This is the final installment of the series around vendor relationships and the signs to look out for if you think things are not going well. I hope you’ve enjoyed it and even found some of it useful.

9. You can’t ask the vendor a question without them responding with a legal argument.

This is a sure sign that things are not going well with the vendor. If the standard response to a query, even a simple one, is a reference to contractual terms and conditions or agreed items for delivery then you have a real issue on your hands. Probably best to get out before your respective legal teams have to get involved. Alternatively engage your legal department and get them involved sooner rather than later.

10. It costs more to develop offshore than in house.

It pays to understand how many resources you would need to do the work in house and how long it would take. You can then compare this against any cost quoted by the vendor. In most cases the actual cost of outsourcing to an offshore vendor will work out to be around 90 per cent of that internal cost. If your vendor is well over this figure either you have under estimated the complexity of the project or they simply don’t understand what it is you are trying to achieve. Either way something is wrong and you need to work quickly to understand what that is. If it’s the latter then once you are sure it’s not your communications efforts, be wary, as continuing a project with a vendor that does not grasp the project, is a disaster waiting to happen.