Challenge
When our client for this project, a European mobile banking service provider, was preparing to expand their business globally and venture into new markets, they approached our company with a request to test the quality of their hardware and software systems.
The main system in question was a mobile Point of Sale solution that allows businesses to perform transactions and access a range of other sales-related services with a convenient, all-in-one product. Our main task was to conduct a thorough check of the hardware terminal, as well as its connection to the mobile application and the performance of the application in different environments. The mobile POS system was intended to be used by millions of businesses across Europe, so our job was to make sure that the systems are robust and configuration reliable. Specifically, we had to check:
- The correct operation of the hardware terminal
- The stability of the connection between the terminal and the application
- The performance of the whole solution under various conditions
- The compatibility of the application with different platforms
- The possibility and execution of the OTA firmware update
It was also necessary to ensure that every step of receiving a payment through the mobile POS system is intuitive and well-suited to the needs even of non-tech-savvy users — from connecting the hardware to confirming a transaction. This is why a great deal of UI/UX testing was also to be implemented on our side. Having delivered POS testing services to multiple clients before, we knew exactly how we needed to approach this particular POS testing project.
Solution
After a collection and thorough analysis of the client’s requirements, and taking into account the scope of the POS software testing project, it was agreed that we assign one Senior QA Engineer to the setup. As a dedicated resource, they were to be integrated into the client’s team and collaborate closely with their in-house tech specialists. Working as part of distributed teams is our forte, which is why we quickly built an efficient professional relationship with other specialists working on this POS QA project.
Responsibilities of our Senior QA Engineer included:
- Setting up the QA process on the project from scratch
- Selecting the candidates to strengthen the testing team
- Performing all the necessary QA activities on a daily basis
- Communicating with the client’s in-house team and with the project stakeholders during regular meetings
- Providing proactive recommendations on how to improve the client’s onboarding documentation for the end users
Throughout the whole POS system testing project, we have been maintaining the documentation, starting with designing a test strategy and test plan, all the way through creating test scenarios, traceability matrices, and bug reports.
Additional POS application testing activities, aimed at checking the update and maintenance capabilities of the solution, included:
- Testing firmware updates, firmware OTA update, firmware + SDK compatibility testing
- Testing SDK (logs)
Technologies
Types of testing we employed on this project included:
- Manual testing
- Functional testing
- Compatibility testing / cross-platform testing (12 mobile devices in total, including iOS and Android smartphones, iPad mini, and iPad Pro)
- Exploratory testing
- Ad-hoc testing
- UI/UX testing
- Smoke testing
- Regression testing
