Re: Contractors of Questionable Ability

[John Posada <posada -at- FAXSAV -dot- COM>]

>>>Has anyone else had to deal with an outside party to do work that you
subsequently had to test and validate? Our company hired a multimedia
design place to build our website, and I am having massive reservations
about their abilities. Infuriating delays aside (over a week late in
delivering a test site), I have found that many of the errors are (IMHO)<<<<

Much of this message contains declarations that in context, cannot be evaluated.  An example is "..over a week late..."  A week in how much total time.  If the turnaround was three weeks, then that miss is not at all good.  However, if the timeframe was 6 months of complex backend coding, then a week isn't bad...it would be the -not calling to say I'll be late- that would be worse.



>>>>a lack of basic HTML knowledge. I am getting the impression that this
company is trusting their site authoring tool a bit too much and are
unable to deliver a site that meets my standards and expectations. The
bosses want the site commissioned ASAP, yet for it to happen, I will
have to come into the office during the holiday break (something I DON'T
want to do).<<<<<

To what standards are we judging here.  Remember when we had the discussion about wysiwig web authoring Vs hand coding?  Is the problem with parameters such as fixing a table at 1,000 pixels wide when everyone has 14" monitors Vs 99% of screen or is it random code that shouldn't be there but doesn't hurt much.



>>>A prime example of the "basic" errors I am finding are the "ALT" text
designations for images. If images display alternate text (I say IF,
because some don't), the popup reads "Picture". I asked the developers
to change the text to something more meaningful (like the section
heading) and it took me over 5 minutes to explain what the ALT text is.<<<<

You may have spoken to someone that was ignorant of the meaning of ALT, but obviously, someone knew WHAT it was because if it had been ignored, it wouldn't have said "Picture", but more like "picture.gif 3467 bytes".  Seems what you have is a difference of opinion on the proper labeling.  What does the job spec that you gave the outside party say to do?  How did you describe "meaningful" and would multiple images in a page all have the Section Heading title?  I cannot read minds and chances are, they cannot either.



>>>A day later, the changes have not been implemented. I haven't tested one
quarter of the site and I am already at my wit's end; I have walked away<<<<

When did they say they would have it fixed?  "A day later" sounds pretty tight unless that was demanded and they agreed.  Why would they make changes to a site you are only a quarter through instead of you find all the changes and they fix them all.  You aren't going to put out the site only 25% fixed, are ya? 



>>>>from my computer in frustration so many times this afternoon, I don't
know what to do. I am making my list (and checking it twice) of all
errors and I will submit it to the web developers, for correction over
the holiday break. The same list will go to upper management for their
edification.<<<<

Make sure that whoever gets this report feels the same way "philosophically" as you do about what should be expected by the vendor.  You may shoot yourself in the foot by 1) criticizing an implementation that was requested/expected/allowed and by nailing the error, by extension, knocking the "upper manager" 2) Make sure that what you criticize is based on what the negative impact is to the department Vs a whinny "I_don't_like_<BR>_codes_because_I_don't". 



>>>>Basically, I don't know what to do anymore. The more I test, the more
frustrated I become. I have covered my gluteus maximus as much as
possible, yet I feel as if it's my fault, or, at the very least, that I
will somehow be held responsible for this debacle. Management made the
decision to hire these people, yet I have had exclusive contact with the
multimedia company since this project started.<<<<

So are you the one who should have described in greater detail how to