Your developer stopped replying
The most common one. The site still works, but nobody is looking after it and you cannot get hold of whoever built it. First job is finding out what you actually control.
Moving to Doory
Moving from someone who stopped answering.
You do not need to know where anything is or what any of it is called. Working that out is the first part of the job.
Where people start
If any of this sounds familiar.
Most people arriving here are not sure what they own or who controls it. That is the normal starting position, not an embarrassing one.
You are paying for things you cannot identify
Several small charges, no clear picture of what each one is for, and no confidence that cancelling any of them is safe. That gets untangled and written down.
Nobody knows where the domain is
It is registered somewhere, to someone, renewing on some date. That is findable — it is public information — and it is the first thing to establish.
The site works but nothing is maintained
Running on software years out of date, no backups anyone has tested, no monitoring. It has not broken yet. That is not the same as being fine.
How it works
Four steps, and you approve each one.
Nothing changes until the replacement is built and checked.
We work out what you have
Where the domain is registered, who is listed as the owner, where the site is hosted, where the email runs, and what you are paying for. Usually an hour of looking, and you get the findings whether or not you hire me.
You get told what it would take
A plain description of what moving involves, what it costs, and anything that needs sorting first — like a domain registered to someone who no longer works for you. Fixed price before anything starts.
The move happens without downtime
The new site is built and checked before anything changes. Email keeps working throughout — that is the part people fear, and it is the part that gets planned most carefully.
Everything ends up in your name
Domain registered to you, accounts owned by you, and a written record of where each piece lives. Including how to leave, if you ever want to.
Worth reading first
Three articles that answer the usual questions.
Questions
About moving.
What if I cannot reach my old developer?
That is a normal starting point, not a dead end. Most of what matters can be recovered without them, because domain ownership is provable and registrars have processes for exactly this. It is occasionally slower. It is rarely impossible.
Will my email stop working during the move?
No. Email is the thing people worry about most, so it is planned first and moved deliberately rather than as a side effect of moving the website. The two are separate systems even though they share a domain.
What if my domain is registered to someone else?
We find out early, because it changes the plan. Sometimes it is a simple update. Sometimes it means a dispute process. Either way you want to know now rather than the day you need to change something urgently.
Do I have to rebuild the site?
Not always. If what you have is decent and just unmaintained, sometimes the right answer is to take it over as it is. I will tell you honestly which situation you are in — a rebuild you do not need is a waste of your money.
How long does it take?
A straightforward move is usually a couple of weeks, most of which is building. Domain transfers have their own waiting periods set by the registry that nobody can shorten. Complicated situations take longer and you will know that up front.
The next door
Start by finding out what you have.
Send me your domain name and whatever you know. I will look up what is public, tell you what I find, and you can decide what to do with it.