What a mouthful, but I think as our business grows and the levels of complexities in the software and web world increase, MerlinFX will do its best to educate its clients as best we can. This blog for example is the perfect way to keep you informed of what we are up to and what technologies will affect your business.
We are finding that to provide a valuable service, sometimes the line that seperates warranty, bug fixes, maintenance and free consultancy –are very much blurred.
Let me explain. A MerlinFX Warranty is where for a period of time after a project has been completed, exhaustively tested by us and you that everything is working as it should to the design and technical specification document and the final proposal. After this period, if changes / tweaks are required that were unforseen and falls outside of the warranty – we have a right to charge you for the time to resolve this.
If it is a bug that we did not pick up, we will fix it.
If for some reason you require a certain process, function, activity etc to be changed, we refer to these as tweaks, where you will be charged. Other forms of tweaks could be major additions – which also have a timed charge.
Maintenance, mentioned in a previous post, is the changing, updating of the application as required by feedback from the users, changes in technology and integration with other systems. This all takes time and will be charged accordingly.
Support covers pretty much all the above and on many occasions we do help our clients with software and computer issues that fall outside of the scope of our original agreement. This could be answering questions on why Outlook doesn’t work to fixing a network issue. Whilst we can help you with these issues, the bigger we get the more customers we have – the harder it is for us to service. We do it because we’re such nice guys. Providing this service for free takes us away from working for the clients paying for jobs to be done.
Unfortunately for us this is not good business practice, great for you because you are effectively getting free support. Sadly this has to come to an end, but it’s not all bad news for you. Like I said, we’re nice guys! We are endeavouring to add a knowledge base of common issues and allow you to proactively learn and seek a solution to your IT issues that fall outside of our agreements. If you do not have your own IT department, this is the next best thing.
You can decide to pay for Support on an hourly basis or purchase Support Blocks for various amounts with discounts attached. You can save even more by logging your job via our new Job System. Every feature that will be included in our system will be available to you as a full web application you can use in your own business. If you are a client of MerlinFX, access to the knowledge base is free.
So yes, you can create Knowledge Bases for your business. Suppliers, contractors, investors, clients can all log in and view your content, procedures etc. There is a lot more to it, but that’ll be giving too much away!
Consultancy. The bane of our creative existence. As web professionals we stay ahead with the latest web trends and once we get a handle on your industry, your business and how your customers like to work with you – then we can provide solutions. This can take the form of spending numerous hours preparing documents, technical specifications, research, travelling and more importantly providing ideas for you. Some of this cost is reaped from the job cost, but lengthy, complex solutions require many meetings / consultations. It is impossible to project how many meetings it will take. Adding a cost to this will allow you to prepare adequately for meetings, keep to a strict agenda and effectively reduce costs – for both of us.
Much of the time our clients enjoy free consultancy. This is about to change as well. The catch phrase of yesteryear, ‘free quote’ may work for the electrician; but building a complex ebusiness web application to suit your business and clients and then making it easy to use – isn’t done in 3 minutes. The other benefit you get is our experience in our industry. The web is in a consistent state of flux. What took 50 lines of code now takes 5; what was in is now out; what was expensive to implement is now cheaper. As web developers we have to stay in touch with the latest. We spend a portion of each day researching the latest web developments in software, hardware and how these will make our products better or create new ones. We send our programmers to training courses. We integrate the latest technologies into our own systems before we pass on the benefits to you in the way of ideas. Often we tweak the products at no cost you as well.
Depending on the size of the project and/or frequency of meetings, liaising with the client, if it falls into the area where we are providing you with solutions and ideas before a project or the next stage of a project begins, it may attract a consulting fee.
We will keep you posted on these developments.
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