For how long do you maintain/unbug projects after launch?

Hi all,

after you have launched a client's project, for how long do you include free maintenance and bug fixing? Given the situation you do not have a maintenance contract with the client?

A while ago i found this contract boilerplate by csswizardry:
https://github.com/csswizardry/Contract/blob/master/Contract.md

It says:

Any bugs, which, unfortunately, cannot be guaranteed against, that are directly related to The Work, and are discovered within two weeks of the end of The Work, shall be fixed as a matter of course, and require no renegotiation of terms.

It seems like any bugs found after that two week period are not included in the original body of work and must be paid extra.

However, i find it kind of difficult to justify this to the client and partly also my conscience.

But then i have the current situation where a client discovered a bug in a project i finished in 2008. The bug is definitely my fault, but it never came up until now. Basically it's that a submenu can only have up to 9 items. 10 items break it. Now is the first time there is a need for 10 items.

I could fix it, but it is an all flash site and fixing it would mean a lot of fixing.

So, how do you good people handle maintenance? In general? And if you have comments on this special case, they are welcome.

- Marc

Generally it's a 30 day window.

When I started I used to provide unlimited bug support. I soon found that browser compatibility just couldn't be indefinitely guaranteed. It's unrealistic with emerging/future platforms, browsers and OS to commit to be available to fix a bug in a future release and absorb that cost. By the same token, if a client insists on using IE 6, then you have to be firm with bugs.

Once I started working with CMS I found that client support shot up. Most support calls arose where clients were ignoring documentation or implementing bad processes when updating their sites. In those cases too, clients didn't see any difference between a "bug" and an error.

But ultimately it depends on the client and how much I work with them and how well we work together. I've outsourced stuff in the past too and would see anything from 15 days to 30 days as reasonable. It also ensures your client will prioritise the use and testing of their product.

Re your own situation and knowing how labour intensive Flash can be, I wouldn't be hasty in offering to absorb the cost of that. You'd be lucky to get 12 months warranty on a car which probably cost many many times the cost of your flash project?

Your situation is not a bug, it is a redesign issue. If the design the client accepted no longer suits his needs, then you need to negotiate a redesign.

To carry out the car analogy, it's like a customer buys a car, then has three or four more children. Does he expect the dealer to replace his car with a bigger one?

This is just a variation on the old feature creep issue.

That contract, btw, is missing a critical section on the client being responsible for legal fees involved in recovering any money the client fails to pay.

Thanks for your answers.

I thought about it some more:
That bug we now found actually is a bug. The client could reasonably presume that a submenu can have any amount of items and i gave him no indication otherwise. It's more like buying a bus and usually you only travel with your two children but when you want to take the soccer team on a trip you discover there are not enough seatbelts.

But after some more digging i found that the legal warranty on programming contracts in Germany (where i happen to be living) is three years. I think that german consumer rights are a bit above average, certainly in realtion to north american.
So that's that.

So now it comes down to what kind of future i would like to have with said client. And since the client is det on keeping his 6 year old design and have it translated into modern form, i will see if we can find some kind of arrangement.

@BobRay, good point.

Ah, a sub-menu. I hadn't noticed that. True, a dropdown sub-menu wouldn't normally have restrictions - unless it's a horizontal "dropline" sub-menu.

Yes. But i know that feature creep of which you speak very well. Took me some years to get the antidode.