The Apartment Service Case Study

Problem

Managing Director, Charlie McCrow of The Apartment Service came to uniCenta to help him with difficulties in his project.

The project was initially handed to a software house who was costing The Apartment Service a hefty chunk of cash and resource every month.  After eighteen months, less than average performance, tens of thousands over-budget and way past delivery the project was still no closer to seeing the finished result.  A complete absence of some fundamental project management functions and lack of stakeholder communication meant that Charlie's vision wasn't happening.

Reaction

It was decided, quickly, to pull the project in-house and harness the vast experience, and knowledge, of The Apartment Service team.  Project history showed most efforts were based on ad-hoc, and loosely agreed, milestones.  As is often the case, many of the stakeholder's "vapour wishes" (and they kept coming thick and fast... quite right too) were far too ambitious for the current development team and the budget.  Something had to give and it was clear that handling a situation like this would take a special kind of Project Management and hands-on involvement.  Key areas were re-negotiated in order to get traction back into the whole thing.

More importantly though; with considerable time, money and effort spent to-date The Apartment Service was keen to see some tangible results.  And quickly.

The first question was to ourselves; "Could we do it?"  Of course, we said "Yes"

Solution

Our brief was to audit, to code level, what had been achieved so far and get the project back on-track.  It was clear we needed a quick rescue plan so, we promptly put in some structured lines of communication - both ways - between the development team and the stakeholders; delivered initial project documentation and rationalised the development budget and the development team.

Nett result:
Successful outcome for The Apartment Service. Site Launched 30th March 2009 - www.apartmentservice.com

  • Investment preserved
  • Best-practice methods injected into project
  • Easing of future development costs
  • Minimised/Eliminated future project trauma

Before

After

Key Points

Build a site worthy of The Apartment Service's standing as europe's leading apartment rental business

Create a real-time, on-demand availability and booking engine

Deliver a B2B/B2C driven Customer and Supplier Portal using latest .NET technology

Open up their technology to Agents and Affiliates