Prograils

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO and co-founder of a digital health platform that allows healthcare practitioners such as physiotherapists and chiropractors to design, assign, and prescribe home exercise programs. We also conduct telehealth sessions via video.

What challenge were you trying to address with Prograils?

We’re very much a product-centric company. It’s important to be close to the customers on that level. We were looking for a software development agency to help us build up our platform.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They handled the entirety of the coding for the site, working with Ruby on Rails, iOS, and Android.

What is the team composition?

There were about seven team members working on the project.

How did you come to work with Prograils?

We originally found them on Clutch. There were several other companies we looked at on the site too. I flew over to Poland to meet with Prograils and one other company. There, I also held some phone interviews and did due diligence with others. 

In terms of location, our partner had to be inside the EU for efficiency. I ended up in Poland because it’s relatively close to our headquarters. Our new partner also needed to be using the same tech stack as us. That was Ruby on Rails, so we wanted somebody that was specialized in that area. We were also looking for general responsiveness. When I send an email, I like getting replies back. I also valued being able to fly over to meet with their co-founder. We got along well, and I thought their attitude was a pretty good match for our company.

I was generally in charge of this hiring process, but my co-founder had the ability to veto vendor options. He would deny a company if he found any red flags in the financials and annual statements in the companies I shortlisted. Only one company option was ever vetoed. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in January 2018 and continue to do so.

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

We don’t really have any KPIs with them. Generally speaking, though, I would definitely recommend them to a friend and avoid recommending them to a preditor. That’s because I’m happy with the work. Our teams gelled well and found it easy to work together.  

How did Prograils perform from a project management standpoint?

We connect the dots and communicate over Slack several times each day. I also fly out to meet them every quarter. Generally, it’s very good for working with them.

Deadlines in this space are tricky—they’re often not the fault of the vendor. Sometimes the scope is just unreasonable. All in all, I’m very pleased with how they’ve managed the project. They have a dedicated project manager who’s positioned between me and the engineers. That’s been a helpful structure.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They have great attitudes. It’s important to them to keep communicating, rather than to take something and run with it. We’ve developed a strong relationship, and they’re not afraid to push back if I want a feature that’ll be difficult to implement, for instance. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

We’ve worked together for more than a year now, and they’ve taken all my feedback into account. They either act upon it or give me a good reason to not act upon my suggestions. I don’t have any criticism. They take me seriously, and I take them seriously.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CTO of GrasPro, an online maintenance system for groundsmen or pitch managers for soccer or football fields. Groundsmen undertake all sorts of activities, including fertilizing, irrigating, mowing, and so on. Using our platform, they can keep diaries and create reports about all of their activities. The head groundsman can make plans for future activities or create a list of activities based on the capabilities of the pitch.  

What challenge were you trying to address with Prograils?

We needed an external company to help us develop the system more rapidly, so we reached out to Prograils. We figured they had the competence and knowledge we were looking for.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Prograils developed our system on Ruby on Rails, with a PostgreSQL database. The platform is hosted on Heroku.

How did you come to work with Prograils?

We had an initial version developed internally on Ruby on Rails, and we stuck to that technology. We googled for software companies that could work with it and reviewed a couple of candidates. Prograils ticked all the boxes in terms of technology.

We liked Prograils’ ideas for our project the most. From the first meeting, they proactively suggested ways to further improve our software. We didn’t hear that from any of the other companies we interviewed.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Prograils in November 2014.

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

I don’t have any metrics right now, but we appreciate Prograils’ quick turnaround time. If we submit a new request, they’ll come back within a day or two with some feedback or a review. The smaller features usually get implemented within a couple of weeks.

 How did Prograils perform from a project management standpoint?

We use Slack for our day-to-day conversations, so we can ping them if we have a question. They usually get back to us within minutes. We use Trello for backlog maintenance.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We’re impressed with how quick they are. Their technical competence is quite high, close to the standard we’ve set internally.

 Are there any areas they could improve?

Sometimes, the QA has not been to the standard that we expected. On a few occasions, I had to ask them to fix things I thought would’ve been obvious. This only happened 2–3 times over the last five years. It’s nothing serious, and it’s the only negative point I can think of.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the owner and CEO of Sapu, an online platform that provides legal advice to landlords. We represent landlords in their disputes with tenants. Our platform provides legal documents and online chats for tenancy needs.

What challenge were you trying to address with Prograils?

We hired Prograils to develop our system.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Prograils built our web-based system using Ruby on Rails. The platform includes a subscription model, payment functions, and generated invoices. They developed features to update credit cards and ensure clients are billed monthly. Some tools also support the publication of documents, articles and blog entries.

What is the team composition?

There were 4–5 people from Prograils involved in the project. They provided 2–3 coders and 1–2 designers.  

How did you come to work with Prograils?

One of my associates had used Prograils in the past, so they came highly recommended. I went to Poland to have a three-day workshop with their team and gave them my requirements. They were highly accommodating and listened to my needs, so I chose them for the project. Their ideas and insight also contributed to my choice.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent around €20,000 (approximately $22,500 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

The development ran from January–December 2018. We’ve done additional work with them since the system was completed and they fix any bugs that arise.  

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

Although it’s too early to see the direct impact of their work, several of the features have improved our website’s searchability from an SEO standpoint. The amount of daily users on our system has greatly improved.  

How did Prograils perform from a project management standpoint?

Prograils was readily available and communicated effectively with us. Their team was quick to reply—I felt secure in every answer and solution they provided. They managed the work through several systems, including one to track development hours and Trello. I got daily reports from their team that allowed me to monitor their progress. Their management approach and pricing were perfect for us.  

What did you find most impressive about them?

The work they produced was high quality and they delivered everything we asked for. The layout, styles, and features were all great. I valued their technical insight and empathy for any issues we had.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There was nothing that became a concern for us, so I can’t think of any areas for improvement. Though there were a few delays, everything was solved for us.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the director of business operations, a board member, and one of the co-founders of Openairapps, an application company that produces applications targeting different industries. 

For what projects/services did your company hire Prograils?

After initially starting the development of our first app in-house, we found that we lacked the time and experience to complete the project. We sought external development assistance. 

What were your goals for this project?

We had developed a very clear use case package with overarching designs and requirements. Prograils were to develop the application in accordance with the 250+ use cases and supporting documentation.

How did you select this vendor?

We sought several quotes from local Australian companies and our project was deemed too difficult or was quoted with extremely high prices. We looked for international options instead. One of our board members and co-founders is of Polish descent and suggested Prograils.

Can you go into detail about the services they provided and the scope of the project?

Prograils built our application's front- and backend as per our designs. We worked with Prograils throughout the project answer questions regarding the use cases, designs, and requirements. Their team also helped with bug fixes and planning for further developments.

What was the team composition?

Prograils had several full stack developers assigned to our project. Even after completion of the initial project, they have kept a resource assigned to us.

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

Prograils's work was extremely valuable to us. Without their professional assistance, we would have failed. They performed way above our expectations and were better than any local developer we could've hired.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Respective project managers from both parties managed the project. We also used tools such as Dropbox, Trello, Slack, Teamlens, and Github to communicate and keep track of the work being done. While Prograils is a Polish company, we had no language barriers or communication issues.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Prograils has an extremely high professional integrity. They went above and beyond on multiple occasions.

Are there any areas where they can improve?

No, there were no areas that required improvement.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

The business is called Invitation to Tuscany, although now it's also Invitation to Provence and Invitation to the Italian Lakes. We are a villa agency that rents villas in Tuscany and Provence. I’m the owner and director of the company.

What challenge were you trying to address with Prograils?

I had several websites: Invitation to Provence, Invitation to Tuscany, and Invitation to the Italian Lakes. From the client’s point of view, I wanted people to be able to go to one place and filter villas according to what they want or need.

What was the scope of their involvement?

I wanted the process of deciding on a house, requesting the house, and the owner accepting the house to be automated. Without logging in, owners can click on a link in an email they received. The client then gets a notification and an email about how to go forward. They can then go ahead, make their payments, and get all their documents generated.

This is done in Ruby on Rails. They used various gems, but I didn't go into it. There is some geolocation built in because we have agents in different parts of the world, but the core of it is all on Ruby on Rails.

What is the team dynamic?

I met the owner of the business, Maciej Litwiniuk [CEO and Co-founder, Prograils]. Right from the beginning, I was assigned Tomasz Blachut [Project Manager, Prograils] who is my interlocutor. 

There are 5–6 people working on the project at different times. I only ever spoke to Tomasz, who was good at interpreting emails and turning them into tasks. All those tasks went onto Trello, which is how they build, and it's still running. We've got the snagging and stuff; it's still going through Trello.

How did you come to work with Prograils?

I found them by chance. I was Googling Ruby on Rails developers. I was looking for somebody who would use Ruby because I liked the language and I liked the notion of the framework. They came up, and there was something about the way their site was written and how it worked. I got in touch with them quite a long time ago but decided not to build it then. A year and a half later, they got back in touch with me and asked if I was going to continue the project.

I spoke to a few different agencies and I found they were all trying to be all things to all men. They were neither developers nor designers, or they were obviously designers but not very good at being developers. I decided to stick with Prograils as our developers and I’ve got a London agency who had already done some work to design the frontend of the website.

How much have you invested with them?

We've spent $20,000–$30,000 with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We've been working with them since early to mid-2016. Things crop up with the site, and I would like to continue to add further functionality to the website as we move forward.

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

The solution means all the tedious steps are automated, and we can concentrate on speaking to the clients, making sure the house is right for them, and solving any problems they have. They always want the cars, meals, and caterers booked.

A lot of the owners like the fact that rather than having to log, they can just click on a link in the email and that does it for them. That was their idea and they implemented it. We used to only book on Saturdays, and now we've got booking on all days. People can book different times in different calendars, and it works very well.

Other agencies and the owners themselves can also book these houses. Calendar management is important and they made it so that blocking off calendars is just about as easy as it can be: it's drag and drop, and there’s no need to press anything. You just drag all over the calendar, and it'll lock it off for you. Some of the features made the processing more streamlined and faster.

How did Prograils perform from a project management standpoint?

We’ve used Trello, Slack, and Skype. The project took 10 months longer because they misjudged the complexity of the backend when we first described the project, but what was great was that they said they'd do it for X amount of money or X amount of hours and they stuck to that. Although it took longer, it didn't cost me any extra, which I appreciate a lot because it’s tight margins in this business.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They're clear, transparent, and responsive. They stuck to their word. They never pulled the wool over my eyes, and they never tried to sell me a solution that wasn't what I asked for. They took longer to develop it, which might feel frustrating, but it means that they took doing the job that they promised to do very seriously.

I would say there's a kind of ethical core to how they do business, which I appreciate because that's how I do business: if I say I'm going to do something, I'll do it. If it ends up not quite working out how I planned, costing me more, or taking me more time, I'll suck it up and make sure I do my sums better next time. That's how they did business as well, and it stopped it becoming too stressful.

Are there any areas they could improve?

It would be good to have a review every 3 months on projects of this length. We never had an overarching review of where we were, where we're going, and how long it's going to take to get there. I think it can be good to take stock occasionally and to check what's going on. They could probably do better on testing some of the things.

Some things came back and had to go back because something bumped out with them, which should've been caught in testing and wasn't. Overall, I thought they were very good. I haven't looked at the quality of the code, but my impression is that it's good.

The reason I've got that impression is because whenever I asked them to change something, the speed with which it gets done makes me think that the code underneath must be solid because they're not going back and having to unravel the code. They've kept it as it should be.

Please describe your organization.

We run an employee-rating community.

What is your position?

I am the founder and chief executive officer of the company.

What business challenge were you trying to address with Prograils?

I started my company a year and a half ago, developing my platform in Lithuania. The team I had was cheap, but they were amateurs in terms of delivery time and quality of work. The company employed junior resources only, and they just couldn't produce what I was asking of them.

Please describe the scope of their involvement.

The original app had been built on a platform called Ionic, which is a web app. We are looking to translate the work into native Android and iOS apps. Prograils facilitated this for me. My specialization is in sales, not programming. I wasn't concerned with what programming tools would be used as long as the price and quality were right. In a sense, we did start from scratch.

We're currently working on another app that can run in a software-as-a-service capacity, allowing companies to assess which of their employees performed best. Prograils developed a minimum viable product that is stable and had good-quality coding, so it was very reliable.

They have assigned a three-and-a-half-person team to us. We have one Android developer, one iOS developer, and another person specialized in both platforms. We are assigned a project manager as part of the development price.

How did you come to work with Prograils?

I looked for development resources within my network and reviewed companies in Copenhagen. One possible choice was a company based in Copenhagen with a development team in Romania. I also looked at another uprising agency in Denmark. An acquaintance had used Prograils for a project, so I decided to work with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in November. Prograils has done a good job so far but, with time, the development in my company will have to be made in-house, since we are a tech company.

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

The core of the site was its rating system. We have done some testing that has run without issues. Prograils did what we told them to do. They have some great designers who understood what our aim was and took care of our requests after each testing cycle.

Elements like the dashboard have turned out great. Companies can see and understand where good service is located. Currently, the app is more stable than in the beginning. Quality-wise, it has been above the results we saw from the Lithuanian team.

We've seen some traction for the app. Users are installing it and passing it along to their friends.

How did Prograils perform from a project management standpoint?

Like any good collaboration, there have been some financial battles. They met our deadlines and, when they didn't, it was our fault and not theirs. I can admit that at times we were not the easiest of clients.

We used GitHub, Google Drive, Trello, Sketch, and InVision for project management. InVision and Sketch helped to speed up our mock-up process. They were used at our request, and we appreciated their flexibility with that.

What distinguishes Prograils from other providers?

I'm very surprised by their English fluency and impressed with their willingness to find creative solutions. I worked with other teams that jumped when I told them to, without questioning me. Prograils specializes in figuring out what a problem is and how it can be fixed.

Any prospecting customer should focus on learning the process and on finding the tools that can help them. I came across Trello, which is a visual, agile application. Finding programmers who are OK with working in a visually oriented way is also important. It eliminates a lot of the going back and forth in the process. Given that a team may not be native English speakers, when discussing complex items, it's better to have a visual approach.

Is there anything Prograils could have improved or done differently?

Prograils are very good in terms of explaining how many hours they allocated and how much it cost me, but they're not so good in terms of giving estimates. I have told them this and they are improving themselves.

Please describe your organization.

Our company sells news articles through the use of crowd funding. We started the company in June of 2015, with a period of fundraising. The company has been around since September, when the website was finalized.

What is your position?

I'm a co-founder of the company.

What business challenge were you trying to address with Prograils?

We needed a web platform that could support our business. Our goal is selling articles by means of crowd funding, where journalists are able to put up a pitch of their article ideas, and receive funding based on it. We had a very short time span for delivering the website. It was mainly done on money that we received from government funds with a short deadline, October 1st 2015. We needed to be live before that time, in order to test it and gain experience on how it was working, and be able to provide reports to the government funding agency.

The specifications were only ready in July. We needed a company that could make a minimum viable product version with a very pressed timeline. The website was secondary to delivering on time.

Please describe the scope of their involvement.

They developed the website using Ruby on Rails. The other companies that we approached mostly suggested building the site in WordPress. Having a website built from scratch with real programming, and not WordPress templates, seemed to make the most sense.

How did you come to work with Prograils?

We contacted different companies to see if they would be able to deliver the site on time, with the specifications that we had in mind. In web development, timing is typically a problem. Deadlines are often ignored or missed due to poor management or some kind of negligence.

Prograils was referred to me on the basis of the work they were doing for a different company. We contacted them along with a few other development firms. They were the first to claim that they could deliver what we needed on time, at a reasonable price. They had the right interest in the company and seemed honest in their approach. The choice was based on a good first impression and their prompt response featuring an actual implementation proposal.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in financial terms?

The total cost was about $20,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project was completed on the 20th of September [2015]. There were a few features that were not in place yet, but that was only a question of a few days' work. 

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

The overall feedback that we have received has been positive. Users like the design, which is simple and easy to navigate. Opinions always differ, and there were a few suggestions of different approaches. The logic that Prograils used might not be the perfect one for some, but it was still solid. It’s also a reliable solution. We rarely get reports of malfunctions or defective elements.

We haven't had any major issues with Prograils. There are a few fixes that we still need them to implement, but there haven't been any major technical issues, breakdowns, or missing features.

How did Prograils perform from a project management standpoint?

They always delivered their work within the specified deadlines. We used Trello to follow the project and delegate tasks.

What distinguishes Prograils from other providers?

I don't have much experience with other developers, but they seem very flexible and reasonably priced. They know what they're doing and are good developers. There's always been a great dialogue between us, and we never had a problem with getting in touch with them whenever we had a question.

They've always been very responsive and easy to work with. Their developers have good heads on their shoulders and they come up with some very creative fixes and shortcuts. I would say their involvement has definitely improved the overall quality of the application we’re offering.

Is there anything Prograils could have improved or done differently?

Not that I can think of, no.

Please describe your company.

My organization is a construction company. We're the main contractors for professional clients like governments.

What is your position?

I'm the chief financial officer.

Could you describe the business challenge that you were trying to address with Prograils?

There was some internal workloads that needed to be updated. All our work had been done in Excel, and we had problems sharing the knowledge from one Excel sheet to another. We talked to Prograils about making this website so we could use it as a multiuser and then we could share all the information between the colleagues. It was actually more of a collaboration portal that we wanted, so that we could take the data we use and present it in an intuitive and structured way to our internal users.

Could you describe the scope of their involvement?

Our contribution was our existing Excel sheets and all of the data within them. I met up with the guys from Prograils in Poland, and we just went over the Excel sheets together. They presented ideas of what they could do, ways to manipulate and present the data, and then they made a mockup for it. We talked a little bit about it, and then they started the process by programming the system for us. It was a very smooth process for us.

What technologies were used?

They were using Ruby on RAILS for the most part.

How did you come to choose Prograils?

They were recommended to me by a business associate, who has made a similar program with them. She told me that they were cheaper than other options and had a great balance between value and experience.

Could you provide a general cost estimate for this engagement?

It was around $15,000 to $20,000.

Is this an ongoing project, or have you concluded your work together?

It is ongoing. They're adding some new features to the system now.

Do you have any statistics or metrics on the project? 

I haven't seen the results yet because they haven't yet finished developing the solution. From what we can tell so far, our small demos have worked well, but we don't have a completed prototype yet. Only certain components have been developed and tested so far. Qualitatively, we've been impressed with their performance. They're very responsive to us and implement our feedback very well.

Have you encountered any issues from a project management perspective?

No. No problems so far. We're in constant communication with them, and they haven't missed any of our deadlines.

When working with Prograils, are there any areas in which you think they could improve?

Usually, I don't work with IT [information technology] companies, I'm a construction guy. I think the process was very smooth, and I think they were very good at conveying the ideas of how the system could work. I think overall, it was a very good process, and we keep going on to the system and getting new features every week, which is great.

Could you briefly describe your organization?

I have a company that offers consulting services and specialized software solutions. We offer a proprietary solution that helps the management of small companies. The tool helps executives and board members make informed decisions through accurate reporting.

What is your position?

I am the founder and CEO.

Could you describe the business challenges that you were attempting to address when you first approached Prograils?

We needed some developers that could build out our custom application for us because we didn’t have the necessary expertise. I work in finance, so I couldn’t code anything myself. I was searching for a company to deal with the technical development. I got in contact with Prograils through a mutual business relationship. They came highly recommended. 

Could you describe the scope of their involvement in greater detail?

They’ve designed a cloud-based application coded in Ruby on Rails. I had the original idea, the concept of the application, and I described it for them in great detail. They coded everything from scratch, based on my specs. I then tested the prototype, and we had a lot of discussions about how we could refine and improve its functionality and interoperability with other systems. They would then go ahead and implement those improvements. 

How did you select Prograils as your partner for this endeavor?

Prograils was my very first contact, and I felt very confident about their capabilities, so I decided to go with them. I was originally introduced to them by a mutual business contact.

When was this project completed?

We started out in the summer of 2013. The application was developed from August of 2013, to January of 2014.

In terms of results, could you share any statistics, metrics, or user feedback you’ve received that would demonstrate the quality of their performance?

I don’t have a lot of statistics, but I have positive feedback from my customers, and they are very satisfied with the end product. That’s the only thing I can give you at this stage. I was very satisfied with their project management style they used. They used a tool where all items in the project were created as tickets. We could correspond on the Internet about each of the tickets, and I could follow the progress from beginning to end. They were extremely responsive and flexible with us. They answered both on evenings and weekends. They were very flexible, and we completed the deployment in the time period agreed, so that worked very well.

When working with Prograils, is there anything that you’d consider special about their approach or development methodology that distinguishes them from other vendors?

They were very fast and they understood the concept of what I wanted. I didn’t have to explain every detail; they had some business understanding on their end, too. They weren’t simply a bunch of coders and technical junkies, but business strategists and creative thinkers. They really pay close attention to details and make great, insightful recommendations when they’re able to. We’ve greatly appreciated that.

In retrospect, are there areas in which you think they could improve as service provider?

No. I don’t really have any areas in which they didn’t perform well. They were a relatively a new company when we began, so their procedures about service and maintenance plans had just been put in place. That would be the only area in which they could have improved, but it really didn’t affect the overall project or its success.