Scope Creep Examples — Web development
New stakeholders join and want their own sign-off cycle
The build was approved by the original technical contact. A new stakeholder joins the client team and wants their own review before anything ships.
User acceptance testing was completed and signed off by the client's product owner, per the SOW's acceptance process. Before launch, a newly hired director joins the client team, reviews the staging environment, and asks for a full new round of UAT under their own review — not because anything is broken, but because they weren't part of the original sign-off and want to see it for themselves.
Clause typically implicated
Clause typically implicated
Acceptance testing clause→ — Defines the formal acceptance process and who's authorized to sign off — a new stakeholder wanting visibility doesn't by itself reopen a completed UAT cycle.
Suggested change-order wording
Suggested change-order wording (illustrative, not legal advice)
UAT was completed and signed off by [product owner] on [date] per our acceptance process. Happy to walk the new director through what was tested and why — a full re-run of UAT would be additional QA time beyond what's scoped, estimated at [X] hours. Would a walkthrough session cover what's needed, or is a full re-test genuinely required?
How this usually resolves
A walkthrough session is almost always what actually resolves this — the new stakeholder typically wants confidence and visibility, not a literal repeat of testing, and once they've seen the results and reasoning firsthand the request to re-run UAT usually drops.
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