Launch Verdict — what you get, what it costs, what it doesn't cover.

Everything below is the deal as it is written. No packages to compare, nothing revealed after you pay.

What it is

The Launch Verdict is a written answer to one question: can this product take real users and real money today, or not yet.

I read your codebase, run the product, and write down what I find. You get an answer with the evidence behind it — not an opinion, and not a list of everything that could theoretically be better.

It is a review, not repair work. No code is changed during the verdict; fixing is the next step, and you decide whether to take it.

One thing to be clear about: a verdict is an engineering judgement after a time-boxed review of what I was given access to. It is not a guarantee and not insurance, and it cannot prove that nothing is wrong — no review of any product, at any price, can do that. What it does is tell you what was found and show you the evidence, so the decision is yours to make with your eyes open.

What arrives

Five things arrive, and two more come with them. All of it is yours to keep.

1. A written go/no-go verdict on whether the product can take real users and real money.
2. Every finding ranked by severity, each with the evidence: where it is, how to see it yourself, and what it costs if it stays.
3. A fix plan with named work items and the price of the sprint.
4. A scope spec, written so another contractor can pick it up and price it — you keep it, whoever ends up doing the work.
5. A recorded walkthrough of the findings, in my voice.

All of it arrives as one written document you can forward to anyone, plus the recorded video walkthrough.

6. One round of written questions, within 14 days of delivery.
7. 100% of the price credited into a Fix Sprint started within 30 days.

Scope is this list. It is never an hour count, so there is no meter running and nothing to argue about at the end.

What I look at

Every product

Authentication and sessions.
Authorization and roles — whether one user can reach another user's data.
Secrets and configuration.
Data integrity and the safety of destructive operations — including whether a restore path exists and has been tested.
Error handling and observability — whether you would even know it broke.
The release and rollback path.
Known-vulnerable dependencies.
The obvious performance hot paths.

A SaaS that takes payments, in addition

The money path — payments, webhooks, refunds, subscription state.
Tenant isolation — whether one customer's account can reach another's.

Anything I exercise actively runs on staging or on a copy — never on your production data.

What is not included

Nine things this is not. Read them before you buy, not after.

1. No code is written or changed during the verdict. That is the Fix Sprint.
2. It is not a penetration test and not a security certification — no SOC 2, HIPAA or GDPR audit. It is an engineering readiness review.
3. No legal or compliance advice.
4. No design, UX, brand, SEO, marketing or conversion review.
5. No load testing at scale, and no performance benchmarking beyond the obvious hot paths.
6. No changes to your infrastructure or your accounts. Read-only access to the repository, plus a staging environment if one exists.
7. Web products and their APIs only — no native mobile apps, no games, no machine-learning model evaluation.
8. No ongoing support and no retainer. Questions after delivery are one round, not a channel.
9. No audit of third-party vendors. I review how they are used, not what is inside them.

The steps, and what each one costs

Four steps. You can stop after any of them, and each one is priced before it starts.

Suitability call — free, 30 minutes.

A check of whether your case fits. It is not a sales call: if it doesn't fit, I say so and tell you what would fit instead. It is also where we agree which of the two verdict prices applies — before any money moves.

Launch Verdict — $2,500 for an app with authentication, $3,500 for a SaaS that takes payments.

Five working days, or seven for the SaaS tier. Paid 100% up front. This is the page you are reading.

Fix Sprint — $9,000 to $12,000, two to four weeks.

The work named in your fix plan, executed. The exact price is named inside the verdict, from what the review actually found — never before. I don't sell a sprint without a paid verdict.

And if what I find is smaller than a sprint, there is no sprint to sell you: you keep the fix plan and the scope spec, and your own developer or any contractor can do the work.

Build — a product from idea to release, priced from the spec.

For a product that doesn't exist yet, or a rebuild the verdict says is the honest answer. There is no list price: the price is named from the spec, once there is a spec to name it from.

How the days run

Day 1 — Access and a walkthrough: what the product does, what "live" means for you, where the money and the user path run.
Days 2–3 — The review itself. Findings collected with the evidence for each one.
Day 4 — Severity ranking, then the fix plan with named items and a price.
Day 5 — The written verdict and the recorded walkthrough, delivered.
After — one round of written questions, within 14 days of delivery.

A SaaS that takes payments runs the same sequence with up to two more days in the middle — the money path and tenant isolation are extra ground to cover.

The rules

Eleven rules. They apply to every engagement, and they don't change per client.

1. The verdict is paid 100% up front.
2. The days start on the agreed start date, once read-only access is in place — not when the money arrives. The clock never runs while you are waiting on your own team.
3. I run one verdict at a time. If the next start date is not this week, you hear it before you pay, not after.
4. If the work never starts, the whole amount comes back — whether you changed your mind before the start date, access never landed, the product turned out to be something I don't review, or I couldn't deliver. Once the review has started, the price is not returned.
5. If the product turns out to be materially different from what we agreed once access lands, you hear it before the work starts. Then you choose: pay the difference to the other tier, or take the full amount back.
6. 100% of the verdict price is credited into a Fix Sprint started within 30 days of delivery.
7. No Fix Sprint is sold without a paid verdict first.
8. A sprint is paid 50/50 — half at the start, half on acceptance. Acceptance runs against written scenarios agreed before the work starts, so "done" is defined before anyone begins.
9. The sprint price named inside your verdict is valid for 30 calendar days, and it is tied to the state of the codebase at the time of the review. If the code keeps moving, the price gets named again. The published verdict prices do not move.
10. Scope grows only by newly named items. Nothing is added to the bill that was not written down and agreed first.
11. Your code stays yours. Read-only access under a mutual NDA, a working copy only while the review runs, deleted on delivery — and every tool that touches your code is named on the free call, before anything is sent anywhere.

Start with the free call

Thirty minutes to check whether your case fits. If it doesn't, I'll say so — that is a useful outcome for both of us. And if your message already makes it clear, I'll say it by email and save us both the call.

FAQ about the deal

Can I buy a Fix Sprint without a verdict?

No. Pricing repair work before reading the code is guessing, and I'd be guessing with your money. The verdict is what makes a fixed sprint price possible — and 100% of it comes back to you in the sprint.

How long is a quoted price good for?

The published verdict prices are the prices — they don't expire and they don't move. The sprint price named inside your verdict is different: it is good for 30 calendar days and is tied to the state of the codebase at the time of the review, because findings age as the code changes. If that window passes, the sprint gets priced again from where the code actually is.

What does acceptance mean on a sprint?

It means the written scenarios we agreed before the work started now pass. The scenarios are written down first, in plain language, so "done" is not a matter of opinion at the end. The second half of the payment follows acceptance, not a calendar date.

What if more work turns up once the sprint starts?

Scope grows only by newly named items, agreed in writing before they are worked on. Nothing is quietly added to the bill. If something new is found, you see it, you price it, and you decide.

Can I get my money back?

If the review hasn't started, yes — the whole amount, no conditions. That covers changing your mind before the start date, access that never lands, a product that turns out to be something I don't review, and my own failure to deliver. Once the review has started, the price is not returned: you are paying for the answer, and the answer arrives whether or not it is the one you hoped for. The other reversal in the deal is the credit — 100% of the price goes into a Fix Sprint started within 30 days.

What if the review finds nothing serious?

Then you get that in writing, with the evidence, and the decision to ship is yours to make on it. A clean verdict is a result, not a wasted purchase — it is the difference between believing your product is ready and knowing what was checked and what was found. You still keep the scope spec and the recorded walkthrough.

Who actually does the work?

I do, personally — all of it. There is no team behind this page and no work passed to anyone else. I build with AI coding tools every day, which is exactly why I know where they leave holes — but the review itself isn't delegated to them: I read the code and write the verdict myself, and my name is on it.