Which hosting company intentionally removes help desk access to its clients for more than three weeks? Of course they gave a reason, but how come other hosting companies did not resort to such a method under similar circumstances?

Which hosting company promises you this and that, but rarely delivers on schedule? No explanations needed here, right?

Which hosting company finds all the time in the world to ignore you by INSTANTLY deleting your pleas for support but yet cannot find the time/opportunity to send a single one line email... even after you emailed them innumerable times? that too when they have removed help desk support?

Which hosting company owner finds the time to sit at his pc and argue here on WHT... the recent lengthy argument with Vortech is being referred to (carried on for hours)... but does not find the necessary time to talk to his support staff... they say they will get back to us (mchost clients) after they speak to marc on issues plaguing us?

The answer is... BELIEVE IT OR NOT... MCHost !!!!!!!:rolleyes:

So if you don't mind having your host's helpdesk inaccessible, if you don't mind most of their other important pages eg. server status, etc. inaccessible too (or how on earth would you know what is the problem unless you got in touch with them... but oops... you cannot get in touch with them... no helpdesk... and you have to consider yourself lucky to receive an email from them... and if you don't mind being offered false promises repeatedly... then MCHost is the hosting company you're looking for!

MCHost is on its way down... and I'm not sure if this is the beginning of the beginning of the road downhill OR the end of the beginning...

whatever... the beginning of the end of MCHost former glory seems to be knocking loudly at their doors.

Waits for Marc to make his entry and make his argument here when he has lots more important things to do.:rolleyes:

NOTE: This post is written by an extremely disgusted MCHost client who, like many others evident in the MCHost forums, are equally disgusted.

So why do you stay with them? There are many alternatives.

Hey, should that be sung to the theme of "Shaft"?

I wouldn't hang around a place that doesn't appriciate my money. Let your $$ do the walking.

My dollars are not gonna do the walking... they are gonna do the running over this week... i cannot take this anymore.

Originally posted by bear
So why do you stay with them? There are many alternatives.

Because it's a lot of work to move websites! It took me several weeks to get all my website moved off. Of course, you won't have very many customers left if you have been with them for awhile. :mad:

Because it's a lot of work to move websites! I am not at all trying to encourage you to move. However, if you move from a CPanel host to a CPanel host, it really is quite simple to accomplish.

Yup! Thats the main reason ie. the pain of moving. But things have now come to such a head that I just cannot take it anymore. Better some pain now than much more pain later when clients begin to leave.

What I find totally ridiculous is MCHost taking the helpdesk off! Why? I don't buy his silly reason about forcing clients who were due for months to pay up! its laughable!

anyway, even if that is THE REASON, then it is mchost that allowed such clients to get away with it before - and now everyone else has to suffer???

ridiculous!!! really!!!

what gets me is that since they have removed helpdesk access for some of their clients, they have the nerve to delete our questions in the forum which we repeatedly make (sometimes in slight irritation which is natural when earlier posts go unanswered or get deleted too!)

sorry - but i think mchost if can remove helpdesk without prior warning OR without making an reasonable alternative arrangement - what's to prove they won't do something worse in the future?

and kiwi/marc has built up a solid reputation of not keeping his promises to us - and also does not evidently know the meaning of a simple english word like 'soon' to top it off!!!
:rolleyes:

i got fired by a client today who got fed up after waiting for a week for me to resolve a few issues - which i couldn't resolve because mchost has made it difficult for us to get in touch with them.

mchost now cannot boast of being the company they were before - things have really got rotten over the last few months. mchost will soon gonna be toast if they continue like this.

I have to agree with Incognito here. It's your decision to move or not, but it isn't hard at all to move from one Cpanel host to another. With a little planning, you can move them like 3 or 4 an hour, depending on the size and complexity (like databases, etc.)

You need to decide if you think this is a temporary problem that you and your clients can ride out, or if you think it's a sign that things will get bad enough that your client's will suffer. The bottom line has to be what's best for your customers, or they won't be yours.
Tough decision. Good luck with it.

Sorry, that move was necessary. However we've had clients with accounts due for 2 months, submitting 4-5 tickets every day and yet not updating their billing information. All you need to do is update your billing information and we'll approve the account - done, you're back in the helpdesk. There are even 2 dedicated threads to this in our forums and what to do if you don't receive the login information (email Natasha at natasha@mchost.com).

Good luck with your decision.

If this was related to you not paying your bill, then Kiwi is nice about it. The minute your credit card is declined or you are past due with us, we deny any sort of support at at. You must pay to receive support.

Well, that's quite different. Non-payment means no service in most businesses...can't say I'd blame Kiwi if that's the case...

Here are the facts:

I have never ever had non-payment issues with MCHost... thats not the case here.

I updated my cc info in the first week of January at the mchost website. The third page mentioned that the new login info to the helpdesk would be emailed within 48 hours OR that i should email natasha.

48 hours passed. no email.
72 hours passed. no email.

then i emailed natasha the next day. no response.

another email followed a day later. no response.

then i emailed kiwi/marc at billing@mchost.com. no response.

so i proceeded to email complaints@mchost.com. no response.

so now i think i better contact the man himself. no response. (three emails sent to marc alone.)

what's the last option? i opened a thread in the forum. it went unanswered for one whole day.

the next day i opened another thread with a "louder" title to attract marc's attention after so many days of not hearing from mchost even after repeated tries via different methods. a few minutes later the thread got deleted. and it wasn't followed with an email after the deletion when i specifically requested it.

a few minutes later, mind you. hmm, i thought, so it indicates that someone from mchost had definitely read the thread. but consciously chose not to answer.

well, let me give it one more day, i thought. but sigh, no emails even now.

so i posted another thread in the forum - this time demanding that i receive the help desk info asap - but guess what? within a few minutes that thread got deleted too without any followup email being sent.

i had absolutely no problems when i updated my credit card info. so it is not that mchost does not have my records.

well, still not a single email with the login info yet. now if you were in my place, please tell me how on earth are you supposed to get in touch with mchost?

oh - and just to keep the record straight - my bills to mchost were always paid on time via paysystems. i never had any problems or issues regarding payments to mchost before. this entire fiasco started from January this year. till then everything was ok on the billing front.

so mchost gets my money on time. no problem there whatsoever.

now when mchost requests me to update my credit card details all over again - this time with the three digit number on the back of the card - i promptly go ahead like a dutiful client and do as requested.

so, what would you have done or thought under these circumstances.

And the worse part is that i am clearly not the only one facing this problem. there are several other resellers facing the exact same problem and not hearing from mchost for several days. a visit to their forum will confirm exactly how many resellers have been similarly affected with this issue - but i bet mchost has deleted those threads too.

its only in the cross posts made in different threads that the picture of more resellers being affected similarly emerges.

Originally posted by Kiwi
Sorry, that move was necessary. However we've had clients with accounts due for 2 months, submitting 4-5 tickets every day and yet not updating their billing information.

That is your problem, not mine. Why affect all other resellers like me who have never had payment issues with you.

And furthermore, even if you disabled your helpdesk, why isn't mchost staff not responding to emails from us resellers. i am not the only one not hearing from mchost as is plainly evident from your forums. you know that better than i do.

All you need to do is update your billing information and we'll approve the account - done, you're back in the helpdesk. There are even 2 dedicated threads to this in our forums and what to do if you don't receive the login information (email Natasha at natasha@mchost.com).

Good luck with your decision.

I have done all of the above Marc. And still not received my new help desk login info yet - after two and a half weeks have elapsed and after sending several emails to you and natasha and also at complaints@mchost.com

so don't come here and try to make it look as if i did something wrong OR did not do what was expected of me.

i wouldn't have been angry or felt the need to email you, or post in your forum, or even post here in wht HAD YOU SIMPLY SENT ME THE HELP DESK LOGIN INFO as your website claimed to so within 48 hours.

that is the issue here. just do what you promise and if not, then at least have the decency to communicate the reason for the delay, especially after so many emails have been sent to both you and your company.

what amazes me is that marc responds to posts made in wht but not in his own forums:rolleyes:

i do not like to make complaints on a public forum, but my hand was forced this time. that too i waited for almost 10 days, emailing you each day during this 10 day period,

a simple one line email from you would have taken you much less time as compared to the time it took you to post so many sentences above, wouldn't it?:rolleyes:

can't understand what your company policy is. it seems that you now have developed a laid back attitude to your older clients, because in your pre-sales area you are seen responding to newbies with their questions everyday very promptly.:rolleyes:

:eek3: ..seems like they need better planning.

"Customer loyalty" and "loyalty to your current customers" go hand in hand.

*cough mchost:eek:

Your email was replied to by Natasha the same evening, in fact everyone that emailed ehr got a response after max. 10 hours, i can see that in my records. For some reason, perhaps your email didn't reach her or her reply did not reach you (we've had a couple of client emails bounce back for out of space or other issues, etc).

We're not going to discuss/resolve billing issues in public. Please, if you haven't received a response, try using another email address, because by posting here, i first of all don't know who you are and second, we have promised a reply to everyone within 24 hours and if you didn't get it, there is most likely a mail issue.

Originally posted by Kiwi
Your email was replied to by Natasha the same evening, in fact everyone that emailed ehr got a response after max. 10 hours, i can see that in my records. For some reason, perhaps your email didn't reach her or her reply did not reach you (we've had a couple of client emails bounce back for out of space or other issues, etc).

We're not going to discuss/resolve billing issues in public. Please, if you haven't received a response, try using another email address, because by posting here, i first of all don't know who you are and second, we have promised a reply to everyone within 24 hours and if you didn't get it, there is most likely a mail issue. Marc you always seem to have problems with emails...?

Maybe you need your own personal email server ;)

Regards
Phillip

Originally posted by iamdave
Marc you always seem to have problems with emails...?

Perhaps because i get approximately 1200 emails per day. I am by far not the only person working at MCHost and i certainly can't handle all issues myself, sorry.

Originally posted by Kiwi


Perhaps because i get approximately 1200 emails per day. I am by far not the only person working at MCHost and i certainly can't handle all issues myself, sorry. That's understandable, however, everytime someone has an issue you resort to the excuse of email problems...

Originally posted by iamdave
That's understandable, however, everytime someone has an issue you resort to the excuse of email problems...

I stated clearly that all emails that were sent to the appropriate departement have been answered. Enough, i don't discuss billing issues in public.

Originally posted by Kiwi


I stated clearly that all emails that were sent to the appropriate departement have been answered. Enough, i don't discuss billing issues in public. That's fine, you shouldn't discuss your issues with clients on forums. All i stated is that you repeatedly resort to the excuse of emails being lost...

i thought they took the support system down because boxadmin doesnt do thier support anymore? I know i saw in another thread that mchost customers were finding themselves in the boxadmin database that was left open . Maybe this has nothing to do with it . Taking a support system down has to be the worst freaking idea ever , even if you have customers that have not payed (your fault) , you still need to be aware of whats going on and what issues people may be having with the account . I think locking the the non paying customers out of thier account would prove to give far better results , rather then taking away support from EVERYONE

We didn't take our support system down, we changed from an outsourced payment solution (paysystems, do a search here and find out why we're moved from them) to inhouse payment solution and new itegrated helpdesk in one.

Good luck Marc,

Hopefully now we will see less threads about MChost all over WHT!!! :rolleyes:

Regards
Phillip

LET THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES:
<copied from just one thread the MCHost forum. there are so many more similar posts on so many more threads>

<edit>
deleted subsequently because i honestly feel after reading the next two comments below this post that i perhaps shouldn't have posted a copy from a thread on mchost's restricted forum in the first place.
</edit>

i apologize to the two posters immediately below for lack for foresight on this issue.

:D :D :D MARC'S EXCUSE ABOUT EMAILS NOT BEING RECEIVED OR SENT IS NOTHING BUT LAUGHABLE AT BEST :D :D :D

Just to make sure, I had four MCHost resellers send me email from thier domains to me. I received them all fine.

I emailed them too. They checked and received it just fine too.

I also HAVE NOT HAD problems receiving or sending email to and from anybody else in a long time.

GO FIGURE! :rolleyes:

Originally posted by mjack
LET THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES:
<copied from just one thread the MCHost forum. there are so many more similar posts on so many more threads>

MCHost Forums > Private Forums - restricted to resellers only >Hmm...none of my business, but wouldn't posting this quote from their forum board constitute a breach of the AUP/TOS? Says right in it that it came from a 'restricted to resellers' area of a private forum.

Crossing some boundaries here that maybe you shouldn't?

Valid point bear, whats the point of them being restricted if our posts just get spread about WHT.

First... an apology from me to bear and acidHL. I have edited out the copied text from the thread from the MCHost forum. Your posts made me aware that what I did should not have been done. Thanks for pointing that out.

I may have inadvertantly crossed some boundaries... but i have only done so because Marc often tries to make it appear as if there is hardly anything wrong at his end. Just as he had done in his posts above.

Also, if I have crossed some boundaries, please keep in mind that this sort of response is only being made as the very last resort since I do not have any way of even leaving MCHost presently without access to their helpdesk.

Marc has also crossed the boundaries of decency and toleration limits by proving that he has time to come here and make posts but ignore/delete repeated earlier posts made by us on the same issue in his company forums + ignore repeated emails to him and other email addresses at his company.

Now things have come to such a head that Marc is forcing me to stick with his company even though I want to leave because I cannot submit a ticket to MCHost without access to the helpdesk.

What would you have done in a similar circumstance? Is there any other decent or practical option available?

This is costing me big time because all the effort I had put in over the last two years in my hosting business is now being wiped away by Marc's refusal to communicate with me via normal channels. How does it feel to receive angry emails for several of your customers when you can do nothing in response?

MCHost AUS/TOP is written to allow us to host with them. One basic assumption is that they need to provide us with a hosting service and timely support (no definitions being attempted here) to our requests for the same service. But after almost three weeks and no communication from them + repeated attempts to delete your posts in their own forum without responding to the issue in return later... well... Marc is the one who broke this basic assumption of his AUP/TOS and set of this reaction.

I still am amazed that after a day since I created this thread... there is still not a single email from MCHost! Yet he posts here several times. Ridiculous!

I will let you all know when I receive an email from MChost and then this matter can be laid at rest.

I had heard mchost improved, but when the hell will they release theyre dedicated server range?? :confused:

Originally posted by mjack
I do not have any way of even leaving MCHost presently without access to their helpdesk.Why is that? Aren't you able to access your WHM or Cpanels for the various accounts? If you can, it's not hard. Use Cpanel to grab their backups and filters, use the new hosts cpanel to 'restore' to their new home, and change the IP in the old WHM to the new one.

Or have I missed something (other than minding my own business..)?

There are two issues which require helpdesk access. marc insists only on such posts being made via their helpdesk. as you already are aware of. i have used emails too which rarely get answered as you are already aware of too.

i agree with marc that such posts should be made to a central system like a helpdesk... it helps to streamline a web host's support services. emails are to difficult to manage.

the problem here is that i am not being given access to the helpdesk. if mchost gives me access to the helpdesk then this issue will be put to rest.

i have finally decided to leave mchost now solely because of two reasons:

1. their gradually degrading quality of support/communication over the last few months. the recent issue of no helpdesk access was the issue which clinched the decision for me.

timely support and communication are strongly linked to each other.

2. the gradually declining level of their once superior hosting service in general alongwith marc's repeated failure to keep his word. on some issues, its been months not weeks. sigh!

mchost was initially a great company. but marc has failed in keeping up the levels of service as his company grew. which, if one looks back, is extremely stupid because he was warned time and again of the consequences by many of this older forum members... who have mostly left before me. this downturn for mchost wouldn't have happened if marc shouldered his responsibilities in an efficient manner.

i am one of the few oldies left and am going to leave now too. i am very serious of my web hosting business. the level of service offered by mchost today is too poor to allow me to grow my business if i am to offer viable hosting solutions to my clients backed up with adequate and timely support.

i don't think anybody in his right mind who is serious about growing his business successfuly would tolerate such poor levels of service, support & communication either.

to marc: you often say you are not responsible for this or that... think again... an owner of any company is responsible for the company's success in the decisions he takes and the effort he makes. period.

if i was in marc's place, i would simply stop signing up new clients temporarily until i sorted out the current mess within my company. other responsible web hosts have done that.

i also sincerely believe that if 1 client complains to me then one should assume that 10 clients could have complained but have not for whatever reason.

i also wouldn't have ever taken such a drastic step as removing helpdesk access without having a backup system in place... which would negate the idea of removing helpdesk access in the first place anyway:rolleyes: because as marc claims, he had to remove it because some clients had not paid up for two months!:rolleyes: i would have simply warned them and later after some time taken their sites offline. anybody with common sense would have done that rather than to remove helpdesk access for all their clients even temporarily.

and this issue of not issuing the new helpdesk logins in time just does not make any sense to me. it seems to me as if the real answer is that marc simply does not currently have enough people on his staff to handle the level of support requests. maybe that is the real reason... maybe.

and i am not one who requests help desk access frequently. i rarely if ever use the helpdesk more than 5 times or so a year. because whm and cpanel allow a lot to be done without the need for helpdesk staff to help out with.

this is going to be my last post on this issue here in this thread. extreme frustration at not being able to hand down support to some angry clients had led me to bring this issue to mchosts notice, especially after my earlier posts in the mchost forum went unanswered/deleted and my numerous emails weren't replied to.

i will only post again in this thread when mchost does send me an email as they promised they would which contains the info which will allow me to access their new help desk.

i do not want to continue bashing marc and mchost any longer in this thread. i just hope that marc sends me the info i so desparately need 'soon'.

Originally posted by mjack
[color=red]I still am amazed that after a day since I created this thread... there is still not a single email from MCHost! Yet he posts here several times. Ridiculous!

I would have written you back yesterday morning, however i don't know of any 'mjack' in our clients database and if you don't wish to tell us who you are, we can't :rolleyes:

I cannot re-send your login information if i don't know who you are.

I hope that makes sense.

am emailing you.

ok guys... mchost has finally responded. sigh!

i would not have been forced to post here if only they had responded in the first week of january when i updated my credit card info at their website... which clearly mentioned that i would receive the info within 48 hours.

is extremely grateful to WHT - without this forum i perhaps would have been ignored by mchost even longer :)

Originally posted by mjack
am emailing you.

Originally posted by mjack
ok guys... mchost has finally responded. sigh!

If someone responded it was probably a billing representative and they don't visit WHT. Glad you got everything now, though.

well marc... as you can see... emails were working just fine. all it needed was for someone from mchost to repond to my numerous earlier emails. had that been done i wouldn't have been forced to open a thread like this.

anyway, unfortunately some damage has been done to both of us... both to me (angry clients) and to you (by these kinds of posts). all this could have easily been avoided, you know.

i know we have nothing personal against each other, we both are trying our best to run our businesses to the best we can, but when the tolerance limits get stretched beyond a point. people will naturally start complaining.

anyway, alls well that ends well... i think i should now provide some clients with a month of free hosting in return for making them upset due to all this delay. and i am not expecting any compensation from mchost. i am a reasonable fellow who does not expect 100% uptime or support answers within a few minutes... but so many days of delayed communication really stretched it this time.

could anyone refer me to some hosting companies that offer multidomain hosting with decent support... but most importantly... that aren't owned entirely by just a single individual? i am referring to properly incorporated companies with a sizeable operation with at least more than one owner.

i am not hinting that one person operations are necessarily bad or inferior, but after having experienced issues with one-person operations time and again... i do not want to host with anybody who is not properly incorporated and who does not have a sizeable operation any more.

cheap price plans are not important... i am willing to pay for quality and prompt support.

i thought of venturesonline.com but they don't seem to offer multidomain hosting :(

am so impatient to reach that *critical number* of clients which will allow me to afford hosting my clients on my own managed server in a quality data center. maybe in a few more months down the line.

Sorry to hear of all the trouble you've had lately :angry:

i thought of venturesonline.com but they don't seem to offer multidomain hosting

Yes they do - http://www.venturesonline.com/hosting/bulk-reseller.html

Even though I still have until the 10th of Feburary before my account closes there, Marc blocked me from the reseller forums today. Oh well, I don't have any accounts left there so I can survive. Considering he doesn't even help current customers, I doubt I have any chance of finishing out my term there.

Originally posted by mjack
could anyone refer me to some hosting companies that offer multidomain hosting with decent support...

I recommend www.httpme.com

Be sure to check out their announcement forums. Can you say "effective communication"?! From the posts, it doesn't look like one little thing goes on on ANY server that isn't mentioned in the announcement forums for that server. Amazing.

If every hosting company was like that, we'd all be out of business. The owner of httpme.com has build his entire business on the back of communication, community, and common sense. He posts here a lot and is known as "Aussie Bob".

Cheers!