>>I think that 25% figure is interesting, to those of us who are programmers. How many times have you tried to "pin down a client", and thought you had a good definition of a spec signed off, with a written description and screen shot and then made delivery only to be told, "that is not what I said"!
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>OR, they use your app for a year or more without a single complaint, then come back and say "it's not what I wanted." Of course, what they want is to have the app modified to reflect new conditions, but they don't want to pay for the modifications. They are trying to get you to do it for free by claiming it "wasn't right". That's why I quickly learned, in my first year of consulting, never to program by a job, only by the hour, with with regularly scheduled test runs and sign offs.


Jerry;

I worked at one company and was hired as The VFP Programmer. A team of 3 VB programmers created and delivered a major app to the client (a major energy company), and 1 1/2 years later the client came back and stated, "The program you delivered does not work"! They were right but actually waited 1 1/2 years to use it. They required a major add-on but first the original application had to work. The business agreement was this: We would receive $15,000 to fix the original and $125,000 for the add-on.
This was a financial forcasting application (IRR, etc.) and delt with huge sums of money vs time depending upon usage of electricity and natural gas.

The three VB programmers had quit and I was the only guy left. The owner gave me the project and I fixed the original problems. I was not a VB programmer! We got the add-on and I delivered it ahead of schedule and it worked as advertised. The owner was happy and we got more VB work. That is one way to get VB experience, but there was more than a little pressure.

One of my clients was the World Trade Center. I wrote an application to control utilities usage (climate, lighting etc.) through Real Time Pricing (RTP). It hurts to think about loosing them.

Tom