Syncafy
Quick reads

Guide · Small business 3 min read

If someone else holds your software and data, they hold your business.

Vendors change the deal and developers move on. Here's what goes wrong when the code, the data or the accounts aren't in your name, and how to check yours this week.

Smiling business owner holding up a large key with a red bow beside a desk with a laptop, a small server and an open file drawer, an open red padlock on the wall.

Most small businesses run on software they rent. For email or payroll that's usually fine. The trouble starts when the thing holding your customers, your records or your website belongs to someone else. Their decisions become your problems, and you hear about them by email.

10 million
domains changed hands when Google sold its domain business to Squarespace in 2023
16%
price rise for QuickBooks Online Plus in the US in July 2025, from $99 to $115 US a month, per Woodard
June 15
2026, the last day to export Skype history before Microsoft deleted it for users who hadn't moved to Teams

What goes wrong when someone else holds it

Business owner holding a box of folders outside a locked app-shaped shop, with a red padlock and a price tag with an upward arrow on the door.

Vendors change the deal. Intuit stopped selling QuickBooks Desktop Pro and Premier to new Canadian subscribers in April 2025 and pointed accountants to QuickBooks Online. Wave, the free accounting app plenty of small businesses start on, said it would move its older free accounts to its Starter plan on June 1, 2026. Bank connections and extra users would then need the paid Pro plan.

Products get sold or shut down, too. When Google Domains moved to Squarespace, Squarespace gave domain owner permissions to the last person responsible for payment on the domain. If your developer's card paid for your domain, that person was them.

Then there's your own developer. Say they build your website, register the domain and put hosting on their own card to save you the hassle. ICANN, which oversees domain names, warns that a developer you hire may register the domain with their own contact details even when you paid, which makes them the official registrant. Getting it back can mean showing your registrar proof that you paid them. If they move on or stop answering, your website and your email are stuck with them.

You're still accountable for the data

In Canada, handing customer data to a vendor doesn't hand off the responsibility. Under PIPEDA's accountability principle, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner says a business is responsible for personal information it holds, including information it transfers to a third party for processing. It expects a contract that gives the data comparable protection, and the right to audit how the provider handles and stores it.

That's hard to do with terms you clicked through. It's harder still when a freelancer has the only admin password.

Why an off-the-shelf app won't fix it

An off-the-shelf app is rented software. The vendor picks the features and the price, and it can stop selling the app whenever it likes. Even when you can export the data, the setup stays behind. Custom fields, automations and the workarounds your team learned don't come with you. We don't think the core of a business should be rented.

What owning it looks like

Small robot handing a business owner a ring of keys tagged with a cloud, a database, a globe and a folder, a server cabinet behind them.
  • The code lives in a GitHub organization your business owns. Developers are members you can remove.
  • The database and hosting run in accounts billed to the business, not to a person.
  • The domain is registered in your business's name, with you as the registrant.
  • You hold the top admin login on every account. Anyone who helps gets their own login, never yours.
  • You can export all of your data in a standard format, any time, without asking anyone.
  • Any developer can pick up the code and keep working on it.

That's how Syncafy builds. The code, the data and the accounts are in your name from day one. If you stop working with us, you keep all of it, and you can hire whoever you like to carry on. Our monthly fee covers hosting, monitoring and fixes. It doesn't buy us a hold on your business.

A locked folder leads to a database, a globe with a red flag pin and an open box with folders lifting out under a red arrow.
  1. Code in your account
  2. Data in your database
  3. Domain in your name
  4. Export any time

Want to see this mapped to your business?

Start small

Owner at a kitchen table with a checked clipboard, a card, a ring of keys, a laptop and four folders, three of them checked.

Do an ownership check this week. You need a coffee and a list.

  • List every account the business runs on. Domain, email, website, hosting, accounting, point of sale, booking, anything with a login.
  • Next to each, write who the main admin is. A former employee or a developer is your first fix.
  • Write down whose card pays. If it isn't the business's, move it.
  • Ask your registrar who the registrant on your domain is. It should be your business.
  • Try an export from every app that holds customer or financial data. If you can't get it out, you don't own it.

Not sure who holds the keys?

Bring your list of logins to a free 30-minute call. We'll go through who controls each one and what to move into your name first.

More quick reads