You are buying something you cannot inspect. These questions are the closest thing to inspection available before money changes hands.
The questions
- Who owns the repository and the infrastructure accounts on day one?
- Which specific engineers work on this, and are they employed or subcontracted?
- What happens to the price if scope changes — and who decides it changed?
- Show me a README from a finished project. Could a new developer start from it?
- What is your response time for a production outage, in writing?
- How do you handle store rejections — do you respond, or do we?
- What is not included in this quote?
- Can I talk to a client whose project went badly?
- What would you refuse to build?
The four that separate people
Question one should be answered instantly and unambiguously. Hesitation here is the single biggest red flag in the list.
Question four is the hardest to fake. A real README from a real project tells you more about engineering culture than any portfolio.
Question eight sounds hostile. It is not. Every studio with real volume has a project that went wrong, and the ones who will discuss it honestly are the ones worth hiring.
Question nine tells you whether they have judgement or just capacity. 'Nothing, we build whatever you want' is not the reassuring answer it sounds like.
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We do this work for clients every week. Bring us the specifics and we will tell you what we would change first.
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