1. Anonymous Gold

    Managing Director at Ampheon Limited

    04 September 2008 17:34pm

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    After you've built a web site, how do you handle bugs the client reports after say 1 month, 3 months, 6 months or a year? Do you offer a limited warranty period or do you just fix bugs indefinitely? If you offer a warranty what do you do when that expires? Charge the client, or maybe offer them an extended warranty or maintenance agreement?

  2. dj barker Bronze

    Online Marketer at Large

    04 September 2008 18:16pm

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    hi, Malcolm,

    when I used to code sites I charged:

    1. 30% payment up front
    2. 40% on delivery
    3. 30% after 1 month, once all client-flagged bugs had been ironed out (note: bugs not extra features!)

    After that, I charged by the hour for bug fixing.

    How about you?

     

    daniel

  3. Matt Illston Bronze

    MD at Mr Zen Ltd

    05 September 2008 08:47am

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    Hi Malcolm,

    Or you could take a standard software approach which offers support at around 20% of the original cost as an annual fee. I would expect that to include:

    • Bug fixing (not developments)
    • Software upgrades (security / patches etc let say on a cms system or similar as long as that's not covered by the hosting arrangement)

    You need to be careful to separate bugs / security from developments

    • Development would include adding new features, making changes for brand new browsers (thanks Google!)
    • Bugs would include making changes that should have been covered by the original spec - for example fixing browser issues that pre-existed the site launch, but weren't spotted in testing.

    The tough thing is persuading the client that a bug fix is actually a development request.. Good luck with that..

    Matt

    MrZen Ltd

    Web Development for the Travel Industry

  4. Pooja Sharma Bronze

    Business Manager at W3Quest InfoTech Ltd

    05 September 2008 17:46pm

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    Hi

    We ususally give a fixed time period waranty depending on the size of the website/application it varies to 1 month to maximumof 90days. In addition to that till date all oyur clients have entered into support agreement renewed on yearly basis which covers unlimited bug fixing. However as mentioned its important not to confuse it with new development requests... which should be charged accpordingly.

     

  5. Tom Hayes Silver

    CEO/Owner at Lightbox Multimedia

    08 September 2008 16:38pm

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    This is an area which we are struggling with as well although it is more in relation to the support side of things.

    We haev a number of clients who ring on a daily basis looking for site updates and fixes but expect them to be done within 24 hours. However we are often busy with other projects and the clients seem to be unwilling to sign a support agreement - which would involve a monthly fee...

    How do I make support contracts more palatable for clients? I was thinking of offering a reduced hourly rate for customers who pay us a monthly fee. Those that didnt want to pay the monthly fee would pay a premium hourly rate (25%/30% more) if they wanted support work carried out.

    Would be interested to know people's thoughts on this one and if anyone has a good example of how to deal with these types of contracts I am all ears!
     

  6. dj barker Bronze

    Online Marketer at Large

    08 September 2008 18:02pm

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    hi, Tom, how about building extra time into SLAs for customers who don't want to sign up to your monthly contract?

    eg, for requests that take under 3 hours of labour you could say:

    • Standard contract: 72-hour turnaround, £100 per hour
    • Gold contract: 24-hour turnaround, £70 per hour

    It wouldn't need to affect your project rates, as this would just be for the smaller "need this today" projects you're talking about.

     

    daniel

  7. Tom Hayes Silver

    CEO/Owner at Lightbox Multimedia

    08 September 2008 18:25pm

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    Thanks

    Daniel

    Sounds like a good idea. What are the general thoughts for what customers would/should pay for a "support" contract?

    We typically base any support contract on a fixed number of hours per month. However the key really is to incentivise clients that they need to sign up for this contract rather than just ringing up and making ad hoc requests.

    My gut feeling tells me that if you could get a client to pay a nominal fee on a monthly basis in order to avail of lower rates and faster turnarounds for maintenance work that this would be a resonable model. I am interested to hear other people's experience in this regard.

    Tom

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