Choosing a software company: questions to ask before you sign

Most proposals look alike. The differences show up in the answers to a few plain questions, asked before you sign, and in how readily a supplier puts those answers in writing.

• Who owns the code, the designs and the content once you have paid?
• Are the domain, hosting, app store and payment accounts in your company’s name, with the supplier added as a user?
• Can you export all your data at any time, in a format another system can read?
• If you part ways, what does the handover include?

• What exactly is in the first release, and what is left for later?
• How are changes priced once work has started?
• Who on your side signs off each stage, and how long do you have to review it?
• What will you see along the way: a working version every few weeks, or only the finished system?

• Who fixes bugs after launch, for how long, and how fast?
• Who applies security updates to the system and the libraries it uses?
• Is there a care plan, and what does it cover and leave out?
• Where are backups kept, and has anyone tested restoring one?

If your customers read Arabic, ask to open a live Arabic site or app the supplier built, on a phone. Check that the layout flips properly, that numbers, dates and English words inside Arabic text display correctly, and that the Arabic reads as if a native speaker wrote it, not as a word-by-word translation.

• The accounts will be in the supplier’s name “to keep things simple”.
• A fixed price with no written scope behind it.
• No live work you can open, and no client you can call.
• Vague answers about who looks after the system once it launches.

Ask us the same questions. How we work is set out on our About page; anything it does not answer, ask us before you decide.