How Much Thai Coding For Bt 7,500?

[klikster]

I have had very poor experience trying to hire coding work done here in Thailand. Seems not to be too many freelancers, or perhaps finding them is difficult.

As was posted here some weeks ago, I was looking for a unique web page 'dispay' (not web page or graphic design). I recently had a professional freelance JavaScript coder in New Zealand do the first part of the script. US$ 250. Code solid, easy to config, and compact. Could I have had the same for Bt 7,500 .. and should I have been able to get it done for significantly less?

My one mere serious attempted adventure into the world of Thai programmers involved a proposed application that a seasoned professional westerner estimated between USD 3,000 - 5,000 depending on final specs and scope creep. A pair of Thai recent grads, after hearing a brief verbal/translated description, bid Bt 180,000.

Has anyone here had any similar experience in trying to find Thai 'C", PHP and JavaScript coders?

Or is the "working alone" taboo too much for them?

[GungaDin]

Have you considered www.getafreelancer.com ?

[onethailand]

I have yet to find a Thai programmer that really knows what he is doing. I certainly wouldn't hand a project to a Thai programmer until long after having watched him/her do other smaller things.

Unless you are prepared to invest the time and money to take someone on full-time and can afford to take some risk, I would probably find a freelancer overseas - getafreelancer and guru.com are good places for this.

[klikster]

Have you considered www.getafreelancer.com ?

I use coder sites sometimes, but that's not the point of this thread.

[klikster]

I have yet to find a Thai programmer that really knows what he is doing. I certainly wouldn't hand a project to a Thai programmer until long after having watched him/her do other smaller things.

Unless you are prepared to invest the time and money to take someone on full-time and can afford to take some risk, I would probably find a freelancer overseas - getafreelancer and guru.com are good places for this.

At one point I actually entertained the thought of trying to hire a Thai coder. But after several experiences it doesn't seem economically feasible. Then there is dealing with the language fluency problem. That's why my OP was about comparing the price:value of the New Zealander and other countries' coders with the Thai offer I got.

I'm also thinking that Chinese coders are a much better value. I had a crackerjack Chinese guy datamine one of my own sites because I needed to change the page names, etc.

For US$ 100 he wrote a script that built the template, complete with corresponding information in the proper tags <title><meta description><h1><h2><img> tags, formatted the content into different <div> tags, identified stubs, renamed images, and wrote a basic menu. 1,400 + pages.

Then a few days later I realized I had made a mistake. He ran the job with the corrections at no charge.

I talked to a "C" programmer one time and he told me his new company (Thai) would not even entertain a query on a project of less than US$ 50,000. Have the "old boy" network and kickbacks for public projects ruined the Thai industry?

Edited August 25, 2008 by klikster

[onethailand]

There are plenty of good coders out there - you'll especially see a lot of Indian, Russian, and Eastern Europeans, who tend to be the cheapest.

However, I would tend to look for those with more of a specialist focus (note also that the above groups can do just about anything under the sky) - more expensive but safer if your scripts are of a proprietary nature.

C and Java programmers are in very high demand here, there are simply not enough to go around. Plenty of Web programmers out there but the great majority of them are very average, and those with real ability are again in high demand and hard to find.

Tell you what though - if you find a good one, share with me and I'll do the same if I find one

[klikster]

There are plenty of good coders out there - you'll especially see a lot of Indian, Russian, and Eastern Europeans, who tend to be the cheapest.

However, I would tend to look for those with more of a specialist focus (note also that the above groups can do just about anything under the sky) - more expensive but safer if your scripts are of a proprietary nature.

C and Java programmers are in very high demand here, there are simply not enough to go around. Plenty of Web programmers out there but the great majority of them are very average, and those with real ability are again in high demand and hard to find.

Tell you what though - if you find a good one, share with me and I'll do the same if I find one

If you're looking for a Java programmer, PM me.

[12DrinkMore]

Been down the Thai programmer path. Out of six "programmers" I had the "pleasure" of working with, there were four male and two females.

Two of the males were useless and caused more problems than they fixed. Fired after a few months.

The other two (overweight) males caused fewer problems because they were always asleep or attending to their private businesses, fixing mobile telephones and toy racing cars. Fired after a few more months.

Out of the two females one was really good. She produced more than the rest put together, listened to what I said and warned the rest when I was coming to the office so that they weren't sleeping when I arrived.

The other female was utterly clueless, but extremely productive with useless code. After she left it took me a month of solid undisturbed effort to rewrite everything she had produced in an generic reusable way. It had taken her over a year. The codebase was reduced by over fifty percent.

Yep, the Indians can speak English, are keen and produce good code. The Thais will gve you a headache. Just go and look over a few Thai websites.