Getting started
Bringing your data across
A property’s history is the whole point of Briesa, so migration is the part we take most seriously — and the part where we would rather be honest than optimistic. Tell us what you are on now and we will say honestly what carries.
Where it stands
Bringing your data across is the plan, and it starts with a conversation about what you are on now. Bulk import of the rent roll is listed on the Large plan. Where an answer below is not known yet, it says so.
What carries across
What comes across cleanly?
Properties and addresses, which are the spine and the first thing to move; contacts and their roles — vendors, purchasers, landlords, tenants and their solicitors — tied to the engagement they belong to; live engagements, the campaigns and management periods running now, with their agreements attached; and trust balances, as an opening position at a date you nominate.
What carries badly?
Free-text notes, historical trust movements, and documents that were never filed against a property. Each is answered below.
Will our notes survive?
They arrive, but they arrive as text. Anything structured in your old system that was really a note stays a note.
What about documents without an address?
If a file was never filed against an address, we cannot invent one. Every document in Briesa belongs to a property and, through it, to an engagement.
How it is done
In what order?
Properties first, with their history where the export has it. Then contacts, so the engagements have parties to attach to. Then the live engagements, and nothing that has closed. Then trust, as an opening balance at a reconciliation you have already signed off. History last, if at all.
Where should we start?
With what is live — the campaigns and tenancies running now — and let the history follow.
Do we send you the data, or do you take it?
Not settled in writing yet. Tell us what you are on today and we will say how it comes across from that system.
Does changing plans or moving a team mean another migration?
No. A plan is a limit, not a different system, and moving a team is a single change to where it sits, with no data migration.
How long it takes
How long does a migration take?
We do not publish a figure, because it depends on what you are on and how much of it there is. Setting the agency up is an afternoon, and most agencies are working in Briesa the same day; closed engagements can follow for months.
When do we switch the trust account?
Not on a Monday. Keep your old system readable while you reconcile the first month in Briesa, and turn it off when the two agree.
What it costs
Is bringing data across charged?
Not decided, and we would rather say so than guess. Tell us what you are on and roughly how many properties and tenancies would come across, and we will tell you.
Which plan includes bulk import?
Bulk import of the rent roll is listed on the Large plan. Every plan is the whole system, and properties, engagements, documents and trust movements are unlimited on all of them.
What happens to history
Do historical trust movements come across?
Usually not: most systems do not export them in a form that reconciles. We bring the balance, and your old system stays readable for the retention period.
What about closed engagements?
They are useful but never urgent. They can follow the live work for months, or not at all.
Once it is in Briesa, can history be changed?
No. Compliance records are never hard-deleted and history is not editable: a record entered in error is corrected with a correction, which leaves both the original and the reason on the file.
Still not sure what carries from your system? Tell us what you are on now, and a person will answer.