Bespoke software advantages and disadvantages when you already run an ERP

The advantages and disadvantages of bespoke software come down to one trade: it fits the way your business actually works and connects to the systems you already run, at the price of more money and more time up front, and of relying on whoever builds it. Bespoke software, also called custom software, is software built for one organisation, as opposed to an off-the-shelf package sold to many. For an engineering SME with a service operation, it earns its keep when the same information is typed more than once between the engineer on site and the ERP, and a package is the better buy wherever one already does the job.

Advantages of bespoke software

For a business with engineers on customers' sites, bespoke software has five advantages.

• It fits the way you work, so the job sheet carries your fields and your rules instead of a vendor's idea of the average firm.
• It connects to what you already run, reading customers and machines from the ERP and writing back what was missing.
• You own it and decide what changes next, where a package changes when its vendor decides.
• You decide where the data lives and who sees it.
• Its cost is paid for the build and its upkeep, where a package is usually paid per user, every month.

Connecting to what you already run matters most, because the other four are worth little if the tool is one more screen to fill in.

Disadvantages of bespoke software

Against a package, bespoke software has four disadvantages.

• It costs more up front than a licence.
• It takes time before anyone can use it, where a package can be switched on this month.
• You depend on whoever built it, for upkeep as well as changes.
• It asks something of your own people, because someone who knows the process has to describe it and decide.

There is a fifth, which software houses tend to leave out and which happened to us: we built ourselves a tool we did not really need, and rebuilt the same page more times than we care to admit. Building something nobody needed is the real risk of bespoke software.

How each disadvantage is kept small

Build one job at a time instead of a whole system, so the first bill and the first wait are those of one job. Put in writing that the code is yours, and the data with it: the Intellectual Property Office's guidance on ownership of copyright works says the copyright in a commissioned work first belongs to whoever created it, unless you agree otherwise in writing. With that clause, a change of supplier is a handover instead of a rescue. Have its future users try the tool on real past cases before it goes live, and check what the market and your ERP already do before building.

In our experience, AI has made building a bespoke tool quicker and more affordable for an SME than it used to be.

Bespoke software examples: which jobs justify it in a service business?

In a service business, four jobs most often justify bespoke software: the job sheet or service report, the engineers' schedule, the installed base at customers' sites and the quote, because each is done your own way and passes through several hands before reaching the ERP.

• The job sheet, entered once on site, reaches the office ready for the invoice.
• The schedule turns on who is trained on which machine.
• The installed base is kept by serial number, so the office knows which machine an enquiry is about.
• The quote is where figures get retyped between the costing sheet and the ERP.

When we put AI inside such a tool, it prepares a draft report or reads an entry from a document, and one of your people checks what matters.

Signs that the need is real

In an engineering SME, the need shows in the engineer's notes retyped at a desk, the spreadsheet everyone opens and nobody dares sort, paper coming back from site at the end of the week, and the detail someone has to ring the engineer for before invoicing. The sum is yours to do: your hours of retyping a week multiplied by what an hour of that person's time costs the business.

When is off-the-shelf software enough?

Off-the-shelf software is enough when the need is your whole trade's and a package already covers it, when your ERP has the function and nobody has opened it yet, or when the process is still changing too often to be worth building around.

Before anything is built, we look at what the market sells and what your ERP already does, and when that is enough we say so, even though we earn nothing from it.

Once the work is done your way and the package forces retyping around it, the package is the one that costs you. Government guidance written for its own departments, Define your purchasing strategy, says of off-the-shelf (OTS) products: "Even small modifications to OTS software can remove most of the benefits of using it."

Does bespoke software mean replacing your ERP?

Bespoke software does not mean replacing your ERP: a well-designed bespoke tool leaves the ERP doing what it does, takes the data it already holds, such as customers and machines, and gives back what was missing, such as the report entered on site, so nobody types twice.

Most industrial businesses we meet already run an ERP and want neither to change it nor to work with ten applications beside it, a fair position for anyone who has counted their passwords lately. Badly thought-out bespoke software ends up as one more application to open, so we connect to the system in place and neither modify it nor replace it.

Is getting data in and out of an ERP really that hard?

Getting data in and out of an ERP is hard when you go through its database, which nobody should write into lightly, and far easier through the doors the vendor provided, such as a file export or a connector. What your ERP lets a tool read and write is checked before anything is promised.

How to decide, and where to start

Start with the one job where the same information is typed the most times by the most people. Three questions find it: where do we retype most between site and office, which document do we wait for before invoicing, and which spreadsheet would worry us if the person who keeps it were away for a month?

Stator is a French company that carries out AI audits for industrial businesses with 10 to 199 employees (industrial maintenance, lifting and materials handling, machinery, after-sales service), then builds the missing tool, wired into the ERP or software they already run. We start with a free 30-minute video call on where your team's time goes, then build one tool at a time, on a quote: bespoke software that plugs into the ERP you already run, and it belongs to you.

Frequently asked questions about bespoke software

What is bespoke software?

Bespoke software is software built for one organisation, as opposed to an off-the-shelf package sold in the same form to many customers.

Is bespoke software the same as custom software?

Yes, "bespoke" is the usual British word and "custom" the American one, and both describe software written for a single organisation.

Is bespoke software suitable for a small business?

Bespoke software suits a small business when one job is done in a way no package covers and the same information keeps being retyped.

What happens to bespoke software if the supplier changes?

If the contract gives you the code and the data in writing, a new supplier can take the software over. Without that clause, the copyright in commissioned work stays by default with whoever wrote it, according to the Intellectual Property Office.

If you cannot tell which of your processes deserves a bespoke tool and which a package would cover, that question is what a 30-minute call on where the time goes is for.