You didn’t think much about it when you signed up. The monthly cost seemed reasonable, the demo looked promising, and getting started felt easier than building something from scratch. So you committed moved your jobs across, trained your team, and got on with running the business.
Then the email arrived.
It might be a price increase at renewal. It might be a new pricing tier that bundles in features you didn’t ask for. It might be a “we’re updating our plans” notification that means the package you’re on no longer exists. However it’s worded, the message is the same: you’re paying more. And there isn’t much you can do about it.
This happens to trades businesses on JobLogic and SimPro. It happens to accountancy practices on their practice management software. It happens to property companies, financial services firms, and healthcare providers. Any business that relies on a SaaS subscription eventually faces the same moment.
So what are your options and is there a better way?
When the Price Goes Up, the Choices Aren’t Great
When a software provider raises its prices, most businesses face three options. Pay the increase and move on. Negotiate, which rarely works unless you have significant purchasing power. Or migrate to a competitor and start the whole process again.
Migration sounds straightforward until you actually do it. Customer records, job history, compliance documents, asset registers all of it needs to move. Your team needs retraining. Your engineers or staff need to learn a new interface. And the competitor you’ve moved to? They’ll likely do the same thing in 18 months.
Reviews from trades businesses tell a consistent story: slow performance, app crashes, data re-entry, and support teams that don’t fully understand the workflows they’re supposed to support. Businesses put up with this because switching feels worse. That’s not a coincidence it’s how the subscription model is designed to work. SaaS prices rose 12.2% in 2024 alone nearly five times the rate of general inflation and Zylo’s research found that 52.7% of purchased SaaS licences sit idle, meaning businesses are regularly paying for software that isn’t even fully used.
The Workaround Tax
While you’re locked in, there’s another cost quietly accumulating. It doesn’t appear on any invoice, but it’s real.
It’s the spreadsheet someone maintains alongside the software because the reports don’t pull through correctly. It’s the paper form engineers still fill in because the mobile app doesn’t handle that particular compliance requirement. It’s the WhatsApp thread your team uses because the in-app messaging isn’t quite right. It’s the hour a week someone spends copying data from one system into another.
This is the workaround tax the time your business spends compensating for software that almost fits. Most businesses accept it as normal. It isn’t. Our post on bespoke versus off-the-shelf software explores why this gap exists and what it actually costs.
Before CME Heating came to us, their admin team was chasing engineers for paper timesheets, manually re-entering mileage records, and tracking vehicle inspections on printed checklists every single week. They were paying for software and supplementing it with manual processes without questioning whether the two things together were actually cheaper than one system built to do both.
The Same Problem Looks Different in Every Industry
What makes this frustrating is that it isn’t unique to trades. The pattern repeats across industries.
Nestflow, a European fintech company offering home equity release products, were managing complex financial deals across four countries using Google Sheets. Each deal lived in a separate spreadsheet tab. Multiple advisors edited cells directly. There were no access controls, no audit trail, and a growing compliance risk as the volume of sensitive client data increased. They were paying for a collection of disconnected tools and bridging the gaps with time and manual effort. You can read more about how that transformation worked in detail.
Luelle Property Group were coordinating renovation projects across multiple residential properties using WhatsApp for job assignments, spreadsheets for progress tracking, and email threads for compliance documents. Every tool worked just not together.
In each case, the problem wasn’t that the software was bad. It was that no single off-the-shelf product was built for the specific way these businesses operate. And because it didn’t quite fit, the business adapted — and paid the cost of that adaptation every single week.
What If You Owned It Instead?
A custom-built application changes the dynamic entirely. You commission it once, built around the exact way your business works. There are no per-seat fees. No renewal negotiations. No price increase email. No features bundled in that you didn’t ask for. If something needs to change as your business evolves, you change it.
For CME Heating, we built a single application that replaced every paper form and manual process weekly timesheets, van inspection logs, mileage records, holiday requests all generated automatically, visible to the office in real time, accessible from any device. The admin team stopped chasing paperwork. Engineers stopped re-entering data.
For Nestflow, we built a secure deal management portal with an 11-stage pipeline, automated credit checks, AI-generated underwriting memos, role-based access controls, and a full audit trail. What previously required multiple systems and significant compliance risk now runs through one owned platform.
For Luelle, we replaced the WhatsApp threads and spreadsheets with a full job management application structured workflows, compliance document collection, in-app messaging, and a management dashboard giving real-time oversight of every property and contractor.
None of these businesses will receive a price increase email for the software at the core of their operations. They own it. According to Retool’s 2026 research, 35% of teams have already replaced at least one SaaS tool with a custom build, and 78% expect to build more this year a clear sign that the economics are shifting. You can see more of this work on our custom business apps page.
Does the Maths Work?
A typical business spending £400–£600 per month on software is spending £5,000–£7,200 per year. Over five years, that’s £25,000–£36,000 before any price increases, which are currently running at nearly five times the rate of general inflation.
A custom-built application for a business of that size typically costs £10,000+ to build, with a modest monthly maintenance retainer covering hosting, updates, and ongoing development. The break-even point for most businesses is somewhere between two and three years. After that, the savings compound. Our post on the real cost of business app subscriptions works through the full maths if you want to run the numbers for your own situation.
Is This the Right Move for Your Business?
A custom application isn’t the right answer for every business. But it is almost certainly worth a conversation if:
- You have a team of five or more people
- You’re spending £400+ per month across a stack of software tools
- You’re still relying on workarounds to fill the gaps between them
- You’ve received a price increase notification in the last 12 months
- You’re nervous about what your next renewal email will say
We’ve helped a heating and plumbing company, a property renovation group, and a European fintech firm replace fragmented software stacks with single, purpose-built applications. The industries are different. The problem was the same.
Take a look at our app development service, explore our project portfolio, or read our guide on when to replace your SaaS stack with a custom application to help frame the decision.
The conversation starts with understanding your current setup what you’re paying, what’s working, and where your team is losing time. From there, we can tell you honestly whether a custom application makes sense.
Isn’t it nice when things just work?
Talk to Webshape Design about building something better →
Frequently Asked Questions
Can Software Like JobLogic or SimPro Increase Its Prices Mid-Contract?
Most SaaS contracts allow for price increases at renewal, and some include clauses permitting mid-contract changes with notice. The key issue is that you often have limited recourse pay the new rate, negotiate from a weak position, or face the cost and disruption of migrating to a competitor.
What Happens to My Data If I Leave a SaaS Platform?
Most platforms allow you to export your data, but the format, completeness, and usability of that export varies significantly. Job histories, compliance records, and asset registers can be difficult to migrate cleanly, which is one of the main reasons businesses stay on platforms they’re unhappy with.
How Is a Custom App Different from Just Switching to a Competitor?
A competitor is still a SaaS subscription — someone else’s software, someone else’s pricing decisions, someone else’s roadmap. A custom application is yours. It’s built around your workflow, you control what gets developed next, and no one can raise the price on it.
What Does It Cost to Build a Custom App for a Business Like Mine?
For a typical small to medium-sized business, a purpose-built application generally ranges £10,000+ depending on complexity. The best starting point is a conversation about your current setup we can tell you quickly whether the investment makes sense against what you’re currently spending.
How Long Until a Custom App Pays for Itself?
For most businesses spending £400–£600 per month on software, the break-even point is typically two to three years. After that, the ongoing maintenance retainer is significantly lower than the subscriptions it replaced — and the savings compound year on year.
Do I Need Technical Knowledge to Run a Custom App?
No. The applications we build are designed for the people who actually need them engineers on their phones, admin teams at their desks, managers reviewing dashboards. If your team can use a smartphone, they can use the application. We handle everything technical.
