marked high priority.
- Helen MarsdenFour, yes. I think one of them was mine. About a dashboard filter.
- Daniel OkaforThat's right. Two were how-to questions, one was about a filter, and one was a connector sync query, which I suspect is the same thing we've just been talking about, or its first sign. Let me check that. Give me a moment.
- Helen MarsdenTake your time.
- Daniel OkaforYes. It was logged by one of your analysts, and it was about records not appearing for recent repairs. It was answered within the response time for your plan, but it was closed after the analyst said the number looked okay on the day. I think it was closed a little too early, and I'll say that plainly, because the symptom was real.
- Helen MarsdenSo it was reported, and nobody joined it up with anything.
- Daniel OkaforThat's a fair way to put it. I'll make sure it's reopened and linked to the work on the connector, so there's one thread and not two.
- Helen MarsdenThank you. I'd like to see that thread, if I may.
- Daniel OkaforOf course. I'll add you to it.
- Helen MarsdenWhile we're on it, the nightly refresh. Does it finish before the morning? Because the officers open the arrears dashboard first thing, and one or two have said it feels like yesterday's numbers.
- Daniel OkaforIt should be complete by seven each business day, and from what I can see it has been. But there's a difference between the refresh finishing and the source having new records to bring in. If the housing system connector is only handing over old data, the refresh will finish on time and still feel stale.
- Helen MarsdenSo the system was up, the data was old.
- Daniel OkaforExactly that. Available, but not fresh. Which is why I'd like to get to the bottom of the connector before we say anything more about it.
- Helen MarsdenRight. Fine. That makes sense, and I'd rather have that distinction made clearly than have it blurred.
- Daniel OkaforNow, the renewal. Your contract runs to 1 Sep 2026 and the renewal date is 2 Sep 2026. You're at forty-four thousand a year on Growth, and that's matched by the order form and what we've invoiced, so nothing odd there. And you're up to date with payments, which I appreciate.
- Helen MarsdenForty-four thousand. Yes. That's the figure the director has in his head. He compares it with the cost of two developers, and you can guess how that goes.
- Daniel OkaforI can, and it's a reasonable comparison for him to make. I'd only say it's worth putting beside it what it takes to keep a connected platform running and the data fresh, which is a job that tends to be underestimated. But I don't want to argue it on a call. I'd rather you had the facts and could judge.
- Helen MarsdenHe will want the facts. And he'll want to know what happens if we don't renew. Not that I'm saying we won't. I want to be clear that no decision has been made.
- Daniel OkaforUnderstood, and thank you for being so open. If it helps, I can explain how the data and the dashboards would be handed over, and what stays with you either way. Nobody should be surprised.
- Helen MarsdenThat would be useful, but let's keep it to a separate page, so it doesn't look as though I'm planning anything.
- Daniel OkaforOf course. Separate page, only if you ask for it.
- Helen MarsdenThank you. What about the users? Forty seats and five people. Is that something you'd bring up?
- Daniel OkaforI'd rather be honest about it than wait for you to find it. Forty is the licensed number, and at the moment the team uses a fraction of it. That's either a reason to bring more people in, which I'd prefer, or something to look at when we talk about the right shape for the next term. I wouldn't want you paying for headroom you don't need.
- Helen MarsdenThat's more candid than I expected.
- Daniel OkaforI'd rather it was right for you. Tom Ashdown, who looks after the commercial side of your account, would be part of that conversation, and I'd want him to hear the same picture you've given me.
- Helen MarsdenYes, I remember Tom. He did the original order form with us. Fine. I'd be happy for him to join, but after I've seen your note, not before.
- Daniel OkaforThat's reasonable. Note first, then Tom.
- Helen MarsdenIs there anything in the brain itself that's changed that I should know about? I haven't been to a training session for a while.
- Daniel OkaforA few small things in how search ranks results, and the dashboards builder is easier to share now. I could do a short session for your team if you want, even a half hour, on the dashboards your officers use. It may help bring the wider group back, and you'd see in practice how they ask their questions.
- Helen MarsdenPerhaps. Not until the connector's sorted, though. It would be awkward to train people on a thing that's giving them the wrong numbers.
- Daniel OkaforQuite right. Connector first, session second.
- Helen MarsdenAnd the board section. Can I at least say that the discrepancy is understood and being worked on? Without promising the date it's fixed?
- Daniel OkaforYes, you can say it's understood in outline and being worked on with our engineers. I wouldn't promise a date I don't own, so let me come back to you by the end of the week with what they find, and then you can word it with confidence.
- Helen MarsdenThat's enough for me. Thank you, Daniel. I do appreciate that you didn't try to explain it away.
- Daniel OkaforWell, it wouldn't have helped either of us. Is there anything else on your list that I've missed?
- Helen MarsdenOne more, small. Our complaints data. Last time you said there might be a better way to bring in the case notes, and I never heard back. I don't want to open a new thing now, but I did make a note of it.
- Daniel OkaforThat's on me, and I'm sorry. I'll fold it into the note, so it doesn't get lost a second time, and say clearly what's possible and what isn't.
- Helen MarsdenThank you. Then I think that's everything for me.
- Daniel OkaforLet me read back what I have so we're agreed. One, I send you the connector status and the last record date in writing, today or tomorrow. Two, you ask your IT colleagues what changed in the housing system update. Three, I come back by the end of the week with what our engineers find, and the helpdesk ticket is reopened and linked. Four, after that, a short value note with sources for the director. And five, the complaints notes go into that note too. Have I got that right?
- Helen MarsdenThat's right. And Tom after the note, not before.
- Daniel OkaforAnd Tom after the note. Good.
- Helen MarsdenDo you ever get the feeling these calls are the only time anyone looks at the whole thing at once?
- Daniel OkaforOften. It's partly why I like them. Things drift in between, and then it's a conversation like this that pulls it back together.
- Helen MarsdenWell. I'll let you go. I've a meeting with finance at half past.
- Daniel OkaforOf course. Thank you again for your time, Helen, and for being so straight with me today. I'll be in touch shortly.
- Helen MarsdenThank you, Daniel. Speak soon.
- Daniel OkaforSpeak soon. Bye for now.
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