WordPress handover risk on a company site is who still holds the theme, the plugins and the accounts. The public page can look fine while nobody on your side can enter the admin. That is a transfer problem, not a design job. HED Creative writes the handover list into the scope. If the passwords are not yours, the sentence that the site was received is false. One accountable partner keeps the same list in Berlin and Ankara.
Theme and plugins
If a paid theme sits on an agency account, the licence is not renewed and updates stop. A page builder ties the form and the layout to its own shortcodes. Move to another firm and the content is no longer plain text. Discovery names the theme, the licence owner and which plugin earns its place. A plugin that earns nothing is switched off before handover. If the page breaks when it is switched off, that risk is a line in the scope.
Account locks
Domain, hosting, mail, analytics and the admin user should sit in your ownership. A site where the agency remains the only admin leaves the handover dependent on that agency choosing to help. The backup sits where you can download it. If an update key is hidden in a third-party panel, it is written on the list. An account opened in Berlin and an account opened in Ankara carry the same owner name.
Addresses and content
Handover is not an excuse to change URLs at will. Live URLs, enquiry pages and language twins are listed. If a move is required, the old address points to the new one. No move happens before that redirect is written. Content stays with you. An agency cannot claim the text belongs to them. Product records and form fields are exported.
When a rebuild is the clearer scope
A theme whose licence cannot be obtained, an admin user stuck with one person, and a builder nested inside itself cost more than a patch. Then the conversation is a new build with a written scope, not a handover. The decision comes from the list, not from worry. The new build also opens accounts in your name. The old URL list is not thrown away. A ranking promise is not attached to that decision.
Add the handover list to the brief on website development. If the addresses are a visibility job, the SEO scope uses the same list. Related: website care after launch.