UAT Testing Services
Testing to verify that your software is meeting the needs, requirements, and business processes of your users’.
What is User Acceptance Testing?
User Acceptance testing is the final software testing and quality assurance step emulating real-world usage conditions before a software application is released to end users. While many may term this as end-user testing, the last thing you want is real end-users to do your testing! What you want is one level, or stage prior to releasing to end users that replicate closely how they will use your software.
These user acceptance tests are not usually focused on identifying simple problems such as spelling errors and cosmetic problems, nor show stopper defects such as software crashes which should have been fixed during the early system integration test phase. Acceptance tests are black-box system-level tests whereby each test case represents some expected result from the system given a predefined set of test scenarios with documented expected results combined with pass/fail criteria.
- Acceptance testing can be done by the system/software provider but is usually performed by an independent 3rd party, clients, or end-users (beta customers) prior to accepting the transfer of ownership satisfying contractual obligations, and may also be required for payment.
- Any acceptance testing is done with acceptance criteria. Acceptance criteria, usually evaluated as pass or fail, can apply to each individual test, a group of tests, or the system as a whole.
- Acceptance testing provides confidence that the delivered system meets business requirements and is the final quality check where any defects not previously detected are uncovered, or any nuances in the usability or user experience can be tweaked.
- Acceptance testing is generally not part of the regression testing or beta testing cycles, yet it can be partially automated depending on the make-up of test scenarios and their complexity.
Accept and Release with Confidence
What’s the most important aspect of your software development lifecycle? While it’s critical to produce clean code, ensure promised functionality, and address cross-platform compatibility, acceptance by end-users remains a key indicator of software success. Even though the functional testing process may have addressed system testing, integration testing, and comprehensive application testing, if staff, executives, and customers find your software cumbersome or complicated — or if they feel it doesn’t address specific business needs — you’re left with an expensive problem rather than a viable investment. The solution? Purpose-built user acceptance testing (UAT) to ensure delivery meets expectations.
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User Acceptance Test Plan
With the number and type of end-users rapidly expanding both across platforms and departments, many companies have turned to in-house user acceptance testing — since local and in-house users regularly leverage the application; why not incorporate their feedback?
Most companies, however, understandably have limited experience designing a user acceptance test plan, and local staff may not be equipped to provide actionable feedback based on the testing results. As such, organizations often benefit from expert third-party assistance when it comes to designing a user acceptance testing checklist and adopt UAT testing best practices. By combining in-house expectations, any requirements from your software development vendor, and a framework of common user interactions, companies get the dual benefit of rapid UAT testing and reliable, actionable results.
User Acceptance Testing – An Example
XBOSoft worked with a client on User Acceptance Testing for a healthcare patient portal. In this case, user acceptance testing was comprised of end-user testing scenarios from multiple end-user points of view to determine if they “ACCEPT” the software or not. Usually, acceptance is done by or on behalf of an end-user or end customer for whom you are developing software. Sometimes, a software development organization may ask a small group of actual software users who have deep domain knowledge to do acceptance testing as well. In any case, the UAT test environment should be established from the end-user point of view for stories or use UAT test cases that they would execute frequently.
If you want to do a User Acceptance Testing (UAT) for a patient portal, what would be the top scenarios that a user would do on the portal. Some user stories that we have run across in our experience in healthcare user acceptance testing include:
Notification to patient
A patient receives notification through either their email or the mobile app that they have a message, results, or other information regarding their account.
Look up test results
A patient goes into the portal and checks their mail or looks at recent test results. This could include results from the lab or other tests or just an email from their doctor.
API for test results
Although not from a patient’s point of view, test data from various systems needs to get into the portal for the patient to access. This could include x-rays, blood test results, electrocardiograms, and any other information captured.
Input/update billing info
A patient must enter or update their credit card or bank account information for automatic payment.
Correspondence
Simple messaging back and forth between the doctor or nurse and the patient with records kept for a predetermined amount of time.
Make an appointment
A patient needs to make an appointment with a variety of specialists or their primary care doctor. Sometimes they can make an appointment directly or perhaps need a referral from their primary care physician.
Cancel or edit an appointment
Patients often need to cancel or edit and reschedule an appointment. The doctors must be notified if this interferes with the normal care process.
Fill or check a prescription
A doctor must first input the prescription for the patient, and then the patient can pick up or submit it to an outside pharmacy.
Inputting vitals
Information such as temperature, blood pressure, glucose levels, etc. is input by a technician either manually or through an automatic interface via the equipment used.
Going through typical scenarios such as those listed above would constitute the Healthcare User Acceptance Testing for a patient portal. Special attention is needed when considering the end-user. Sometimes it is the doctor, nurse, or patient. Each has different usage patterns and priorities. These are by no means exhaustive, but as you can see, there are many variations as well as negative patterns that need to be tested as well. Any UAT environment should be designed so that the software testing results provide actionable data.
Improved UAT Process With XBOSoft
XBOSoft’s acceptance testing is provided as an independent third party to ensure that the delivered system testing phase meets your business requirements and/or the requirements set forth in your contract with your software development vendor. To deliver maximum value and results, our UAT testing process relies on a four-step methodology:
Test Strategy and Plan
XBOSoft’s experts derive a strategy, UAT test plan, and guidelines for acceptance criteria using either your requirements specification or the existing contract with your vendor. This allows us to determine ideal testing types with a keen eye for risk aversion.
Determine Acceptance Criteria and Tests
Based on pass/fail criteria guidelines, we develop test scenarios with entry/exit and pass/fail criteria. To “accept” or “not accept” is defined for each test case and the system as a whole, in turn producing UAT results that encompass both specific feature sets and the business value of the entire solution.
Develop and Execute
All test cases executed with expected versus actual testing results are documented against criteria and combined with defects and/or issues found.
Sign Off
Upon successful completion of the User Acceptance Testing and resolution of the issues, we provide a recommendation on the acceptance of the system.
By using our developed acceptance criteria and UAT testing methodology with pass/fail definitions, XBOSoft’s User Acceptance Testing ensures quality for your end users from the point of view that is the most important, THEIRS. A comprehensive software testing process covers system testing, integration testing, application testing, and ultimately, User Acceptance Testing.
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Recent User Acceptance Testing Blog Posts
User Acceptance Testing (UAT) Best Practices
By Stephen Gohres | March 17th, 2021
In Agile, developers, testers, and business analysts build a working product through a series of short iterations. At the end of each iteration, the product owner accepts the software as working or not, and the team moves forward to the next iteration.
Incorporating User Acceptance Testing into Agile – XBOSoft Webinar
By Connie Kang | January 21st, 2019
Listen in to this webinar with Philip Lew and Cheney Ma as they discuss the problems with User Acceptance Testing and how to implement in Agile when it appears there is no time as the sprints roll on.
Impact of GDPR on Software Testing
By Jorry Zhao | September 25th, 2018
As software testers, we may think that GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) has nothing to do with us. However, the keyword here is data. The problem is that to do our testing, we typically need data….