+ FREE RESOURCE · BUILDER CRÉATIF

Your app, without your agency.

15 things to check before you sign elsewhere.

The agency stopped answering, the contract ended, or the last update is a year old. The app still runs, your customers use it every day, and nobody can say precisely what you own in there.

Before you look for someone else, take inventory. These fifteen points are verifiable from your browser, your invoices and your inbox — none of them requires opening a line of code. Tick what is already in your name: the score tells you whether you are free to leave.

⚠️ Admin access, an invoice and an email address are enough to answer all fifteen. If you cannot answer one of them, that is already an answer.

+ THE CHECKLIST

The 15 points, one by one.

Tick every point that is already in your name, or already true for you.

Your score

0 / 15

A · 5

What you own

Five accounts. Each has one owner, exactly one, and it is written down somewhere.

01 The Apple Developer account

Why it matters

It is what publishes to the App Store: $99 a year, one owner. Open App Store Connect. If the legal entity shown at the top is not yours, the app is not yours.

What it costs you if the answer is no

A transfer exists, but it starts on their side and takes weeks. Without their consent you republish under a new account: reviews, ranking and live subscriptions all restart at zero.

02 The Google Play account

Why it matters

$25 once, for life. Same question: does the Play console open with an email address from your company, as owner and not as a guest?

What it costs you if the answer is no

An app transfer is started from the source account. If they don't start it, nobody can start it for them — not you, not Google.

03 The source code repository

Why it matters

The code must live in an organisation under your name, with you as an admin. Being a “read-only guest” in their workspace is not ownership, it is a permission they can revoke.

What it costs you if the answer is no

One click removes your access and the only copy of the code leaves with them. Rewriting an app that already exists is several months of work to get back to the screen you have today.

04 The server and the database

Why it matters

Look at who receives the hosting invoice every month. The name on the card is, in practice, the name of whoever holds your user data.

What it costs you if the answer is no

The day their card expires, the server stops and the app shows an error. And you stay legally accountable for data you cannot reach — the most uncomfortable position on this list.

05 The domain name and its access

Why it matters

The domain carries your site, your email and often the address the app calls. It renews for a few tens of euros a year, and it is lost for the same amount left unpaid.

What it costs you if the answer is no

An unrenewed domain breaks the app and the email on the same day. Getting it back after expiry runs into the hundreds of euros, when it is still possible at all.

B · 4

What still runs without them

Owning is not enough. Someone else has to be able to use it.

06 A build works today

Why it matters

The question to ask any outside developer: “pull the repository and hand me an installable build”. Half a day is enough to get the answer.

What it costs you if the answer is no

A project that no longer builds is not a project, it is an archive. Restoring it is the first quote you will receive, and it comes before any new feature.

07 Signing keys and certificates

Why it matters

The hardest point on this list. Whoever holds the Android signing key controls every future update of that app. Losing it means you can never update it again — only publish a different app, empty of your users.

What it costs you if the answer is no

Your installed users stay stuck on the last version, permanently. Check first whether signing is delegated to Google: if so the upload key can be reset, and the problem becomes paperwork.

08 The paid third-party services

Why it matters

Payments, notifications, maps, transactional email, SMS: each has an account, a subscription and an owner. Count them, there are usually four to eight.

What it costs you if the answer is no

A lapsed subscription doesn't kill the app, it kills one feature. Payments stop while everything else keeps running — these are the longest failures to diagnose.

09 API keys and secrets

Why it matters

These are the credentials that let the app talk to those services. If they live in their password manager, your app runs on keys you cannot revoke.

What it costs you if the answer is no

You can neither rotate them nor see who is using them. A live payment key still sitting with a departed provider is an open door you have no way to close.

C · 3

What it costs you meanwhile

Three numbers that already exist, that you can read tonight, and that nobody shows you.

10 The delay from “I report it” to “it's live”

Why it matters

Time it on the last bug you reported. A team that answers ships a fix in two to five days, store review included.

What it costs you if the answer is no

Past three weeks it is no longer a bug, it is your product. And every day of waiting on a broken payment screen shows up directly in the month's revenue.

11 The store rating and its slope

Why it matters

Don't look at the rating, look at its slope over six months. A sliding rating makes store visitors hesitate, and you only see it on the download curve, a quarter later.

What it costs you if the answer is no

A rating degrades in weeks and recovers over months, because the old reviews stay. It is the one point on this list money cannot fix quickly.

12 Crash rate and recent reviews

Why it matters

Open the one-star reviews of the last three months: they describe your real bugs, for free and often better than an audit. The crash rate is right there in the store consoles, no developer needed.

What it costs you if the answer is no

An app that crashes one session in twenty loses users without ever telling you. And meanwhile the hosting bill grows with the number of users, and nobody is looking at it.

D · 3

What the next team will look at

These three decide the price of the first update, before anyone opens the code.

13 The release document

Why it matters

One page, not a book: how to get from the code to a live version on both stores. It is the first thing the next team reads, before opening the code at all.

What it costs you if the answer is no

Without it, the first update takes two to three weeks of reverse engineering that you pay for before gaining a single feature.

14 The test accounts

Why it matters

A demo account, an admin account, and a way to test a payment without charging a real card. It fits in one email, and the stores already require it to approve your updates.

What it costs you if the answer is no

Nobody can verify a fix before shipping it. You discover regressions at the same time as your users, on the same screens.

15 The version history

Why it matters

The repository history and the store release notes tell who changed what, and when. That is what lets you date a bug instead of hunting for it everywhere.

What it costs you if the answer is no

Every bug is hunted blind. That is the difference between a one-hour fix and a three-day fix, on every incident, for the rest of the app's life.

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The fifteen points on one page, with the exact question to ask and the person to ask it to. Enough to have your current agency fill it in — or the next one, before you sign. One email, nothing else.

Your app, without your agency.

Who owns what

The 15 points, one by one.

What you own

What still runs without them

What it costs you meanwhile

What the next team will look at

The day they stop answering

Get the checklist by email.

Missing a few boxes?

Your app, without your agency.

Who owns what

The 15 points, one by one.

🔑 What you own

⚙️ What still runs without them

📉 What it costs you meanwhile

📘 What the next team will look at

The day they stop answering

Get the checklist by email.

Missing a few boxes?

What you own

What still runs without them

What it costs you meanwhile

What the next team will look at