App Maintenance & Support

Yes — this is a common engagement. We audit the existing codebase, dependency state, store policy compliance, and operational maturity, then propose either light-touch maintenance or a more structured remediation engagement depending on the state of the app. Honest assessment, not pressure to rebuild. Where the existing app is sound, we take it forward; where it needs significant refactoring, we propose that explicitly with reasoning.

Covered: monitoring and crash response, dependency and CVE patching on agreed cadence, OS compatibility testing on annual releases, store policy compliance updates, small bug fixes on existing functionality, and quarterly health reports. Billed separately: new features, significant refactors, design changes, and engineering work that goes beyond the agreed scope. The line is documented in writing during onboarding so there are no surprises.

Response times are agreed in the retainer SLA. Light-touch retainers typically include next-business-day response for non-critical issues and 4-hour response for production-down incidents. Active retainers can include faster response (within 1 hour) for critical incidents, with documented runbooks so triage is predictable rather than improvised. We are explicit about what 'response' means versus 'resolution' — response is engineer engagement; resolution timeline depends on the issue.

iOS and Android typically ship major releases annually (iOS in September, Android in August or September) with developer betas available months earlier. We test on the beta builds during the beta period, surface compatibility issues, and ship updates before public release where possible. Privacy manifest, data safety, and target SDK changes are tracked on Apple and Google's policy calendars so updates land ahead of deprecation deadlines, not after.

Yes. Resubmissions, versioning, policy compliance reviews, and the App Store / Play Console listings themselves are handled end-to-end as part of the retainer. Privacy manifests, data safety declarations, App Tracking Transparency disclosures, and screenshots are kept current as platform requirements evolve.

Yes. Maintenance covers iOS, Android, React Native cross-platform builds, Progressive Web Apps, and the supporting web surfaces (marketing sites, admin dashboards, customer portals). For mobile apps built alongside web platforms, we coordinate updates so the experiences stay consistent. Web-only retainers are also available through our managed UK hosting and bespoke website design services.

Backend, API, and database maintenance is available as a separate retainer via our app API and backend integration, custom API development, and database optimisation & maintenance services. For products where the mobile app and backend are tightly coupled, we typically combine them into a single full-stack retainer with a coordinated SLA.

Both. Reactive fixes for incidents and emerging issues, plus proactive recommendations in quarterly health reports. The reports cover what we observed in the data, what we'd recommend prioritising next, and honest assessments of features or flows that have stopped earning their place in the product. Maintenance retainers are most valuable when they include genuine product attention, not just keep-alive operations.

Yes. Retainers are monthly with 30 days' notice for cancellation or scope change. Scaling up or down between tiers is straightforward — we agree the new scope and adjust the SLA accordingly. The goal is alignment with your business reality, not lock-in.