A fixed-price contract means that a client and an outsourcing company agree on the final budget, deadlines, and scope of a project in advance. Such a high level of predictability has created a popular misconception that this type of cooperation model is the most advantageous for the client side. Yet, it’s not quite true.
Why a Fixed-Price Contract is Not a Good Idea for your Product Development?
Indeed, calculating all costs upfront makes sense for some short-term projects. But it’s often just a guessing game when it comes to building more complex solutions. To give you the full picture, we’ll outline the main risks of fixing the price in software development.
Higher Cost or Not a Fair Price
A Fixed-Price doesn’t mean a fair price. In a fixed-price model, programmers must estimate the work when they have minimum knowledge about a product. So even if a coding team acts in good faith and does its best, odds are their quote will be unrealistic. For instance, it will be hard for developers to accurately quote the functionality that is unknown to them. Neither is it possible to provide the estimation for the changes which will be required due to some future circumstances.
Basically, this means that the price mentioned in a contract won’t be fair either way. Specifically, if it takes developers less time to complete the work than it was originally expected, a client will overpay. On the other hand, an outsourcing company may earn nothing or even have some financial losses if it underestimates the project. In such a case, a client will suffer as well – a product will doubtedly have a high quality since it is created in a rush.
Longer Time for Documentation and Preparations
Writing specifications is hard and takes a lot of time. Thinking through all the details of a project in advance is time-consuming, even if you are an expert and have done it a hundred times before. It’s reasonable to expect that expertise from developers, but writing a specification has to be a collaboration and time dedicated to it up front by you, the client.
If you find yourself in a time crunch to deliver your product, this contract model is not for you. Long planning is required to estimate the most accurate price for the software that will be developed. But that can be a potential drawback when it comes to short deadlines. And still, we might not avoid some communication misunderstandings while the project is ongoing.
Worse Response to Changing Conditions
If the market situation suddenly changes – there is only a place for adjustments within the budget and that might be tight considering the mentioned plan written beforehand. Also, if the client gets an idea that would be much more beneficial for the business – it might not be possible to introduce it within the price of a Fixed-Price contract.
Poor Flexibility
After you sign the contract, there is no easy room for changing or adding features. Let’s say that the Many clients insist on setting the budget before a project starts because they know exactly how the final product should look like. Or, better to say, they think they know it. But, in fact, it’s a mere delusion. In software development projects, there is always a factor of requirements volatility. It means that market conditions and user expectations will inevitably change. And if the feature prioritization is not adjusted to these changes, the project will likely fail
At the same time, the parties are usually reluctant to amend a fixed-price contract since most new terms require signing another agreement and lead to additional costs. That’s why developers usually try to build a product that was defined at the very beginning rather than the best product possible. As you may guess, such an approach rarely ends up with the project success.
Not Suitable for Complex Projects
With smaller projects, the fixed-price model works well. However, if your product is more complex ,like an e-commerce website or a multi-platform mobile app, the fixed model will be too rigid. Products with complex functions, dependencies, and long implementation need constant review, modification, and flexibility.
Less Client Involvement and More Miscommunication Risks
To work well in a fixed-price model, clear and straightforward communication is a must. If you miss a detail or the project specifications aren’t clear, you can easily receive something different than what you expected. Also, a potential advantage, the reduced need for client involvement once the specification has been agreed, can result in isolated development where the end product, although it technically meets the requirements, does not meet the client expectations.
Wasted Time Negotiating Change and More Conflicts
If requirements do change during a project, and in 99% of cases there will be some change, time that could otherwise be spent building your site gets sucked into negotiating instead.
Costly Maintenance Later
You can buy utensils once and then use them for ages. But software solutions aren’t anything like this. New technologies are evolving at a rapid pace so websites and mobile apps need constant maintenance. This, of course, refers to all digital products created under different cooperation models. However, the solutions built according to a fixed-price arrangement will require updates faster and they will probably more expensive.
The reason is obvious. As we’ve already mentioned, such solutions are developed according to predefined requirements without taking into account current conditions. To become relevant, they have to be upgraded not long after the initial release. Also, if the quality was compromised due to a wrong estimation of the project, further maintenance will be more complex and, thus, more expensive.
Ineffective Cooperation
To complete a project successfully, a client and a development team must be on the same page. But it’s not the case of a fixed-price contract. Every party in this type of arrangement has its own interests which often contradict with the interests of another party. In particular, a client wants to receive a top-notch product at the price fixed in a contract. At the same time, developers usually just want to tick the boxes on the feature list.
As all the participants of a project treat it differently, a fixed-priced model doesn’t work well in terms of transparency, communication, and overall cooperation. A coding team isn’t interested in disclosing to a client any issues discovered during the development process. At the same time, a client is motivated to get as much as possible without increasing the price.
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER
Many clients like fixed-price contracts because they think setting all terms upfront brings them a lot of benefits. But, in practice, there are more cons than pros in this type of cooperation model. Specifically, it doesn’t allow for flexibility so a client cannot change the requirements after the agreement is signed. In addition, the unfair price may result in overpricing or compromised quality. Along with the long planning process, ineffective cooperation, and expensive maintenance…, these downsides make a fixed-price model not the best choice for software development.