Okay,

Basically this started about a month ago. They had a few offers going on which seemed great to me. 1 was buy a server get another for $1 (total $230/month for 2 servers) great deal! Plus a cold feet offer where you get the FIRST month free. So I decided to order this.

1. I talked to JON over aim (the tech support guy) Not sure why tech support is doing sales, anyways. We talked it over, i brought down some things added some ips and the deal was set. So I called him up,

2. The toll free number couldn't be reached from my service area. WTF? I am in Canada, so that's alright I will pay the phone bill No problem this is a great deal.

3. After a few messages/missed calls, we finally got talking. He figured rackshack support was terrible etc.. and that a lot of places had crappy service .. etc.. .etc... etc.. and we were done there

4. I sent the money via paypal. and it was suppost to be setup withen a day.

5. After about a week of excuses for it not being setup I recieve an e-mail "Your server is up blah blah" your "SERVER" meaning one. I thought that was fine maybe they do one at a time, 1 week is not bad considering this great deal. So I open up PUDDY and try to SSH to the box. "host unreachable" so i put the IP into IE, it turns out it's some fitness website.

6. So I tell them about the problem. He figures that they gave me the wrong IP (good job). So I wait for a while... he says the noc cannot fix it for some reason. After many e-mails/convorsations I figure this is going no where (about 2-3weeks after the payment, and the 1-2 setup guarentee) and 0 servers online.

7. I request a refund.. they ask me to send an e-mail so I do. After I request a refund, the tech who had helped me (who was very nice through all this) told me he was quiting. Which was a bonus to all of this, now my only actual contact to the company is leaving. So he gives me someone elses AIM name to talk to.

8. I talk to him, he figures I should read the TOS again, for some reason. Blah blah this went on for a while, so I told him look you give me a refund or I am going to file a complaint with paypal. He said go for it. etc...

9. I file the complaint with paypal, after about a week (now way over month from the payment date) Paypal sends me an e-mail.
"Our investigation has determined that the seller is at fault, and as a
result we have attempted to recover your funds. $8.44 has been
credited to your account. This is the maximum amount we were able to
recover. Please allow up to 5 days for this adjustment to be
reflected in your account."

Great, a whoping $8.44 returned, I am not sure if it is worth the $225 to hire a lawyer. :confused: To get the rest back. I would just like a refund.

:angry: :angry: :angry: also would strongly advise people to keep clear of RackVillage.com:angry: :angry: :angry:

PS - Sorry this message is so damn long, if you don't read it I will understand.

thats horrible

See
I knew rackvillage was trouble

rackvillage claims they "bought out" kikko
Kikko was a scam
so is rackvillage

It is kind of funny though that paypal would give you ONLY $8.44 LOL

i'm sorry for your loss

Hey now that you got $8.44 back, i wonder what happens to the seller? Do they just take $8.44 from them? LOL

Why did it take you so long to post about this btw? or were you just waiting to see how much paypal would give you back

There's been a lot of warnings here about RackVillage (TriServers, Kikko, whatever they call themselves this month).

I sent $5 to them on a lark to test one of their servers under that "cold feet" offer. I had one response ('we'll get you set up soon), and that was it.

They are con artists and hopefully they will soon run out of billing services that are willing to sponsor them.

These kind of sucker must pay,
Do a chargeback .... dont wait !

Originally posted by x007
These kind of sucker must pay,
Do a chargeback .... dont wait !
Lol, now that cracks me up :D. Didn't you see him say that he payed paypal, and they refunded him $8.44 ?

Anyways, Good luck on your next business ventures.:)

how does this refund at Paypal work?

it seems like when DJiMPaCT told RackVillage that he would complain to Paypal all they had to do was hurry and withdraw their money from their account or what? Then DJiMPaCT wouldn't get his money?

If that's how it works that really sucks!!

Paypal always took my money from even if there was none in there and just left me with a negative balance.

Dont try to do someting whit paypal...

Do a chargeback on your credit card not paypal ....

Originally posted by x007
Dont try to do someting whit paypal...

Do a chargeback on your credit card not paypal ....
Yes, but what if the funds, didn't come from the credit card threw paypal ? Even if it did you would be charging back PAYPAL. Not rackvilliage, and as far as i remember paypal will sue you.

Originally posted by QWEST

Yes, but what if the funds, didn't come from the credit card threw paypal ? Even if it did you would be charging back PAYPAL. Not rackvilliage, and as far as i remember paypal will sue you.


The thing are, rackvillage have get money from djimpact from paypal, so normaly djimpact have pay it whit a mastercard or visa or whatever (hope so at least he have payd paypal whit that), So the best to do at fist is to try to do someting whit paypal, he have done this but get nothing.. Almost nothing.., Then now call master/visa then do a charge back, you will get your money, paypal will loose this money then paypal will get this money from rackvillage after that !

That the way this work, as customer paying whit a master/visa etc.. You always have the last word, then btw you have 4 month to do a charge back... !!

If this money as not been payd whit a CC you have lost your money for sure !

I hate some sucker like that that scam ppl like that, this guy have to pay dont let this like that !

Originally posted by QWEST

Yes, but what if the funds, didn't come from the credit card threw paypal ? Even if it did you would be charging back PAYPAL. Not rackvilliage, and as far as i remember paypal will sue you.

I would say let them sue me, I would tell them that you did not get the service that you paid PayPal for.

You risk having your paypal account closed. This is one very reason why I can't stand paypal.

I think Paypal should impliment a "holding peroid" over X number of dollars. Like a 7 day clearing system. So crap like this would stop. It would sure cut down on their chargebacks.

It should be like this for "Non-Tangible" items esp.

Were a seller could see that customer A paid and you can see the hold amount, but can't withdraw or spend it.

Just like other 3rd party payers, they pay every 15 days right?

If a customer request their funds back it goes to the customer's hold for certain # of days so the merchant can dispute.

Just my $.02

To add this, if PayPal did this and the $ kept going back and forth, the money would basically be sitting in their accounts drawing interest or they could charge small fee to get the $ back.

Hey everyone. Thanks for the posts. Couple of answers here.

1. They only gave me $8.44, because that is all rackvillage had in their account.
2. I cannot charge back my credit card, since the funds didn't come from it.
3. I did make a post, asking for advice but didn't post the name of the company. I thought that would make them refund the money.

Rackvillage messaged me on AIM today, saying the following things.

1. They will give me a refund IF I remove this thread.
2. " I am not going to argue with you.. the TOS which you agreed to upon sign up is our procedure document.. which we abide to"

Isn't the TOS only valid IF I recieve the product?

3. They only had $8 in their paypal account because they have 2 accounts. For some reason, some bull **** about accounting? (Don't you have to pay to recieve money in another account?)

Anyways bottomline do not trust these people.

so you gonna remove it?
lol

I dont think he can ^_^

Originally posted by DJiMPaCT
Rackvillage messaged me on AIM today, saying the following things.

1. They will give me a refund IF I remove this thread.


I would tell them, refund my money FIRST then I will see about removing having this thread removed if you even can.

I would file a small claims suit against them.

This should not cost much, threaten them that you are going to do so, they would have to arrive in your local.

I am not going to remove this, no chance of that. I will get the money back. I am also pretty sure that this thread+others, will loose them quite a bit of business. I was also curious if they are actually a company? Like has anyone gotten a server from them?

Yea ive got a server from them and i love it! They run my whole villiage, with out the power of rackvilliag, my villiage would be no villiage.:rolleyes:

your village seems to be without power at the moment. :)

Originally posted by QWEST
Yea ive got a server from them and i love it! They run my whole villiage, with out the power of rackvilliag, my villiage would be no villiage.:rolleyes:

Originally posted by skylab
your village seems to be without power at the moment. :)



I was just about ready to say the same thing. ;)

Originally posted by QWEST
Yea ive got a server from them and i love it! They run my whole villiage, with out the power of rackvilliag, my villiage would be no villiage.:rolleyes:

LOL, one of those villages on discovery channel?

Yes, it is on the discorvery channel;). Anyways DJ, good luck on getting your money back. In situations like this its best to do one of two things.

1.) Threaten to sue paypal if all money is not recovered. ( paypal dosen't like to be sued before you know it they will have head managers or ceo's on etc )
2.) Just take them to small claims court, hope it goes well, and if not since there in your hometown hire someone while the court is in session to fix up there transportation ride ie. take off the breaks. That should get them going :D good ;). If that fails, then just plain out kick there WO*** once the court is out of session. :cartman: :homer:

lol, thanks for the advice :) I will give them untill the end of the month. And then I will take some legal action..

Originally posted by DJiMPaCT
1. They will give me a refund IF I remove this thread.


Well, they just threw their own TOS out the window by making that statement and have nothing to protect themselves with anymore. They have also exposed themselves to possible criminal charges, namely extortion.

Sounds like some sort of mail fraud to me. Maybe you should call the local DA and have them look into it. The least you can do is call the Bette Business Bureau..

Just a thought

http://www.newyork.bbb.org/nis/newsearch2.asp?ID=1&strBCode=01210000&ComID=0121000000032741

Looks like the BBB is trying to look into them but cant get a response.

http://www.newyork.bbb.org/nis/newsearch2.asp?ID=1&strBCode=01210000&ComID=0121000000005709

if they keep changing names so often, it probably keeps the bbb from ever doing anything about 'em as they take like a year to do anything worthwhile.

Be sure and save all the emails. Get these guys in front of a judge and they'll be done. No more scams and maybe even 30 days in the poke! Bet they won't dare another person to file a complaint. Your State Attorney Generals Office (or equiv.) is a great place to start for prosecuting internet fraud...it works, I promise! They'll send you a package to fill out. Gather all the info you can on these people including former business names, names of employees, which most likely it's only one or two people using different names, phone numbers, paypal records, everything you can find. When the letters from a gov office start showing up in the mail, people tend to get worried!

Originally posted by DJiMPaCT

:angry: :angry: :angry: also would strongly advise people to keep clear of RackVillage.com:angry: :angry: :angry:


Somebody should start a website devoted just to settling Hosting Provider complaints. Hosting-BBB.com ?? :nuts:

I'm sorry to hear about your troubles. There are more and more of these kind of complaints being discussed here on WHT everyday. There has got to be a way to Put a STOP to these Scam Artists!!

i wonder if this would be of help? probably not, but, just a thought.

http://www1.ifccfbi.gov/index.asp

Originally posted by raq4less

Somebody should start a website devoted just to settling Hosting Provider complaints....
...There has got to be a way to Put a STOP to these Scam Artists!!
You mean something like THIS:

http://www.scamhosts.com :D

(Domain just registered, so use this temp. URL: http://users.250host.com/~scamhosts.com/)

Ingredients: Tired owner, late night, and an impulse to buy a domain name that popped into his head after reading this thread. 20 minutes of dirty work in PhotoShop (you can tell, eh? :) )

In the interest of full disclosure, this venture is entirely self-serving. I'm a new host. I know I provide a good service. I know I'm an honest businessman. But evil rats like the host in this thread give everyone a bad name. I'm sick of reading these posts about how "[insert con host here] screwed me over".

In the future, I envision the informed buyer of visiting two places before he purchases webhosting. 1.) Sites like http://www.findmyhosting.com - to find the best value. 2.) http://www.scamhosts.com - to avoid the scam hosts that aim to milk you of a few quick bucks.

The aim is for scam hosts to be an unbiased website without an agenda (beside uncovering scams) that seeks to inform customers of unreputable hosts. There are number of ways this information could be conveyed. A couple ideas: A who's who directory of scammers with customer comments; a forum - much like WHT - where customers would post the latest scammers.

This is a fresh concept, so many details need to be worked out. But my goal is simple: to help put an end to quick buck hosting scams.

That's enough OT for this thread. If you're interested in helping with design, management, or content, please contact me at brian@250Host.com . Any and all suggestions are welcome.

Thanks,

Brian Salisbury

Whoops, dupe post. See previous post.

Originally posted by Brian S

Ingredients: Tired owner, late night, and an impulse to buy a domain name that popped into his head after reading this thread. 20 minutes of dirty work in PhotoShop (you can tell, eh? :) )


Oh good Brian..... Take my fresh idea and run with it! Actually, that's why I posted it. I would, but just don't have the time. Good Luck with it

Originally posted by Brian S
In the interest of full disclosure, this venture is entirely self-serving. I'm a new host. I know I provide a good service. I know I'm an honest businessman. But evil rats like the host in this thread give everyone a bad name. I'm sick of reading these posts about how "[insert con host here] screwed me over".


Hummm..... You're heading for failure already. Self-serving??

The operator of such a site would need to be Neutral. What would you do if you got a complaint about your own company? sweep it under the rug?

CAUTION: There's a lot of legal liability with running such a site. You could be sued for liable if you post Negative comments about a company and they turned out to be Bogus. The false complainer gets a cheap laugh....and you get served with a $10 Million dollar liable Lawsuit. Bummer Dude! consult an attorney first, and make sure you have good business insurance.

just my 2 cents!

I don't think so. Being unbiased is the catch though. Review comments sent by the scammed customer before posting and maybe even contacting the accused party before posting any comments. This may bring an attempt at settling the complaint and if so, the negative comments wouldn't have to be posted. May be something like

CompanyX: Complaints filed; 2, Complaints settled; 1, Results; ???

Comments on unsettled complaint; ????

If they truly are scam artists, most likely they will end up with several negative comments posted and be out of business rather quickly. If it is simply a misunderstanding, then a resolution will be sought to prevent any comments from being posted. Just like the BBB, but displayed in a way where all the internet can easily see. And if it is learned that you are dealing simply with a disgruntled customer after discussing the problem with both parties, you can drop the complaint all together. No liability in that, just as there is no liability on the BBB. Your giving all parties an opportunity before anything bad is posted and then that puts any comments stated under the category of "freedom of speech".

I met a guy who had a new Dodge Durango. A lemon according to Arkansas law. Chrysler wouldn't talk to the guy, told him to get a lawyer. Instead he took bright yellow water based paint and wrote "Lemon" on all four sides of the dark green vehicle, put it on a trailer and pulled it behing his Chevy pickup everywhere he went for almost a month, until Chrysler started getting complaints from dealers and the entire state saw it on the news. Chrysler gave the man a real good deal on a new Chevrolet. No liability in that. Your speaking the truth.

Originally posted by dontknownutn
I met a guy who had a new Dodge Durango. A lemon according to Arkansas law. Chrysler wouldn't talk to the guy, told him to get a lawyer. Instead he took bright yellow water based paint and wrote "Lemon" on all four sides of the dark green vehicle, put it on a trailer and pulled it behing his Chevy pickup everywhere he went for almost a month, until Chrysler started getting complaints from dealers and the entire state saw it on the news. Chrysler gave the man a real good deal on a new Chevrolet. No liability in that. Your speaking the truth.

Hahahahaha thats the funniest thing i've ever heard! I'll have to remember that :laugh:

I dont get it :eek::blush:.

You don't get it? :confused: :eek:

- His DODGE truck was a lemon, faulty product.

- State law says that Company has to fix/replace

- The would not do it

- He buys another brand new CHEVY truck

- Tows DODGE truck behind CHEVY on a trailer in protest.

- DODGE (DaimlerChrysler) get embarrased by news stations reporting what this guy is doing

- They settle with him to stop embarrassing them

I think it is quit funny myself as well.

Yes lol that is hillarious, what sort of a deal did they get?

Also about those fraud forms, I think I will give them to the end of the month for a full refund.

hey dude,

don't worry with $8.44 you can get a bus or order half a pizza.

being serious dude, don't send e-mail to companies by paypal, you don't know where your money is going, just pay it by credit card and if they **** you you can ask for a refund by the credit card company, you can just don't pay the credit card billing about that company.

get rackshack, I have 9 servers with them, NEVER EVER had problem about billing's etc, I had only problems because of my fault.

Thanks.

Originally posted by raq4less

Hummm..... You're heading for failure already. Self-serving??
The operator of such a site would need to be Neutral. What would you do if you got a complaint about your own company? sweep it under the rug?
By self-serving, I meant that the site would exist to help the reputation of honest hosts like myself.

A complaint about my own service? I hope that would not be an often occurrence. But I mean what I've said. In my free hosting business, I've always been up-front about its failings. When 250Free screws up, I tell people. If someone was truly wronged by 250Host, they'd have every right to post about it, I wouldn't have any qualms about it so long as it is legit...

Speaking of legitimacy...

I have no interest in the site becoming a tool for disgruntled customers who didn't get an email reply within 10 minutes. I think the best system for ensuring legitimacy would be one like dontknownutn suggested. A system with a hostname, problem description, user comments, and the host's reply. If there's one lonely guy complaining, it would be clear the problem is isolated, or he had it out for the host.

I think the same concept would work for even a forum. Take WHT for example, when someone posts complaints about a particular host, other's affected usually jump on bandwagon with their stories, or those who've had good experiences reply in quantity.

To be clear, I'm not aiming for the site to be a flaming platform for customers who have an itch with some host.

Brian

Question: How do you draw the line between a good host with 2 bad customer experiences (and (as always) the good customers never post) ? Even 2 such posts can scare a potential client. Its a little risky - didnt one of those spam databases get sued by someone they had listed?

Originally posted by MaB
Question: How do you draw the line between a good host with 2 bad customer experiences (and (as always) the good customers never post) ? Even 2 such posts can scare a potential client. Its a little risky - didnt one of those spam databases get sued by someone they had listed?
I haven't yet heard of a lawsuit against WHT for users complaining about a bad host. It can be done fairly, and will be. Is there a chance of being sued? Sure. But I don't think it's any greater than a disgruntled customer suing any one of us.

I believe most people are honest. If A user complains about X host, X host responds fairly, and B, C, and D users contradict A user's complaints, I think it will actually be far more positive for X host.

Brian

I would call consumer afairs. They are a nightmare to most companys(lets just say Microsoft ****'s in there pants at the sound of consumer afairs). CA can basicly shut a comapny down and defintly get your money back.

Im so glad i saw this thread. I was gona by there most expensive package today RIGHT before i saw this thread.....

I was gona run a whole hosting company off them. I would of lost liek 5000 dollors! :(. I love this forum.

Yeah, IIRC, the blackhole spam listing places have been sued, but have consistently been found not guilty of anything.

I'm not a lawyer (but I do watch Law & Order a lot :D ), but I'd tend to think a statement wherever you take customer reviews, saying something like "Disclaimer: ScamHosts does not investigate the integrity of these posts, nor do we endorse them," could save your butt.

Then it's you simply quoting something. If I say "Don't buy anything from Company X. When I asked for a refund, they murdered me," and you simply quote me, I don't believe you can be held responsible, particularly if you make it clear that you don't know that the statement is true.

All that said... People still might sue you. A startling number of lawsuits seem to be filed on no real grounds whatsoever, with the big company knowing they'll lose the case, but hoping that by tying someone up for years in expensive lawsuits, they can drive them into bankruptcy.

So essentially... You can probably do this without much of a risk of being found guilty of anything, but you run the risk of being sued anyway.

Originally posted by fog
So essentially... You can probably do this without much of a risk of being found guilty of anything, but you run the risk of being sued anyway.
Agreed. :)

Now, it's finding the time to get this done...

Brian

nvm

WARNING: Long post, lots of details. DO NOT BUY WITH RACKVILLAGE!


Seeing as Faggle is on my box, I might as well post my experiences, being the owner. I threatened the owner that I'd post on the forum, and the server has been complete sh*t for awhile, I am gonna post it.

Here goes.



I wrote this as my experiences happened, to keep everything fresh, and true. So I will probably have edits in here, which were probably added recently.

So here comes June 21st, I've been looking at a provider for 2 weeks or so, and RackVillage looked the most interesting to me. I talk to their CEO, Dan Leubitz, he was very responsive, saying he'll have me setup within 4 hours. So I go ahead and order, without caring what the reviews said, as I was in need of some personal servers. He said he couldn't get it done that day (I ordered at 11AM), so he will do it the next day, Friday. He is still _pretty_ responsive, but much less. And said first thing Monday he will get it all straightened out. So comes Monday, my server comes on. 10MBIT port (I was told 100mbit), p3 1ghz (wow that was right), and 128RAM, I was supposed to have 512MB ram. That day I found out someone I knew awhile back worked there, Jonathon. I was happy, I figured he would help me out since they were already driving me nuts. So 2 days later he finally gets around to it, puts in the 512MB. This was the first time I actually had a chance to work on my server, June 27th-June 28th. Their bandwidth was horrible, 50-200kB/s incoming, 5-6kB/s outgoing. I was laughing histerical as he said in email "our speed flies" before I ordered. Yeah, Okay. Keep in mind, my second server is still nowhere to be seen.

June 30th, my second server arrives online. The specs were _supposed_ to be P3 1ghz, 512 ram, 40gb hd. I got, p3 733, 128 ram, 20gig HD. So now, server1 is _almost_ complete, just missing the 2nd 20gig drive. server2 is missing 384 ram, 20gig disk, and 366 mhz. So I wait, and wait, and wait.

Finally, July 12th, their bandwidth was fixed (Update: July 16th it was capped at 12Mbit, it was uncapped by IDT for testing purposes, then returned to 400kB/s). I was very impressed, I was getting almost a full 100mbit. I was with 2 boxes, both wrong specs. I told them Friday, the 12th, I want my specs fixed or I'll cancel. Sweet talked I was. Monday came, he said everything would be fixed. After having my 2nd box down for 5 hours, he said "it's ready." Ok, so I go in, 512mb ram. Yay. Another 20gig disk, yay. Was working on formatting it then the box just dies out of nowhere. Ask him for reboot, automatigally went AFK 30 minutes before the deadline I gave him (5pm). He then reinstalls BOTH of my boxes because he doesn't know what he's doing and neither do his techs, or should I say tech. (update: I asked him to fix something for me, and he was TELLING me to login to his customers boxes so he could help me. He gave me their root password. Something wrong? I THINK SO)

It's August 14th now, Dan said he'd give me a free month, etc, and I told him I am not renewing, as I had a few close friends who wouldn't even host their site with me because they were so unreliable. He assures me things will get back to normal, and to let this free month be a second chance. Last week the box was down 50 hours during the week. They seem to not know how to null route an IP address, accusing a box of being DoS'd all that time. They also rebooted BOTH of my machines because they "lost" an IP address somewhere and couldn't find it. LOL!

And they only have 12mbit offering 400GB/month plans to their customers. Something is wrong in that picture, ESPECIALLY since they are offering me 400GB on EACH box for $225 a month. They pay $225-275 per MBIT.

I kinda forget what happened after this...I haven't logged into my boxes for around 2 weeks now. All I know is mention WHT or refund to him.. he's down your pants licking your nuts up and down begging you to stay.

Oh yeah, and my boxes were reinstalled 10 times total, (5 times on the first box, 5 times on the second box).

Thank you for reading my horror story. It was a great adventure to say the least.

Big boy Dan is not going to be happy you exposed their little scam.

He didn't like it when I told of my experiences.

--
:uzi: From: "Dan Leubitz" <dan@kikko.com>
Subject: Refund
Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 11:22:36 -0800

Nice post on webhosting talk... That's a good one! Before I issue a
refund I am now going to scour through your old bandwidth charts to see
if you were over.. Perhaps you owe me;)
--

I never did get that refund.
Kikko/Triservers/Rackvillage or whoever they are now, must lose lots of business from all their bad reviews. Would have been easier for them to issue the refunds and answer emails. Shouldn't be long until they kick the bucket. :bomb:

Haha, RackVillage doesn't have bandwidth charts. Well, except for their MRTG graph that IDT offers them, which everyone can see at http://dedicated.idt.net/mrtg/colo/kikko/169.132.175.253.8.html.

If they want me to remove the link I will, but it's not password protected or anything, and viewable right from http://dedicated.idt.net/mrtg , so I am going to assume it's public.

They were asking me good bandwidth solutions because I told them how I have my T1 network setup. They asked me to send them my scripts (and I did, cause I felt bad for them), and I told them it requires a machine between the main router and the switch. I don't know if it ever went live, but my gateway didn't change, so I guess they didn't use it (probably couldn't figure out how to set it up, I told them I wasn't going to help them at all)

Looks like he was trying to make you feel guilty with no help from his network.

Good one Dan, next?

I have post a lot of warning thread to to this company, kikko, RACKVILLAGE and triservers.com. They are some company and bad company.

I have cheated USD 400 by them, they are very bad company, more bad than terrorist.

I have complaint them to bbb.org

Don't expected they will refund your money, i have wait for more than 4 months, no refund.

Don't trust this company.

Man that sucks....:angry: :angry: :angry: 1st sign of trouble, exit that hosting company on the double.. <--lol:stickout