Messages on read, and a project half done
The first few weeks went well. You saw screens, you tested a login page, the freelancer sent upbeat updates. Then the updates got shorter, the demo kept moving, and now your messages sit unanswered. The invoice for the last milestone was paid. The site or app is somewhere between half finished and nearly there, and you honestly cannot tell which.
You may not even know where the code lives. It could be on their laptop, in their personal GitHub account, or deployed to a server billed to their card.
Why this happens more than people admit
Most freelancers who vanish are not scammers. More often they took on too much, hit a technical problem they could not solve and felt too embarrassed to say so, or got a better-paid contract and quietly let the smaller one slide.
The deeper cause is structural. A one-person arrangement has no backup, no code review and usually no agreement about where the code and accounts live. Everything depends on one person staying available and honest about progress. When that fails, there is nothing underneath.
What it costs to leave it sitting
| Risk | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Lost access | Hosting, domain or app store accounts in their name can lapse or be switched off |
| Unknown code quality | You cannot plan the rest of the project without knowing what is really there |
| Security | Their access to your servers and data is still live |
| Launch dates | Marketing, customers or a funder may be expecting something |
| Money already spent | Without a clear view, it is hard to decide whether to build on it or write it off |
The access problem is the urgent one. A domain or hosting account that expires in someone else's name can take your live site down with it, and recovering it is slow.
How we take over the project
- Secure what you can. We help you list every account involved (repository, hosting, domain registrar, database, email service, payment provider, app stores) and work out which ones you control. Where you do not, we help you request transfer or recreate them under your ownership.
- Get the code into a repository you own. If there is a copy on a server or in an old zip file, we recover it and put it in your GitHub, GitLab or Azure DevOps account, with history if it exists.
- Revoke old access. Passwords, SSH keys and API keys the freelancer used are rotated so the former access no longer works.
- Assess honestly. We build the project locally, run it, read the code and compare it with what was agreed. You get a written view of what works, what is missing, what is fragile and what would need redoing.
- Decide finish or rebuild with you, using that assessment. Often a large part is usable. Sometimes the foundation is the problem and patching it would cost more in the long run. We explain the trade-off rather than defaulting to a rewrite.
- Finish the build in the open. Work happens in your repository, with regular demos on a staging copy and notes on every setup step, so you are never again dependent on one person's memory.
Back in control of the project
You own the code, the accounts and the documentation. You know what state the project is actually in, rather than relying on hopeful updates. The remaining work is planned against a realistic view of the code, and you can see progress because it lands in a place you can look at.
If you decide later to bring development in-house or move to someone else, you can, because nothing lives only in our heads or on our machines.
Signs this is where you are
- Your developer has stopped replying, or replies but never delivers.
- You are not sure where the code is stored or whose account it is in.
- The hosting, domain or app store account is registered to the freelancer.
- You have paid for milestones but cannot test the result yourself.
- You need someone to tell you, without spin, whether what exists is worth finishing.