Crofter/How we work

Three stages. One workflow at a time. Everything on the table.

We do not run strategy workshops. We do not ship slideware. We pick one workflow that burns real time today, build the software for it inside your existing systems in four to eight weeks, and keep it alive on a retainer.

1. Discovery

Two weeks. £5,000 to £10,000, fixed.

We sit with the operation.

Discovery is not a slide deck and it is not a workshop. A senior engineer - the same one who will lead the Build, if there is one - spends two weeks inside the firm. We sit with the paralegals or the consultants or the compliance team while they do the work. We read the documents they produce. We look at the systems they use and the ones they have quietly given up on.

At the end we write a Build plan: one named workflow, an architecture that fits your stack, the integrations it needs, a fixed price, a fixed timeline and the numbers we would expect back. If those numbers do not stack up, we say so and refund the unused part of the Discovery fee. If they do, the plan becomes the basis of the engagement letter, including the targets the refund clause is keyed to.

2. Build

Four to eight weeks. £35,000 to £75,000, fixed.

One piece of software. Paid back, or refunded.

A Build is one piece of specialist software wired into the tools you already use: Microsoft 365, Sage, Salesforce, your practice management system, your document store. Fixed price, fixed date. The lead engineer is named, the code is yours under the engagement letter, and the architecture is written up in plain English.

We do not disappear at the end of a Build. We hand over to the Managed retainer, or to your own team if you prefer, with the architecture note and a tuning playbook. The codebase is small enough to read in a sitting, on purpose.

The refund clause If a Build does not pay back inside six months - measured against the targets set in the Discovery plan and written into the engagement letter - the Build fee is refundable. The letter defines exactly how payback is measured and how the firm's use of the software is verified. We have a stake in whether the Build was worth doing.

3. Managed

Monthly. £3,000 to £8,000 a month.

A retainer, not a ticket queue.

Software that is actually in use drifts. Models get better. Policies change. Your firm buys another firm. The Managed retainer is how Crofter stays a serious business and how you keep the software honest.

A retainer is one named senior engineer, a monthly tuning and monitoring cadence, and first refusal on the next Build when you want one. There is no support tier called Bronze, Silver or Gold. There is one engineer, and they pick up the phone.

Fig. 2

The engagement at contracted durations, in weeks from kickoff.

Drawn for an eight-week Build, the longest we contract: go-live in week 10, and the refund window closes in week 36. A four-week Build goes live in week 6 and its window closes in week 32. How payback is measured is set out in the engagement letter.

How we size a Build

The same arithmetic, with your numbers in it, is Fig. 1 on the front page.

Hours per case, cases per year, loaded cost.

Discovery ends with three numbers: the hours the workflow takes per case today, the number of cases the firm handles in a year, and the loaded cost of those hours. The arithmetic that follows sets the Build fee and the refund targets. We do it in the open, with the firm, not on a slide we keep to ourselves.

Worked example: an HMRC investigation document pack at a mid-market tax practice. Pipeline sizing, not a delivered case.
Hours per complex enquiry today30 paralegal, 3 partner	33
Hours once the Build is live8 paralegal, 1 partner	9
Hours saved per enquiry	24
Enquiries a year	100
Blended loaded cost an hoursee the note below	£75
Recovered a year	£180,000
Recovered in the first six months	£90,000

On those numbers a Build in the £45,000 to £65,000 range pays back inside six months with room to spare. The sizing put the loaded cost of a complex enquiry at £2,500 to £3,500, which is £76 to £106 an hour over 33 hours; £75 keeps the example on the cautious side. Whether your firm's numbers sit that way is the question Discovery answers, and the engagement letter then binds us to the numbers we agree.

Prices

In plain text, because a pricing gate is a tell.

What it costs.

Discovery
Workflow map, the payback arithmetic and a Build-ready proposal. Two weeks, one senior engineer inside the firm.

£5,000 to £10,000fixed
Build
One piece of specialist software wired into your stack, in four to eight weeks. Refundable against the Discovery targets inside six months.

£35,000 to £75,000fixed
Managed
Tuning, monitoring and the next Build when you want it, from a named engineer.

£3,000 to £8,000a month

These are real ranges. If your Build falls outside them, we will say so on the first call.

Compliance posture

The sector pages add the rules specific to each profession.

Where UK defaults matter: in the plumbing, not the headline.

Crofter works from the UK, and every engagement starts from the posture a mid-market firm's finance director and compliance lead can sign off without a second meeting.

Hosting: UK region by default: Azure UK South or AWS London. Data leaves the UK only if you ask for that in writing.
Data protection: UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018. A data processing agreement for every Build, and a DPIA drafted during Discovery.
Model providers: Enterprise endpoints under zero-training terms. Your prompts and documents are never used to train a model.
Access: Single sign-on through your identity provider. Access is logged, and every output cites its source.
People: The engineers on a Build are named in the engagement letter and based in the UK. No offshore subcontracting.
Certification and cover: Cyber Essentials Plus, independent penetration testing of anything that goes into production, and professional indemnity cover with a cyber extension - in place before a Build touches live data, with the certificates attached to the engagement letter.

What we will not do

Where we tell you to spend the money elsewhere.

We will not run a strategy workshop. We will not sell you a Copilot licence. We will not compete on price with a sub-£10,000 boutique; if that is the shape of the work, we will tell you where to go. We will not take on a Build without a named business sponsor and a workflow we can measure.

We will also tell you, during Discovery, if the right answer is an off-the-shelf product for your profession rather than a bespoke Build. That is better for both of us.

We pick one workflow that burns real time today, ship one piece of specialist software inside your existing tools within eight weeks, and keep it alive on a retainer. That is the offer.

If this reads like a fit, send a note or write to crofter@nullhex.io. A first call is thirty minutes on a video link, with no deck.