Absolutely Garbage Programming

  • I’ve been a WordPress developer for over 20 years – I cannot describe to you how poor this plugins’ quality processes are and how poor the development of this product is unless you are using it:

    1. Only on it’s own with no other integrations
    2. Only in a single timezone with no distributed team members
    3. In an environment where you are comfortable building your WordPress instance around Amelia and not the other way around

    Timezone management in the plugin is just broken. Everywhere. Times don’t display right, the calendar will put your events in server time (UTC) with the current time pointing to your user’s timezone. You’re going to miss calls unless you are a single-user in this system or you never have to manage multiple timezones.

    They follow NO proper standards for webhooks or API integrations, even for things as simple as proper timestamp formats, so if you’re hoping to do any automation in the future, have fun. The calls also randomly drop fields that aren’t even user based – such as how long call durations are for. The only way I can even think of that happening is Amelia poorly managing errors and just sending along bad data anyway without any type of notification… an absolutely horrible practice. Getting calls into our CRM was a nightmare.

    The scheduling form randomly won’t validate fields, meaning they’re doing no sort of server-side validation (my guess) and just letting bad data through. This also leads me to guess there’s risk for security gaps with poor validation, but I don’t know for certain.

    At the end of the day – we used this for a month, and we spent more time fixing and working around Amelia than on calls. We’ve tabled ALL of our development for the month to focus entirely on ripping this out of our system and finding a replacement.

    Unless you literally have no choice, or you are using Amelia in the most basic of scheduling needs, skip this one. You’ll regret using Amelia.

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  • Plugin Author ameliabooking

    (@ameliabooking)

    Thank you for taking the time to provide such detailed feedback about your experience with WP Amelia. We’re sorry to hear that our plugin didn’t meet your expectations, especially given your extensive background as a WordPress developer.

    We have quite a large user base, and while the majority are satisfied with Amelia, we recognize that your experience has been different. Here are some points to address your concerns:

    Our integrations are widely used with minimal issues reported. Amelia relies on WordPress’ timezone settings and the user’s device settings, allowing for different time zones for each employee. We acknowledge that if an employee (logged into WordPress) is assigned a different time zone and visits the Calendar page, the times are shown in the server’s time zone. Since this issue wasn’t previously reported, we appreciate you bringing it to our attention. Our developers will work on resolving it in an upcoming update.

    Appointments and events are saved to your server, and everything related to webhooks and endpoints is recorded in the server’s time zone. If there are employees in different time zones, using the server’s time zone as the main reference is the most logical approach. As the admin, you should be aware of this time zone and adjust it during exports as needed. We recognize this as an area for improvement, and our developers will look into enhancing this functionality.

    The API is available in our Elite license plans, while we see you used the Standard version. Based on your description, it seems like you attempted to build on top of Amelia using callbacks and webhooks. Our webhooks are derived from WordPress hooks and follow standard practices. The API was introduced in response to customer requests, providing a structured way to fetch data. All sent data is accurate and includes all necessary information. Some formats couldn’t be changed due to legacy use before the API’s introduction, which you may have encountered. If you have suggestions for improvement, we would appreciate your insights.

    The plugin is secure, with only a few minor vulnerabilities in the past that were promptly fixed. There have been no security breaches or reports indicating Amelia could be used as an access point for attacks. We’re unsure how you concluded there are security risks, so if you could elaborate on this by reaching out to us directly, we’d appreciate it.

    Your feedback is important to us, and we are committed to improving Amelia to meet diverse needs. If you have any constructive advice or would like to discuss your concerns further, please feel free to contact us.

    Thank you again for your input.

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