An investor book moved off spreadsheets, to the penny

Some investment firms raise money by issuing bonds, sold to investors through networks of independent brokers. Each investment is a trade with its own currency, rate and term. Every investor has identity and anti-money-laundering checks to record, and every broker has commission terms to honour.

At any moment the business has to know who holds what, in which currency and through whom, and be able to prove it.

• Investors as legal parties. Sole, joint and corporate holders, each with the people behind them, their check dates and their contact preferences.
• Brokers and their terms. Commission terms, including sliding scales, and a restricted role for the sales team that sees only the brokers.
• A trade workflow with gates. Eight stages from enquiry to settled. Bank details come before compliance review, identity and anti-money-laundering checks are recorded before clearance, trades outside the limits need a director's override, and nothing can change once a trade settles.
• Bonds and their rates. Rate schedules for each bond, with nightly jobs that keep each trade's current rate, and each investor's and broker's status, up to date.
• Reporting and email. Dashboards for operations, finance and sales, and email connected to each person's Microsoft 365 mailbox.

The team was handed a user guide, a training pack and a recorded walkthrough.

The CRM went live about ten weeks after the first call, and the old platform was retired. Every trade from the spreadsheets and every reference from the old platform is in the new system. Every bond but one matched the old platform to the penny; the exception was a single trade that had been paid but not yet settled. Every difference found along the way is named and explained in the reconciliation.

• 10 weeksfrom first call to go-live
• 100%of trades accounted for, by reference
• 0ptolerance in the reconciliation
• 8trade stages, each with its own gate

It is now on a monthly support plan.