Just a warning about HostSave's business practices.

I'm a webmaster for my church's website which was hosted by HostSave until about 2-3 months ago. The church was setup for autobilling by HostSave which had a credit card on file. Before I closed the hosting account, I emailed HostSave SEVERAL times to ask them about any billing issues, etc. NO RESPONSE whatsoever to any of my inquiries other than an email to say the account was closed per my request.

Today, the church recieved a notice from a collection agency saying that HostSave was due $23.00 and some change for services rendered.

Well, there is no dispute that the money is due. But, why didn't HostSave just charge the credit card on file that they have charged for the past year or so?

And secondly, why didn't they just contact me or someone at the church rather than turning it over to a collection agency??????

Talk about needless embarrassement to me and my church..

So, stay away from HostSAVE, whatever you do!

Thanks for the warning! Many people will find that very useful.

-Mike

Originally posted by sdollen
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Talk about needless embarrassement to me and my church..
. . . . . . That about sums it up.
Seems they coulda done something different.

Someone asked me why I hadn't paid the bill if I wasn't disputing the fact that HostSave was due for services.

Well, it isn't that I didn't pay the bill... the billing was setup for autobill to a credit card they had on file and which they had charged on more than once occassion. I just figured that when I canceled the account, that they would process a final bill.

Also, the credit card actually belongs to my church and is reconciled by a lady (financial secretary at church) so I wouldn't have had any idea that the charge didn't hit the account, and the secretary wouldn't have had any idea to watch for the charge to hit the account. She is the one that recieved the letter from the collection agency and alerted me and asked me if I knew what it was.

So..... as I've said before....stay away from them if at all possible. HostSave is a shady company at best.

Hello,

Still cannot understand why well known hosting providers are getting bad reputation these days.

Is it all beause of money ?

Youve probably done this already but if not, I would give them both a phone call and get that straightened out.
The host, AND the collection agency.

HeadMaster,

In my opinion, I think it's because they grew too fast and have a lack of customer support. Also, I think some of them just don't give a flip and figure that you can't go anywhere else and pay $7.95 a month. So, as someone usually says on this forum - "You get what you pay for".

Martie, I'm definitely trying to contact them. I don't want something like this showing up on the church's credit history. But, I'm surprised they turned a bill for $23 over to an agency. But, everytime I think about it I get hot under the collar that they didn't try to contact someone first, and why they didn't just charge the credit card as usual. Also, I tried to contact them via email MULTIPLE times about a final bill before I canceled the account and never received a response.

Live and learn.

Yeah that's very stupid. Did you give them a number to call when you signed up?

Collection agencies aren't free, and such a small bill, that's outrageous. Yeah lack of customer supoort was probably at the core of the problem.

Good point they should have just used the autobilling system.

They definitely had a number to call.. and worse case scenario they could have done a WHOIS on the domain name and gotten the info from there. But, at minimum they have email addresses which they didn't even bother to use.

So, having not heard from them, I just assumed that they autobilled the credit card on file after I canceled the account.

They are pretty lame is all I can say. I wish someone from there visited this board... I'd love to hear what they have to say.

One of my clients also had problems with HostSave...call Affinity (they own HostSave, it's the same customer support people). http://www.affinity.com 1-877-865-6580 or 310-524-3000 someone actually helped me there with the HostSave issue.

That's definitely in poor taste. I hope you get it worked out to your satisfaction. I think an apology from HostSave would be in order, but that's just my opinion.

Originally posted by sdollen
I'm surprised they turned a bill for $23 over to an agency.


Just a guess but i suspect a host the size of hostsave probably automates their debt collection. So the odds are you account was handled by a program rather than a person. A lot of companies have systems in place like this, and as soon as an account falls so many days over due, whether that be a deliberate act by the customer of an error in their processing, they will hand the account over for collection.

The agency will most likely be collection on several accounts which is what makes them chasing $23 worth while for them.

I agree theres no excuse for the way you apear to have been handled, just giving what i think might be an explanation.