Blog
What we are building, what broke, and what we would do differently. Written by the people doing the work.
Most growing companies do not have a software shortage. They have a handoff problem: the same order, job or request gets typed, checked and chased across five tools by people who should be running the business.
Buyers in the UK, Australia and New Zealand still treat "offshore" as the main hazard. The builds that fail usually fail earlier: a vague brief, floating scope, and no way to know what "done" means. Here is how to write the brief, stage the money, and still own the code.
Public registers only work where you can read the filings. Here is the version that works in any jurisdiction: the ownership default that surprises most buyers, the five things an assignment clause has to settle, and the hand-back drill you run at 25% of the build.
Drafting guest replies can give a 12-room guest house back about five working weeks a year. A website chatbot can make promises your hotel is legally stuck with. One question sorts every AI tool into the right pile.
Most small-hotel software is sold on a feature list written for a 200-room hotel. Walk one ordinary Saturday through a twelve-room guest house instead — it produces about a dozen genuine requirements, and a visitor levy your booking engine is about to have to collect.
Somewhere in your business a spreadsheet is doing the job of software you never bought. It marks the exact point where off-the-shelf stopped fitting — and it is where the decision to buy, configure, integrate or build should start.
One question — if this ended on Friday, what leaves with me? — run across delivery apps, OTAs, booking plumbing, development agencies and AI vendors. And why GDPR portability and the EU switching rules will not rescue a UK business.
The ranges in every custom software cost guide are real and useless. Here is how the number actually gets built — and the contract clause that matters more than the price.
Every vendor selection guide tells you to look for a proven track record and deep industry expertise. Neither is something you can check before you sign — which is precisely why both survive. Here are five questions that fail properly.
