Worked setups · Stonemasons & memorial masons
Bereaved families, church faculties, and a diary where most visits are an arrival time, not a slot.
Worked example: Ashworth & Son Stonemasons. A fictional third-generation memorial masonry firm in Frome: headstones, additional inscriptions, restoration and bespoke stonework, working across Somerset churchyards and cemeteries.
Proven in a full run on the live system on 3 September 2026. The businesses on these pages are fictional — worked configurations we built to run BLAM8 end to end on the live system, not customers. Every step described happened in the run it cites.
1 · The diary
Every booking is one of a short menu of fixed-length visits, so the diary runs per service. One mason is out at a time (capacity 1) with a 30-minute travel buffer between visits, 24 hours' notice, bookable 90 days ahead.
exact time
At the workshop — the family comes to you, so it is an appointment at an exact time.
morning or afternoon
At the churchyard or property — the customer is told morning or afternoon; you manage the hour.
whole day
A whole-day job, Tuesday to Thursday only, never in frost.
Timing is what the customer is offered: an exact time for an appointment they come to; morning or afternoon for work at their address where you manage the hour; a whole day for a day-long job. The diary reserves the real length either way, so it can never double-book.
2 · Before a booking is made
Twelve details the agent gathers before a visit is booked — asked in the trade's own words, never re-asked once given, with documents requested as attachments rather than typed.
| Detail | Needed | How it's gathered | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type of visit | Required | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known | |
| Full name | Required | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known | |
| Email address | Required | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known | Filled from the sender's own address — never asked for by email. |
| Phone number | Required | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known | Also remembered on the customer record. |
| Nature of the work | Required | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known | |
| Inscription wording & lettering style | Required | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known | The exact wording, kept verbatim through to the booking. |
| Cemetery permit or church faculty | Required | As an attachment — a photo or scan | The granted document, needed before any installation. |
| Photos of the existing stonework or site | Required | As an attachment — a photo or scan | |
| Memorial or loved one's name | Optional | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known | |
| Cemetery or site name | Optional | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known | |
| Site address | Optional | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known | Remembered on the customer record for the next visit. |
| Access or permissions notes | Optional | Asked in the reply, or reused if already known |
The agent asks only for what is genuinely missing, never re-asks something already in the thread or on the customer's record, and refuses to book until every required detail is present. Documents are requested as attachments and their contents are never claimed as checked — a human reviews them.
3 · The CRM that fills itself
Plus Won and Lost. A contact quiet for 21 days is flagged for a nudge.
Cemetery & plot number
Needed for every memorial job at the same plot.
Preferred stone & finish
Slate, granite, limestone — remembered so it is never asked twice.
Site address
The churchyard or property, reused by the portal and the reply drafter.
Extracted from the emails as they arrive, plus the contact's phone number. A returning customer is never asked for any of it again — by email or on the portal.
4 · What the agent knows
Eight notes in the knowledge base. The agent quotes the rates itself and enforces the rules without being reminded.
Lawn memorials from £895; full kerbed memorials from £2,150; additional inscription on an existing memorial £110 plus £3.40 per letter; re-gilding from £180; restoration £340 a day plus materials.
No installation is booked until the cemetery permit or church faculty is granted — the firm applies on the family's behalf; approval takes two to four weeks.
Every memorial starts with a free design consultation at the workshop and a signed proof of the design and inscription before any cutting.
Installations Tuesday to Thursday only, never in frost, and never within six months of the burial while the ground settles.
New memorials take eight to ten weeks from permit approval; additional inscriptions three to four weeks.
A 50% deposit at design sign-off, the balance on installation, by bank transfer against an invoice.
Work within 25 miles of Frome; surveys free within 15 miles, £40 beyond.
Listed-building restoration needs listed building consent — the customer or their architect obtains it, not the firm.
5 · The journey we proved
The run we proved on the live system, in order. Each step happened as described.
Customer
Emails to ask about a headstone for her mother, buried at St Mary's churchyard. Slate if possible; wording undecided; "we've never had to arrange anything like this before".
BLAM8
Drafts a reply that opens with condolences and no exclamation marks, explains the consultation-first process, reasons that a churchyard needs a church faculty rather than a cemetery permit, quotes lawn memorials from £895, and deliberately offers no dates to a bereaved first contact. The owner approves it.
Customer
Replies with the inscription wording and photographs of the plot attached, asking for a consultation next Tuesday or Wednesday afternoon.
BLAM8
Keys the inscription verbatim, records the photos as the required document without claiming to have read them, and holds three afternoon slots exclusively for 24 hours.
Customer
"Tuesday 8 September at 15:30, please."
BLAM8
Flips that slot to a confirmed booking, releases the other two, and confirms in one sentence — the reply is the confirmation. The event lands in the calendar and the customer gets a reference code and a portal link in the footer.
Customer
Opens the portal, asks "is there anything you still need from me?", asks what adding a name to her father's existing stone would cost, and asks for someone to look at the plot before the meeting.
BLAM8
Answers from the promise ledger (nothing owed by her; two things owed by the firm), works the inscription price out at £110 plus 40 letters at £3.40 = £246 with the faculty caveat, offers survey windows, and books the survey — address reused from her record, documents asked for by email.
Owner
Sends a quote for the memorial with an optional line for gilding the lettering and a 50% deposit.
Customer
Opens the link, unticks the gilding — the total updates — and accepts by typing her name.
BLAM8
Freezes the accepted version, raises the 50% deposit invoice and emails it as a PDF with the firm's bank details. Money shows the balance still to invoice, and the deal, promises and timeline are all on the customer's card without anyone typing.
What this run showed us we still owe this trade
Built since · 4 September 2026 — Every booking requirement can now be scoped to particular services ("only for: Installation day"), and the setup assistant recommends the scoping itself. The plumber's previous gas safety record is asked only on a gas safety job; the farrier's passport only on the first visit and the vet's practice only for remedial work — proven in both later runs.
Connect your mailbox and tell the setup assistant what you do. It proposes the diary, the services, the checklist and the pipeline for you to confirm — nothing is saved until you press Save. Free 14-day pilot, no card.
BLAM8 assistant