Slot 07 Ongoing server care Service
Your ops person, without the hire
A monthly arrangement for agencies and hosting businesses. I keep the servers patched, monitored and backed up, and I pick up the phone when something breaks.
Slot 38 Who it is for 2 profiles
Built for two kinds of business
Both have the same problem: servers that need an adult, and not enough work to justify hiring one.
Profile A
Agencies
You build and run client sites. Somewhere along the way you also became responsible for the servers under them, on cPanel or Cloudways or a VPS someone set up years ago. I take that layer. You keep the client relationship, and you get a specialist to hand things to when the problem is below the application.
- Client sites across cPanel, Cloudways, RunCloud or plain VPS
- Updates and security handled without you scheduling them
- Someone to escalate to when a client site goes down
- Migrations when a client arrives or leaves
Profile B
Hosting businesses
Small hosts and resellers where the founder is also the support desk. The retainer takes the infrastructure layer off your plate so you can sell hosting instead of babysitting it. Migrations for arriving customers are usually the first thing people call about.
- Fleet patching, panel updates and licence sanity
- Abuse and compromise handled properly, not by deleting the file
- Outbound mail reputation kept clean
- Inbound customer migrations handled for you
Slot 30 Scope What is covered
The unglamorous work, on schedule
None of this is interesting. All of it separates a server that runs for three years from one that dies on a Sunday.
Updates and patching
Security updates, kernel patches, panel updates and PHP lifecycle, applied on a schedule you agreed to rather than whenever something forces it.
Monitoring a person reads
Disk and inode headroom, load, memory, mail queue depth, service availability and certificate expiry. Alerts routed to someone who acts on them.
Backups, verified
Jobs checked, retention reviewed, and a real restore performed periodically. A backup you have never restored is a belief.
Security
Firewall and rule sets kept current, compromises investigated properly, and outbound mail kept clean so your addresses stay deliverable.
Performance
Slow query review, cache and web server tuning as traffic changes, and honest advice about when the answer is more hardware rather than more configuration.
Incidents, then write-ups
When something goes down it gets fixed and then explained: what happened, why, and what changed so it does not repeat. In writing, in plain language.
Slot 20 Onboarding Starts with an audit
Every engagement opens with an audit
Before anything is agreed, I look at what you actually have. It is the only honest way to price ongoing work, and you keep the document either way.
- Installed software and version currency, including the end-of-life parts
- Exposed services and firewall posture
- Backup configuration, and whether a restore has ever been proven
- Resource headroom against real usage, not marketing specs
- Panel, PHP and database configuration against the workload
- Mail reputation and outbound sending controls
- Monitoring coverage and where the alerts currently go
- A priority order for what to fix first, with reasons
- Servers managed
- 5,000+
- Clients served
- 10,000+
- Years
- 15+
Slot 08 Price list Starting figures
What a retainer starts at
Two shapes. Count servers if you run hosting. Take the retainer if you run an agency and want one line on the invoice.
| Per server Patching, monitoring somebody reads, verified backups and security response, on one server. | from $49 per server, per month |
|---|---|
| Agency retainer Up to five servers on one arrangement, with an agreed amount of hands-on work each month. | from $199 per month |
Final quote depends on how many servers there are and how different they are from each other. The form takes 60 seconds and I reply with a fixed number.
Slot 04 Questions FAQ
Questions I get asked
What does the monthly retainer cover?
Updates and patching on a schedule, monitoring with a person reading the alerts, backup checks, security response, and an agreed amount of hands-on work each month for whatever comes up. Big projects like a full migration or a server rebuild get quoted separately rather than quietly eating the retainer.
We are an agency, not a hosting company. Does this still fit?
It fits best, honestly. Agencies build sites and then inherit servers nobody wants to own. You keep the client relationship and I take the layer underneath, so when something breaks below the application there is someone to hand it to instead of a forum thread at 11pm.
Does it cover client sites on Cloudways or RunCloud?
Yes. Managed platforms remove some work and leave plenty behind: PHP versions, database tuning, backups you can actually restore, security response, and email, which those platforms do not host. Servers you own directly are covered the same way.
How fast do you respond?
Response targets get agreed before we start, set against what you actually need rather than a number that looks good on a page. I would rather commit to something I can hold at 3am in my timezone than publish an aggressive figure and miss it.
Will you take over servers you did not build?
Most of them are. An inherited server starts with an audit: what is installed, what is exposed, what is out of date, what is backing up and what only appears to be. You get that written up with a priority order before anything changes.
How many servers can this cover?
From one busy VPS to a small fleet. What matters more than the count is how similar they are and how much runs on them. Ten identical web nodes are less work than three servers doing entirely different jobs.
Slot 03 Other services
Other things I do
- Website and server moves Your sites, databases and email, moved without downtime.
- New server setup and security A new server, set up properly and locked down before it goes live.
- Website design and build A fast site with no hosting bill, or WordPress kept properly maintained.
- WHMCS billing and signup design A signup and billing area your customers can actually get through.
Slot 02 Contact Reply within 1 business day
Hand over the pager
How many servers, what runs on them, and what you are currently doing yourself at the wrong hour. We will work out whether a retainer makes sense.