Parsys Media

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of an online wealth advisory platform. Using our website and web app, clients can buy mutual funds in India.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Parsys Media?

We needed external resources to build our website from scratch.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Parysys Media was responsible for building our website from the ground up using our technical specs. It was an investment website that would integrate with the Mumbai Stock Exchange’s mutual funds platform. This would allow our clients to buy and sell on the Mumbai Stock Exchange.

During the scoping process, we spoke on the phone and also met them to go over the project point by point. We provided 14–15 pages of documentation, which covered our home page, the different sections within that, the contact us page, login page, blog, and more. The site would have a lot of APIs, so the tech stack needed to include JavaScript with AngularJS on the frontend and Node.js on the backend.

Although we gave them thorough requirements, they only wrote down a few items in the contract, so we asked them to represent our entire technical document. This took a few days, and we even paid extra because they needed additional resources to handle the contract.

They eventually gave us a quote for PHP and Java and contacted us regularly during the development process. However, once we paid the project fees, they stopped responding to our calls and didn’t share the project structure. In the end, they failed to complete the site.

What is the team dynamic?

I spoke with two people, including their co-founder and a developer.

How did you come to work with Parsys Media?

They responded to our job post on Freelancer.com, were local, and seemed genuine. We had an initial meeting to go over our needs and agreed on a price. But, once we paid them, they said that our requests were outside of the statement of work (SoW), despite the fact that we’d presented a clear document from the beginning. They didn’t complete anything, even after 15–20 days, and stopped responding altogether. Eventually, I had to cut my losses.

How much have you invested with them?

I paid 50,000 Indian rupees (approximately $704 USD at the time), but the total price would have been 130,000 Indian rupees (approximately $2,000 USD). They convinced us to pay them directly rather than going through the Freelancer payment system, which had set milestone payments.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked with them in April 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Describe the impact this engagement has had on your business.

I couldn’t afford to waste any more time, so I had to cut my losses and find another development firm. Now, I have a website, web app, and Android app.

How was project management handled?

We met face to face twice, and they showed me their credentials. At the time, I felt they were authentic people trying to do part-time work. The team supposedly consisted of a project manager, two developers, and a frontend specialist, but we didn’t interact with anyone aside from one of the developers. He said they were working on the project but couldn’t deliver in the end.

Is there anything that the vendor did well or that you would consider a strength?

No, they didn’t complete anything.

In what specific areas can they improve?

I couldn’t say.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of a startup that's a drone community platform. It allows people to upload their content and manage their drones.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Parsys Media?

India is facing a lot of legal problems to do with flying drones in civil airspace. I needed someone to develop my application for people to collaborate, upload their videos, find out about no-fly zones in India, and register the drones. I wanted somebody I could trust and who has already developed similar applications.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They never started developing the application. Since the day they asked for more money, I’ve been running through circles. I’ve been contacting the Cyber Cell and the police department, and I’ve raised tickets in our consumer helpline. I know it’s going to take a long time to deal with them.

What is the team dynamic?

They said there would be three to four people.

How did you come to work with Parsys Media?

I posted my idea on freelancer.com. I wanted someone in India so that I could meet in-person if needed. I received three or four bids from and Parsys Media's was the lowest. They contacted me through the internal chat on freelancer.com and said they’re going to work on the project. They immediately switched me to WhatsApp chat messaging service. They said that they’d have to hire people to get the project started and that payments through the freelancer platform take a long time to process, so they requested I make the payment offline. I trusted them as they're an established company, so I initiated a transfer of the kickoff payment on July 13th, which was a Friday. On Saturday and Sunday, there was no response from them, then on Monday they completely ignored my calls. On Tuesday, I received another email saying the cost would increase because of my requirements.

How much have you invested with them?

45,800 Indian Rupees (approximately $650 USD). I made an initial kickoff payment of 18,000 Indian Rupees (approximately $250 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together in July 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Describe the impact this engagement has had on your business.

Their behavior was very unprofessional. They've only spoken to me about money. As a developer, I expect somebody to call me and ask about the vision, rather than the money immediately. You need to understand what I require and then decide with your team members whether you’ll be able to pick up the project or not.

How was project management handled?

They were very unprofessional. From day one, they only communicated with me through WhatsApp and email. I constantly asked for a contract and they never sent me one. I have WhatsApp screenshots where I’ve asked them to send me some kind of contract because I was arranging money from another party. After a lot of asking, they sent me a draft contract. In that email, it was written to sign the document and send it back to us so we can start working.

I felt that Ashish (CEO, Parys Media) and Vartika (COO, Parys Media) purposely made me switch from Freelancer to WhatsApp so that I didn't use a credit card to make the payment and alter or dispute the charges. Generally, when I tried to call them, they used to hang up saying they were busy in a meeting. They used to call me back at their convenience late at night, like 9:00 pm or 9:30 pm.

In what specific areas can they improve?

They need to value the customer’s opinions rather than focusing on the money. If I have an idea and I posted a job, I am ready to make the payment. The moment you start asking me about payments from day one and not inquiring about the idea, that’s a trigger that something is wrong. I learned the hard way. Moving forward, I won’t trust anybody. I’ll make sure that I deal with somebody I know and meet them face to face.

What advice do you have for clients with similar needs to yours?

Follow the same healthy practice of not trusting anybody online. Trust the freelancer website and always use your credit card, staying within the portal. If something goes wrong, at least you have their support to help you out. I contacted them and they were very nice in responding to my queries, but I understand it was my mistake of moving outside of freelancer app.

Company Responses

This comment was provided by Ashish Khadpe, CEO at Parsys Media, on August 01, 2018. 

This is a false allegation that has been put up against our organization profile on Clutch and we have not cheated anyone. We have an email conversation with Mr. Anurag Mukherjee as a reference in which we have already stated all our terms and conditions in the provided SOW to him, which includes the scope of work (point 5) and penalty (point 16) in case a client cancels the project. Mr. Anurag has made the payment to us after receiving the SOW from our end. Mr. Anurag Mukherjee was not clear about his requirement and was not able to communicate the exact flow to our team. We have given our understanding on the project to him as part of SOW. Also as this project never started, there was no question of communication and execution.

We are ready to refund the amount as stated in SOW shared with the client but he is not agreeing to the clause. In such a scenario, our organization cannot help much in providing the resolution as per customer satisfaction.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are an IT services company based in India. It was a startup when I started off and now we are an employer of 150 people. We focus on ASP.NET and SharePoint. We have our Indian clients and also clients in the US and the Middle East, but since we are located here, we primarily cater to the Indian market. We are slowly expanding.

I am a Team Lead; I have my own team here.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Parsys Media?

We have a pre-sales specialist team and they have a lot of access to our document management system. Our software specialists coordinate with the pre-sales team via our document management system. That system has been delegated to Parsys. Then we also have our time booking system with Parsys. Parsys is doing other things for other people in the company, but this is mainly what they are doing for my team.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

From my knowledge, they have portals which are based on Java.

How much have you invested with Parsys Media?

I don’t know about those figures. This pricing model is working out for everyone. They have flexibility in terms of pricing; they are quite agile in that regard I would say. We have support services that we routinely pay for when we are initiating a new portal. We pay them an implementation fee as well.

What is the status of this engagement?

It’s ongoing since 2014.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

I was facing a lot of problems before Parsys Media. We had another internally developed software that we were using. The document management system that I am talking about is quite huge. It maintains a lot of historical data that is really important for us. We were facing a lot of trouble accessing it, and soon we made a plan to change. Then, Parsys Media came and had it running very quickly. I don’t think there were any problems from the independent analysis we did. I don’t know how Parsys overcame the issue, but it’s great now. Even the number of simultaneous users with access has increased. Before, if even one person was signed in, there would be problems for anyone else who wanted to sign in. Now, two or three people can remain logged in without any problems. They are adding more and more features.

The best part is their technical guys are well trained and they suggest more enhancements that you can add yourself, which I have not seen another vendor do. You get whatever you ask for, but when they see something, they make suggestions. That is good, so it’s working really well for me now and I’m sure that will continue.

How did Parsys Media perform from a project management standpoint?

The best thing about them is that they provide a dedicated consultant. I think they call them a software specialist; he or she is the one who looks into maintaining the portal. We’ve been working two years with them and I don’t think we’ve faced any issues.

What did you find most impressive about Parsys Media?

I have a direct comparison with my past vendor, which was not working well. Parsys is doing well. I think that’s really important, delivering the project and then maintaining it.

Are there any areas Parsys Media could improve?

As of now, nothing is coming to mind. I think their approach is good.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I’m the CEO of a finance-related company called DreamLadder Capital. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Parsys Media?

We wanted to develop a website with several API integrations.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We got their contact through freelancers.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Parsys Media didn’t complete even 5% of our work. Both Ashish (CEO, Parsys Media) and Vartika (HR recruiter, Parsys Media) are fraudulent people. They asked me to take the work outside of the freelancing platform that we were initially using, and once they received the initial funding, they averted all our calls.

After some time, they came back with the excuse that the work I was asking for was outside of the scope of the project.

What was the team composition?

They do not have any good developers.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

We had to move on to another vendor after sending Parsys Media an initial payment. Their strategy is to take the money and run.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Their service is pathetic. This should serve as a warning to potential clients.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I can't name anything.

Are there any areas for improvement?

They should shut their shop down.