Strensall Merchants / BG-Demo – QBR
Callcompleted
Strensall Merchants · 28 May 2026 16:45
Quarterly review with Strensall Merchants. No decision was sought. Finance director Fiona Metcalfe wants a usage case in pounds before the 28 Feb 2027 renewal, and Ashok Patel is the only person who knows the connectors.
What was said
What this says
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Quarterly review with Strensall Merchants. No decision was sought. Finance director Fiona Metcalfe wants a usage case in pounds before the 28 Feb 2027 renewal, and Ashok Patel is the only person who knows the connectors.
What happened: Daniel Okafor ran the 28 May 2026 QBR with Neil Craven, Fiona and Ashok. Daily actives were just over fifty of one hundred and sixty Enterprise seats, down a few percent on the previous quarter.
Customer view: Fiona said she never renews without a usage case and will agree nothing on price on a call. Neil values the cross-branch view, and branch managers use it little.
Commercial: The contract runs to 27 Feb 2027 and renews on 28 Feb 2027, with ninety days' notice. Daniel will draft a value case with pounds where supportable, and Fiona confirmed the order form figure matches her records.
Watch: Ashok is the sole admin in practice and a second admin is only being considered. The delivery connector is held back, and the evidence does not show the high priority ticket's details or its response time.
Themes
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Theme
QBR and renewal value case
Importance
renewal
Sentiment
mixed
Voice
decision-maker
Who was there
BG-Demo
CRMmade from
Them
CRMmade from
Follow-up
Next steps
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Daniel Okafor to send Neil Craven training dates by the end of the following week and draft the usage and value case for Fiona Metcalfe.
- Daniel Okafor to set up an engineer session with Ashok Patel on depot delivery formats and write up the high priority ticket response time.
- Ashok Patel to send Fiona the mismatched accounts list in pounds and confirm a second admin.
Risks
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Daily use is about a third of the Enterprise seats and drifting down, so the finance director may question value at renewal.
- Ashok Patel is effectively the only admin, so a fortnight's absence would leave a failed load unfixed.
- Branch managers ask few questions, and a quiet support month could hide unreported problems.
Opportunities
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- A short branch manager training session could lift use among the seats not yet active.
- The delivery data connector would give Neil Craven the delivered-versus-booked view he wants.
- A housebuilder accounts page across branches could deepen use among key accounts.
Transcript
Daniel OkaforHello, can everyone hear me all right? I can see Neil and Ashok. Fiona, are you with us?
Fiona MetcalfeI'm here. Sorry, I was finishing a call. Good afternoon, Daniel.- Daniel OkaforGood afternoon. Thank you all for making the time, I know a quarter to five on a Thursday isn't anyone's favourite slot. So that's all four of us. Lovely.
Neil CravenNo bother. I've had a builder on the phone since eight this morning about one of his sites, so honestly this is a rest. Which branch, which account, that's all I've said all day.- Daniel OkaforHa, I know that feeling. Did you get it sorted?
- Neil CravenMostly. A delivery note showed against the wrong branch and the credit team couldn't see it. Which is rather the thing we bought this for, so I'm not complaining too loudly.
- Fiona MetcalfeDaniel, before we start, what decision do you need from us today? I'd like to know whether I'm listening or choosing.
- Daniel OkaforFair question, and a good one to ask. No decision today, Fiona. This is the quarterly review: how the team is using B-Viz, what's gone well, what's rough, and what you'd want from us over the next few months. The renewal is a way off, I just want us to talk about it properly and early, so nobody is surprised.
- Fiona MetcalfeGood. Then I'm listening. I'll say now that I won't be agreeing anything on price on a call, but I'm happy to hear the picture.
- Daniel OkaforUnderstood, and that's exactly how I'd want it. Ashok, you always have something for us. What's changed since we last spoke?
Ashok PatelYes. Two things. I tidied the way the trade account numbers map between the branch system and the credit ledger, so one account now shows once across every branch rather than as several lookalikes. I tested it on one branch first, obviously, then rolled it wider last week. And I reviewed who has admin rights, because that list had grown a bit untidy.- Daniel OkaforThat's really useful. And the account mapping, did it behave when it went wider? Just to close the loop on that.
- Ashok PatelIt did, with one exception. A handful of accounts had old numbers from before a branch merged into another. The data says they're the same customer but the ledger disagrees, so I've left those alone until I can check with credit.
- Fiona MetcalfeWhich accounts, roughly? What's our exposure on them?
- Ashok PatelI don't want to overstate it, Fiona. I haven't totted it up in pounds yet. I'll put it in a note to you and your team once I've got the list reconciled.
- Fiona MetcalfeIn pounds, please. Thank you.
- Ashok PatelIn pounds. Noted.
- Daniel OkaforRight, let me share my screen and walk you through the usage. Bear with me a moment. Can you see it?
- Neil CravenI can see a graph with a line on it.
- Daniel OkaforThat is, I'm afraid, the whole of my technical briefing. Let me make it bigger. There. So this is the last few months of people actually using B-Viz. You've got one hundred and sixty licensed users on the Enterprise plan, and on a typical day in the last month we've seen just over fifty of them active.
- Neil CravenFifty out of a hundred and sixty. That's a third. Is that good or bad? Tell me straight.
- Daniel OkaforHonestly, Neil, it's a bit of both, and I'd rather say so. It's a healthy base, and these are daily actives, so many more people dip in over a month. But it's down a few percent on the previous quarter, not a collapse, a gentle drift. And it tells me there's headroom, because you've paid for far more seats than are in daily use.
- Fiona MetcalfeWhich is precisely my question at renewal. If a third of the licences are in daily use, I need a case for the rest. I never renew without a usage case.
- Daniel OkaforYes, and I think that's fair. I'd rather build that case with you than defend a number. So let me show you who's using it and what for, and then we can say where the gaps are.
- Daniel OkaforSo, questions asked. This is the measure I trust most, because it's people actually getting an answer. It's steady, slightly lower than the quarter before, and the pattern is interesting. The questions are concentrated around trade credit and key accounts. Branch managers are asking much less.
- Neil CravenThat doesn't surprise me. The credit team and my key account managers are the ones who live in it. Branch managers, they're on the counter, they're not sat at a desk. What's the builder actually seeing? That's what they care about.
- Daniel OkaforThat's a really good point. Would a simpler way in help them? Something on the pages they already look at, rather than asking them to go and ask a question.
- Neil CravenPossibly. Let's sort it, not talk about it. If I give you five or six branch managers who'd try it, can you do a short session with them?
- Daniel OkaforYes, happily. I'd suggest a training session, short and practical, using their own accounts, so they see their own customers on the screen. I'll come back to you by the end of next week with a couple of dates.
- Neil CravenGood. Cheers.
- Daniel OkaforSorry, just finding the next page. Right. Records indexed. This is the one that tells me whether the brain is staying fresh. It's been rising steadily across your sources, which is what we want. No flat spells.
- Ashok PatelI'd agree with that. I check the nightly refresh most mornings, and it's been done before the start of the working day. I'd have said if it wasn't.
- Daniel OkaforYou would, yes. And that fits what I see. Connectors, then. How many are live is steady, nothing dropped out, and nothing is sitting half configured.
- Ashok PatelThere's one I'd like to add. The delivery data. I've held off, because I never switch on a source without testing it, and the format from the depots isn't consistent yet.
- Fiona MetcalfeIs that the one that would tell us when a delivery has actually landed, as opposed to when it was booked?
- Ashok PatelYes, that's the idea. At the moment B-Viz knows the order and the invoice, but delivered is patchy.
- Neil CravenThat would be gold for me. Half my calls are somebody saying it never turned up and the paperwork saying it did.
- Daniel OkaforThen let's make that a priority. Ashok, would it help to have one of our engineers look at the depot formats with you? You'd still control what goes live.
- Ashok PatelIt would. I'd test it on one branch first, and I'd rather have it right than quick.
- Daniel OkaforCompletely agree. I'll set up a session and send you some times this week or next.
- Daniel OkaforLet me move on to support, because I'd like to be open about it. In the last month there was just the one ticket, and it was one we marked high priority. Ashok, that was yours, I think?
- Ashok PatelThat was mine, yes. I'd rather not go through it from memory. I'll send the details over so it's written down properly.
- Daniel OkaforOf course. I'll also confirm in writing how quickly it was picked up against the response time in your contract, so you're not taking my word for it. Just one ticket is a quiet month, which I'm happy with, but I don't want quiet to mean people have stopped bothering to tell us things.
- Neil CravenThey'd tell me first, to be fair. And then I'd shout at you.
- Daniel OkaforHa, I'd prefer that to silence. Finance side, Fiona, I'm told there's nothing overdue, so thank you for that. Invoices have lined up with the order form, which says one hundred and thirteen thousand five hundred pounds a year.
- Fiona MetcalfeYes, that matches what we have. One hundred and thirteen thousand five hundred. I'll say it plainly, that's the number I'll be asked about, and I need to be able to explain it to the board.
- Daniel OkaforWhich is why I want to give you the value case in good time. Can I suggest what that looks like, and you tell me if it's the wrong shape?
- Fiona MetcalfeGo on.
- Daniel OkaforThree parts. First, usage by team: who asks what, and how that has moved since you went live on 28 Feb 2025. Second, a few examples where a question saved time or caught a credit problem earlier. Neil's delivery note is already one. Third, a plain view of the headroom: seats, connectors, teams not yet using it, and what you'd gain from bringing them in.
- Fiona MetcalfeThe second one matters most to me. Examples are fine, but I'd want them in pounds. Exposure caught, or time saved turned into a cost I can recognise. If you can't put a pound figure on it, say so.
- Daniel OkaforThat's fair, and I'd rather tell you what we can't measure than invent something. Neil, Ashok, could you help me with real cases? I'd need the credit team to confirm anything with money attached.
- Neil CravenI've a couple already. The credit team spotted one builder going over his limit across three branches before it blew up. Before B-Viz, nobody would have added those up until month end.
- Fiona MetcalfeI remember that one. Credit limits, mind, are never set by sales. I'd want that made clear in whatever you write.
- Neil CravenAye, understood. It was credit who caught it, not us.
- Daniel OkaforNoted, and I'll word it carefully so it's credit's win. That's the right way round.
- Ashok PatelCan I raise the admin point? I said I'd reviewed who has admin rights. I'm still the only person who really knows how the connectors fit together. If I'm off for a fortnight, nobody else could fix a load.
- Daniel OkaforI'm glad you raised it, Ashok, because I was going to. It's a risk to you and to us. A second admin, someone in your team, would take pressure off. We could run a short admin walkthrough for them.
- Ashok PatelI have somebody in mind. I'll check she's happy to be put forward, then come back to you.
- Daniel OkaforPerfect. How is the team finding it, day to day, apart from the odd gap? I mean, do people trust the answers?
- Neil CravenMostly. When it's wrong, it's nearly always because the underlying data is wrong. Nobody blames B-Viz any more, they blame the branch system. Which is progress, I suppose.
- Ashok PatelThat's also why I like the account mapping work. It gets rid of a lot of those moments. The data says otherwise when the ledger disagrees, and then at least we can see where.
- Fiona MetcalfeDaniel, a practical point. The renewal date. When is it, and when would you expect to start that conversation?
- Daniel OkaforThe contract runs to 27 Feb 2027 and renews on 28 Feb 2027. There's a notice period of ninety days, so I'd rather we were well into the conversation before that. My suggestion is that we use the next review to look at the value case together, and I'd start the renewal discussion properly in the autumn, with you, not after you.
- Fiona MetcalfeThat's reasonable. We'll look at it at renewal, then, with your numbers in front of me. I'm not committing to anything today.
- Daniel OkaforNor would I ask you to. I'm only trying to make sure there's no rush at the end.
- Neil CravenOne more from me, and then I'll let you go. The big housebuilder accounts. Can I get a view of the top handful across all branches, orders, deliveries, calls, credit, on one page? Something I can bring to a meeting.
- Daniel OkaforYes, that's exactly what the pages are for. Ashok, I think the data's there already apart from deliveries?
- Ashok PatelMostly there, yes. Deliveries are the missing bit, which is the connector we spoke about. I can build the page now and add that later.
- Neil CravenDo that. Cheers.
- Daniel OkaforRight. Just to close the loop, let me read back what I've got. I'll send Neil two or three dates for a short training session with branch managers by the end of next week. I'll set up a session between our engineers and Ashok on the depot delivery formats. I'll write up the high priority ticket and the response time for Ashok and Fiona. And I'll put together a first draft of the usage and value case for Fiona, with pounds wherever they can be supported. Ashok, you're sending Fiona the list of mismatched accounts with the pounds attached, and checking about a second admin.
- Ashok PatelThat's right. I'd add that I'll send the pages for the housebuilder accounts for Neil to look at first.
- Fiona MetcalfeGood. Thank you, Daniel. That was useful, and short enough to be so.
- Daniel OkaforThank you, Fiona, and everyone. Speak soon. Best wishes to the teams.
- Neil CravenCheers all.
- Ashok PatelThanks. Goodbye.
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