Third Party Software Testing and its Benefits

Introduction

The term third party testing /outsourced software testing is self-explanatory in itself, i.e., testing of software by any individual/independent organization that is not directly or indirectly involved in the development of the particular software.

There may be many questions that come to one’s mind while making the decision of opting for an in-house testing team or to go for offshore third-party testing, first and foremost being "why at all do we outsource software testing?" following the other parameterized ones like "Does it incur any cost overhead?", "Will it improve quality?", "Is it a time saving solution?". The following facts may demystify some of the qualms like these:

Delegating software testing activities benefits us in many ways: independent testing team, parallel testing activities as soon as we are done with the settling of requirements / designs, and a reduced cost.

• The most noteworthy outcome of outsourced software testing is "improved software quality". A quality software impacts customer response and thus the market position at large. Companies that provide outsourced software testing have expertise in software testing. They have professionals that are highly skilled and trained for software testing. Also they are familiar with testing of various domains, e.g., testing of an e-learning software is different from testing financial software. They would have tested various software in the same domain so they are familiar with loopholes of the software and areas where defects may exist. They report bugs more accurately to ensure that much secure software is delivered in the market.
• The second benefit of outsourced software testing is that it reduces the cost of the software significantly. Asia has become the largest market for outsourced software testing. The reason behind this is the cheap cost of software testing services and the high quality work they provide.
• The third reason to outsourced software testing is that companies do not want to have a specific team to test the software as they need it just for a time period. To recruit people and train them is a very tedious task as companies are mainly focused on developing software not testing it. To test software there is the need of specific software that also involves a cost, plus the company has to provide training to use the software. If the software has to be tested on a different platform, OS, or browser, then the company has to set up labs to test the software. In place of doing such arrangements it is beneficial for companies to outsource software testing.
• Outsourced software testing also reduces time of testing cycles as they have dedicated software testing teams. So if companies are in a hurry to deliver software in the market as early as possible then they can outsource software testing.

So how do we decide if a company should outsource software testing? To decide on it, first the company should analyze the type of testing they want, for example, Automation testing, Performance testing, Security testing, Integration testing, etc., and the software needed to perform the testing, e.g., Quick Test Professionals (QTP), WinRunner, etc. The company can also outsource only a specific type of testing in place of testing a software completely.

Thus it can be concluded that if a company outsources software testing to another company it is the responsibility of both companies that the software becomes successful. So the trust between the two companies plays a very important role.