Software Maintenance Outsourcing Checklist: A Decision-Maker’s Guide

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Software maintenance is one of the biggest ongoing business investments these days. Over 60% of total IT budgets are spent on maintaining existing software. Gigenet Research says 80% of application downtime incidents happen due to human error. According to Gartner, IT downtime costs businesses about $5,600 every minute, which can add up to over $300,000 for just one hour of disruption.

If you are CTOs, CIOs, founders, or product heads, software maintenance should be your core priority to run the business smoothly and reduce risks and costs.

The success of your app heavily depends on the software maintenance company you choose to outsource to. As a proven software maintenance and support services company, ManekTech can help you keep important applications secure, stable, and scalable with enterprise-ready processes, proactive monitoring, and long-term support strategies.

In this blog, you will learn about a clear outsourcing checklist to evaluate and choose the right software outsourcing maintenance company to avoid risks and make informed maintenance decisions.

But first, let’s start with the basics and understand what software maintenance really means and why it’s important.

What is software maintenance outsourcing?

Software maintenance outsourcing is when you hire a third-party business partner to manage ongoing software support and improvements.

This includes bug fixes, security updates, performance optimization, system upgrades, feature enhancements, and more to ensure the system works fine and stays free from risks.

This also helps internal teams to focus on new projects without worrying about unexpected costs, downtime, and breaches.

What Is Software Maintenance?

Software maintenance is the process of continuous care for software systems after they are launched. It includes fixing the software bugs, improving performance, and adding features to adapt to the changing environment and needs.

To understand how software maintenance works in the real world, let’s look at the example of Accenture to understand how they have been serving as a long-term maintenance partner to lots of companies like Unilever and Marriott.

1. Bug Fixes After Production Release

The global retail brand faced a crash of the app when they launched a new checkout feature with a promo code.

Accenture’s maintenance team operates under a strict Service Level Agreement (SLA).

They identified the root cause, developed a fix, and deployed a "hotfix" to the live environment without the involvement of the client’s internal team.

2. OS, Browser, API, and Dependency Upgrades

When Apple releases iOS 19 or Google updates the Chrome engine, it causes the enterprise’s internal employee portal to display incorrectly.

Accenture’s maintenance team updated the software dependencies and refactored code to ensure compatibility with the latest browsers and operating systems.

This is Adaptive Maintenance.

Types of Software Maintenance

Software maintenance is a crucial business activity. There are different types of software maintenance, and each serves a unique purpose in keeping software stable, secure, and future-ready.

#1. Corrective Maintenance

We deal with corrective maintenance on a daily basis, like app crashes, login errors, errors in workflows, app update issues, and more.

These types of bugs are called corrective maintenance.

It involves fixing defects or unexpected issues in software after it’s released.

#2. Adaptive Maintenance

Adaptive maintenance means upgrading the software to be compatible with the external environment, such as OS, hardware, browser versions, app migrations, and much more.

#3. Perfective Maintenance

Perfective maintenance is about improving or enhancing the app’s features and functionality according to users’ feedback.

In short, it's about making the software perfect in terms of functionality and usability as per the user’s review.

#4. Preventive Maintenance

The main aim of preventive maintenance is to reduce future risks by identifying the problems before they occur.

It includes refactoring code, optimizing performance, updating dependencies, and reducing technical debt.

For example, monitoring server logs and improving database queries before problems occur helps prevent crashes or slowdowns down the line.

Whether it’s fixing a sudden bug or preventing potential issues, corrective and preventive software maintenance is essential to reduce risks and technical debt.

Difference Between Software Maintenance and Support

Why Software Maintenance Is Critical for Enterprises?

Software maintenance is a non-negotiable thing for every business. Here is the why:

• Uptime & business continuity: It keeps your business running fine and prevents downtime by fixing bugs and optimizing performance. So your employees and customers don't face issues.
• Security & data protection: Regular security patches and updates protect sensitive data from breaches, reducing the risk of cyberattacks and financial losses.
• Regulatory compliance: Your software meets evolving regulations like GDPR, SOC, or industry-specific rules, avoiding legal penalties.
• Performance & scalability: Your software or app can handle higher traffic by optimizing code and infrastructure while growing your business.
• Avoiding system rewrites: You can save lots of money on technical code rewriting and other procedures that may need expensive technical experts and tools.

Why Enterprises Outsource Software Maintenance

Every enterprise and CTO has different reasons to outsource software maintenance. Here are some logical reasons:

1. To solve talent shortages and get immediate access to specialized skills (like cybersecurity or legacy COBOL) that are difficult to hire internally.
2. It also helps to predict monthly costs by converting unpredictable IT issues into manageable expenses.
3. Provides 24/7 coverage across global time zones, which internal teams often cannot sustain.
4. It reduces downtime with faster mean time to resolution (MTTR), and keeps systems secure and up-to-date.

Why Do Legacy Systems Need Continuous Maintenance?

As the entire enterprise business is dependent on legacy systems, failure of even one system can cause costly losses. Using old ERP/CRM systems can affect daily operations and come with its own technical debt risks and hidden vulnerabilities.

Continuous maintenance keeps these legacy systems running reliably, reduces downtime, and protects the business from disruptions. Without it, even small issues can impact operations and revenue.

How Software Maintenance Works at Enterprise Scale?

Here is the full maintenance cycle of how software maintenance works at the enterprise level. Let's go through each stage to understand in detail.

Stage #1. Application Audit

At first, an application audit is done to evaluate the software’s current state, architecture, dependencies, and performance.

This includes checking for bugs, outdated components, and potential risks.

Once the weaknesses and bugs are identified, the software maintenance company plans updates and improvements proactively to minimize unexpected downtime and protect revenue.

Stage #2. Knowledge Transfer

Knowledge transfer is the process of sharing system details, workflows, and technical documentation with the maintenance team.

Here team understands the software’s architecture and business logic to make decisions related to software maintenance.

Stage #3. SLA & KPI Definition

Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) define the expectations for maintenance delivery and performance.

SLAs specify response times, uptime, and resolution targets, and KPIs is to track efficiency and quality.

It makes sure that maintenance performed aligns with operational goals and accountability.

Stage #4. Monitoring & Incident Handling

For enterprises, small problems can become major outages that directly affect revenue and customer trust.

Hence, tracking software performance and security using real-time detection and rapid response to system anomalies is very important.

Stage #5. Continuous Optimization

Even after the software or app is live, it needs continuous optimization to stay compatible with new technologies and remain secure.

Continuous optimization saves you from long-term technical debts and infrastructure costs if the system is already maintained from the beginning.

This includes refactoring code, patching security holes, and scaling resources according to traffic.

Knowledge Transfer (KT) & Transition Process

When you outsource the software maintenance to another company, one question always comes up first:

“Will they really understand our system?”

A strong software knowledge transfer plan helps understand this risk before any changes are made.

Usually, three strategies can be applied in any application transition process.

Reverse Engineering Without Documentation: If your system lacks updated manuals, it will need to use automated code-analysis tools to map dependencies and logic.

This helps to find the "how" and "why" behind legacy code, and rebuild the software knowledge transfer plan from scratch.

Shadowing & Parallel Runs: We work alongside your internal team during the regular day sessions.

By executing a parallel run, our experts manage tasks in a transparent environment where your team can have proper operational understanding before the final handoff.

Sandbox-First Approach: To eliminate production risk, all initial maintenance tasks are performed in an isolated sandbox environment.

This helps vendors to validate fixes without touching live business data.

Maintenance Toolchain & Operational Transparency

It's important to know how your software is maintained and what changes or updates will impact your system when and how.

A mature software maintenance company uses the right tools to ensure visibility, control, and accountability. Below are some of the tools that most enterprises use to track issues, monitor performance, and maintain full transparency across maintenance activities.

• Ticketing / ITSM (Jira, ServiceNow, Zendesk): All issues, requests, and changes are logged and tracked in one place. This ensures nothing is missed and progress is always visible.
• Monitoring (Datadog, New Relic, Prometheus): Monitoring tools continuously track system health, performance, and uptime. They help detect issues early and prevent outages before they impact users.
• CI/CD (Jenkins, GitLab CI): Automated pipelines ensure fixes and updates are tested and deployed safely, reducing errors and speeding up releases.
• Version Control & Audit Trails: Every code change is recorded and traceable, ensuring accountability, security, and compliance.

Security, IP Protection & Compliance

When you outsource software maintenance to another company, you are handing over your business data and code to them and trusting them with your business-critical systems.

That’s why security, intellectual property protection, and compliance must be non-negotiable.

#1. Code Ownership & Intellectual Property

When you outsource software maintenance to any third-party, that company still fully owns your software and things like source code, updates, fixes, new features, and improvements.

The outsourcing partner doesn't have any rights to reuse, sell, or claim ownership of that code.

You can ensure this by signing a work-for-hire agreement and an NDA.

This helps to protect your business from legal risks and gives you 100% code ownership, full control of the software in the future.

#2. Data Access & Infrastructure Security

Set the proper data access and control when you outsource software maintenance.

Outsourced teams should never have open or uncontrolled access to enterprise systems.

You can secure your data using VPN or VDI-based access, hence teams work in controlled environments.

Implement least-privilege access so their engineers only see what they need. Use activity logging to track every action for accountability and audits.

These actions help to reduce the risk of data leaks, unauthorized access, and security breaches.

#3. Compliance Readiness

If your enterprise operates under suitable strict regulations, make sure the outsourced maintenance company aligns with those requirements, such as GDPR standards, supports HIPAA compliance where applicable, and uses SOC 2-aligned security practices.

This ensures your data is handled responsibly, access is controlled, and processes are auditable.

2026 Software Maintenance Outsourcing Checklist

When you hire any software maintenance services, it affects your business risk and continuity.

Hence, you must have clarity on readiness, technology, vendor capability, and risk exposure.

Use the checklist below before you hand over your software maintenance to another company.

#1. Business Readiness Checklist

Before you start checking out the software maintenance vendors, assess your business reality.

• Is this software mission-critical to daily operations or revenue?
• Would downtime directly impact customers, sales, or compliance?
• Is your internal team spending more time fixing issues than building new features?
• Are product launches or innovation slowing down due to maintenance workload?

#2. Technical Checklist

Be ready with your technical checklist because your software must be evaluated honestly, no assumptions.

• Is the codebase stable, readable, and version-controlled?
• Do you have basic documentation or system knowledge available?
• How old is the technology stack? Is it still supported?
• Are there dependencies on specific clouds, APIs, third-party tools, or licenses?

#3. Vendor Evaluation Checklist

Choose a mature software maintenance company that has proven experience in software maintenance and deep experience.

• Do they have proven experience with enterprise or legacy systems?
• Are security, IP protection, and compliance practices clearly documented?
• Do they offer defined SLAs, KPIs, and escalation paths?
• How clear is their communication model (reports, meetings, tools)?
• Can they provide time zone overlap or 24/7 coverage?

#4. Cost and Risk Checklist

The cheapest option is always the riskiest. Consider this cost and risk checklist.

• Is the software maintenance cost estimate transparent and predictable?
• Are support hours, upgrades, and emergency fixes clearly included?
• Are there hidden costs for tools, handovers, or scale-ups?
• Is there a vendor lock-in risk?
• Do you have a documented exit or transition strategy if needed?

Software Maintenance Cost for Enterprises

How much does software maintenance cost? As every application is different, software maintenance costs for enterprises usually range between 15% to 25% of the original development cost per year, depending on complexity, size of application usage, and compliance needs.

You can roughly assume a cost from $5000 to $20000+ monthly, depending on the other factors.

The cost of software maintenance also depends on the pricing models the vendor offers:

#1. Retainer Model

In the retainer model, you pay a fixed monthly fee for ongoing software maintenance.

This usually covers a set number of hours or defined services.

If you want to have predictable costs, steady support, and quick response, then go for this model.

#2. SLA-based Model

In this model, costs are tied to service levels like response time, resolution time, and uptime guarantees.

An SLA-based model is best for performance-related metrics if you can't compromise on downtime and accountability.

#3. Time and Material

In this, you pay only for the actual hours worked.

It offers flexibility when maintenance needs are unpredictable.

Go for the time and material models if you want short-term fixes, upgrades, or assessments.

#4. Dedicated Team

If you are dealing with a large, complex enterprise system, the dedicated team model provides a full-time or part-time team that works only on your software.

You control priorities while the vendor manages staffing.

Is Outsourced Software Maintenance Cheaper?

Yes, logically, outsourcing software maintenance is more cost-efficient and predictable than maintaining large in-house teams.

In-house vs Outsourced Software Maintenance

Dedicated Team vs Managed Software Maintenance

At Manektech, we offer predictable pricing with no surprises and no long-term lock-ins. We offer a 40-hour free trial to every new client so you can see our expertise in action before committing.

SLA-Based Application Support Model

SLA-based application support means your software maintenance comes with guaranteed service levels.

The vendor agrees to respond and resolve issues within specific timelines, ensuring your applications stay available and reliable.

Incident Priority Levels

In software maintenance, speed matters because an enterprise can't afford a delay in solving some problems.

Here are the incident priority levels to decide which issues require immediate action.

See the table below.

SLAs vs KPIs (What CTOs Actually Care About)

For CTOs, SLAs are important, but KPIs are the real insight because they give an idea whether the software is performing well, updates are smooth, and issues are resolved.

At ManekTech, we track the following KPIs:

• MTTR (Mean Time to Resolve): How quickly are issues fixed?
• Incident Recurrence Rate: How often does the same problem happen again?
• Backlog Reduction Velocity: How quickly are pending tickets cleared?
• Deployment Success Rate: The percentage of updates or fixes deployed without errors.
• System Uptime %: We measure reliability, higher uptime.

Technologies We Maintain

ManekTech provides enterprise-grade software maintenance across a wide range of technologies, including legacy ERP/CRM, web and mobile applications, cloud platforms, and databases.

Legacy Technologies: Java, .NET, PHP, COBOL

Modern & Cloud Applications: AWS, Azure, GCP, Microservices, APIs

SaaS & Mobile: iOS, Android, Flutter, React Native

Software Project Rescue & Maintenance Takeover

When your current vendor fails, or internal teams leave, ManekTech can be your software maintenance company in need to rescue abandoned projects, stabilize critical systems, and optimize messy legacy code.

Why ManekTech Is the Right Software Maintenance Partner?

ManekTech is a Top software maintenance and support services company trusted by enterprises worldwide.

With proven processes, global delivery, and extensive enterprise experience, we rank among the best software maintenance companies.

You can hire a software maintenance team on flexible engagement models such as a dedicated team, long-term partnership, or emergency support.

Outsource software maintenance in India, we have highly skilled software engineers in our team who will work according to your time zone coverage.

Conclusion

Do you know that over 60% of enterprises now choose to outsource software maintenance to reduce costs? Hope you must have learnt why software maintenance is crucial for every enterprise.

This blog covered why maintaining legacy and modern systems matters, how SLAs, KPIs, and incident priorities work, and what to check when outsourcing.

Using the checklist, you can evaluate vendors, control costs, and reduce risks.

In the end, hiring the software maintenance company is a worthy investment every company must make.

Book your 40-hour free trial to evaluate our software maintenance services risk-free and see how we protect uptime, optimize performance, and manage critical systems.