120 questions, answered properly

Livin Services is a digital agency that builds and improves websites, online stores, apps and internal systems, and does the growth work around them — search, content, paid media and automation. Work is delivered as fixed-scope projects with a written scope and one price, or as dedicated engineering time inside your own team.

Send one or two sentences describing what you want to be different. WhatsApp +92 337 0330012 or email contact@livinservices.com both reach the people who will do the work. You do not need a specification, a budget figure, or a call before anyone will engage with you.

No. Most useful enquiries start as a problem rather than a specification — "checkout is losing people", "the site is slow", "we are doing this by hand every week". Turning that into a scope is part of what you are paying for, and it happens before you pay anything.

Within one business day for a first reply. A written scope with a fixed price usually follows within two business days, or we tell you exactly what we need from you in order to produce one.

We work from Birmingham in the United Kingdom and Islamabad in Pakistan. That pairing gives a wide working overlap with Europe, the Middle East and the US East Coast, and it means UK-hours communication with a full delivery team.

Yes, routinely — across the UK, EU, United States, Canada, Australia and the Gulf. All work and documentation is in English, and time zones for live calls are agreed in writing before a project starts rather than negotiated later.

No. Small fixed-scope work is quoted the same way as large work, and there is no requirement to add a retainer alongside it. If a job is genuinely too small to be worth engaging an agency for, we will say so and tell you what to do instead.

No. You can get a written scope and a price without a call at all. A call is offered because it is sometimes faster for complicated projects, not because information is withheld until you take one.

Yes, and it is common — a second team for a specific capability, an audit of work already delivered, or overflow capacity during a busy period. We will not use the engagement to lobby you into replacing your existing provider.

We tell you, and where we can we point you at who does do it. Taking on work outside our competence to avoid losing an enquiry costs both sides more than an honest no.

Yes. Send yours and we will sign it, or we can provide a mutual one. Either way, everything you tell us is treated as confidential from the first message, NDA or not.

Because any figure published would be wrong for most people reading it. Two projects that sound identical in one sentence can differ by a factor of ten once templates, integrations and edge cases are counted. Advertising a low number to win the click and revising it upward after a call is a sales tactic, not a price.

Four things move the number: how many templates or screens are involved, how many external systems must be integrated, how clean the existing data is, and how many edge cases are real rather than hypothetical — multi-currency, multi-language, unusual tax rules, accessibility obligations.

Fixed price against a written scope. If the work takes us longer than expected, that is our cost to absorb. Hourly billing pays a supplier for being slow, which is the wrong incentive for both sides.

No. Scoping and quoting are free, including the conversation needed to get there. You are under no obligation once you have the scope, and you can take it to another supplier if you prefer.

Every deliverable listed individually, what is explicitly excluded, the timeline, the milestones, and the fixed price. The exclusions matter as much as the inclusions — that list is what stops an argument in week six.

Anything outside the written scope is quoted separately and approved by you before it is built. It is never absorbed silently and never appears as a surprise on a final invoice. You decide whether the change is worth the cost.

If we misjudged work that was inside the agreed scope, we absorb it. That is what a fixed price means. If the scope itself has genuinely grown — new requirements, systems nobody mentioned — that is a separate quote you approve first.

Yes, and it is often the most productive way to start. Tell us the budget and we will tell you honestly what fits inside it, what we would leave out, and whether the remainder is still worth doing. If it is not, we will say that instead of shipping a compromised version.

Yes, at the scoping stage rather than after invoicing for it. If a feature will not pay for itself, or a platform choice will cost you more later, that goes in writing before you commit.

Timelines are set with the scope and we hold them or flag a risk to the date as soon as we see it, not on the deadline. Most overruns in this industry are visible weeks in advance and simply are not communicated.

Yes. The written scope is designed to be forwarded — it names deliverables, exclusions, milestones and one price, without needing anyone to translate agency language for a finance team.

Typically half on acceptance of the scope and half on delivery, with larger projects split across milestones tied to delivered work rather than calendar dates. A milestone payment is only due once something has actually landed.

The deposit becomes non-refundable once capacity has been reserved and work has begun, because that capacity was withheld from other clients. Before work starts, it is refundable. This is written into the terms rather than discovered later.

Bank transfer for UK and international payments, and card where required. Our bank details never change by email — if you receive a message claiming they have, it is not from us. Confirm any change by calling a number you already have.

No. We do not ask for the full amount up front, and you should be cautious of any supplier who does for a project of meaningful size.

A written scope plus our standard terms of service, which are published in full on this site before you ever speak to us. Nothing in the contract will be new to you at signing.

Not for project work. Ongoing arrangements are agreed for a defined period and are cancellable with notice. We do not use a contract to keep clients who want to leave.

You pay for work delivered and work in progress at the point of cancellation, you receive everything produced to that point, and we hand over cleanly. We do not withhold deliverables you have paid for.

Work that does not match the agreed scope is fixed at our cost, without a time limit. Accepted, delivered work is not refunded, and commercial outcomes that depend on markets or platforms we do not control are not refundable. The refund policy sets out exactly what is and is not covered.

No. Scoping, quoting and any conversation required to get there are unpaid on our side.

Quotes state clearly whether tax is included and at what rate, based on where you are and how you are buying. There are no undisclosed additions between the quote and the invoice.

Milestone payments spread the cost across a project and are standard for larger work. We do not offer credit or financing, and we do not add interest to a normal milestone schedule.

A conversation about the goal, a written scope with one fixed price, a build you can watch on a staging URL, and a handover with documentation and full access. Four stages, and you know which one you are in at any point.

Yes. Work lands on a staging URL you can open whenever you like. There is no reveal at the end, and you never have to ask how it is going to find out.

The people doing the work. There is no account manager relaying messages between you and the person writing the code, and the senior person who scoped the project does not hand it to someone junior after you sign.

At each milestone as a minimum, plus whenever something needs a decision from you. Between those, the staging URL is always current, so an update is never the only way to know where things stand.

Usually access to the relevant accounts, any brand or content material you want used, and one person who can make decisions. Projects slow down for lack of a decision-maker far more often than for technical reasons.

We work in whatever your team already uses where possible — Slack, Teams, Jira, Linear, Trello, email. Adding another tool for a supplier to be present in is a cost with no benefit to you.

Revisions to bring work in line with the agreed scope are unlimited and included. A change of direction that adds scope is quoted separately. The distinction is the written scope, not a revision counter.

Yes, by a second engineer, and that is included rather than an optional extra. Unreviewed code is not finished code.

Fixed-scope projects run against milestones, which suits work with a defined end state. Dedicated-time engagements slot into whatever cadence your team already runs. We do not impose a ceremony on you that only benefits us.

Yes. Your repository, your branching model, your review process, your standups. That is the normal shape of a dedicated-time engagement.

You hear it from us, early, in writing, with what we propose to do about it. The failure mode we work hardest to avoid is a client discovering a problem after the deadline has already passed.

Six practice areas: ecommerce, web and software engineering, AI and automation, growth and marketing, design and brand, and infrastructure and security. Each contains individually scoped services with their own pages, scope and deliverables.

Yes, and most substantial projects do — a build with search, analytics and automation around it. It is quoted as one scope with one price rather than as separate engagements you have to coordinate.

Yes: internal tools, dashboards, portals, integrations between systems that do not talk to each other, and multi-tenant SaaS applications including tenancy, billing and role-based access.

Yes, cross-platform with Flutter or React Native, including the app store submission process — which catches most first-time publishers out and is scoped in rather than left as your problem.

Often yes, and where a repair is the better answer we will say so. Rebuilding is more profitable for an agency, which is exactly why the recommendation should be justified in writing.

Yes — retrieval over your own documents, support automation, content workflows, and integrations with the major model providers. Scoped with refusal behaviour and failure modes defined, because an AI feature with no defined "I do not know" is a liability.

Yes. UI and UX design, design systems and brand work are all available as standalone scopes, delivered in a form your own developers can build from.

Yes: deployment, CI, monitoring, backups and hardening. On hosting specifically we will usually recommend that the account stays in your name, so you are never locked to us for something that costs a few pounds a month.

Yes, both audits against WCAG and remediation. We will not claim a site is "fully compliant" as a marketing line — accessibility is a measured state against specific criteria, not a badge.

Ecommerce and retail, SaaS, professional services, healthcare, education, hospitality, property, logistics and finance among others. Where an industry brings specific regulatory constraints, those go in the scope rather than being discovered during build.

Yes, as a defined block of time rather than an open-ended retainer that quietly renews. You should be able to stop it the moment it stops being useful.

Yes, we work as a Shopify Partner and build on Shopify daily — themes, custom sections, checkout extensions, Shopify Plus and private apps.

Shopify suits most merchants who want to sell rather than administer software — hosting, PCI compliance and updates are handled. WooCommerce suits stores needing unusual logic or deep WordPress integration, at the cost of owning the maintenance. We will recommend the one that fits your situation, including when that is not the one we would rather build.

Yes. A migration is only as good as its redirect map: every existing URL is mapped before launch, structured data is carried across, and rankings are monitored after. Most traffic lost in migrations is lost to redirects nobody wrote.

Usually apps. Most Shopify slowness comes from accumulated third-party scripts rather than the theme, which is why our recommendation is often to remove apps rather than install another one to fix the symptom.

On Shopify Plus, yes, through checkout extensibility. On standard Shopify the checkout is deliberately restricted, and we will tell you what genuinely is not possible rather than sell a workaround that breaks at the next platform update.

Whichever costs you less for the outcome you want. Work happens on a duplicate theme so your live store is never the test environment, and the switch is a single publish you approve.

We can fix the things that measurably cost conversions — slow pages, unclear product information, a checkout with unnecessary friction, missing trust signals. We will not promise a specific percentage uplift, because that depends on traffic, pricing and product as much as on the site.

Yes, private and custom apps where an existing app genuinely does not fit. We check the app ecosystem first, because a well-maintained existing app usually beats bespoke code you then have to maintain.

Yes. Orders, inventory, fulfilment and financial sync are common integrations. Idempotency is designed in from the start so a retry cannot duplicate an order or a ledger entry.

Yes, including markets, currency presentation, tax handling and region-specific content. These are priced as real complexity rather than treated as a settings toggle, because they are not.

Yes, and the quote depends on the state of the data. We look at the actual export before quoting rather than discovering the condition of it afterwards.

No, and neither can anyone else honestly. Ranking depends on competitors, on Google, and on factors outside any agency's control. We guarantee the work — technical fixes, content, structure, measurement — and report what it actually moved.

Technical fixes can show within weeks. Content and authority typically take three to six months to compound, longer in competitive markets. Anyone promising results in thirty days is describing a coincidence or a short-lived trick.

Technical audit and fixes, information architecture, on-page work, content, internal linking, structured data, and measurement against baselines recorded before we start. Without that baseline, nobody can tell whether it worked.

Yes — Google Business Profile, local landing pages with genuinely local content, citations and review strategy. We will not build hundreds of near-identical city pages, because that pattern now risks the whole domain rather than multiplying rankings.

Yes, and it is largely the same discipline done properly: clear structure, questions answered directly on the page, content present in the HTML rather than revealed by interaction, and claims that are specific enough to quote. Assistants cite pages that answer plainly.

No. Paid link schemes are against search engine guidelines and the risk lands on your domain, not ours. We earn links with material worth citing, which is slower and does not get withdrawn later.

Both. Content is written by people and edited by people. We will not publish AI-generated articles unedited under your name — we would not put our own name on that either.

Yes. One honest condition: if the budget is too small to reach statistical significance, you will be paying for noise rather than learning, and we will tell you that before taking the work.

You do. Accounts stay in your name with us as a user, so if you leave, your history, audiences and learning stay with you. An agency holding your ad account is leverage, not a service.

Against baselines captured before the work started, in plain figures, including what did not work. A report that only contains good news is a sales document rather than a report.

Yes. If the product, pricing or the site itself is the constraint, spending more on traffic makes the loss bigger rather than smaller. That conversation happens before the invoice, not after.

You do, outright, on payment in full — code, designs and content, with no licence reverting to us and nothing held back. We retain only our own pre-existing tooling and general know-how.

Yours. Domains, hosting, analytics, ad accounts and repositories are in your name with us added as a user. It is the single clearest signal of whether an agency intends to keep you by choice or by inconvenience.

Full access to every account and repository, documentation written for your team rather than for us, and a walkthrough. Enough that another supplier could pick the work up without contacting us.

Everything needed goes with you and we will answer a successor's reasonable questions. We do not make leaving expensive as a retention strategy.

No. We build on mainstream, well-documented platforms and frameworks specifically so that your options after the project are open. A bespoke framework only one agency understands is a liability disguised as an asset.

Yes, at the level a competent developer needs to continue the work: architecture decisions, environment setup, deployment, and anything non-obvious about why something is the way it is.

That is the intent. If your team has the capability, we would rather hand over cleanly than manufacture a dependency — and we will tell you honestly if a particular piece genuinely does need specialist maintenance.

Only what we are required to retain, for as long as we are required to retain it. Working copies and access are removed at the end of an engagement, and the privacy policy sets out the detail.

Yes. It is in your repository from the start, not delivered as a zip file at the end.

Only if you want it there. A footer credit is not a condition of the work.

It is yours — use it however you like. Equally, we will not publish your project as a case study without your explicit permission.

Anything that does not match the agreed scope is fixed free, with no time limit on that commitment. A change of requirement is a new quote. The distinction is written down, so it is not decided by whoever argues harder.

No. Nothing converts into a retainer by default. If ongoing work is genuinely useful you will be offered it explicitly, and declining changes nothing about what you already have.

Yes, as a defined block of time or a defined set of responsibilities, agreed in writing and cancellable with notice. Not as an open-ended arrangement that renews quietly.

For clients on a support arrangement, response times are stated in that agreement rather than implied. For everyone else we respond within one business day and will always tell you honestly when we can start rather than accepting work we cannot begin.

Uptime and error monitoring can be set up as part of the build and left running under your accounts, so it keeps working whether or not you continue with us.

You, unless you have a support arrangement covering it. Either way, we will tell you at handover which updates matter for security and which are optional, so it is a decision rather than a surprise.

Send it. Small changes are quoted as small pieces of work. There is no requirement to have stayed on a retainer to be allowed back.

Yes — a walkthrough is part of handover, and deeper training can be scoped for your specific team and workflows if needed.

Yes. Inherited codebases are a normal part of the work. We will assess honestly what is salvageable and what is not, rather than defaulting to a rebuild because it is easier to quote.

Backups are configured as part of infrastructure work, and we verify them by restoring one. An untested backup is a belief, not a backup.

Yes. Every review shown is a genuine public Google review, reproduced word for word including typos, and linked to the profile so you can verify it. There are no invented testimonials anywhere on this site, and the rating shown is calculated from those real reviews rather than asserted.

No. Nothing is offered in exchange for a review, and every client is able to leave a public review regardless of how the project went. We also offer a private route to tell us directly — offered to everyone, not just to people likely to be critical.

Four things in writing: the scope is fixed before you pay, the price does not move unless you approve a change, the date is held or flagged early, and defects against the scope are fixed free. We do not guarantee rankings, revenue or conversion rates, because they depend on things we do not control.

Because a promise nobody intends to honour is worse than an honest limit. A blanket refund offer sits alongside terms making deposits non-refundable in almost every agency that advertises one. We publish the specific commitments we will actually stand behind.

Least-privilege access, individual accounts rather than shared logins, and access revoked at the end of the engagement. We will never ask you to send a password, card number or two-factor code by email or WhatsApp.

We handle personal data under UK and EU data protection law, will sign a data processing agreement where we act as processor, and the privacy and GDPR pages set out lawful bases, retention and your rights in full.

Details of cover can be provided on request for engagements where it is relevant, along with any documentation your procurement process requires.

Raise it with us first and directly — most disputes are a misunderstanding of scope and are resolved in a conversation. The terms set out the formal escalation path and the governing jurisdiction if that fails.

Where a specialist is genuinely the right answer, and under the same confidentiality obligations. What we will not do is present ourselves as the delivery team and quietly route the whole project elsewhere.

The honest answer is that no supplier can promise that, which is precisely why everything is in your name and fully documented. Your ability to continue without us should not depend on our continued existence.

Nothing optional runs before you choose. Rejecting is one click, exactly like accepting, nothing is pre-ticked, and refusing changes nothing about how the site works. Preferences can be changed at any time from the footer.

Yes. You get a named engineer with their relevant experience and availability before you commit, working inside your process and tools, for a defined block of time.

Yes, by name, before you commit. There is no arrangement here where a senior person wins the work and someone junior delivers it.

Yes, and we recommend it for anything longer than a couple of weeks. We propose the person we believe fits rather than sending a shortlist to sift through, but you should speak to them first.

Tell us early and we replace them at no additional cost, absorbing the handover time rather than billing you for someone getting up to speed twice. If we cannot find a better fit, we end the engagement and you pay only for work delivered.

Usually not, when the work has a clear end state — a fixed scope puts the estimating risk on us instead of you. Dedicated time is the better shape when the work is genuinely open-ended or you need capacity inside your own team.

If the work is permanent, full-time and indefinite, then yes — hire, and it will cost you less. We will say so rather than sell you a long engagement that should have been a job advert.

Yes, a defined number of days per week or month. It suits maintenance, ongoing improvement, and supporting an existing team through a busy period, and what is reserved is written down.

React, Next.js and TypeScript, Node and API engineering, Shopify and Liquid, WordPress and PHP, Flutter and React Native, and Python for automation, data and AI integration.

A wide overlap with Europe, the Middle East and the US East Coast from our UK and Pakistan offices. Where a project needs specific live hours, we agree them before starting rather than discovering the gap in week two.

Yes. Your repository, your branching model, your review process, your ticket tracker. We adapt to your team rather than imposing a process on it.

Yes to both. Open roles are listed on the careers page, including project-finding roles for people who bring us work, and the referral and partner programmes are open to anyone who can introduce a genuine fit.