Job monitor-website-uptime-alerts-tested · revised 11 October 2026
Set up outside uptime, certificate and domain-expiry alerts and test them
Configure up to five outside checks for one site with alerts to two named people, then trigger a deliberate test failure to prove the alert arrives. No on-call cover is included.
You might be seeing
- You find out the site is down from customers or a friend
- An alert email exists but goes to someone who left
- A page loads but shows an error message, and nothing warns you
- Certificate and domain renewal dates live in one person's head
No passwords, keys, card details or admin invites needed to start.
What usually happened
A check that only asks whether the home page answers can miss a page that loads but shows an error, a certificate about to lapse or a domain about to expire. An alert nobody receives is worth nothing. Monitoring helps only if it checks the right thing from outside your hosting, confirms a failure before alarming, and tells at least two people through a route that has been tested.
Who it’s for: Owner or office manager whose business depends on its website, who usually learns it is down from a customer.
Usually starts when: The site was down for hours before anyone noticed, a certificate or domain nearly lapsed, or an insurer or client asked how outages are detected.
The result: Up to five outside checks run against your site with alerts going to two named people, a deliberate test failure has produced an alert that both received and a recovery notice, and certificate and domain expiry warnings are set.
Check whether this job fits
Four questions, about two minutes. Your answers stay on this page unless you choose to email them.
Checks you can run yourself
Find your certificate and domain expiry dates
Open your site in a browser, view the padlock details for the certificate dates, and look up the domain on its registrar's page or a public lookup.
Look for: Two dates: when the certificate ends and when the domain registration ends. Send us both, or tell us you could not find them.
What you get
- The configured checks, listed with what each one tests
- Screenshots of the settings, the test alert and the recovery notice with their times
- A one-page note for the two people who receive alerts
- A calendar entry or reminder for any expiry the provider cannot watch
Included
- One website with up to five checks: the home page status, a page that must show agreed text, one key page such as contact or booking, the certificate expiry date and the domain expiry date where the provider offers it
- Setting up the checks at a monitoring provider you choose and own, on a plan you approve, including a free plan if it covers the checks
- Alerts to two named people through two routes where the provider offers them, with confirmation settings chosen to avoid false alarms
- A deliberate test failure, such as a check that looks for text that is not on the page, to prove the alert and the recovery notice arrive
- A one-page note of what each alert means and the first three things to check
Not included
- Fixing whatever the monitors find, and any on-call, out-of-hours or response-time commitment
- Server, disk or database monitoring, log monitoring and status pages
- Checking pages behind a log-in or restricted by address
- A monitoring account in our name: the account is yours
- More than one site or more than five checks
How we know it’s done
Agreed with you before work starts. Each check produces evidence you keep.
Each configured check shows the expected result at the provider, and after 48 hours of observation every alert that fired is explained as a real event or removed by a setting change.
Evidence: Screenshots of the check list and its history, with the notes
A deliberate test failure produces an alert received by both named people, each with the time received, followed by a recovery notice when the test ends.
Evidence: Screenshots or messages from both recipients with timestamps
The certificate and domain expiry warnings are set to trigger at least 14 days before the dates found for the site, or a reminder for any expiry the provider cannot watch is recorded.
Evidence: The settings screenshot and the expiry dates found
Sign-off. You sign off after both recipients confirm they received the test alert and the 48-hour observation is explained.
If it fails. If an agreed check cannot be configured at the provider, it is listed with the reason and an alternative, and you pay only for what passes the agreed tests.
When it fits, and when we stop
It fits when
- The pages to check are public, and you can create or approve an account at a monitoring provider
- Two named people agree to receive the alerts, and can read email or a phone app
- You can tell us the certificate and domain expiry dates, or let us read them from public records
We stop and tell you if
- The site is behind a log-in or an address restriction that outside checks cannot pass
- Nobody is willing to receive alerts
- The chosen provider's plan cannot cover the agreed checks and you do not want to pay for one that can
- The site is already down for an unfixed reason
What could go wrong
Monitors and contacts can be paused or deleted at the provider at any time, and nothing on your site is changed. The deliberate test failure is a check that is deleted when the test ends.
Scroll the table sideways to read it all.
| Risk | How we handle it |
|---|---|
| A false alarm teaches people to ignore alerts. | Confirmation checks are set, the 48-hour observation shows any false alarm, and settings are adjusted before sign-off. |
| The alert reaches an inbox nobody reads. | The test failure proves both recipients actually received it, on a second route where the provider has one. |
| The monitor passes while the site is broken for a real visitor. | One check looks for agreed text on a key page, not only a status code, and the note says what the checks cannot see. |
A second reviewer, separate from the work that produced the change, checks it against the evidence before you are asked to apply or approve it. No human supervisor is included unless your proposal names one. At launch much of the preparation is automated, and we say so.
How we deliver
We arrange the work and independent review, then show you the result against the agreed checks. You keep authority over your systems.
- Agree the five checks, the text each page must show, and the two alert recipients and routes
- Set up the checks and contacts at the monitoring provider you own
- Set the confirmation, retry and alert-delay options so a single blip does not alarm
- Trigger the deliberate test failure and record when each recipient was alerted and when the recovery notice arrived
- Observe the checks for 48 hours and explain any alert that fires
- Hand over the settings, screenshots and the one-page note
This is a one-off job, not emergency cover or a subscription. We confirm eligibility, the total price, a start window and a delivery date before you accept. Work starts only after agreed inputs, secure access, any licences and necessary permissions are in place. Hosting, platform and supplier charges are excluded unless the written quote includes them. No charge or booking is created by an enquiry.
Need to keep it working?
To keep the checks, expiry dates and records watched each month, ask about the standing responsibilities.
Ongoing work is separately scoped and quoted: no monitoring, response-time guarantee or automatic subscription is included in this job.
Explore an ongoing engineering lane, or mention the responsibility you need in your enquiry.
What you can check
This is a new service. We have not delivered this job for a client yet.
Other ways to get this done
- Most monitoring providers have a free plan that watches one page and emails one person. If that is enough, setting it up yourself takes minutes; this job adds the second recipient, the text check, the expiry warnings and the proof that it works.
- Your host or DNS provider may offer its own status checks. They are useful but run from inside the same provider, so they can fail together with your site.
Questions
Will someone fix my site when an alert fires?
No. This job sets up and proves the alerts. It includes no on-call cover and no response time. A person you name decides what to do.
Do I have to pay for a monitoring service?
Not necessarily. Many providers have a free plan that may cover the checks. If it does not, the plan charge is yours and we tell you before you commit.
How do you test an alert without breaking my site?
We create a check that looks for text that is not on the page, so it fails on purpose. Your site is not touched.
Send an enquiry
Send us
- The site address and the key page, with the text that must appear on it
- Who the two alert recipients are and how each wants to be told
- Any monitoring tool you already use or prefer
- The registrar and the host, if you know them
Later, once you agree
- An account at the monitoring provider in your name, with us invited at a level that can edit monitors and contacts, or screenshots as we go
- The two recipients' contact details, entered by them
- No live passwords or keys by ordinary email
The monitoring account, the alert contacts and the site stay in your name. We are invited with the smallest permissions needed and you can remove us after sign-off.
Email fallback: open your mail app
If website submission is unavailable, review and send the fallback email yourself. An email fallback is not a website receipt. Or write to hello@syntheticindustry.ai with “monitor-website-uptime-alerts-tested” as the subject.