Pricing
Pricing for Infrastructure Reviews, Projects and Engineering Retainers
Choose a hands-on engagement model for urgent incidents, planned infrastructure work, engineering reviews, migration projects and ongoing operational engineering.
Production issue right now?
Emergency assistance is separate from normal project work.
If a live system is down, unstable or blocking customers, use emergency incident engineering help. We focus on restoring the service, identifying the cause and keeping you updated while work is underway.
Main ways to engage us
Pick the option that matches your situation
The same technology can be priced differently depending on urgency and risk. A simple DNS issue is not the same as a production migration planning, failed database, AWS security hardening review or ongoing engineering assistance arrangement.
Fixed Engineering Work
Best when there is a defined issue and you want a scoped engineering fix with a straightforward expected outcome before work starts.
- Defined issue with a straightforward outcome
- Investigation, changes and basic testing included
- Scope confirmed before work starts
- Suitable when price certainty matters
Infrastructure Review
Best when you want risks, performance tuning issues, account setup, backup processes, security hardening and reliability reviewed.
- Risk-focused review of your setup
- Performance Tuning, reliability, backup processes and security hardening considered
- Straightforward findings and hands-on next steps
- Useful before major changes or when ownership is unclear
Migration Planning Project
Best for moving platforms where planning, backup processes, testing, rollback and downtime control matter.
- Planned move with reduced downtime risk
- Pre-migration planning checks and rollback considerations
- Cutover engineering assistance for production platforms
- Handover notes after completion
Emergency Incident Assist
3-hour minimum. Best for urgent production issues, solution disruption, failed changes or organisation-critical platforms that need fast attention.
- Urgent investigation and repair work
- Full solution recovery and system stability checks
- Straightforward updates while work is underway
- Focused on getting organisation-critical platforms stable
Engineering Help & Project Work
Best for non-urgent infrastructure project work, engineering enquiries, follow-up work or troubleshooting where the time needed is not known upfront.
- Planned application or infrastructure consulting
- Useful for development, configuration and follow-up requests
- Good when the time needed is not known upfront
- Billed by time used
Ongoing engineering assistance
Monthly infrastructure consulting
For agencies and organisations that need dependable Linux, Docker, AWS, database, backup and web stack engineering assistance without hiring a full-time platform engineer.
Essential
For light ongoing engineering assistance, observability checks, backup checks, small fixes and advice.
- Suitable for small organisations and lower-change environments
- Monthly engineering assistance allowance agreed in advance
- Additional work quoted or billed separately
Operations
For regular engineering assistance, recurring infrastructure tasks and planned improvements across client or organisation platforms.
- Priority response compared with ad-hoc work
- Ongoing improvements, checks and troubleshooting
- Useful for web agencies and organisations with production workloads
Priority
For higher-risk environments that need more hands-on monthly engineering assistance and faster response expectations.
- More engineering assistance time and operational involvement
- Suitable for revenue-critical infrastructure
- Scope, hours and response expectations agreed before starting
Typical work examples
Common work examples
These examples show the kind of work we commonly scope. Final pricing depends on access, risk, urgency, data size, production impact and whether the work needs testing or rollback planning.
Migration Planning project
For server moves, website migration projects, Docker migration projects, database migration projects, DNS cutovers, rollback planning and production testing.
NGINX or Apache issue
For 502/503 errors, reverse proxy issues, redirects, headers, SSL, virtual hosts, upstream timeouts or web server configuration faults.
Automation Workflows or internal tools
For internal tools, scripts, integrations, admin workflows or operational automation workflows where the scope is clearly defined.
AWS or cloud platform review
For account setup, IAM, EC2, S3, RDS, VPC/security hardening groups, backup processes, cost waste, observability and reliability risks.
Security Hardening review
For AWS, Linux server, PHP app, Python app, WordPress or security hardening reviews with hands-on remediation steps.
Docker Compose troubleshooting
For multi-solution Compose stacks with networking, volumes, environment files, reverse proxies, database dependencies or deployment planning workflow issues.
Docker container issue
For a single container that will not start, keeps restarting, exits immediately, shows health check failures, hits resource limits, has permission issues or needs log-based troubleshooting.
MySQL or MariaDB performance tuning
For slow queries, high RAM usage, I/O pressure, configuration review, backup impact, index issues and application bottlenecks affecting production platforms.
WordPress optimization
For slow checkout, high CPU usage, database load, PHP-FPM pressure, Redis/cache setup, CDN behaviour, plugins, theme complexity and hosting access.
PHP-FPM or Gunicorn engineering assistance
For worker timeouts, process crashes, high memory usage, socket issues, upstream errors or application server tuning.
CDN or caching issue
For stale assets, cache-control problems, redirect behaviour or edge caching issues where the scope is clearly defined.
Backup and restore setup
For database backup processes, offsite storage, retention, restore testing, observability and disaster recovery documentation.
Not sure what you need?
Not sure which option fits?
Send the issue or project summary and we will tell you the most suitable starting point before work begins. If it is a small fix, we will say so. If it needs a wider review, emergency assist or a project plan, we will explain why.
Something is down now
Use Emergency Incident Assist. Best for outages, broken deployment projects, 502/503 errors, failed solutions, urgent DNS/SSL issues and production incidents.
You need planned time
Use Engineering Help & Project Work. Best for non-urgent infrastructure project work, engineering enquiries, follow-up work or troubleshooting where the time needed is not known upfront.
You know the problem
Use a Fixed Engineering Work. Best when there is a defined issue and you want a scoped engineering fix with a straightforward expected outcome before work starts.
You are unsure what is wrong
Use an Infrastructure Review. Best when you need diagnosis, risk review, prioritised recommendations and a straightforward plan before implementation.
You are moving platforms
Use a Migration Planning Project. Best for server moves, website migration projects, Docker migration projects migration projects, cloud platform moves and DNS cutovers.
You need ongoing assist
Use Monthly Infrastructure engineering assistance. Best for agencies and organisations that need dependable assist without hiring a full-time infrastructure engineer.
Billing
How payment usually works
Pricing is kept straightforward so both sides know whether the work is a quick fix, a defined project, an urgent incident or ongoing engineering assistance.
New customers
Fixed-scope work is normally paid upfront. Larger projects can be split into staged payments once the scope is agreed.
Emergency work
Emergency assistance is billed hourly with a 3-hour minimum. The goal is to restore solution, reduce immediate risk and explain any recommended follow-up.
Projects
Migration Planning Projects, infrastructure improvements and multi-solution changes are usually quoted as projects with straightforward deliverables, assumptions and exclusions.
Retainers
Monthly engineering assistance is paid in advance. Included hours, response expectations and out-of-scope work are agreed before the retainer starts.
Next step
Tell us what you need help with.
Send a short summary of the issue, project or change. We will recommend the right starting point instead of pushing overlapping packages.