Messy work from the start: Unsuitable mutual supplier NDA, legally critical flaws in revised doc, ambiguous wording/layout. Faulty returned docs (missing company, address, family name, unauthorized persons signed, etc.) were just dumped in a folder, unchecked. As a result, many NDA were legally invalid, not enforceable. Folders and file names were a mess too. Agreed to source in China + a few probes into Indonesia. Seemingly went all-in with Indonesia. Added Vietnam without asking. Great way to bill more hours!I was hoping they'd recommend suppliers they had worked with. Yet, whenever I asked if they did, the answer was no. Like any beginner can do, China suppliers were found via Alibaba and 1688. The rest seemingly through Google (I think they don't have local staff in supplier countries other than China - but they were not transparent on this). Didn't vet properly and suggested some questionable suppliers with no on-site factory inspection reports published on the platforms. One such supplier went silent repeatedly, still no samples after 2.5 months. Money prob. lost.Quotes were consistently higher than those I previously got myself on Alibaba.Suppliers did not match sourcing criteria: I asked for suppliers experienced in similar products, gave examples. Yet, vast majority they provided were general-purpose machining shops (easy to find!). Suppliers' lack of specialization lead to critical issues with product, and may be one reason for the higher quotes.Yulia, the owner, only did the initial call. Never heard from her again, didn't get her contact, project mgr never said "Yulia suggested ...". From what I can tell, she was fully detached from the process. Even when it must have been obvious that I wasn't happy, she did not get involved. Project mgr constantly and sometimes unethically pitched additional services. Ex. 1: Suggested packaging sourcing before decision on product sourcing country (-> unnecessary sourcing cost). Ex. 2: Said I would save money if I let them do sample inspection locally, due to consolidated shipments and other minor stuff. The opposite is true: Costs would have exploded at their rates. Anyway, can't entrust them with sample inspection given their sloppy work.Project mgr in the Philippines always had a hard time understanding what I mean and want, and worrying gaps of knowledge. This lead to a massive communication overhead (all billed at $90/h, of course). Ex.: "Can you check if this person is the company director acc. to business license?" --> "Research done. She is. She signed the NNN." --> "I have the NNN, I asked for business license." --> "Done. She is. She appears on 1688." --> "I asked for business license." I then had to send her an example of a Chinese business license and explain that they can find it in the registry. On third attempt, they got it right. MANY examples like this. An endless series of misunderstandings.No expertise with EU/US material compliance: Asked if they could give me the contacts of a few good packaging suppliers they worked with before. They didn't seem to like the idea. I reluctantly agreed that they obtain quotes instead. They liked that (billable!). Turns out, all 3 I contacted (4th I knew and wasn't happy with) were unable to meet mandatory EU/US requirements (TPCH, Prop65, PPWD, REACH, POP). So they suggest to their clients suppliers that will result in clients running into legal issues! Project mgr was completely blank on this topic, babbled of unrelated CE (electronics) and CPC (seller conduct). Now I also need to check if they really verified this stuff for the product - probably not.Would have been much more efficient to communicate directly with sourcing staff. 90% of the time, project mgr just did message ping-pong between me and them (+introduced errors). Great way to boost hours!All communication text-based in some weird app - no calls ever proposed by them. I could have asked for it, yes. I followed their process. Guess I didn't ask because I had already resigned internally, just waiting to quit. Can't change people's competence in a call. Cost: Product was dead-simple (2 similar parts, same process, single factory, fully specified, no design changes). Yulia: "can't give estimate, avg project takes 30 hrs" (=$US 2700 at 90/h). I aborted when quotes were in, after that a few questions + 4 packaging quotes from suppliers they knew (basic packaging, 100% specified, no changes), rejected all upselling. Total paid until I quit: $5237 (58.2 hrs).Be aware: They will likely try to refute all this and inflate the amount of PERFECT work they did. It's the only response I ever got (never a "sorry, we got this wrong"). Don't believe it. Taking responsibility is not their game. It's underperforming, milking, defense mode.
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