Customer offboarding checklist
This checklist is for the support and system administration staff of a host when a customer ends their contract or moves their site elsewhere. Exponential is free software, so a customer can take the site anywhere; a clean handover is part of a good hosting service and of your reputation.
Customer: <customer> Site(s): <domains> Contract end: <date> Handled by: <name>Agree the plan
- To do: Date of the final export and of the shutdown agreed in writing.
- To do: What the customer receives, and how (secure transfer, not e-mail attachments).
- To do: How long you keep backups after the end, according to the contract and the law that applies (Log and data retention).
The handover export
A complete site is the database and the files (What to back up):
- To do: Database dump with the engine's tool (Database backups per engine).
- To do:
var/storage(andvar/<site>/storagewhere separate). - To do:
settings/overrideandsettings/siteaccess; they contain the database password, so transfer them privately and tell the customer to change that password at the new host. - To do: Custom extensions and designs, or the addresses of their Git repositories.
- To do: A note of the versions: Exponential, PHP, database engine and version, engine (Velocity, FrankenPHP, Apache or nginx), extensions.
- To do: Take the export with maintenance mode on, so database and files agree:
php bin/php/maintenance.php on --message="..." --allow-root-user.
The customer's new host can follow Moving a site between hosts.
Access and DNS
- To do: DNS: if you manage it, transfer it or change the records on the agreed date.
- To do: Certificates you issued are not transferred; the new host issues its own.
- To do: Your staff accounts in the customer's administration are removed if the site keeps running elsewhere from your export; tell the customer which accounts were yours.
- To do: The customer's access to your panel and SFTP is closed on the shutdown date.
Shutdown
- To do: Site in maintenance mode or switched off on the agreed date.
- To do: Cron jobs of the site removed (Cron jobs).
- To do: Velocity instance or PHP-FPM pool of the site removed; its ports freed.
- To do: Monitoring checks of the site removed.
- To do: Mail sending for the site's domain stopped.
Deletion
- To do: Site files, database and database user deleted on the agreed date.
- To do: Backups deleted at the end of the agreed retention, not earlier unless the customer asks and the law allows.
- To do: Logs that hold personal data (access logs, request logs) handled according to your retention policy.
- To do: Deletion confirmed to the customer in writing, with the date.
Records
- To do: The customer's record closed with the export date, the deletion date and who did it.
- To do: Lessons learned noted, if the customer left because of a problem.
Related pages
- Moving a site between hosts
- Compliance and GDPR
- Free documentation: this page is free to copy, translate and improve under the GNU FDL 1.3.
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