Ownership
What to do when your web designer disappears
Lost contact with the person who built your website? How to recover your domain, hosting and site access, and keep the site running without a rebuild.
It happens more often than anyone admits. The person who built your website stops replying, closes their business or simply moves on, and you are left with a site you cannot change and renewals you do not understand.
The good news is that most of it is recoverable, and you rarely need to start again. You need to find out what you own, get the logins into your name, and hand the site to someone who will look after it.
Key takeaways
- Start with the domain. If you control that, you control your address on the internet.
- Hosting and platform logins come next. Use account recovery before you assume they are lost.
- You do not need a new website just because the old developer is gone.
- Get every account into your name and your email before you pay for any changes.
- Someone who looks after sites they did not build can take it from there.
1. Find out where the domain lives
Your domain is the one thing you cannot rebuild. Look it up with a public WHOIS service to find the registrar. If the registrant contact is your business, you can usually recover access with that email. If it is the designer's details, you will need to ask the registrar about a transfer or dispute process.
Act on this first. Everything else can be rebuilt; a lost domain can mean a lost business name online.
2. Recover the hosting and platform logins
Most sites sit on a hosting account or a platform such as Squarespace, Wix, Shopify or WordPress. Search your inbox for welcome emails, invoices or renewal notices; they will name the provider. Use the account recovery flow with any business email that might have been used.
If the account is in the designer's name, the provider may still help once you can prove you own the domain and the business. Be polite, persistent and keep it in writing.
3. Take a copy of everything
Before anyone touches the site, save it. Export the content if the platform allows, download your images and logo, and copy the text from every page into a document. Note the pages, the menu and any forms or booking tools.
If you cannot log in yet, a browser can still save each page and the images on it. It is not pretty, but it means a rebuild would not start from nothing.
4. Decide whether the site needs replacing
A missing developer is not a reason to rebuild. If the site works on a phone, the form delivers and you can now edit it, you have a maintenance problem, not a design problem. A rebuild makes sense only when the platform blocks what you need or the structure no longer fits the business.
Run a free website check before you decide. It will show you whether the problems are speed, content and small faults, or something deeper.
5. Hand it to someone who will keep it running
Once the accounts are yours, invite a new developer as a collaborator rather than handing over your password. That way the site stays in your account whatever happens next. Agree in writing what they will check each month and what counts as extra work.
I look after sites I did not build, subject to a quick review of the platform and access. Most of the time the first month is spent fixing the things that were quietly broken.
Frequently asked questions
Can I get my domain back if it is in the designer's name?
Often, yes. Registrars have transfer and dispute processes for exactly this, and proof that you trade under the name helps. Start with the registrar's support and keep every message.
Do I have to rebuild the site on a new platform?
Not unless the current platform stops you doing what you need. If you can log in, edit content and the form works, keeping it is usually cheaper and faster.
What if I cannot find any logins at all?
Work from the domain outwards. WHOIS tells you the registrar; the site's hosting can be identified from its DNS records; invoices in your inbox name the rest. If you are stuck, send me the address and I will tell you what I can see from outside.
Where to start
Run a free website check so you know what you are dealing with, then explore monthly website care. The first job is getting everything into your name; the second is making sure nobody has to go through this again.