Independent Testing to Shield an Ecommerce Startup from Launching Flawed Apps

About Our Customer

The Customer is a US-based startup developing an ecommerce platform comprising web, iOS, and Android applications. The platform provides a convenient online marketplace for fundraising through cashback and donations.

Independent Testing Needed for a Prompt Quality Check

The Customer outsourced the development of its web and mobile ecommerce apps and was looking for a professional testing provider to verify the vendor’s work before launching the platform.

Trusting our 34 years of experience in software testing and QA and practical knowledge of ecommerce software, the Customer turned to ScienceSoft for pre-launch independent testing. The startup didn’t share any formal specifications for the apps since the product’s documentation was scarce. To meet the release date, the Customer set a one-month deadline for testing.

Manual Functional Testing on a Tight Schedule

After analyzing the Customer’s solution and challenges, including the lack of software documentation, ScienceSoft assigned three test engineers to perform manual functional testing of the following applications:

• Web app (tested on Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge).
• iOS native mobile app (tested on real devices).
• Android native mobile app (tested on real devices).

Our team used the exploratory approach, which is well-suited for situations when there are no formal requirements to test against. Following this approach, our test engineers explored the apps, simultaneously documented test cases on Confluence, tested user and admin functionality, and submitted the found issues via Jira.

ScienceSoft created a total of 1,500+ test cases covering:

• Portal functionality
  • Registration and authorization.
  • Account management.
  • Creating and joining fundraising groups.
  • Order placement, checkout process, and cashback.
  • Tiered subscriptions with different cashback rates.
  • Product navigation, filtering, and search.
  • Donating to fundraising groups.
• Admin functionality
  • Brand management.
  • Product management (categories and attributes).
  • Product reports and returns management.
  • Order management.
  • Fundraising group management.
  • Viewing subscriptions, marketplace transactions, and customer feedback.

The testing team continuously updated the checklists with testing results, linked the created Jira issues to test cases, and shared regular progress reports with the Customer. Our test engineers reported over 130 issues across all three apps, including a number of critical defects. The team classified the found defects by severity and priority to streamline the bug-fixing process and simplify future testing.

Realistic View of Ecommerce Applications’ Quality

Within just a month, ScienceSoft performed a thorough functional testing of the Customer’s web, Android, and iOS applications. The testing revealed that the apps were not ready for production. The Customer received a detailed report on the testing results and a full view of the 130+ found issues recorded, classified, and prioritized in Jira.

After its outsourced development team fixes all the defects, the Customer plans to partner with ScienceSoft for a second round of functional testing.

Technologies and Tools

Test management and defect tracking

Atlassian Confluence, Atlassian Jira.

Test environment

iOS and Android devices, Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge web browsers.