Frequently asked questions

Portland, OR. I work with clients globally.

Because we go in fast, we go in light, we get you out alive, and we don't pretend the situation is more complicated than it is.

A Lighthouse + Core Web Vitals scan, a plugin/theme vulnerability check, and a top-issues list ranked by impact. Sent as a written report — no obligation, no sales call required to receive it.

Yes. No annual lock-in, cancel any month before the next billing cycle. If I'm not earning the retainer, you should be able to leave without a fight.

Yes. Performance audits, security hardening, and emergency help can be one-off engagements. You don't need a maintenance plan to work with me.

Fixed-fee, agreed before any work starts. After the assessment I send a written scope and a price. If something genuinely changes scope mid-project, I tell you and we agree on the delta — never a surprise on the invoice.

Almost always — that's most of the work. Taking over WordPress sites built by other agencies, freelancers, or in-house teams is the bread and butter.

Anything that gives me SFTP/SSH and database access: WP Engine, Kinsta, Pressable, Cloudways, SiteGround, ServerPilot, plus self-managed VPS / DigitalOcean / Hetzner / etc. If your host blocks SSH and gives me only a clunky control panel, the engagement is harder but not impossible — I'll flag it during the assessment.

Yes. WooCommerce is a regular part of the work — performance tuning, checkout debugging, payment gateway issues, multi-currency setups.

Yes, but priced as a Premium plan minimum due to operational complexity (cross-site updates, network plugins, subdomain SSL, etc).

Not from scratch as the headline service. I'll occasionally take on a rebuild for an existing maintenance client when their site has reached the end of its useful life — but greenfield design / dev isn't what I'm here for.

We can work with that — including the front end (Next.js, Astro, Gatsby, etc) alongside the WordPress backend.

I get my own named admin user with audit logging. When the engagement ends, that account is removed. Shared credentials are never used.

For most engagements I need at least SFTP and database access. For deeper performance / security work, SSH is needed too. I don't need root unless we agree on it for a specific reason.

Yes. I have a standard mutual NDA, or I'll sign yours within reason.

Client site data stays on your hosting infrastructure — I don't pull databases or files to my local machine unless absolutely necessary for a specific debugging task, and only with your explicit approval. Backups are stored on your designated backup destination, not mine.

Site offline, white screen of death, hacked or defaced, plugin/theme update broke checkout or login, malware injection visible in Google search results, or any active outage costing you money.

Routine inquiries get a written reply within one business day. New (non-client) emergencies are prioritized for same-day pickup where possible. The 30-minute response SLA is reserved for active Premium-plan clients with that service level written into their agreement — I don't make that promise to anyone I haven't already onboarded, because I don't want to break it.

Then I tell you, refund the assessment fee if any was paid, and point you to a specialist who can. I'd rather lose the deal than take it under false pretenses.