Question 1

Where are you, and when are you available?

Accepted Answer

Ahmedabad, India. Our working hours are set to overlap the UK and EU day in full and the US East Coast morning in part, so replies arrive while you are at your desk, not overnight.

Question 2

Who actually does the work?

Accepted Answer

A named engineer who is introduced to you before the engagement starts and stays on the account. On agency work it is a named pair. Nobody else commits to your repository.

Question 3

What do you not do?

Accepted Answer

Marketing websites, and anything that should be bought off the shelf. If the honest answer to your problem is a product rather than code, we will say which one.

Question 4

How do we start?

Accepted Answer

Run the free audit. Paste your composer.json and within 24 hours you have the PHP and Laravel versions against their end-of-life dates, the abandoned packages, and the package that fits with the price attached. There is no email wall.

Question 5

Do you sign NDAs?

Accepted Answer

Yes, before any detail of the application is shared. For agency partners, an NDA and non-solicitation clause are standard in the partner agreement.

Question 6

What versions can you upgrade from?

Accepted Answer

Laravel 5 through 11 and PHP 7 onwards, to the current supported Laravel and PHP releases. Older than that is unusual but not out of the question — the audit will say.

Question 7

What is the difference between a Sprint and a Full Upgrade?

Accepted Answer

Distance. One or two Laravel majors plus the PHP runtime is a Sprint. Three or more majors, or a codebase with several abandoned packages that need replacing and tests that need backfilling, is a Full Upgrade. The exact scope and price of each are on the pricing page.

Question 8

What happens if there are no tests?

Accepted Answer

We add smoke tests around the routes and jobs the business depends on so the upgrade can be proven. In a Full Upgrade we backfill coverage around the critical paths properly and hand the suite over with the code.

Question 9

Will the site go down?

Accepted Answer

Everything is rehearsed on a staging copy first, including the deploy and the rollback. The production release happens in a window you pick, and downtime is minutes or none.

Question 10

Can you take over an application another developer abandoned?

Accepted Answer

Yes — that is a large share of what we do. We need repository access and a database copy. We do not need the previous developer.

Question 11

Do you rewrite the application?

Accepted Answer

No. An upgrade moves the framework and packages under the existing application. Rewrites, new features and front-end framework migrations are quoted separately so the upgrade price stays fixed.

Question 12

What does a care plan actually include?

Accepted Answer

A block of engineering hours a month, a written response-time SLA, security patches and dependency updates inside that SLA, uptime and error monitoring, a monthly health report, and a named engineer who stays on the account. Higher tiers add small changes from your backlog and planning calls. The full table is on the care plans page.

Question 13

Is there a minimum term?

Accepted Answer

Three months, then month to month with a month of notice. Fixed-price packages have no ongoing commitment at all.

Question 14

What if I need more hours one month?

Accepted Answer

You move up a tier, or we scope the extra work as a sprint at a fixed price. Unused hours do not roll over, so if you regularly leave hours on the table we will suggest the smaller plan ourselves.

Question 15

Can a care plan start if the app is still on an old version?

Accepted Answer

The first month would be spent upgrading anyway, so we price that as a Sprint and start the plan once the application is on supported versions.

Question 16

How is this different from hiring someone?

Accepted Answer

Most applications need a fraction of a full-time engineer to stay patched and moving. A care plan gives you that fraction with a written SLA and cover during holidays, without recruitment, onboarding or notice periods. When an application genuinely needs a full-time hire, we will say so.

Question 17

Can you take over our mobile app?

Accepted Answer

If it is a Flutter app talking to a Laravel API, yes. A second-opinion review tells you where it sits on the store calendar. A Store-Compliance Sprint or Catch-up Upgrade brings it back to a shippable state at a fixed price, and the Mobile module on your care plan keeps it there. The app has to be current before the module starts; the module never absorbs backlog.

Question 18

Who owns the store accounts and signing keys?

Accepted Answer

You do. You enrol as an organisation and stay Account Holder on Apple and Owner on Google Play, and you pay Apple and Google directly. We work inside your accounts at the lowest role that lets us do the job, distribution certificates and the Android upload key stay in your custody, and we never submit your app under our own account.

Question 19

Do you do React Native?

Accepted Answer

We also work in React Native and Expo. We have not yet published a React Native case study, so we quote React Native work only after a paid review.

Question 20

Are the prices really fixed?

Accepted Answer

Yes. The price on the quote is the price on the invoice. If we underestimated the work, the overrun is our cost. The only way the price changes is if you add scope, and that goes on a separate line you approve first.

Question 21

How and when do I pay?

Accepted Answer

Half of a fixed price up front, half on hand-over. Care plans are invoiced monthly in advance. We invoice in USD unless agreed otherwise before the project starts, and the pricing page shows GBP and EUR equivalents for comparison.

Question 22

Why are you cheaper than a UK or EU agency?

Accepted Answer

Because we are in Ahmedabad and run a small studio with no sales team. We are deliberately not the cheapest option available — the price carries the audit, the staging rehearsal, the tests and the hand-over, which is what makes it fixed.

Question 23

Is there a money-back guarantee?

Accepted Answer

Not as a marketing line. What you have instead is a fixed price that does not move, a staging rehearsal before anything is released, and code in your own repository from day one — so there is nothing to claw back.

Question 24

Who owns the code?

Accepted Answer

You do, from the first commit. The work happens in your repository under your access controls. Third-party packages keep their own open-source licences, as they always did.

Question 25

What does the hand-over contain?

Accepted Answer

Notes a future developer can read without calling us: what changed, why each package was replaced, what we left alone and why, and a risk register for anything we found but did not touch. They live in your repository.

Question 26

Can my own team keep working on the app alongside you?

Accepted Answer

Yes. We work in branches and pull requests sized for review, and we agree branch protection and review rules at the start so neither side surprises the other.

Question 27

Where is the application hosted?

Accepted Answer

Wherever you host it now. We work with your existing provider and do not require a move. Infrastructure moves are quoted separately if you want one.

Questions, answered plainly

Working with us