Whose Responsibility is Quality Assurance?

A client of mine asked her vendor to make a fix to their database. After making the fix, the vendor sent an email with the following:

"This has been corrected BUT this could have changed some other already established rules (that I don't remember) so please check this carefully."

Hold on a second. If the vendor makes a change to their program, is it my client's responsiblity to make sure that change didn't break something else?

This is actually a very common complaint I get from clients and potential clients. Something along the lines of "Every time the vendor makes a change, they break something else."

How would you respond? What can the customer do to hold the vendor more accountable for the changes they are making?

About Wes Trochlil

For over 30 years, Wes has worked in and with dozens of associations and membership organizations throughout the US, ranging in size from zero staff (all-volunteer) to over 700. In that time Wes has provided a range of consulting services, from general consulting on data management issues to full-scale, association-wide selection and implementation of association management systems.

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