Lately I've been seeing people asking questions about the do/dont's of the hosting business. Well, I will tell you what not to do.

I have an account with Communitech.net. Communitech was decent until it was acquired by Interland. They did have some problems with forcing people to move from shared to dedicated because of two many resources being used (when the reality is they where probably moving them because of the GB they transfered as this were old unlimited traffic accounts). The thing is I never encountered this problem because my traffic is not two high.

Well, as i said, they were acquired by interland. Service has been more less usual although support has lacked a little bit but basically business as usual when they decided to move all their dedicated to Atlanta where interland is based from Kansas City. At this point you guys are thinking... no big deal!! Well it is a big deal if their transportation method is getting all these servers, loading them into a truck and sending them to Atlanta!!!!! :eek: :mad: :eek: :confused: As you can imagine I think this is weird but it gets better... they have not send an email (at least in the last week and a half addressing this move. The truth is I lost the emails before that but...you would think they would remind you when they do something like that :angry:

One word: stupid
Another word: Miserable
And yet another word: different

I'm speechless. Weird, stuipid, and bad for the customers doesn't begin to cover it. :)

I was with Communitech for 4 years before being terminated by INLD in January because I completely and totally disagreed with this plan. They are driven by numbers, and as their stock plummets they feel the need to make desperate and drastic changes. Take it from me, it's too little too late.

Unfortunately, that is going to effectively hurt people like you who are customers and depend on them. I think you can make your own mind up about this company and their future. It's no wonder they have a churn problem.

I would assume it isn't going to get any better for you.

I also heard that the 2 former owners of Communitech, are suing Interland over not being paid for the sale. It's complex, but it's all ending in tears. :eek2:

I was literally one of Interland's first customers, and for some reason, endured their antics for 2-3 years. That was the worst hosting experience I ever had, and I'd definitely recommend steering clear of the company.

One example: After several months, I was their oldest account (all those before me left). So I had the lowest customer ID # in their database.

Now their domain name registration script for new accounts had a bug whereby it would try to retrieve the new customer's details from the database before posting them to the database. As a result, it got the first customer (me) rather than the desired one, and put my name on all new domain registrations.

Believe it or not, at one time I had hundreds of domains falsely registered in my name at Network Solutions. Competing registrars were calling me trying to sell convince me to move all these domains I "owned" to their solution. But what was worse is that I entertained a regular stream of angry phone calls from people accusing me of "stealing" their domain name, threatening lawsuits, etc. They all settled down once I told them what happened. But then they wanted me to help them get their domain name put in their name (which used to require sending an e-mail to Network solutions, editing a template e-mail sent in reply, replying, etc.). I felt sorry for these people, but I couldn't do my regular job if I took the time to help them all.

Interland was not helpful to them, and in the end they mostly had to get Network Solutions (only marginally helpful) to get it straightened out. I heard that Network Solutions had Interland on their bad list over this and was threatening a lawsuit.

Being a programmer myself, the most amazing part of this story is that the offending script was never fixed in over 2 years. During that time we had a new account manager every month or two, and had to describe the situation to them. Of course, they didn't believe us at first.

It was all so time-consuming, I finally gave up and left Interland.

I wouldn't believe this story if it hadn't happened to me. But it is a true story.

Where you with Interland or Communitech?

I started about three years ago with communitech and never had big problems till they where sold to interland. Coincidence?

Originally posted by apastor
Where you with Interland or Communitech?

I started about three years ago with communitech and never had big problems till they where sold to interland. Coincidence? No, it's not a coincidence. I was with Interland.

The company was founded with huge venture capital, for a single reason--successful IPO and sell it off at a profit. From the beginning, they were focused on numbers, not service. As they grew, things got worse and worse. I left when Micron bought them out. Prices were jacked through the roof and TOS were changed without notice. We got one look at our monthly bill and jumped ship.

I should say I experienced many other problems with Interland over the years. The domain name one is simply the best story, so that's what I told. There were also the multiple times they shut down our account without notice because another customer failed to pay and someone in billing shut the wrong account. There was the time they billed our credit card for $2,000 when we had a $20 account because someone in billing changed us to a high-end dedicated ASP solution or something (didn't find out about that until the credit card statement came several weeks later). The list is quite long, really.

There's a lot of competition in the hosting business. Whatever your needs, it's hard to imagine there isn't some other provider who could meet them better than Interland.

I am also a former Interland customer. I had the worst experience with them. I finally finished my move yesterday to DataPipe servers. We were paying Interland about $350/month for a high end shared server solution so that we don't have downtimes at all, but unbelievably we had so much downtimes that are not explained at all... The support is the worst worst worst ever. The attitudes of the support people is sooooo bad that even one time a lady from the billing department while flurting with her and got to know her better she told me that Interland customers always complain and that she suggests me to move to another company! We were HostPro before and then it was bought by Interland. Hostpro were great, and the support was awesome. When we had to move to Interland, the service got sooooo freakin bad. Even at times the support shut the phone on me to not continue explaining!!!! We got a dedicated server now on datapipe and the support is never like it, it is great. The best support i have ever got from any company. They are very friendly and loyal to their customers. I am sooooooo happy that I finally moved away from the crappy business of Interland. I really do not suggest anyone signing up with them. IF you really wanna get a crappy support, go with them!

hehehehe, pete i love that story. It is quite funny about everything being in your name. Couldn't you sue interland for causing you so much pain and trouble? i would have looked into it.... :) i only have managed one account on interland for a customer. i guess they were that bad... i was hired instead to manage it without tech support. haha.

-kohashi

Originally posted by kohashi
hehehehe, pete i love that story. It is quite funny about everything being in your name. Couldn't you sue interland for causing you so much pain and trouble? i would have looked into it.... :) i only have managed one account on interland for a customer. i guess they were that bad... i was hired instead to manage it without tech support. haha.

-kohashi Well, maybe we could have sued. But I didn't want money, just wanted to be left alone!

I've had a lot of unbelievable experiences since going into business some years ago (meaning I wouldn't believe them if they didn't happen to me!). But I think Interland tops them all.

One thing we can all learn from Interland is that bigger != better. My current host (http://www.srlhosting.com) gives me the best service I've ever encountered and it's a small-time shop consisting of the founder/owner and a couple of helpers who appear to be part-time.

Originally posted by Canadianeh
I am also a former Interland customer. I had the worst experience with them. I finally finished my move yesterday to DataPipe servers. We were paying Interland about $350/month for a high end shared server solution so that we don't have downtimes at all, but unbelievably we had so much downtimes that are not explained at all... The support is the worst worst worst ever. The attitudes of the support people is sooooo bad that even one time a lady from the billing department while flurting with her and got to know her better she told me that Interland customers always complain and that she suggests me to move to another company! We were HostPro before and then it was bought by Interland. Hostpro were great, and the support was awesome. When we had to move to Interland, the service got sooooo freakin bad. Even at times the support shut the phone on me to not continue explaining!!!! We got a dedicated server now on datapipe and the support is never like it, it is great. The best support i have ever got from any company. They are very friendly and loyal to their customers. I am sooooooo happy that I finally moved away from the crappy business of Interland. I really do not suggest anyone signing up with them. IF you really wanna get a crappy support, go with them! I can believe every word of this post! Congratulations on finding a host who values you and takes your needs seriously (instead of just taking your money). I hosted a small client site (a Miva store) with DataPipe for about 2 years and they were very good to us.