How long does it take to deliver an e-commerce site — the agency said 3 months, is that normal?

Does your accounting software have an open up-to-date API? Two-way inventory sync is a notorious headache with most local Turkish software suites. The agency probably padded the timeline anticipating technical coordination issues with your software vendor.

We had a shoe store built with a similar scope last year. The agency promised 60 days, but just uploading our product photos and descriptions took us 25 days on our own. The project finally went live on day 115. No matter how fast the agency moves, your own content prep will drag out the timeline.

90 business days is almost 4.5 calendar months. If you don't require weekly progress reports, the agency won't even touch the project for the first two months. Then they'll rush to cram everything into the final month. Definitely put late-delivery penalties and bi-weekly demo presentations into the contract.

those 15-day turnarounds are just people slapping a logo on an off-the-shelf theme mate. if u want custom mockups and 2-way inventory sync, 3 months is totally normal. better to do it right than rush it and end up with half-baked work imo.

Edit: asked below, I wrote the answer in the second message.

Two years ago, we signed with a team that promised a 45-day turnaround on a similar build. We were thrilled by the quick turnaround, but the day we went live, billing completely broke and orders failed to sync to the accounting system. We spent another 3 months patching bugs. It's way safer for them to quote 90 days upfront and deliver clean, solid work.

If you want to cut down the timeframe get your content sorted starting today. If high-res photos, variants dimensional shipping weights, and invoice details for all 140 products aren't ready, the site can't launch even if the agency wraps up the codebase. Don't wait on the agency—get your product data spreadsheet completely finalized right now.

Clarify these three things before signing the contract: 1) Cap the number of design revision rounds so approvals don't drag on for weeks. 2) Specify whether any third-party connector licenses are required for the accounting integration. 3) Clearly state how many days the site will spend in the staging/testing environment after the 90-day mark.

We got stuck at the same point for a while. Weekly written progress reports are much more useful than asking for dates.

When making a decision, first look at what data you have on hand. Hope this helps.

Generally correct, but one part is missing. The harder it is to reverse a decision, the slower you should make it.

Just leaving this note, it might be useful.

Don't miss this: Everything goes well for the first three months; problems arise in the fourth.

In legacy systems, the most expensive thing is unknown dependencies. That's all, sorry if I went on too long.

Don't miss this: The real issue isn't the number, but what it's based on.

I don't think this advice fits everyone. In legacy systems, the most expensive thing is unknown dependencies.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Following.

the discussion got scattered, let me summarize. if acceptance criteira aren't written, when the work is done is open to debate.

good luck with that.

Quick summary for newcomers: Payment schedules should be tied to project phases, not calendar dates.

Don't hesitate to ask; those who don't ask always pay more. Proven by experience.

We experienced almost the exact same thing last year. Implementing a change request process doesn't slow things down, it speeds them up.

The real issue isn't the number, but what it's based on.

We got stuck at the same point for a while. Don't hesitate to ask; those who don't ask always pay more.

Most time waste accumulates in tasks waiting for approval. Hope this helps.

If I understood correctly, you're saying: Mistakes made on the e-commerce site delivery time side are usually reversible but expensive.

Good luck with that.