The Grid

Category: Work Order

  • Fix the process, not the people

    Work request to work order completion in days, not months

    When things go south in an MCST, the council usually changes the managing agent. They start afresh with a new one.

    Why changing your managing agent doesn’t fix your MCST

    Everything starts out well. The building manager is on the ball. Inspections happen regularly. Work requests get a quick response. The council hears from the BM often. Everyone is happy.

    Then familiarity sets in. Standards slip.

    Common MCST management problems after the honeymoon period

    Work requests get delayed or ignored. Some get priority just because the owner sits on the council. The BM signs off without checking if the work is done. Vendors carry out work above the threshold amount, with no formal approval from the majority of voters.

    Residents start to feel targeted. They are told they can’t do something that their neighbours get away with. When issues aren’t settled quickly, the frustration builds. It then turns on the managing agent, or on neighbours.

    Eventually the council changes the managing agent again. The cycle repeats. Only the actors are new. The plot is the same.

    What 50 Singapore MCSTs taught us about estate management

    At Basementgrid, we have studied over 50 MCSTs. What we found is consistent. Changing the people doesn’t solve the problem. It just passes it to the next council and the next managing agent.

    So we built an app to fix the process first. We borrowed from how corporations work. A process keeps things moving. Within it, each person still has room to use their judgment.

    Why an MCST needs a process: there is no founder or CEO

    A company has a founder or a CEO. This person holds the vision and the know-how. Even when staff change, the way of working stays.

    An MCST has no such person. The council changes every year or two. Each new committee starts from zero. Whatever the last council knew often leaves with them.

    That is why an MCST needs a process. The process holds the knowledge. It lets the estate be managed properly day to day. It also lets the estate be handed over easily to the next committee.

    MCST handover: developers hand over the estate, not the process

    The first MCST is created by the developer. At that point, the developer’s job is to hand the estate over to the residents. Whether a management process exists is not their concern.

    So the first council inherits a building with no playbook. They have to work it out as they go.

    Basementgrid gives developers a way to change that. We provide the guidelines for managing estate maintenance, built into an app. The developer hands over the estate with a working process already in place.

    Is the managing agent responsible for improving the process?

    You might think so. It seems reasonable that the managing agent should put the process in place.

    In most cases we have seen, that doesn’t happen. The managing agent is contracted to manage. They come in to do the management part. Improving the way things are done is rarely part of the scope, so it gets overlooked.

    A corporation works differently. Employees are part of the company. They suggest ways to improve the workplace and the process. They have a stake in how things run.

    A contracted party has a different mindset. The same goes for most vendors. They focus on delivering the service. They feel they are paid for what they do, and nothing more.

    So the initiative has to come from someone else. Council members are the natural choice. It is their estate. If they want it run better, they can make the change themselves.

    Report a fault on Basementgrid

    Estate maintenance app for MCSTs: Basementgrid vs iCondo

    iCondo focuses on community, with facility bookings and visitor management. Basementgrid digitalises the estate maintenance process. Every job is tracked and recorded. Responsibilities are clear. If something is delayed or mismanaged, you can trace it back through an immutable activity log.

    Setup takes about 3 minutes. Each role has the minimum it needs to do. Work orders are created and completed by different roles, so no one person controls the whole job.

    MCST management for volunteer councils and small managing agent teams

    We also kept the reality of MCSTs in mind. Council members are volunteers. A managing agent is often just one or two people running an estate of over 500 residents. So Basementgrid has built-in reminders and deadlines. Work doesn’t fall behind quietly. When delays happen, they are on record.

    Council members: fix your estate’s process now

    Don’t wait for the next managing agent to slip. Don’t wait for the next complaint to reach your inbox.

    The estate is yours. The process is yours to set up. And the sooner it’s in place, the easier the next handover will be.

    Here is how to start:

    1. Pick one recurring problem. It could be delayed work requests, or vendor work done without approval.
    2. Raise it at your next council meeting.
    3. Set up Basementgrid in 3 minutes and run that one process through the app.

    You don’t need to change anyone. You only need to change how the work gets done.

    Start with Basementgrid today →

  • Where Did the Money Go? Your Work Order Should Know

    A work order that only records what, where and how a job was done isn’t much use. It’s just a document. So we made the work order do more: approvals, proof of work and payments all happen inside it.

    Who Approved This Spending?

    Work Order Approval MCST

    Many MCSTs need a majority vote before spending above a certain amount. Owners contribute to the maintenance fund every month, and they scrutinise how it’s used. Every dollar needs a proper record, or owners will get upset when they find out about misuse.

    On Basementgrid, a work order is only issued to the vendor once the required votes are in.

    There’s one catch. If no work order is created, the approval step is bypassed, and no software can record spending that never entered the system. That’s why we built payment into the app as well.

    How Was It Paid?

    PayNow QR code Vendor Payment

    We looked at how most organisations actually pay, and built a Billing stage around it. Vendors upload their invoice to the matching work order. From there, you can either:

    • pay directly from the app, using a unique PayNow QR code that carries the work order amount and the vendor’s UEN, and scan it in your bank app, or
    • download the maintenance ledger, tap the work order link to check the proof of work, then have the accounts team make a batch payment.

    Either way, the work order exists and the approvals are logged, so the spending is accounted for. It isn’t a pile of WhatsApp screenshots and emails pieced together by managers after the fact.

    To complete the Billing stage, the payer updates the record or the manager marks the work order as paid. That updates the maintenance ledger, which is what you’ll rely on for audits later.

    Was the Work Actually Done?

    Proof of work is submitted in the app and kept permanently in the cloud, so it’s accessible to everyone involved. It doesn’t sit in one person’s WhatsApp chat or email inbox. Each submission is GPS verified and timestamped, so you can show subsidiary proprietors (SPs) that the work was completed on site within a particular period.

    Looking after your estate’s maintenance doesn’t need you at a desk anymore. You can do it from your couch, or on the MRT between everything else on your schedule.

    Not sure how your MCST handles this today? Book a demo and we’ll help you work out where the gaps are.