What a proper handover includes

Every web project ends. Well-run ones end with a handoverHandoverThe point where everything stops being ours and starts being demonstrably yours: the domain, the repository, the accounts, and a written checklist proving each one moved.more in the glossary; badly-run ones just stop, and the difference decides whether the next developer says that is fine, I can work with this, or quietly quotes you for a rebuild.

HandoverHandoverThe point where everything stops being ours and starts being demonstrably yours: the domain, the repository, the accounts, and a written checklist proving each one moved.more in the glossary is where ownership stops being a warm word in a sales meeting and becomes a checklist with boxes that are either ticked or not. Whoever you hire, for whatever kind of site, this is what the end should look like.

The checklist

• The domainDomainYour address on the internet: the yourbusiness.co.uk people type in. Whoever registers it controls it, which is why yours is registered to you.more in the glossary, registered to you, in a registrar accountRegistrarThe company a domain is registered through and renewed with. Your registrar account is where you prove the address is yours.more in the glossary you control and can log into today.
• The code, in a repositoryRepositoryA safe online folder holding your website’s code, with a full history of every change. Yours lives in your own account, like a deed in your name.more in the glossary owned by your account, with the full history of changes.
• Every credential that exists: hostingHostingKeeping your website on a computer that is always on and connected, so anyone can visit at any time. Paying for hosting is paying for that seat.more in the glossary, analyticsAnalyticsCounting your visitors: where they came from, what they looked at. We set up analytics you own, rather than handing your traffic data to an advertising company.more in the glossary, mail, payment gatewayPayment gatewayThe service that takes card payments on a website and moves the money into a bank account. On our builds it settles to your account, never ours.more in the glossary, all transferred, none shared.
• The content: your words and images in a form you can take, not trapped inside a platform.
• A written note of how the site runs: where it is hosted, what gets updated, what it costs to keep alive.
• The compliance basics, documented: cookie consentCookie consentThe banner asking permission to store small bits of data in a visitor’s browser. UK sites must ask properly; we keep yours compliant.more in the glossary, privacy policy, accessibility state.

The test of a good handover

A handoverHandoverThe point where everything stops being ours and starts being demonstrably yours: the domain, the repository, the accounts, and a written checklist proving each one moved.more in the glossary succeeded if a competent stranger could take the box you were given and run the site without ever contacting the people who built it. That is the standard we build to from the first commitCommitOne saved change to your website’s code, stamped with who made it and when. The full list of them is your site’s history, and it is visible to you.more in the glossary, which is why our handover costs at most an hour: there is nothing to untangle at the end, because nothing was tangled on purpose at the start.

If you are inheriting a site rather than commissioning one, the same list works in reverse: it is your due-diligence sheet. Ask for each item. What you cannot get is what you never owned.