Backups, uptime and hosting: questions every business owner should ask.

Where does it run, and who owns it?

Find out which provider hosts your website or app, which region the servers are in and whose name is on the account. The account should belong to your business, with at least two people on your side able to sign in.

Ask what hosting costs each month, what makes the bill go up and how you would move to another provider if you had to. You do not need to understand every setting, but you should never be locked out of your own system.

How are backups made and tested?

A backup is only useful if it can be restored. Ask what is backed up (the database, uploaded files, configuration), how often, how long copies are kept and whether at least one copy is stored away from the main server or account.

Then ask when a restore was last tested and how long it took. Two figures help here: how much recent data you could afford to lose, and how long the business can cope while the system is down. They decide how often backups should run and how fast recovery must be.

What does uptime really mean?

No service is up all the time, and hosting providers describe availability as a percentage. Even a high figure still allows some downtime each month, so ask what the provider promises, what your own setup adds and when maintenance happens.

Ask how the team knows the site is down. External monitoring can check it every few minutes and alert a named person. Customers should not be the first to notice.

Updates and security on the server side

Servers, databases and software libraries need regular updates. Ask who applies them, how often and how changes are tested before they go live. Keep a short written note of the answers, including who to call when something fails at night or on a weekend.