One database, one straightforward solution, one serious weight off your mind

The most advanced and powerful estate agency software in the UK, Aspasia is the premier Internet based property software solution. It uses Oracle the world's No 1 database engine

What to consider when choosing a software solution?

No inflated claims... let our customers do the talking!

Estate agents wanting to break into Lettings?

Aspasia customers protected by Escrow Agreement

Aspasia customers can take advantage of an optional escrow agreement established through NCC Group, the world's largest providers of such services. Essentially, NCC Group hold an updated copy of the Aspasia source code which can be made available to customers in the event of the demise of SPA Microsystems. An added comfort factor to users of our software.

NCC Group is the world's leading provider of Escrow Solutions. An Escrow Solution is a specialised form of IT assurance, where any business critical application can be securely deposited with NCC Group. Placing software, development or web applications in an Escrow Solution allows licensees to gain access to the source code should a trigger event occur. NCC Group provides a customer focused and quality driven service to 88 of the FTSE 100 companies.

Software Escrow Agreements

Under a Software Escrow agreement, the Owner provides a copy of the source code for a software application to NCC Group. The agreement will spell out the "trigger events" under which the source code can be released to registered users of the application. Some examples of triggering events are the bankruptcy or liquidation of the Owner, or the Owner's failure to maintain the software. Therefore, in the event that the Owner no longer provides support of the application in accordance with the License or Maintenance Agreement the Licensee will gain access to the source code to enable continued maintenance and correction of the application, thus enabling business continuity.

Cost of Escrow

NCC Group handle all the administration involved in maintaining and implementing the Escrow agreement for Aspasia. Aspasia customer companies can become licensees to this agreement by contacting NCC Group who will charge an annual fee.

Data Copy Service

Data in Aspasia is automatically held in one of the most secure environments possible and extensive care is taken with systematic backups. It is almost certainly true that customers using the ASP hosted service enjoy levels of security they would be most unlikely to be able to provide for themselves.

Nevertheless, some customers have expressed a desire for the added comfort factor of having an occasional copy of their data held on their premises in the event of some unforeseen catastrophe. This is available on request for a small fee of £25 on each occasion to help cover the administrative costs.

In what form is the data normally provided?

Aspasia has a very complex database file structure and all data is held in an Oracle database. As such it would be difficult and costly to extract data in a readily usable form for each particular customer's needs. 

However, Oracle has a well recognised and understood mechanism for extracting all the data from a database schema and storing it in it's own proprietary format. 

This "dump" file can then be used by any Oracle software developer to re-create the database and extract the data in whatever form required. It is the creation and download of the Oracle "dump" file that is included in the £25 administrative fee mentioned above.

What if we want to finish with Aspasia and go elsewhere?

SPA Microsystems will work with any customer wishing to move to another supplier and will supply all data in an ASCII format as specified by the customer. Obviously there will be a charge for extracting and converting such data which will be at our normal rates for bespoke programming (currently £600 per day or pro-rata).