What a client status page should show
Published . Updated .
This guide covers what to put on the status page you share with a client, and what to leave off so the page helps on a bad morning instead of starting an argument.
A good client status page shows current state per service in plain language, the start time of any open incident, recent history, and who to contact. Keep it private until published, share one link per client, and update it before the client calls you.
A status page is a notice, not a dashboard of your tools. The reader is the owner, the office manager, or the person who answers the client's phone. They want to know whether you already see the problem and whether they should keep calling customers to apologize. They do not want a graph with no sentence under it.
Should the link be public?
Public means anyone with the address can read it, and a search engine may too if you let it. Private means you choose who receives the address. For an MSP, start private. One link per client, sent to the people on that account who should see it. A single page that lists every client is a list of your book of business. Do not publish that.
The address should not be the client's name. A guessable link gets forwarded, and then it is public in practice. Use a link you can turn off. When the engagement ends, unpublish it. The history of that client's site is not a marketing sample.
Update the page before you return the call. If the client hears the news from you and then sees a page that still says everything is fine, the page has cost you the call. If the page is already honest, the call is shorter.
What do you show, and what do you leave off?
Show the service in the client's words. "Online booking" is better than the internal probe name. Show the current state in a word they already use: up, down, or still being checked. If you are not sure, say you are still checking. A false "up" is the sentence they will quote.
Show when the current incident started, in the client's timezone if you can say it, or in a zone you name. Show a short recent history so a question about last Tuesday has an answer. Show who to contact, which is you, with the channel you actually answer.
Leave off other clients. Leave off internal hostnames, admin URLs, and anything that would help someone knock on the door. Leave off a precise blame sentence you have not confirmed. "The site is down as of 8:40" is a fact. "The host is having a bad day" is a guess you will have to walk back.
| Put on the page | Leave off the page |
|---|---|
| Service name in the client's words | Other clients' names |
| Up, down, or still checking | A cause you have not confirmed |
| Start time of an open incident | Internal hostnames and admin links |
| Recent history and the period it covers | A second, secret status you tell only some staff |
| How to reach you | A percent with no period and no method |
How do you word an incident?
Write what a person can observe, then what you are doing, then when you will update. Two or three sentences. "The booking site has been down since 8:40 Central. We are on it. We will update this page by 9:10, or sooner if it recovers."
Do not stack adjectives. Do not say the incident is minor if the client cannot take payments. If it recovers, say it recovered and leave the start and end visible for the rest of the day. Deleting the incident when the site comes back is how the client decides you are editing history.
If you are waiting on a vendor, say that in one line. "We have opened a ticket with the host" is enough. The ticket number can live in your PSA, which is covered in alerts into tickets.
What does an uptime percent on the page mean?
If you show a percent, say the period and what was counted. "99.6% of recorded minutes over 90 days" is a different claim from "99.6% uptime." Minutes with no check are not minutes of uptime. A one-minute check cannot see a twenty-second failure. The downtime calculator is the arithmetic. The page should use the same definition as the contract, or it should not show a percent at all.
A history bar that counts hours as hours and days as days will match the sentence you write. A bar that looks like minutes while the caption says days will not. Pick one grain and label it.
Whose name is on the page?
The page can look like yours. Your name and your logo tell the client they are in the right place. The operator of the monitoring service should still be visible, so a question about the tool has somewhere to go. Do not present the page as if you built the checker, and do not hide who runs it.
If the site is behind a CDN or a proxy, say what the check measured when it matters. A green mark can mean the edge answered. The origin can be sick behind it. When you have told the client you are watching the origin, the page should say origin, not just the public URL. When you are watching the public URL, do not imply you saw the server behind the proxy.
What does a minimal page look like?
Use a shape you can fill in without a committee.
Online booking is down. It has been down since 8:40 a.m. Central on 10 October 2026. We are working on it and will update this page by 9:10 a.m. The last 90 days of checks are on this page. Call the support number on your agreement if you need a person before then.
That is enough for the first hour. Add the cause when you know it. Add the recovery time when it recovers. Keep the contact line stable so people are not hunting for a new phone number on the worst day.
- One link per client, unpublished until you mean to share it.
- State, start time, history, and a contact, in the client's words.
- Update the page before you return the call.
- If you show a percent, name the period and the method.
- Say whether a proxied site was measured at the edge or at the origin.
How The Watchbill helps
The Watchbill gives each client a status page built along the lines of this guide. A page stays private until you publish it, and its link isn't based on the client's name, so nobody can guess it. It shows the current state, any open outage with its start time, and recent history. A published page reloads every 60 seconds, so a client who leaves it open sees changes without refreshing.
Because a site is marked down or up only after two consecutive minutes agree, the page doesn't flash red for a single blip. On Pro and Business, the page can show your company's name and logo while still saying it's operated by LatticeDDI, LLC, as this guide recommends, and its address stays on thewatchbill.com. The plans that include branding are on the pricing page, and you can try a page on one client with a free account. For deciding when an outage is real enough to show, see How to reduce false uptime alerts.
Sources
- The Watchbill pricing and plan details. Accessed October 10, 2026.