People

Many, I’m sure, will remember being in Mayfair during the 80s and 90s (good times right?!) – I certainly do, working for Graham Chase at Clive Lewis & Partners. After many years working for Graham, I took some time out to travel around Asia and then joined Graham again at his newly founded company Chase & Partners.

In 1998 I founded BackupTyping as same-day, outsourced typing services, when outsourcing was a new concept to the UK property industry, computers cost a million pounds and the internet made a squeaky noise when you ‘dialled up’. Early clients were Chase & Partners and the also forward thinking King Sturge (now JLL) and BackupTyping was born. We believed same day typing services was the key to outsourced typing in the property industry and that it's still true today.

I have a bit of a thing for chairs – there’s plenty of seats around our place. I started a cocktail bar on Margate seafront shortly after moving here, then sold it a few years later. I am now working on building a small portfolio of cute little houses in Margate where I still live.

I’ve worked in property or construction in some form or another throughout my career, starting age 16 at IMS Lycrete. After moving to London and a short spell for a South African mining company, a few years were spent with The Concrete Society. After that I took my first position for Chartered Surveyors at Vigers where I really started learning all the terminology. From there I joined Clive Lewis & Partners, moving to retail where I worked for Guy Grainger. As Clive Lewis morphed into Erdman Lewis and then Colliers Erdman Lewis I continued to work in the Valuation department for Kevin Powell and Chris Fowler-Tutt. 

I later moved to Leslie Perkins, preferring to work in a smaller office and having more responsibility. I eventually joined Lunson Mitchenall where I stayed for 8 years, working for Peter Courtney and Neil Hockin. I loved my time at Lunson Mitchenall and only left to start a family. Deborah finally lured me to BackupTyping. That was 10 years ago and I haven’t looked back.

I love Asian food and have mastered a pretty mean Thai green curry, but love to try new dishes and have recently managed to make mochi from scratch and Kimbap (Korean sushi) which it turns out I’m quite good at, judging by how quickly my kids eat it!

I decided I really wanted to work in the bright lights of Central London and luckily secured a job with Clive Lewis & Partners. There I worked my way up to a team secretary and then a senior secretary, under the leadership of Graham Chase.

After the businesses merged to become Colliers Erdman Lewis I became PA to the head of the Retail Agency Department and responsible for running a team of secretaries. In 1998 I became PA to Graham Chase, then Chairman of Chase & Partners, where I worked before leaving to start a family. 

I provide professional support, working with various clients and also many that I’ve known now for upwards of 30 years.

In my free time, other than visiting my children who are both now at University, I enjoy going to the gym (not even a lie), eating out with friends and working in the garden.

I have worked in the property industry since the start of my secretarial career, with my first job working for SGB Scaffolding in Battersea. From there I worked as a PA for the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors in Parliament Square, which I enjoyed immensely. Having relocated to Manchester and worked for the University of Salford on their International IT project, I went back to London and joined DTZ as a secretary then as PA to the Director of the Professional Department, whilst also covering all other departments during holiday and sickness periods, gaining great knowledge across all aspects of the surveying spectrum. I then became PA to the Head of Shopping Centres, my favourite job, before leaving to start a family. 

Finally joining Deborah and the team at BackupTyping, I haven’t looked back! I love keeping up to date with the property world through the diverse variety of Backup’s clients.

I am a triplet (all of us girls), two of us being identical twins. I had a fantastic childhood growing up with my two best friends, same classes at school, leaving home together, moving in together and even working at the same company together. Also I think that I still hold the record for the fastest typing test at DTZ!

I have over 23 years experience working in the property industry. I previously worked at Mason Philips Chartered Surveyors, moving on to King Sturge (now JLL) as a Float Secretary working in a variety of departments, including Building Consultancy, Investment, Retail, Office, Landlord and Tenant, Asset Management and Industrial. I have been working with BackupTyping for over 16 years now.

I love living by the seaside and when not busy typing, I love to surf and run.