Case study / Quality Management
Zutec: From Project-Specific APIs to Portfolio Quality Intelligence
Background
Good quality management tooling. No way to see across it.
Zutec is a construction quality management platform used across residential and commercial developments to capture inspections, snags and quality audit data at site level. It does that job well — giving site teams a structured, digital way to raise quality actions, assign them to subcontractors and track resolution. But at the time of this engagement, Zutec exposed data through project-specific API endpoints. Each project had its own connection. Portfolio-level reporting — aggregating quality performance across all live developments simultaneously — was not something the platform could provide on its own.
For a leading housebuilder managing multiple active residential developments, this was a significant gap. Site teams and their supply chains used Zutec day to day, generating detailed quality data on every development. But getting a consistent view of subcontractor performance, inspection volumes, overdue actions and audit compliance across the portfolio required going well beyond the platform's native capabilities. The business engaged Acumine to build the reporting layer that made it possible.
Project-specific APIs with no portfolio endpoint
Zutec's API architecture at the time meant each project had its own data connection — accessible via a project-specific Report Adapter URL. Querying inspection data across all live developments simultaneously was not natively supported, making portfolio-level reporting technically complex to achieve.
No cross-project view of subcontractor performance
The site team and leadership needed to understand how individual subcontractors were performing across the portfolio — by inspection volume, overdue actions and resolution speed. This analysis required aggregating data from every project simultaneously, which Zutec's native reports could not deliver.
Quality audit compliance invisible at portfolio level
Construction quality audits were conducted by inspectors on site and recorded in Zutec — but compliance scores, section-level results and trends over time were only visible within individual project views. A portfolio-level picture of audit performance and compliance by project, stage and inspector did not exist.
No early warning on overdue or escalating issues
Without an aggregated view, there was no systematic way for management to identify where quality actions were building up, which subcontractors had consistently high overdue rates, or which developments were carrying the greatest unresolved quality risk — until those issues became visible on site.
What Zutec captures
Rich quality data across two distinct data types — siloed by project.
Zutec held detailed quality data across every live development — but it was fragmented across project-specific API connections. Acumine built an integration layer that looped through each project's endpoint, aggregated both inspection and audit data into a single governed model, and surfaced it in Power BI.
Inspections
Snags and quality actions at unit and location level
Every quality inspection raised on site was recorded in Zutec with its type, location (zone, level, area, unit), assigned subcontractor, originator, status and key dates — date raised, target resolution date and date closed. Review history captured subsequent comments and sign-off activity against each item. This was the primary data source for tracking subcontractor performance and open action volumes across the portfolio.
Quality audits
Structured compliance assessments scored by section and question
Quality audits were captured as structured forms with scored responses across multiple sections — including General, Technical Submittal, Benchmark, Inspections, BCAR and QA System Onboarding. Each question carried a score and comment, rolled up to section scores and a total audit percentage. Compliance was categorised as Fully Compliant (85–100%), Mainly Compliant (66–85%) or Non-Compliant (0–66%). The audit data was stored centrally in a single Zutec project rather than per development — a further structural complexity the integration needed to handle.
The solution
A portfolio quality dashboard that solved Zutec's project-by-project architecture
Acumine built a Power BI reporting platform that aggregated Zutec data across all live developments — solving the project-specific API constraint by building an integration layer that called each project endpoint in turn and combined the results into a single, refreshed data model. The dashboard delivered two integrated reporting areas: construction quality inspections and quality audit compliance.
The integration refreshed daily, ensuring the dashboard always reflected the current Zutec position without any manual export or preparation effort. Both inspection and audit data were structured into a consistent model that supported cross-project filtering, subcontractor benchmarking and compliance trend analysis across the portfolio.
01
Inspection status overview
A portfolio-level summary of all quality actions by current status — Open, Completed by Subcontractor, Contested by Subcontractor, Rejected, and Closed — giving site management and leadership an immediate picture of the unresolved quality position across every live development.
02
Subcontractor performance matrix
A detailed matrix tracking every subcontractor's quality performance across the portfolio — showing open, overdue, overdue by more than 14 days and overdue by more than 30 days alongside average days given to fix, average days to close, average days awaiting inspection and a subcontractor engagement percentage. Used to identify underperforming supply chain partners and drive accountability across developments.
03
Inspections by subcontractor, type and location
Clickable stacked bar charts showing inspection volumes and status breakdown by subcontractor, inspection type and location — with a monthly trend view showing how inspection volumes and resolution rates were tracking over time. Each visualisation filters the full dashboard, enabling targeted analysis of specific subcontractors, locations or issue types.
04
Open snag breakdown by project, manager and subcontractor
Horizontal stacked bar charts showing open snags categorised by sub-status — To Fix, To Review, To Close, On Hold, Rejected Awaiting Issue — broken down by project, site manager and subcontractor. A funnel view provided a structured summary of where the open snag volume sat across the workflow pipeline at any given point.
05
Quality audit compliance dashboard
A dedicated audit page showing monthly compliance trends (Fully Compliant, Mainly Compliant, Non-Compliant) with a cumulative audit count line — alongside inspector-level breakdowns, a 100% stacked bar of section compliance percentages and a project compliance matrix with colour-coded scoring. Filters by project, project manager, project stage, section and date range allowed the team to interrogate audit performance from multiple angles.
06
Audit log and compliance by section and question
A structured audit log tracking total audit scores by inspector, date and project — with drill-down to compliance by individual section and question. Rows expanded to show project stage and inspection date, and the full matrix was clickable to filter surrounding visualisations. Used by the quality team to identify consistently weak areas and share good practice across developments.
Outcomes
Portfolio quality visibility that Zutec alone could not provide
Cross-project quality intelligence for the first time
For the first time, the quality team and leadership had a single, always-current view of inspection volumes, open actions and subcontractor performance across all live developments — without logging into individual projects or manually compiling data from separate sources.
Subcontractor accountability made measurable
The subcontractor performance matrix gave the site and commercial teams a consistent, evidence-based view of how each supply chain partner was performing — by overdue rates, resolution speed and engagement levels. This turned subcontractor performance conversations from anecdotal to data-driven.
Audit compliance tracked and trended over time
The quality audit dashboard made compliance performance visible at portfolio level — showing trends over time, highlighting projects and inspectors where scores were consistently below target and identifying which sections of the audit most frequently fell into non-compliance. This supported both quality improvement conversations and resourcing decisions.
Early warning on escalating quality risk
By surfacing overdue actions, high-volume open snag positions and declining audit scores in a live dashboard, the platform gave site management and leadership the early warning signals they needed to intervene before quality issues escalated — rather than discovering them through project walkdowns or end-of-phase reviews.
Technology
Zutec quality data structured for portfolio management in Power BI
The solution integrated Zutec's project-specific Report Adapter APIs through a custom data pipeline that looped through each project endpoint, aggregated inspection and audit data, and loaded it into a single, structured model. The daily refresh cycle ensured the dashboard always reflected the latest Zutec position across all developments. Power BI delivered the reporting layer — with role-based workspace access giving authorised users a full portfolio view.
This challenge — a quality management tool with strong project-level capability but no native portfolio view — is one Acumine encounters across both housebuilding and contracting. If your business uses Zutec and your quality team lacks the cross-project visibility they need, Acumine can build the same reporting layer for you.
Work with Acumine
Using Zutec and missing a portfolio view of quality performance?
If your site teams are recording quality inspections and audits in Zutec but your leadership team has no consistent view across developments, Acumine can build the reporting platform that bridges the gap — aggregating your Zutec data into a live Power BI dashboard covering subcontractor performance, open action volumes and audit compliance.