Using Indian/ Asian Development Houses?

[Sammle]

Hi,

Further to my thread in the other forum, I am looking for a bespoke web app for my business.

I have had quotes from Indian software houses for $2400, and one from a US firm for about $5-6000.

The quality of the work on the portfolio of the US outfit is much better, but it could be down to the clientelle and the budgets, not the actual coders. The US guys are also asking 'better' questions and want more detail on the project than the Indian guys. (i.e. they want a full functional spec detailing every single DB field I want, every little feature detailed, etc), whereas the Indian guys are happy with a 6 page brief I wrote and a few extra questions on top.

Has anyone had any disasters/ big successes with Indian firms or US firms, and would you say it is worth paying out double the cost for a US- based development co?

Thanks

 

[Kev Jaques]

The problem you will face is one of ambiguity if your brief is not detailed enough. So you could end up with all kinds of things if not properly specified. Of course they should provide some documentation for you to make sure what you want is what you get, however that's not always the case.
If it has a proper spec then there will be no ambiguity and so you should get what you wanted.

What's wrong with buying in UK?

Depending on your requirements you could be looking at anything.
Have you considered maintenance might also be needed?
And if it's so bespoke, training might be an issue depending on who is using it?

Lots more questions, if you have a brief then the devs on this forum could give you a ball park estimate so you could compare.

 

[matt.chatterley]

I've got to agree with Kev's sentiment here - a good, solid spec (although rarely is one perfect) is vital.

Also - if you get the feeling that the more expensive company are asking better questions, understand what you want better/in more depth, etc, it stands to reason that you're probably going to be happier, quicker, with what they produce.

I'm curious too as to why you've not looked at UK quotes - are they more expensive again than the US options? The exchange isn't that drastic these days!

 

[Sammle]

Purely because I have not had any responses to my RFQ from UK- based firms

 

[matt.chatterley]

Purely because I have not had any responses to my RFQ from UK- based firms

Blimey - thats a bit poor in these times, maybe they've gotten used to working half days in the recession?

The only time I'd *ever* not reply to enquiries is (sometimes) when they are the crazy one-liner sort e.g "I want to build a facebook but in green"

 

[Mister B]

The quality of the work on the portfolio of the US outfit is much better,

And therein lies the answer. If the quality of work is so much better why compromise your business for the sake of a few thousand?

Mister B

 

[Sammle]

Blimey - thats a bit poor in these times, maybe they've gotten used to working half days in the recession?

The only time I'd *ever* not reply to enquiries is (sometimes) when they are the crazy one-liner sort e.g "I want to build a facebook but in green"

Well, I don't know... The spec is detailed enough and I got replies from US, Germany, and several from India.

 

[Sammle]

And therein lies the answer. If the quality of work is so much better why compromise your business for the sake of a few thousand?

Mister B

it could be down to the clientelle and the budgets, not the actual coders.

 

[sanjiv]

Hi,

Further to my thread in the other forum, I am looking for a bespoke web app for my business.

I have had quotes from Indian software houses for $2400, and one from a US firm for about $5-6000.

The quality of the work on the portfolio of the US outfit is much better, but it could be down to the clientelle and the budgets, not the actual coders. The US guys are also asking 'better' questions and want more detail on the project than the Indian guys. (i.e. they want a full functional spec detailing every single DB field I want, every little feature detailed, etc), whereas the Indian guys are happy with a 6 page brief I wrote and a few extra questions on top.

Has anyone had any disasters/ big successes with Indian firms or US firms, and would you say it is worth paying out double the cost for a US- based development co?

Thanks

What do the Indian company want upfront?
What sort of web app is it?

 

[Sammle]

Nothing- part of the RFQ is that they work on a milestone basis.

It's a custom cart and fulfillment system.

 

[uworld]

Post some details.

 

[Sammle]

I'm not looking to find someone to do the work here, all I want is some feedback on my original Q. Thanks.

 

[TheWebDesigner]

Seems a bit pricey even for a custom cart.
Depending what features you want.

Why not post the spec of what you want and maybe some of us here could help you out.

In the current climate im disappointed to hear your UK replys have been non existant, no idea why companies arent bothering to help.

Bit like the 5 plumbers ive called who have not responded seems under £500 isnt worth the work.

Only issue I see with international companies is the time zone and getting help, I have clients in Australia but its perfect, they have an issue and mail me, they go to bed, I fix while there asleep.

Urgent stuff obviously I get up in middle of night lol.

Al

 

[cmcp]

Before generalising on workers by their nationality, have a look at why they're letting you down. It'll be due to your selection process.

I've been let down continually by UK, USA, central Europe and Eastern European developers. India too, but of the keepers I find on good projects they've all come from India.

The work ethic of these guys outshines any western team I've put together. Sure there's just as many cowboys as there are hard workers, but there are a lot of hard workers and it's your job to find them.

 

[dingbat]

Don't be fooled by examples of work given by any company. Also, for all you know the US company is outsourcing the work to Asia anyway.

I've used 5 web developers to date. One in Vietnam, one in India and 3 in the UK (of which one was outsourcing anyway).

Had problems with all of them. The least troublesome was the last UK guy I used. But I think that had a lot to do with my being on his case and not settling for crap.

From my perspective dealing with web developers is as much heartache as dealing with builders. Do as much research as you can, speaking to the website owners, if possible.

 

[TheWebDesigner]

hmm my edit didnt work.

Basically get a full spec from them and make sure you ask for everything you want from it.

Maybe ask them if there is anything they would adivse to add.

Also find out what level of future proofing the system will have. No point shelling out more in future if your business plan changes.

Last point ask if you are the sole owner of the software, and they wont use with other clients, the US price suggests full ownership. Indian price seems too cheap for your full ownership.

Al

 

[TheWebDesigner]

Dingbat hit the nail on the head.

Outsourcing UK companies annoy me.
Why setup a design or development house when you cant do either?

But were not all as bad as builders, you wont catch me telling a client

"Oooooh the jobs no as easy as you may think, the previous system was setup by cowboys so will cost alot more to update/repair/design"

lol

Al

 

[Sammle]

Seems a bit pricey even for a custom cart.
Depending what features you want.

Why not post the spec of what you want and maybe some of us here could help you out.

In the current climate im disappointed to hear your UK replys have been non existant, no idea why companies arent bothering to help.

Bit like the 5 plumbers ive called who have not responded seems under £500 isnt worth the work.

Only issue I see with international companies is the time zone and getting help, I have clients in Australia but its perfect, they have an issue and mail me, they go to bed, I fix while there asleep.

Urgent stuff obviously I get up in middle of night lol.

Al

Well I want the solution in CodeIgniter.No HTML web design is needed.

From my doc:

• The solution shall broadly consist of the following functionality:

o User signup, login, and management

o Shopping cart with ability to save basket, and display personalized products (not generic images) after putting an item in the basket. Options for handling payments should also be discussed.

o Basic order fulfillment system, allowing us and our fulfillment partners to track and update what stage orders are at. (i.e. accepted/ printed/ shipped, etc) We should then be able to feed this data back to the customer, so they can see exactly when their order has been dispatched.

o Calendar and reminder functionality so customers get reminded about friend/ family birthdays.

o A search facility, which finds products based on keywords.

 

[sanjiv]

Well I want the solution in CodeIgniter.No HTML web design is needed.

From my doc:

• The solution shall broadly consist of the following functionality:

o User signup, login, and management

o Shopping cart with ability to save basket, and display personalized products (not generic images) after putting an item in the basket. Options for handling payments should also be discussed.

o Basic order fulfillment system, allowing us and our fulfillment partners to track and update what stage orders are at. (i.e. accepted/ printed/ shipped, etc) We should then be able to feed this data back to the customer, so they can see exactly when their order has been dispatched.

o Calendar and reminder functionality so customers get reminded about friend/ family birthdays.

o A search facility, which finds products based on keywords.

That is very expensive for that.

Why does it have to be CodeIgniter? Of course there will have to be HTML otherwise how will it be displayed to the people accessing the website?

 

[Sammle]

That is very expensive for that.

Why does it have to be CodeIgniter? Of course there will have to be HTML otherwise how will it be displayed to the people accessing the website?

No but I mean I do not want a 'proper' web design done. They have to integrate with my existing template.

I want CodeIgniter, as I have knowledge of CodeIgniter already and may decide to take on some work myself in the future. Much easier to work with something I am already familiar with. I do not have the time to develop the above from scratch at the moment.

They are all quoting 120-160 hrs.

 

[cmcp]

No front end design, just back end development.

 

[sanjiv]

No but I mean I do not want a 'proper' web design done. They have to integrate with my existing template.

They are all quoting 120-160 hrs.

Oh right.

Why does it have to be CodeIgniter?

Also would it not be better to use an out of the box PHP Shopping Cart which is easily customisable and can be used as a basis. This is so that it is more secure and it comes with security updates and also if ever you need to do anything yourself, then there would be a community that could easily help you. Also Payment Gateways will integrate out of the box too.

 

[TheWebDesigner]

The spec seems very basic for the prices they are quoting.

With it being an open source php platform the cost does seem high.

Why not use one of the many open source carts available oscommerce? virtuamart? tested by thousands of users, free updates, proven reliability.

All free and you could pay a coder to make it look like how you want it.

Al

 

[TheWebDesigner]

For that sort of money you could have your current site converted to any other platform and a shopping cart integrated into it.

We have done that alot recently taking clients from static html,php sites to CMS sites and putting in new e-commerce stores.

Im actually doing one as we speak and popping back to forum to read updates.

Al

 

[Sammle]

Oh right.

Why does it have to be CodeIgniter?

Also would it not be better to use an out of the box PHP Shopping Cart which is easily customisable and can be used as a basis. This is so that it is more secure and it comes with security updates and also if ever you need to do anything yourself, then there would be a community that could easily help you. Also Payment Gateways will integrate out of the box too.

Because I have tried customising an existing cart (CS-Cart, and I played with a lot of them). and I found a lot of 'glitches' I could not work out. Like I could not link back to the personalised instance of the product and show a thumbnail of the personalised product in the cart of that user.

 

[Sammle]

The spec seems very basic for the prices they are quoting.

With it being an open source php platform the cost does seem high.

Why not use one of the many open source carts available oscommerce? virtuamart? tested by thousands of users, free updates, proven reliability.

All free and you could pay a coder to make it look like how you want it.

Al

The spec is MUCH more detailed, that was just the summary page.

 

[TheWebDesigner]

Sammle

Check out Virtuamart
Its tested and has the backing of all the major Payment Gateways, RBS Worldpay, Paybycash, and many others.

Security flaws are updated automatically, where as your custom system if a breach happens you need to pay to get it fixed.

With the custom cart quotes what level of security comes with them SSL certs etc, and what liability do they take in the event of client data being "taken".

AL

 

[sanjiv]

Because I have tried customising an existing cart (CS-Cart, and I played with a lot of them). and I found a lot of 'glitches' I could not work out. Like I could not link back to the personalised instance of the product and show a thumbnail of the personalised product in the cart of that user.

Are you interested in quotations from any users from the forum here for a solution similar to the scenario I provided?

 

[Sammle]

Ok let's hear it

 

[TheWebDesigner]

I would be interested to give you a quote could you PM your current site link or post on the forums if you wish to do so.

Thanks

Al

 

[cmcp]

Here's my advice.

• Extend Magento, use your budget to build onto it.

• Don't go with anyone who is PMing you just now. You contact the developers that are recommend to you.

My recommendation is Joseph Edmonds of Edmonds Commerce.

 

[Sammle]

The website is not active yet. All I have done is develop the product personalisation engine... The rest of it is still to be developed. PM me with details of what you need to know to provide a quote

Thanks

 

[Sammle]

Here's my advice.

• Extend Magento, use your budget to build onto it.

• Don't go with anyone who is PMing you just now. You contact the developers that are recommend to you.

My recommendation is Joseph Edmonds of Edmonds Commerce.

My problem with Magento is that it is extremely heavy last time I checked, and I think things like gift vouchers, credits, etc cost big money? Isn't the licence about $12,000 a year?

 

[Eagle]

What's wrong with buying in UK?

^ Exactly.

 

[sanjiv]

What's wrong with buying in UK?

Agree there too
Surely if its a UK store, then it would be best bought in the UK so that the currency is all set properly, postage is set correctly etc.
Also there will be no spelling mistakes

 

[Sammle]

Am I missing some joke here? If people from the UK don't quote, I don't really have much choice... Can we stop this?

 

[sanjiv]

Am I missing some joke here? If people from the UK don't quote, I don't really have much choice... Can we stop this?

Sorry... What do you mean by not quote? Ignore emails?

 

[Sammle]

Sorry... What do you mean by not quote? Ignore emails?

No, they do not bid when the project goes up on various sites inviting people to bid on the work.

 

[sanjiv]

Oh right you mean on freelance sites. I would suggest posting on this forum looking for a designer and also searching for these companies on Google. You are right that on freelance sites most people are from US and Asia.