The proposal arrives as a PDF. Three pages, a logo, a list of feature names such as “security hardening”, “performance optimisation” and “priority support”, and a total at the bottom. You have a second proposal from another provider that looks quite different, and a third that is only an email. Which one is better is hard to tell, because they are not describing the same thing.
This website maintenance proposal checklist is meant to fix that. It is a list of what a proposal should state in plain words, so you can read any of them, mark what is missing and send back questions before you agree to anything. It works whether the provider is next door or in another country.
Read the proposal in a different order
Most people go straight to the total. Do it last. A figure means nothing until you know what it covers, and a proposal that is vague about scope can be made to look cheap simply by promising less.
Start instead with the pages that say what happens each month, what is excluded and how you leave. Print it or paste it into a document, and write one of three marks beside each line: clear, vague or missing. A feature name with no task behind it counts as vague. “Priority support” with no description of how to reach anyone is vague. The list below gives you the lines to look for.
The website maintenance proposal checklist
1. It describes your site, not a generic one
- The proposal names your website address and the platform it runs on, for example WordPress or WooCommerce.
- It says who hosts the site, or states plainly that hosting is not part of the arrangement.
- It mentions anything unusual you told them: a shop, a booking system, a members area, several languages.
If the document could be sent to any client with only the name changed, the provider has probably not looked at your site. A careful team looks at the site, or at least asks questions about it, before it quotes. For the kind of work an overseas team is expected to list, our maintenance page for overseas clients is a useful yardstick to hold beside the proposal.
2. The monthly work is written as tasks
Look for verbs and objects: “update WordPress core, themes and plugins after taking a backup”, “check that forms deliver to the right address”, “review the security scan results”. Avoid proposals that list only nouns. Ask for each of these to be named:
- Updates, and whether they are tested before reaching the live site.
- Backups: how often they run, which location holds them, the retention period and whether a restore is ever tried.
- Security monitoring and what happens when something is found.
- Uptime monitoring and who is told when the site goes down.
- Content changes, with a clear allowance.
3. The allowances have edges
Anything described as “some”, “regular” or “as needed” has no edge. A good proposal says how many content changes are included each month, what counts as one, what happens to unused allowance and what you pay when you exceed it. The line between a content update and technical work, explained in this guide to content updates, is where most disputes start.
4. The exclusions are written down
This is the section most proposals leave out and the one that protects you most. It should say whether new features, redesigns, copywriting, search engine work, advertising campaigns, hacked-site cleanup and plugin licences are included. Where something is excluded, the proposal should say how it will be quoted. For the usual list of omissions, see what website maintenance plans do not cover.
5. The report is described
Ask what the monthly report will contain and whether you can see a sample. A useful one lists the updates applied, the scan results, the uptime record and the team’s recommendations for next month. A line reading “maintenance completed” tells you nothing.
6. Access and ownership are settled
- You are the owner of the domain, the hosting account and the WordPress administrator account.
- The provider uses their own named login rather than yours.
- Backups and logins come back to you on the day you leave, not after an argument.
- Your passwords are never sent by email or chat in plain text.
7. The way you contact them is specific
Not “dedicated support” but a channel: an email address, a WhatsApp number, a ticket form. Who reads it? What do they do with it? Which working days and hours does the team keep, written in your own time zone so there is no mental arithmetic later? Do not accept an unwritten promise about speed. If a response time is stated, ask whether it means a first reply or a finished fix, because they are different things.
8. The term and the exit are plain
- Is the arrangement month to month, or does it run for a year?
- How much notice is needed to stop, and in what form?
- Does it renew by itself?
- What is handed over when it ends?
These terms are examined in more depth in the terms a maintenance contract should set out.
Items that matter more when the provider is overseas
A few lines in a proposal are easy to overlook until money moves. General information only, not legal or tax advice, so check anything binding with a qualified adviser in your own country.
- Who you are contracting with. The proposal should name the business, not only a brand, and give an address and a contact person.
- Currency of the invoice. Is it quoted and invoiced in your currency or theirs? If it is theirs, who bears the conversion difference?
- How you pay. Card, bank transfer or a payment service, and who covers the transfer charges.
- Tax on the invoice. Ask whether tax is added, and what the invoice will show. Your accountant will want to know before the first payment.
- Which law applies. A short clause saying which country’s law governs the agreement avoids surprises if there is a disagreement.
- Personal data. If customers’ details sit on your site, the proposal should say how the team treats them and who can see them.
Words that should make you ask a follow-up
| Phrase in the proposal | Question to send back |
|---|---|
| Unlimited support | Unlimited requests, or unlimited hours? What counts as a request? |
| Priority response | Priority compared with whom, and through which channel? |
| Regular updates | How regularly, and tested where before they go live? |
| Full security | Which checks exactly, and what happens when one fails? |
| Performance optimisation | Which pages, measured how, reported when? |
| Best efforts | What is the provider actually committing to deliver? |
| Additional work as required | Quoted in writing before it starts? |
One line, read properly
Take a typical sentence: “We provide regular plugin updates and security checks.” Run it through the questions above. Regular means what, weekly or whenever someone remembers? Which plugins, including paid ones that need a licence key? Is a backup taken first? Does anyone try the contact form and checkout afterwards? What does the security check look for, and where do you read the result?
A better version of the same promise might say that updates are applied after a backup, that forms and key pages are checked afterwards, and that the findings appear in the monthly report. It is longer, and that is the point. Treat this as a website maintenance quote checklist you can reuse for any provider, because the habit of turning a promise into tasks is what protects you.
Compare two proposals side by side
When you have more than one, this website maintenance proposal checklist turns into a comparison tool. Build a plain grid with a row for each of the eight areas above and a column for each provider. Fill in what each document actually says, not what you assume it means. Blank cells are the finding. A provider whose cells are mostly blank may still be good at the work, but you are being asked to trust, and the proposal should ideally replace that trust with something you can check.
It also helps to compare like for like. If one proposal includes content changes and another bills them separately, the totals cannot be compared until you adjust for that. The reasons two quotes can differ are covered in what drives a maintenance quote.
What to send back
You do not need a legal letter. A short email works. Copy the lines you marked vague or missing, number them, and ask for a reply to each. How a provider answers is nearly as informative as the answers themselves. Good ones respond plainly and may update the document. Poor ones reply in general terms, change the subject to the price, or hurry you to sign.
If you end up with a reply that says “that is covered”, ask for it in writing and inside the document. A promise that lives only in a chat message tends to be forgotten, by both sides, within a few months.
Keep a copy of what you agreed
Once you sign, save the final proposal, the questions you sent and the replies in one folder. In six months, when a new request arrives and you wonder whether it is included, this is the paper you will reach for. It is also what you hand to the next provider if you ever move.
If you would like a proposal written for your own site, with the tasks, allowances and exclusions set out in writing and the exact figure quoted before any work begins, you can ask through our enquiry page.
Next in this series: B2B Website Maintenance: What a Business Site Needs
