Frequently Asked Questions

Your existing website remains live while we build and test your new store in a separate environment. Once everything is approved, we switch your domain to point to the new site during quiet trading hours. This approach keeps disruption to a minimum and allows your business to continue trading throughout the migration process.

Around ten working days for an average-sized website, though more complex sites can take a little longer. We'll always provide a realistic timeframe after reviewing your website before any work begins.

No. You keep your domain and email exactly where they are. There is no requirement to move them.

Yes. Your domain remains yours throughout the migration and afterwards. In fact, you keep ownership of everything. Your domain, infrastructure, website and data all remain under your control.

We build your new site in a completely separate environment while your current website continues trading as normal. Once you approve the move, we switch to the new site. In the unlikely event of an issue, we can simply switch back while we investigate and resolve the problem.

Absolutely. Complete the contact form first so we can get a basic understanding of your business and what you're looking for. After that, we'll arrange a convenient time to talk by Teams or phone. No sales pressure, just a straightforward conversation.

No. BlueprintE is designed so your business remains in control. Your platform is built using accounts registered in your name, and ownership stays with your business from day one. That means you're not dependent on us, and you're not tied to a particular hosting provider. If you ever want to move support elsewhere, bring it in-house, or change hosting providers, you can.

We'd be sorry to see you go, but you'll only lose our support. Your website will continue running exactly as it did before. Any future maintenance, updates or development can be carried out by another developer or an in-house team. The platform remains yours. Only the support team changes.

You do. From day one, everything is set up using accounts registered in your name. The website, code, data and infrastructure all belong to your business. We maintain the platform for you, but ownership always remains with you.

No. We monitor the health of the platform, not the activity of your customers. Our monitoring checks that websites, services and backups are operating correctly. We do not track customer behaviour or usage data.

Always. BlueprintE was designed around portability from day one. It's not a feature we might remove in the future — it's one of the core principles the platform is built on.

Honestly, it's not if systems fail, but when. Every online system eventually experiences problems — for reasons both inside and outside human control. What matters is how quickly recovery happens afterwards. That's what we focus on.

If our current hosting provider experiences a problem, we have multiple options for quickly restoring your website elsewhere. BlueprintE is designed to be portable, allowing us to recreate your platform on another hosting provider without needing to rebuild the website from scratch.

Every part of your platform is backed up using two separate external providers. Some would say that's over the top, but we take your data seriously. This allows us to recover from almost any failure, whether it's a small mistake or a major incident.

We are highly confident your website will never experience a major failure. However, we believe good engineering is about preparing for the unlikely, not pretending it's impossible. That's why recovery is built into every part of BlueprintE.

Containers package your website, its software and its configuration into a single portable unit. Think of it like an app. Everything needed to run your website travels together, making it easier to move, recreate and recover if needed. This is one of the reasons BlueprintE can remain portable and independent of a single hosting provider.

Separating the website and database allows each part of the platform to be managed, scaled and recovered independently. It improves resilience and makes maintenance, upgrades and recovery simpler when problems occur.

We carry on managing it. Monitoring, backups, maintenance, updates and support all continue as part of the service, allowing you to focus on running your business.

Absolutely. We don't build and leave. We build and support your website for the long term. While we prefer to quietly maintain your platform behind the scenes, we're only ever an email or phone call away if you need us.

We do. We run the technology, you run the business. It's why we think of ourselves as a utility: reliable, dependable and largely in the background. There when you need us, but never demanding your attention.

We monitor your website, backups, containers and the services that keep your platform running. Your vCPU, RAM & storage, so we can advise you when we feel it's time to increase them. We also keep an eye on important third-party services such as Stripe, DHL and DPD for updates or changes that could affect your website. Proactive maintenance is included as standard. We'd rather spot a problem before it becomes one.

Pre-emptive maintenance means monitoring and updating your platform in response to changes made by external providers and services before they cause problems. Rather than waiting for something to break, we act ahead of it.

No. We'll always be clear about what you're paying BlueprintE and what you're paying to third-party providers. If a service has its own subscription or usage costs, we'll tell you upfront.

If your business grows, your platform may need to grow with it. Most companies will be perfectly fine on the standard package, but some may eventually need more resources to support additional customers, orders or products. If that happens, we'll explain what's needed, why it's needed and what it will cost before making any changes. Any additional costs are simply the direct cost of the extra resources from the hosting provider. We don't add a success tax because your business is doing well.

We can't answer why agencies charge what they do. Our fees are based on the actual work we do to keep your site online and taking orders — nothing more.

They can. As your website grows, it may require additional processing power, memory or storage to support increased traffic, orders or products. If that happens, we'll explain exactly what's needed and why. A full breakdown of infrastructure costs can be found on our pricing page.

Your infrastructure costs may increase as your business grows and requires additional resources. However, we will never take a share of your success. Our fees are based on the work we do, not how successful your business becomes.

How long have you got? Short answer: we believe modern ecommerce infrastructure should be more portable, resilient, and maintainable than traditional monolithic systems. WordPress is a tool built for a different era of the web.

Stability, recoverability, security, and portability. When we say you can leave and take everything with you, we mean it — you pick up your containers and go.

We can add anything you want (within reason), but dashboards should tell you what you need to know — not display 30 irrelevant metrics trying to look important.

Your website is a tool. It should do what you need it to do to the best of its ability, without unnecessary extras, bloat, or hidden dependencies that may cause problems later.

Not at all. Some clients like to make their imagery slightly different from standard manufacturer images — particularly for social media. It's entirely optional.

Because even though you can do it yourself, we're here to support you.

Just tell us what you want and where you're planning to use it. A quick email is fine. We'll ask if we need clarification.

Of course. Even if you use AI generation, we still recommend using manufacturer images as well. They complement each other well.