Support Plans for Community Websites
Hosting is £75/year but that excludes fully focused technical support time, rather it includes only light troubleshooting of typical user problems like a login issue (which is beyond any users control), or a “full media library” or a buggy page layout. Use of our support is also notionally capped, so if you expect to raise multiple issues (1 or more monthly) consider an Extra Support Plan.
You will also need to email the correct email support address to invoke support ourlocality@sustainingdunbar.org, not just any old email address.
Our world class software and systems are easy to use. Almost all our site owners require little or no support at all. When they do there’s a myriad of support tools we have created – all free: help guides and AI assisted chat and self help support etc.
But there will be times when none of the above is enough. And since we don’t recommend googling or other AI for answers (frequently not specific to our setup) we can offer additional support.
If your setup needs more predictable hands-on help keeping your site properly maintained, read on.
What’s in the EXTRA plan
- Minor technical fixes & troubleshooting e.g. plugin quirks, website structure or planning, menu management, widgets or blocks & layout niggles, image management etc, DNS tweaks.
- Configuration and site hygiene (improving security, user management, performance tweaks).
- Basic Workspace (email/Drive) support for your domain (if we manage it and you’re on Extra Business).
- Advice on best practices, integrations and improving accessibility.
What’s not
- Content editing, creating original content or posting your content etc.
- New unsupported functionality (a plugin you googled), or a complete redesigns, or anything that looks like an endless piece of string.
- Training sessions for an individual or a group or ongoing project management – for which a quote is necessary.
- Support for Third party integrations, unless you signed up for Growth or Business.
- You are on holiday and want something done that your boss expected to be complete but you did not prioritise / failed to … 😉
All support is provided on a voluntary "best efforts" basis
Extra Support Plans
| Plan | Best for | Annual | Monthly credits | Typical reply |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Community Plus | Low-maintenance sites that need to be just right | £300 | 1 | Within 3 working days |
| Community Active | Active local projects – that have regular grant income – you serve a community that expects the authoritative answer on the website to be functioning properly | £450 | 2 | Within 2 working days |
| Community Growth | Frequently updated sites with extra functionality e.g. generating leads, building audience | £600 | 3 | Next working day |
| Community Business | As above with external integrations and dependencies | £900 | 5 | Same working day |
(these plans are annual and in advance – credits are use-or-lose monthly)
How it works
- A request = one issue/ticket (email/form/message), typically up to 15-30 minutes of support time – this covers examining the request scope, logging into your site, verifying the problem, seeking clarification etc and crafting replies and any follow up.)
- Unused requests can carry over by one month (max usable in a month = your monthly allowance +1).
- If something needs more time, you get a quick assessment and a separate quote before we proceed or just upgrade to the next level.
Hours: The service is still provided pro bono – Mon–Fri, UK time, excluding holidays, sickness etc. Check our small print.
Same-day responses depend on when the request is received.
The best bit last is that proceeds go to the New Treescapes Fund
trees are an integral part of our villages and townscapes and we need more of them
Preserve, Protect
& Plant Urban Trees
small print – best efforts basis
In a “best efforts” agreement, we the provider will try to deliver the service to the best of our ability, but do not guarantee a specific outcome, uptime, or timeframes. In the context of our hosting and website services, it implies:
- No contractual service level (SLA): we aim for good uptime and performance, but there’s no binding guarantee (e.g. not 99.9% uptime).
- Support responsiveness is informal: we do our best to fix issues quickly, but without a guaranteed response or resolution time.
- Resource allocation is flexible: especially in shared or low-cost hosting, resources are allocated as fairly as possible.
- Liability limits: if something fails (downtime, data loss, slow site), we are not legally liable beyond maybe a small discretionary credit, if you’re paying for additional services, even if it was our fault.
- While hosting will be provided on a best efforts basis, third-party integrations (third party plugins, WorkSpace, newsletter software, forms etc etc) are offered “as is” (no warranties or guarantees, you must lean on the third party’s own warranties).
In short, it means “we’ll act in good faith and competently, but you accept that some things may be outside our control and cannot be contractually guaranteed.”
ai questions – ai responses
While we may ocasionally use an ai to clean up our poor english, we will not fob you off with ai answers. We read all questions carefully and do not rely on ai answers. ai responses may seem well crafted and coherent but are often off (frequently sending the user down rabbit holes)
We may also decline to respond to ai generated questions, and ask you to put all questions in your own words. It takes us on average longer to deal with an AI generated question than a plain English one. 🙂