BeME Community

Trying to set realistic expectations before we commit to anything.
We've started reaching out to a few vendors for a custom AI development company to build a fraud detection tool, and the timelines we're getting back vary wildly. One team said six weeks, another said four months for what sounds like a similar scope. Hard to tell if one is rushing or the other is padding.
First time doing this so we have no internal benchmark to compare against.
Trying to figure out what's realistic:

• Whether a wide timeline gap usually means one team skipped a proper discovery phase
• How much of the delay typically comes from data prep versus actual model building
  If you've gone through something similar, how did your real timeline compare to what was originally promised?

Weighing this decision and honestly dreading either direction right now.
We're about four months into a route optimization build and progress has slowed to a crawl, communication feels one sided, and half our questions go unanswered for days. Considering whether to switch to a different logistics software development company or just push through since we're already this deep into the build.
Never had to make this call mid project before so genuinely torn on what's the smarter move here.
Things I keep going back and forth on:
How much time a handoff to a new team would realistically cost us at this stage
Whether slow progress now is a sign of bigger problems ahead or just a rough patch
If you've switched vendors partway through something like this, was it worth the disruption?

Going back and forth on this decision longer than I probably should be.
We have a six month project that needs extra hands fast, but committing to full time hires feels risky if the workload drops off after the project wraps. Looking into IT staff augmentation as a middle ground but not entirely sure if it actually saves money once you factor in everything involved.
First time weighing this tradeoff seriously so want to hear from people who've actually made this call before.
A couple things I'm unsure about:
Whether augmented staff genuinely ramp up fast enough to be worth it for a short term project
How this compares cost wise once you account for onboarding time either way
If you've gone through this decision before, what made you pick one over the other?

Weighing this decision and honestly dreading either direction right now.
We're about four months into a route optimization build and progress has slowed to a crawl, communication feels one sided, and half our questions go unanswered for days.
Considering whether to switch to a different logistics software development company or just push through since we're already this deep into the build.
Never had to make this call mid project before so genuinely torn on what's the smarter move here.

Things I keep going back and forth on:
How much time a handoff to a new team would realistically cost us at this stage
Whether slow progress now is a sign of bigger problems ahead or just a rough patch
If you've switched vendors partway through something like this, was it worth the disruption?

Weighing this decision for way too long now and could use some real input.
We need to scale our dev team fast for a project with a tight deadline, and going through a full hiring process direct feels too slow right now. Looking into an IT staff augmentation company instead but part of me wonders if we're just adding a middleman and extra cost for something we could do ourselves with more patience.
Never gone this route before so genuinely unsure if the tradeoff is actually worth it for a team our size.
Things I'm still weighing:
Whether augmented staff actually integrate well with an existing team or if that transition is usually rocky
How much time this genuinely saves compared to just pushing through direct hiring slower
If you've gone this route before, was it worth skipping the direct hire process?

Kind of spiraling a bit here, need some outside perspective before we make this worse.
Had to walk away from our original fintech app development company about two months into the build, communication had basically broken down and deadlines kept slipping with no real explanation. Found a new team that seems more organized but now we're stuck handing off a half built payment flow and hoping they can actually pick up where the last team left off without starting completely over.
Never been through a vendor switch mid project before so I genuinely don't know what to expect from here.
Things I'm stressing about right now:
What documentation, access, or code we should be pulling together before the handoff actually happens
Whether compliance work already done, like PCI stuff, needs to be reviewed again by the new team or if it carries over
If anyone's switched vendors partway through a fintech build, what made the transition smoother or worse than you expected going in?