Hello All,

I have heard and seen what I thought was all the available software for billing, however I just stumbled across this:

http://dreamcost.com/?page=hostadmin

Has anyone used this? What experience have you had with it. It seems to me from a quick look of their online demo to do more than most of the other software I have looked at.

My main concern with billing is tracking all aspects of the billing, not so much automated service.

Thanks for your opinions in advance.

Regards,
Phil

I don't know about now, but a year or so ago they were VERY lax on securinty and when I called them on it they said they had no plans to change. Something to do with encryption, I can't remember the exact thing I pointed out to them being so long abo. I wouldn't trust them to say the least.

Originally posted by JeremyL
I don't know about now, but a year or so ago they were VERY lax on securinty and when I called them on it they said they had no plans to change. Something to do with encryption, I can't remember the exact thing I pointed out to them being so long abo. I wouldn't trust them to say the least.

You don't have any idea what it was? Anybody else? I think their software is just what I need. It does everything I am looking for and it has open source code.

Thanks,
Phil

I would suggest doing a search on this board. Their support reputation is not good.

yea - by the looks of it id stay away, and go with more mainstream like ModernBill or WHM Autopilot (for WHM) :)

Or Whois.Cart,

Support should be a factor when deciding what software to use.

I do agree that support should be a priority for deciding on a product to use.

However I have looked at almost every billing program around and not one of them does everything that I need. The closest one is ModernBill, but I don't like software that I can't get at. The source is available on HostAdmin which means if they ever go out of business I still have my software that I can actually fix if I need to. If ModernBill left tommorow then what? For something as important as billing I would think it is important to have alot of options.

Regards,
Phil

I have used hostadmin and I think it is better than modernbill. It has many features and I havent had any problems yet!

Originally posted by rackserv
I have used hostadmin and I think it is better than modernbill. It has many features and I havent had any problems yet!

Thanks for this info, I have sent an email to their support with questions. Depending on how long they take to answer is going to be part of my decision.

Phil

I would do a lot of research into this. Once you pick one, it will be hard to migrate to another system if you expand quickly. So pick something that can grow with your business without putting a load on your servers...

It has a nice little bug where users can login to one another's billing management based on poorly coded sessions. Just to let you know.

Unfortunately you can't see for yourself as their forums are blocked by anyone without a license.

Originally posted by rackserv
I have used hostadmin and I think it is better than modernbill. It has many features and I havent had any problems yet!

For how long have you used it?

m.

Originally posted by mesopia(Jay)
It has a nice little bug where users can login to one another's billing management based on poorly coded sessions. Just to let you know.

Unfortunately you can't see for yourself as their forums are blocked by anyone without a license.

Which software are you referring to?

I believe he is talking about HostAdmin. I have heard rumors about this, but I haven't seen it or proved it yet.

More info please?!?!

Regards,
Phil

I was talking about HostAdmin.

I used Dreamcost last year for an sort of Adult Escort Agency site, okay only did it for kudos :blush:

We purchased Dreamcost and had an nightmare of a time with it, loads of bugs which stopped it functioning properly. Two of us ironed out most of them and got it working but not very stable.

Their support was pretty bad and we ended up removing it form the site within a month.
However that was a year they might of changed?

Originally posted by rackserv
I have used hostadmin and I think it is better than modernbill. It has many features and I havent had any problems yet!

Thanks for the info, but after seeing you just registered, have only 4 posts and already have a diasbled account, I would choose not to trust your info.

Regards,
Phil

Originally posted by WebHedz
I used Dreamcost last year for an sort of Adult Escort Agency site, okay only did it for kudos :blush:

We purchased Dreamcost and had an nightmare of a time with it, loads of bugs which stopped it functioning properly. Two of us ironed out most of them and got it working but not very stable.

Their support was pretty bad and we ended up removing it form the site within a month.
However that was a year they might of changed?

Thank for this very informative info.

Just to let everyone else know... I sent an email to sales/support several days ago with pre-sales questions and I still have not received a response.

If this is how they treat their interested customers I would hate to see how they treat their existing (paid) customers.

Regards,
Phil

OK. Here is the deal on hostadmin.
We bought hostadmin a year ago.

1- There is a problem with session keys, so if USER 1 knows USER 2's session ID, USER 1 can log into the acount of USER 2.

2- The payment screens/signup does not support CVV for credit cards.

3- The admin area is loaded with bugs like admin cannot renew domains or update a users CC number.

4- There is a bug in the "view cart function" where users can view other users carts & changes a user makes do not "stick". There is also a problem with the coupon part too.

These are just what immediatelly comes to mind. We bought it & Tony, the guy who scripted HA went on vacation for weeks. So we were on our own, we fixed all the problems & use it on our site. But some SERIOUS mods had to be done to secure it & make it functional. The one cool thing is that it is no Zend encoded or anything, allowing source modification.

Their forums are overflowing with complaints, the guy Tony does not really give any useful support & have fun trying to get a refund. The software is beta at best & makes a good starting point if you know PHP & want to really customize a billing solution.

Originally posted by itshosted
have fun trying to get a refund

Just to even things up a bit... ;)

We looked at it months ago. We buy up a lot of things and never end up using them. But in this case Hostadmin was quite a way from doing what it was meant to do (or what we expected it to do) so we asked for a refund, and got it.

So it's not all bad news. :)

Gary