Frequently asked questions
Frequently Asked Questions About Shop Maintenance
From costs and SLA models to taking over existing projects: here you will find answers to the most important questions about our managed service for online shops and websites.
In short and in plain language
Here you find answers to common questions about your shop and your website.
The questions cover the maintenance contract and the costs. They also cover the terms in the contract. We also explain how we take over a project.
There are questions about the technology too, such as updates and backups. An update is a new version of a program. A backup is a copy of your data.
Your question is missing? Write to us or call us.
General Maintenance Questions
- What exactly is included in a maintenance contract? A maintenance contract bundles everything a shop needs on an ongoing basis for stable, secure operation. This includes regular security updates for core, plugins and server…
- Who benefits from a managed service contract? A maintenance contract is worthwhile for any company that treats its online shop or website as business-critical infrastructure. When downtime directly costs revenue, or an…
- Why should I not handle maintenance myself? Self-managed maintenance is fundamentally possible but requires continuous expertise in platform updates, newly disclosed vulnerabilities, plugin compatibility and server…
- Which systems do you support? Our core focus is on Shopware Community Edition and WordPress including common shop plugins. With Shopware, we deliberately work within the open-source CE, so you are not pushed…
- Do you also offer maintenance for other shop systems? Our focus is clearly on Shopware CE and WordPress with shop plugins, because here we have the deepest operational experience and know update paths, typical failure patterns and…
- Can I book individual services without a contract? Yes, we offer many services as one-time projects without committing you to an ongoing contract. These include security audits, performance analyses, cleanup after a hack via our…
Pricing and Contract Models
- What does a maintenance contract cost per month? Monthly costs depend on three factors: the scope of managed systems (the number and complexity of shops or websites), the desired SLA tier (Basic, Business or Enterprise) and the…
- Is there a minimum contract duration? We recommend a minimum duration of six months. There is a practical reason: the onboarding with audit, cleanup of critical points and setup of staging and monitoring requires…
- Are emergency deployments included in the price? Within the agreed SLA, emergency deployments are included in the monthly flat rate. This covers first response within the committed timeframe, diagnosis and recovery for outages…
- Are there additional costs for updates? No. Regular security updates and maintenance work are included in the contract and are not billed separately. This applies to core updates, plugin and theme updates, and…
- Can I change the SLA tier during the contract term? Yes, the contract is meant to grow with your requirements. An upgrade to a higher SLA tier is possible at any time, for example when your shop grows, gets more traffic, or the…
- How is billing handled? The maintenance flat rate is billed monthly by invoice with payment due within 14 days of invoicing. This keeps administrative effort low and makes ongoing costs easy to plan. You…
SLAs and Response Times
- Which SLA tiers do you offer? We work with three graduated models so you do not pay for response times you do not need. The Basic SLA offers a first response within 8 hours on business days, 5-minute…
- What does first response specifically mean? First response means our technical team begins analyzing the problem within the committed timeframe and informs you of the status. You therefore know reliably that your request…
- Do response times also apply on weekends and holidays? Under the Enterprise SLA, response times apply 24/7, 365 days a year. This is the right choice for shops that also sell on weekends or around campaign days and where an outage on…
- What happens if the SLA response time is not met? We take our SLA commitments seriously and document every response time without gaps, so that compliance remains verifiable and does not rest on mutual feeling. Should an SLA…
- Can I customize the SLA parameters individually? Yes, the three SLA tiers are intended as a starting point, not a rigid corset. In practice, we frequently adapt the parameters to a client's specific reality: shorter response…
- How do you measure SLA compliance? All incidents, response times and measures taken are logged in our system, so every commitment can be substantiated by real timestamps rather than estimates. This creates an…
Migration and Takeover of Existing Projects
- Can you take over a shop built by another agency? Yes, taking over existing projects is one of our most common entry points. You need neither rebuild the shop nor switch to us as your developer to get professional maintenance. We…
- What happens during onboarding of an existing project? Onboarding follows a fixed sequence: a technical audit for the inventory, cleanup of critical issues, setup of staging environment and monitoring, creation of system documentation…
- Do I need the source code or access from my previous agency? Ideally yes. For a clean takeover, we need access to the server (SSH), the database, the hosting panel and the CMS backend. If your previous agency developed custom plugins or…
- What happens if my shop already has security issues? Then cleanup takes priority. In this case, onboarding begins with prioritized resolution of the acute security issues via our emergency support before we think about regular…
- Can I keep my hosting provider? In most cases yes. We work with common hosting providers and adapt our maintenance processes to the respective server environment instead of making a migration a condition. For…
- How long does taking over an existing project take? Complete onboarding typically takes two to four weeks. During this time we run the audit, clean up critical points, set up staging and monitoring and create the system…
Technical Questions
- How often are backups created? The backup frequency depends on the SLA tier and therefore on the value of your data. Under the Basic SLA, we create daily full backups. Under the Business SLA, hourly incremental…
- How are updates applied? Every update goes through a fixed, multi-stage process. First we apply it to a staging environment, a copy of your live system. There, automated and manual tests verify the…
- How quickly are security patches applied? With security patches, we prioritize by severity. Critical patches with a CVSS score of 9.0 or higher are applied within 24 hours, because here the window between disclosure and…
- Do I receive reports about the state of my shop? Yes. Depending on the SLA tier, you receive monthly or quarterly status reports that comprehensibly summarize the condition of your shop. They contain uptime statistics, all…
- What happens if an update fails? We are prepared for an update failure rather than improvising. Before every update, we create a complete, tested backup and verify the update on staging beforehand. Should an…
- Can you also improve the performance of my shop? Yes, performance optimization is a fixed component of our services. We analyze loading times systematically, identify the actual bottlenecks instead of optimizing blindly, and…
Collaboration and Communication
- How does regular communication work? Communication follows a clear rhythm so that you neither stay in the dark nor get overloaded with detail. In regular operation, you receive monthly or quarterly status reports…
- Do I have a dedicated contact person? Yes, every project has a dedicated contact person who knows your system in detail and is your first point of contact for all maintenance-related questions. This saves you from…
- Can we track maintenance work in our project management tool? Yes. On request, we integrate our maintenance work into your existing project management system, so that requests, incidents and measures appear where your team already works…
- How do you handle urgent requests outside business hours? This depends on the chosen SLA tier. Under the Enterprise SLA, we are available around the clock, which is the right choice for shops with continuous sales or high business…
- What happens if I am not satisfied with maintenance work performed? We take every piece of feedback seriously and treat it as an opportunity to improve the process. If maintenance work does not meet your expectations, we first analyze the cause…
- Can we adjust maintenance frequency seasonally? Yes, we deliberately adapt maintenance intensity to your business cycles instead of running the same cadence all year round. Before sales-intensive phases such as the holiday…
Long-Term Collaboration and Contract Development
- How does the maintenance contract develop over time? Most maintenance contracts evolve organically with the client's requirements rather than staying unchanged for years. When a shop grows and receives more traffic, we adjust the…
- What happens if I want to cancel the maintenance contract? Cancellation is possible at the end of the agreed term with the contractually defined notice period, without hidden hurdles. It matters to us that a separation runs just as…
- Can you also help with the further development of my shop? Our core focus is deliberately on maintenance and stable operation, because that is where our daily strength lies. For major developments such as new features, a redesign or a…
- Do you offer training for shop administration? Yes, on request we train your internal team, because a well-trained team and professional maintenance are not mutually exclusive but complementary. The training covers basic shop…
- How do you handle data protection and confidentiality? Data protection and confidentiality are non-negotiable with external maintenance, because we have deep access to systems and potentially to customer data. We treat all information…
- Can I flexibly adjust the maintenance scope? Yes, the maintenance scope is deliberately not rigidly fixed, so that you do not pay for services you do not currently need and can still scale up quickly when required. Upgrades…
Question not covered?
Get in touch — we reply personally and without obligation.