Can you warrant your EPoS solution will work? Huw Thomas, COO, PMC
Hardware, software or a combination of both, all the elements of an EPOS solution must be fit for purpose. In fact, more importantly the solution has to do exactly what the customer expects it to do. According to Huw Thomas, COO at PMC, unfortunately, most of them don’t.
That observation could apply to anything from a ‘green field’ application where the retailer is implementing a new infrastructure, through to those with a solution in place but with point releases and bug fixes arriving regularly. The problem is that the majority of retailers are too busy managing the business and their internal IT teams are too busy ‘keeping the lights on’ to ensure that solutions are fit for purpose and bug fixes have actually fixed the defects and are safe to deploy in a live environment.
Does that mean that retailers are relying on unwarranted hardware and software solutions? Yes it does, however that should be no surprise to anyone, as vendors have never truly warranted their solutions. They are driven by different business priorities and funadmentaly need to get maximum market penetration in the shortest possible time. There is limited incentive for them to warrant that retailers end up with the highest quality product.
Acceptance criteria vs. levels of diligence
Vendors want to sell product that much is clear. Their mantra is ‘get the solution out there, go back and fix it later’. However, what tends to happen is that the people charged with getting solutions out in to the market rarely ‘go back and fix it later’ because they are no longer involved in the project.
Fundamentally, they are driven to sell hardware or licenses. They want the solution to be acceptable but are not desperately concerned if it’s not fully watertight. Indeed, it is now considered acceptable that part of the testing and quality control process should be carried out in the field with users finding and fixing the bugs.
It’s clear that vendors deliver on expectation – retailers expect there to be bugs and vendors deliver accordingly.
Everyone has a level of acceptability when they must deploy
Most retailers have their own IT teams, including the sponsors and implementers of a particular project. These people are charged with getting the solution up and running, and in many cases are under similar pressures to vendors. Management want the solution deployed, the internal IT team know it has issues but it’s reached a level of acceptability and it gets deployed.
This is not hard to understand because acceptability is driven by the event date, without exception, system acceptability gets watered down as the date for deployment gets closer. This creates a culture of quality apathy that makes allowances for more and more problems that will be ‘fixed when it’s up and running’.
Why testing should be a ‘no choice’ option
The message to retailers is simple: “Before you hit problems, engage with an independent organisation to carry out testing in a live environment and warrant that your system does exactly what you expect it to do – you will save time, money and effort.” Most retailers accept this is necessary but few have the time or inclination to do it. This is wrong. They accept the situation because it’s not dramatic to avoid a disaster. This is a dangerous thought pattern because a big enough disaster could put them in a business critical situation.
At perhaps the lowest level of concern, a retailer has disgruntled employees and possibly unhappy customers - staff are grumpy because they can’t use the system effectively, and customers are unhappy because they can’t checkout quickly at the tills. It might not be a 24x7 problem, so retailers simply consider the level of acceptability. That’s where you find statements such as: “We run eight tills in each store even though we only require six, because at any given moment two could be out of action”
However, if the problem becomes business-critical then the implications are much worse. If there is a system failure, then rather than dealing with unhappy customers and staff, the retailer has to shut the door. If the store is full they could be faced with charging every customer a token amount for what they have in their basket.
Testing that emulates a live environment should be a no choice option because deployment of a solution is not final. Retailers face new functional requirements, which mean new code, and there will always be defects in the live environment. Software vendors provide new point releases based on functionality updates and bug fixes, and there will always be new releases of hardware.
Infinitely customisable products in a mass market mean there will be issues
If a retailer has just spent a million pounds on a new EPOS package, why should he then spend more money on making sure it works properly? After all, if you buy a car you expect it to work, you don’t expect to pay someone to drive it for you for a thousand miles to point out problems and correct them to make sure it works. That’s because the car is a mass-market product that is fundamentally the same for every application.
The need for the investment in testing is easier to understand when you recognise that although retail EPOS may be a mass-market, it’s also an infinitely customisable market. That is why neither hardware nor software vendors can adequately test product in every operating environment.
Vendors are selling a generic product into a massively individualised market – any variation to what comes out of the box can lead to problems. Additionally, application requirements change, sometimes dramatically – it’s like deciding to buy a Ford Focus and then wanting to go off-roading with it, race it or decide that you really want a motorcycle.
Advantages of testing
An independent tester will stay the course with the retailer, running through the process and providing ongoing support. They take responsibility for the replication and management of defects and ensure that the solution performs as expected and certify it accordingly. Only when the business requirement matches the functional specification, which matches the quality needed in the live environment - that’s when the solution is certified.
For further information please contact enquiries@paulmasonconsulting.co.uk |
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