No replies. Slow changes. Tied-in contracts. Domain held hostage. Here's how to leave cleanly, keep your Google rankings, and switch without your site going dark.
Trades stay with web companies they hate for the same reasons every time. Here's what they tell us, and what's actually true.
Most "12-month contracts" automatically renew on a 30-day notice clause. Find your sign-up email, read the small print, the exit window is almost always smaller than they make it sound. If you can't find the contract, ask them. They have to provide it.
Done badly, yes. Done properly, no. The fix is 301 redirects from every old URL to the new one, plus a clean migration of your content and Google Business Profile. We do this for you. The trade who came to us in March kept every ranking, moved up two for "[trade] near me", and was live in 48 hours.
They shouldn't, and in most cases they don't. Check Nominet for .co.uk domains or ICANN for .com — whoever's named as the registrant owns it. If it's them, you can dispute. We've handled this transfer for clients before and won every time. Worst case: we register you a new domain and redirect the old one once it expires.
It doesn't. We build the new site on a staging address first, keep your old site running until the new one's ready, then flip the domain in one go. Total downtime: zero to about 30 minutes during a DNS propagation window. We do this overnight on a Tuesday so nobody's looking.
Most people only count the monthly fee. The real cost of being stuck is bigger and quieter.
£50–£150/mo
Typical small-agency retainer. Add the time you spend chasing them for changes, the missed enquiries from forms that don't work, the slow page on mobile losing you visitors.
£297 once
Site built, hosted and live for a year. Then £15 a month after, or leave entirely. Most clients break even in month two and never look back.
Two months of what you're paying now usually covers the whole switch.
And by year two you're saving £1,000–£1,500.
There are four things to move when you switch website companies. We handle three of them for you. You handle one, which takes about five minutes.
We tell you exactly what to email your current agency to request the "auth code" or transfer key. Once they release it, we point the domain at your new site. Done in 24 hours.
We rebuild the site on our infrastructure with everything that matters carried over: your reviews, your content, your service pages, your local-SEO setup. Plus the redirects so nothing breaks for Google.
We update the website link, photos, and any wrong details. If they've claimed ownership of it under their account, we walk you through reclaiming it. Usually takes 7 days, end-to-end.
We draft it for you. You forward it on from your own email so it counts as your notice. Five minutes of your time, total.
A plumber, an electrician, a roofer, and a family builder. Same template, very different feel. Read them on your phone, see what's possible.
"My current agency has gone quiet. They haven't replied in three weeks. Can I still move?" Yes. If they've gone silent, the contract has effectively broken. We've moved sites where the original agency had stopped trading entirely. As long as your domain is reachable, we can do the migration.
"What if my agency tries to charge me an exit fee?" Check your contract. Most don't have legitimate exit fees and any "release fee" they invent is usually unenforceable for a domain you already own. We've never had a client end up paying one. We'll review yours for free if you forward us the agreement.
"Will my site lose its Google rankings during the move?" Not if it's done right. The technical word is "301 redirect" — every old URL gets pointed to its new equivalent so Google understands the move. We do this for every page. Most clients see rankings flat or up within four weeks.
"How much does the switch itself cost?" Nothing extra. The £297 covers the whole site build, including the migration work, the redirects, the GBP move, the domain transfer support, and the cancellation-email template. We don't bill for the move.
"What if my old agency refuses to release my domain?" Rare, but it happens. We escalate via Nominet (for .co.uk) or ICANN's TDRP process (for .com). It takes a few weeks but we win every time, because the registrant rights are clearer than most agencies realise. In the meantime, we can register you a new domain and run that in parallel.
Six quick questions, fifteen minutes. We build the new site. You see it in 48 hours and decide if it's worth switching. If you move, we handle the whole migration. If you don't, you've lost nothing.
Or read our ownership & exit policy first if you want to see what "free to leave" actually means.