We were first notified that our POI barcode scanner crashed back in April 2018. We contacted our developer in El Paso Texas who assured us it would be fixed asap, this has not happened.
We have put in repeated requests asking for a resolve. During this time fix dates continued to pass leaving us not knowing the issues. Contact with the developer has been extremely stressful to say the least, resulting in various excuses or contact completely ignored.
It was eventually suggested that if we were unsatisfied with his service (or lack of), that he would allow us to host the app elsewhere.
Understanding that this issue has been causing problems with the end users and subsequently POI, another developer came forward offering their assistance, but even their attempted contact to the current developer has also been ignored with zero response.
As we run on a voluntary basis and unfinanced, the scanner app has always been a financial strain on POI however we have always paid accounts sent to us by the developer and had also paid what we consider a large sum in advance for the services.
We had also paid the developer for database setup to extend our app into the UK. This job was never delivered. Other projects we had allocated to the developer to make up for monies paid by us have also gone undelivered following months of waiting and frustration.
Due to a non-functioning app being downloaded resulting in complaints and one-star reviews, we requested it be removed from the app stores. This took 11 days for the developer to click the unpublish button which resulted in further complaints by app users to POI.
The POI volunteers have been trying to deal with the daily onslaught of messages, emails, comments and complaints regarding the app since it crashed, resulting in countless hours of replies and stress on the team and damage to POI.
The scanner app has consisted of at least 20 voluntary hours per week in product research, barcode and scan result loading into the back end over many years.
We feel completely let down by the developer who has displayed total disregard for not only POI, but also our app users and ultimately the cause.
As we now enter the next phase to resolve this issue, we wish to once again express our apologies for the inconvenience this has caused to the tens of thousands of POI app users who have relied on this barcode scanner for their shopping purchases.
We want to thank you for your patience and loyalty at this trying time. We are doing our utmost to get it functioning again, however it is proving to be extremely difficult at this point whilst it is in external hands. We have no access to the app coding and as the url is no longer functioning which they set up, we also have no access to the data.
Update: Our new developers now have all the app data and are in the process of assessing the damage and what it's going to take for us to get it back up and running. This may be a lengthy process. We are doing our best.