Rent a solution

[Howard LeCanard]

Does anyone have experience with renting a solution to clients? I have a client who is balking at the potential cost of paying for a total redesign of her solution, but she desparately needs it.

She has a solution that was converted from 3 to 7. There are corrupt files and it was designed poorly, as well as being designed a long time ago. I could design a modified solution that would fit their current needs, and that I wouldn't need to keep patching, but she would rather pay me to keep sewing patches on their current system.

I don't think she knows how much nicer a solution could be. I'm considering rebuilding her system in advance, to show her how much it could really do for her. Then I got to thinking.

She may still think my development cost is too much, but maybe a monthly cost would be more reasonable. She already has all the copies of FileMaker and a dedicated machine with Server on it, so she wouldn't have to buy more software.

I'm trying to figure out if I should just let her pay over time, to cover my fees (plus interest), or if I should set up a rental agreement where she keeps on paying as long as she uses the software. If I go with the second option, I'm seeing a lot of potential issues, and having to involve lawyers.

Of course, another possible answer is to forget the whole thing.

Has anyone does something like this before? Any advice?

[Ted S]

Seems like a pretty good and proven business model to me.

I work for a manufacturing company. We purchased an ERP system (non-FileMaker) about 5 years ago for about $200k. Every year we pay the software provider 50k+ for maintenance and support. For this we get unlimited support calls and all the latest software patches and general releases.

This is pretty typical I think. The difference is that the software was not custom written for our company. There are scores of other manufacturers running the same software.

I would think that if you design the solution with only one customer in mind you may not be able to sell it to others if you wanted to because of the uniquness of the design. You may want to consider a more general design and see if you can get other similar businesses in your solution.

[Ender]

Hi Howard,

The idea of renting a database seems silly to me. What happens when the client stops paying, are you going to evict the data and take the files?

I'd ask if she would be willing to look at some mock ups of a couple layouts so she could see some of the features you could add in a redesigned solution. If that goes well, make a proper proposal for redesigning it. Find out what they want to do that their current system does not do well, and include those in the proposal. Talk about the improvements you can offer in access speed, user friendliness, security, or whatever.

You can schedule the redesign in phases so that she can pay as modules are delivered. This makes each payment easier for her to swallow, you start getting paid sooner, and she can see the quality of your work early in the redesign. She need not commit to future phases if she's not happy with the first one.

In the end, this will be about your ability to sell yourself and your skills. Of course, if she simply doesn't have the money, then maybe this isn't a good venture.

If you think this database has marketability, then another option would be for you to build a solution on your own that handles all those things that this type of business likes to track, and offer to license it to this client and any other similar businesses. The cost of licensing would be less for them because you maintain ownership of the design and can license it to as many businesses as you want. If they like your work they will pay you to add additional features over time.

[Lee Smith]

I wouldn't do any work on these files until after you and the client have formed a contractual agreement that a new solution is wanted, and then you should hire an an attorney who is familiar with copyright laws to help you construct it.

Your problem is not in whether or not you can rent a solution to them, in a sense that is what they would do if you owned the rights to solution, and you sell them the rights to use it.

Your problem is in convincing them that an update is in order. Without their concurrence in this fact, you are subjecting yourself to a lot of work without the prospect of receiving compensation for your time (unless you plan on selling any solution developed to others in the industry).

If may help your cause to have them read the White Paper available at FMI site about upgrading solutions. It is recommended that for solution that is more than something simple, that you create the files in v7 first, and import the data anyway.

HTH

Lee

[Howard LeCanard]

I guess I should confess that my main motivation is that I hate working with these old files they're using. It would almost be worth giving them the new system to avoid any more work in the old system. Almost!

Thanks for your input.

[Lee Smith]

I would venture to say that most of us have been in this predicament.

Decision, decision, decision.

You can choose to:

Build the Files for the employer, and let them have them for Free. What a nice employee you would be. :

Build the Files for the employer, retain ownership, and allow the employer to use them as long as you are employed.

Build the Files for the employer and just charge them for Time and expenses, and they would owned the rights. This usually means that you do the development as an employee, and the time and expenses are incurred during your normal work day.

Build the Files for the employer, charge them for the use, but retain ownership and reserve all rights to sell it to others. This would mean that all development of the files would be done on your own time, and off premises, except for the time needed to implement and test at the employers office.

Once you have decided which way you are going to proceed, then you can better figure out your approach, and any written contract/agreement needed to protect yourself.

HTH

Lee

[Howard LeCanard]

Build the Files for the employer, and let them have them for Free.

I've done that one before, back when I was an employee. I found that when I'm billing $0 per hour, that's what people value my time at, and keep asking for more work at that rate.

Build the Files for the employer, retain ownership, and allow the employer to use them as long as you are employed.

Build the Files for the employer and just charge them for Time and expenses, and they would owned the rights. This usually means that you do the development as an employee, and the time and expenses are incurred during your normal work day.

Build the Files for the employer, charge them for the use, but retain ownership and reserve all rights to sell it to others. This would mean that all development of the files would be done on your own time, and off premises, except for the time needed to implement and test at the employers office.

I wish I could get so lucky. This client has also been unwilling to give me much information about their workflow (just make the files work, please!), so I would have to borrow heavily from the current system. To sell the resulting system to the general public would not be seen as a friendly action.

I guess I already know the answer. When I read over my original question, I think what I was really asking was, "Can I just go ahead and do the work that the client doesn't want me to do, and expect to receive some sort of payment?"

Any answers of one word or more appreciated.

[Lee Smith]

Lee Smith Said:

Build the Files for the employer, and let them have them for Free.

I've done that one before, back when I was an employee. I found that when I'm billing $0 per hour, that's what people value my time at, and keep asking for more work at that rate.

and I went on to say "What a nice employee you would be", meaning that if you expect $0, that is what you will receive.

The rest of my post was to give you food for thought.

Lee

:cool:

[Howard LeCanard]

Yeah. I guess I'll just keep slogging through the current system. Maybe some time I'll do a quick mock-up for a proof of concept, and see if I can wow her with my skills when I'm not working on corrupt files that were designed poorly.

Who knows? It could lead to something.

Thanks Lee.

[Razumovsky]

After plenty of headaches like this, I have refined my rap to deal with the situation. I often will refuse to work on poorly designed legacy databases, and now avoid clients that insist on cutting corners and pinching pennies. Almost always ends up with both parties unhappy. Sometimes, I will take a short gig agreeing to fix some things if I feel like the client can really appreciate the position it puts me in. In these situations I make sure to email or write something like the following so I can have it to refer to if something happens later:

"Dear new client,

I am happy to do this work for you, but I do need to stress that I cannot make any guarantees that other bugs will not come up as a result of these fixes, nor can I vouch for the integrity of the data in the current system. What I am essentially doing is putting buckets under some specific leaks in a ceiling that was not built to code and is of

questionable structural design. When 'inheriting' a database created by someone else, even with well commented databases designed by professionals and following standard protocols, it takes a good deal of study and analysis to become comfortable making casual changes and accurately estimating development time. With a database designed by

relatively inexperienced (in filemaker) people that is as complex and sprawling as this one, the time involved in this process can rapidly

become impractical. I do not anticipate there will be any major problems with these fixes, but I did notice several other red flags and potential issues while poking around today, and when working on an inherited database of this type I do need to be clear that my name is only on the buckets, not the ceiling."

If they are not comfortable with my unwillingness to take responsibilty for the 'rest' of the database, then I walk away. I have found that clients usually respond very well to this, and it warms them up to overhauling the system.

I am thinkng of formalizing this as part of the contract as well when taking on short repair gigs. Like I said- I tend to avoid these, but they also can be a good way of getting a 3 month project out of a 1 day gig.

-Raz

[Howard LeCanard]

That's a great way of handling it! I'm wishing I had walked away from this particular set of files.