Real impact of software bugs. Have you ever considered what a software bug is and how it might affect your business?
Do you know how much your application’s errors really cost and what consequences could you face if the quality of the software is not taken care of in the early stage?
App failures affect businesses of all sizes and across all industries, from gaming to telecom. It occurs as a result of users discovering bugs in more than half of all software. If bugs are minor then users usually live up with that most of the time. However, in some cases, companies suffer significant losses or even go bankrupt as a result of a single software defect.
Let’s take a look at the possible challenges the company can face because of software failures.
Financial Losses
According to a Carnegie Mellon University study, 60-80% of the cost of development is spent on bug fixing. Consequently, the longer it takes to identify and fix a bug, the higher the cost. However, the bug revealed after release can cost a hundred times more than fixing it during development stages and can cause financial losses not only for the company but for the software users as well.
Research by CISQ found that, in 2018, poor quality software cost organizations $2.8 trillion in the US alone. That’s a staggering number and 18.22% of that figure was cost accrued from technical debt alone. Pair that with the fact that on average, software developers make 100 to 150 errors for every thousand lines of code.
A well-known Amazon bug is a good example. Because of a software glitch, the price of some goods on Amazon’s website dropped to one penny in December 2014, about ten days before Christmas. Moreover, due to Amazon’s automatic delivery and services on warehousing, plenty of products have already been shipped before sellers could cancel purchases. As a result of the bug, several small businesses suffered losses of about £100,000 and appeared on the threshold of bankruptcy.
Destruction To The Brand
People became accustomed to the high speed and high performance of software with the invention of technology. Customers nowadays expect quality from every app they use. According to Google statistics, 48% of people believe that a poorly performing app indicates that the company is uninterested and doesn’t care. Users will leave if your software isn’t working properly or has bugs or UX flaws. Actually, 72% of people who use apps complain during the first 90 days of the application download. Moreover, they will probably share their bad experiences with friends and via social networks.
As a result, you lose potential customers and your brand’s reputation suffers. Also, if the bug is serious, you should be ready for a public announcement and media attention, which will not be in your favor.
A good example is Facebook, the most popular social network ever. However, its reputation has frequently been damaged by numerous glitches and bugs.
A photo API bug in September 2018 showed the images of nearly 7 million users to third-party apps. People who used Facebook login to sign in to other apps and give access to their photos were affected. Users who never completed sharing to the site were also among those whose images were exposed.
The glitch worked for 12 days, and during that time, about 7 million accounts were affected.
Suspended Growth
According to statistics, more than half of users would completely abandon the app if they encountered one or more bugs in a single day. When you spend a lot of time and money developing an app for your company, you certainly don’t expect users to uninstall it. Still, it happens very often due to a large number of applications, high competition, and the absence of bug-finding apps. If the app is buggy and unreliable, it is always better to search for a more successful alternative.
Donald Daters, a dating app for Trump supporters, was one such example. Users may use the app to find a partner who shared their political views. People of various ages and interests created profiles and searched for someone to date. They all had one thing in common; a deep admiration for President Donald Trump.
It was one of the most awaited dating apps, however, it had been released with a bug. The bug in the software caused users’ personal information (including users’ names, photos, and private messages) to be leaked out on the launch day.
As ?a result of the leakage, the app was poorly accepted and rated by the user.
Post-Bug Lawsuit
When bugs in your software cause financial or reputational harm, you’re likely to face a lawsuit and lose in court. In this case, your company not only loses money, but it also endangers its reputation.
Modern history knows a lot of examples of post-bug Lawsuit. One of the recent examples of software bugs happened with Uber, a ride-hailing taxi app. Due to a software glitch in the Uber app, a French businessman sued the company after his wife discovered his adultery. The Frenchman used to visit his mistress who lived in the same city in the south of France on a regular basis. It lasted until the day the man used his wife’s phone to use Uber. After using the app, he signed in with his personal credentials and logged out. But because of a bug, his wife began to receive notifications about her husband’s rides. The angry ex-husband sued Uber for up to $45 million in damages.
Stronger and Improved Testing is the Only way Out.
It is difficult to keep the company safe from the above-mentioned outcomes because there is no software without bugs. Trying to mitigate business risks pay more attention to proper QA and testing of your software. The application should not be released until the engineers are happy with the testing results. Early detection and correction of bugs protect your company from negative consequences. When the company gets information about a bug from a user, it should act quickly to fix it. When the company gets information about a bug from a user, it should act quickly to fix it. Engaging a professional testing provider in the development process is one of the most effective and proven QA solutions.
If you want to take a step toward the bug-free software of your dreams, you can always apply to TestDel, an independent provider of QA and testing services. The company can discover bugs in web applications and offers a full suite of software testing services, including test management, consulting test documentation, and quality assurance. Having more than 5 years of experience, we test on different stages of the development cycle and take care of your app after release.