Hi,

Anyone here still with eirca? I issued a trouble ticket this morning and no response until now. Is has been 13 hours. My website and all ASP.NET code no longer working since yesterday. :(

I had someone take a look at your ticket, it was related to the server move already announced for the machine in question.

Please see the ticket for more information.

Simon

I'm with eirca. I just checked and my .net sites seem to be running, albeit a bit slow.

I'm with eirca. I just checked and my .net sites seem to be running, albeit a bit slow.
Can you create a ticket for that with the domain details? They shouldn't be running slow.

Thanks,
Simon

I have a ticket with Eirca.net from May 22 (Department: Billing/Accounting) asking to close my reseller account with no answer or reply.

They actually charged me today for another month of service but no answer or reply to my ticket within a weeks time

Eran

It seems that my initial request to cancel the account was not done in the proper manner. Eirca's "Acceptable Usage Policy and Terms Of Service" in section 6 - Cancellation policy refers to contact the Help desk but the link does not work.

So I opened a ticket requesting to cancel my account on May 22 which was not answered till short while ago - May 29.

No one had told me I had done it the wrong way which I found out only 2 days ago, and now I have to wait another 3 days for my account to be canceled.

Eran

I think they don't have 24 hours support.

I don't know why their windows hosting keep on repeat same problem again and again...not stable...

Well one of their staff is active here so i hope everything gets resolved.

I have submitted several support questions (tickets) to their billing department. But often they don't get answered and after some time they are just closed. It is really annoying.

Hi

I have also requested the cancellation request of my windows H-Sphere plan but no response.

Anyone has any suggestions?

Regards

Hopefully Simon comes on here and gives us a little run down on why there is all of these unanswered requests (billing, sales, cancellations, etc) with no reply in sight.

(Simon being the active rep here on WHT, posted earlier in this thread)

Let's hope he responds because I too have had the same problems this month.

Simon is a nice guy, Has always handled the issues well. I have opened my ticket on 15th and 18th June. I have also sent email to Eirca management. I have received the autoresponders and ticket numbers but absolutely no proper acknowledgement from Sales/Billing department or management. And that is really a cause of worry.

I suppose their help desk software has bugs, or else why would they ignor our tickets.

hopefully everything gets worked out for ya..

I still ned answers for 2 questions concerning billing - and since they don't care to answer them (or don't answer the questions I'm asking) - I think I will have to look for a new host.

I really like the idea about clustered hosting - and has been satisfied with Eirca until now - but if I cannot get any support - I will have to look for some providing who provides it!

I still ned answers for 2 questions concerning billing - and since they don't care to answer them (or don't answer the questions I'm asking) - I think I will have to look for a new host.

I really like the idea about clustered hosting - and has been satisfied with Eirca until now - but if I cannot get any support - I will have to look for some providing who provides it!

I feel your pain. I've had a billing ticket in for 3 days with no answer. I've been waiting all evening/night to get an answer to why I can't get to my email. I got a reply asking which server it was related to, then nothing else.

I'm not sure what's going on either... I've tried emailing their staff directly, as I can no longer access the "genius" portal to check on the status of my tickets.

Oddly enough, the one time I did email Simon directly, I got a firm scolding in the reply to one of my open tickets asking me to not email the Eirca management directly. Strange, huh?

I'm in the process of making backups of all my accounts on there, for a worst-case scenario.

Please update this thread if any of you hear back from them.

Glen

I'm not sure what's going on either... I've tried emailing their staff directly, as I can no longer access the "genius" portal to check on the status of my tickets.

Oddly enough, the one time I did email Simon directly, I got a firm scolding in the reply to one of my open tickets asking me to not email the Eirca management directly. Strange, huh?

I'm in the process of making backups of all my accounts on there, for a worst-case scenario.

Please update this thread if any of you hear back from them.

Glen

Hey Glen, I couldn't get into the portal either. It seemed to start early last night and lasted well into the wee hours. Tech support did get back to me, but only said that they didn't see the problem, and were unable to duplicate it. Whatever it was it seemed to have cleared itself up.

I don't understand what's going on there. Simon has always been great with the clients, and it looks like they're making some nice improvments, but there does seem to be something not quite right with support lately.

Simon just updated the Eirca blog on this issue:

http://weblog.eirca.net/2009/07/05/record-number-of-new-clients-adjusting-support/

I wish I could take a 3+ month vacation! :)

I was finally able to get my issues resolved, albeit with some rather vague answers. Very odd stuff going on around there. I hope it's past us now.

I still have a billing question from 25. June which is not answered. The ticket gets closed after some days - and I have to reopen it. I even submitted a ticket to sales that I had this ticket that was not answered - it also got closed after some days.

I'm still getting my billing tickets closed without a response or resolution (let me qualify that - 1 ticket that has been open since the first week of June; closed twice with no response). Simon can post a blog about falling behind but that does not excuse just closing a ticket and refusing to acknowledge an ongoing issue. All I have been asking for is for my account to be closed and a credit issued because they failed to deliver on a documented promise. This has been going on since late May.

I'm not just another cut and run negative poster. I have been extremely patient and I have tried to avoid airing my grievances here but people need to know. They have my money because I trusted them with a year in advance payment. Shame on me. If you think EIRCA is where you want to put your money and business at least don't give them a year in advance payment...try it for a month or two. Maybe Simon can turn this around but for me this is an EPIC FAIL and I feel robbed.

I'm still getting my billing tickets closed without a response or resolution (let me qualify that - 1 ticket that has been open since the first week of June; closed twice with no response). Simon can post a blog about falling behind but that does not excuse just closing a ticket and refusing to acknowledge an ongoing issue. All I have been asking for is for my account to be closed and a credit issued because they failed to deliver on a documented promise. This has been going on since late May.

I'm not just another cut and run negative poster. I have been extremely patient and I have tried to avoid airing my grievances here but people need to know. They have my money because I trusted them with a year in advance payment. Shame on me. If you think EIRCA is where you want to put your money and business at least don't give them a year in advance payment...try it for a month or two. Maybe Simon can turn this around but for me this is an EPIC FAIL and I feel robbed.

Sure with the high-amount of support, handling requests might come on a first come first served basis. Simon was pretty active in this thread, but Im sure WHT isn't the best place to get support. A toll-free number? Perhaps giving them a call would be best?

A toll-free number? Perhaps giving them a call would be best?

Ok, maybe I wasn't clear. I have tried every avenue but posting on this site to get support. They do not have a toll free number- if you find one, try it - it won't work. The online "call back" feature does not work - if it's available at all it just tells me that I have tried outside of support hours and offers an option to send an email. I opened an online chat - tech said he could not handle a billing issue. Tried PM Simon on this board, no response. I tried emailing Simon directly - said he would look into the issue - he never did and my ticket was closed.

Again - for almost two months I have been trying patiently to get a resolution... What more can I do but provide information for others to make an informed decision. I think the fact that Simon has let these posts go for so long without a response is very telling and out of character....that is exactly how I feel about my recent experience; especially considering I once was a DIY customer when Simon owned it and I had good experiences then. So what is going wrong with EIRCA? I don't believe the issue is "explosive growth" as that should not result in closed, unanswered support tickets. I feel that my money has been hijacked and they could care less…that is a company in desperation…not growth.

Hi

I totally understand what userBeavis is saying. I have been EIRCA client for so long. Simon did not let things go out of hand before this. This time it is really bad.

The phone support is not at all an option. I wonder if the phone support really exists, I tried placing a call at different times but it never came.

Once in a while somebody replies to ticket but the problem is still very much there solution of the problem / ticket is more important than someone just replying once to a ticket.

Tickets to sales and billing are going unanswered.

I have been with Eirca for a long time but I am not sure what is going on with them currently.

Simon, Dean please take note.

We've been a dedicated server client with Eirca for a couple years.

It quickly went downhill after we signed up with Eirca and we're extremely frustrated with the server problems and them ignoring our tickets. We have tickets that go weeks without them fixing the problem. This is not a new issue with Eirca. I think the goal is for us to just give up asking.

I also ask Eirca repeatedly for updates to open tickets which goes ignored. I open new tickets referencing unresolved tickets (which Simon told me to do to get a status update). Those tickets are either forced closed by their staff or just perpetuate another ticket to go ignored. When I do get a response it normally does not answer my questions and creates new questions for me based on what they said. Which then restarts the cycle.

If an issue results in Eirca needing to change something on the server or install new software, I give them the go ahead. On several occasions that has caused something to break with our websites. We're then abandoned by their support staff as we try to figure out what's wrong...which of course nothing changed with our websites. Then we'll run into support replying that only a specific person on their staff knows about that which they went home right after changing our server. So, we'll need to wait until that person gets back for their next shift.

Don't get me started with Simon issues. Things were so bad that he said he would talk to me on the phone about them. I was very encouraged by that. Well, after 6 times of him not being there at the time he told me to call him and me waiting around after he did not call me at the scheduled times I got fed up. He finally did call me out of the blue one day and the call was nothing more than his scripted verbatim about how they're working on fixing issues. I doubt he even knew/cared who he was speaking to. Nothing personal about asking what my needs/issues where. He just immediately started his script after I said hello. I just sat there and listened to him ramble on as he has obviously had done many times before. He also said he would call me back in a couple weeks to get feedback on how things have improved. Of course I didn't hear from him again.

Yes, he's posted that they're going to fix things. But, he and senior staff at Eirca has said this to me in the past repeatedly, when I can actually get them to respond. Their support is still just as bad. You can't get straight answers to tickets, they ignore tickets, you can't get anybody on the phone. They introduced live support chat to fix the problems and I've checked many times since they rolled that out and all it says is to give them a time to call me back. Which I do, but then I receive an email back saying they're unable to get back with me at that time (it's just an autoresponse).

I am encouraged that others are having the same problems. I'm always wondering if they're just ignoring me. It's so frustrating when I ask them important and basic questions and they just can't give me straight answers and/or answer them at all.

I hope Simon at Eirca enjoys his 3 month vacation as well.

It quickly went downhill after we signed up with Eirca and we're extremely frustrated with the server problems and them ignoring our tickets. We have tickets that go weeks without them fixing the problem. This is not a new issue with Eirca. I think the goal is for us to just give up asking.

I'm not sure why people don't simply leave? I mean there are a lot of good/great hosting companies that would more than appreciate your business. I have no idea what the problems are, so I cannot speak to them, but you should certainly be able to submit a ticket and receive a timely reponse, let alone pick up the phone and actually talk to someone.

If I had my dedicated server with them instead of Cartika, I'd leave within 24 hours if my server was down and I had no response from support...really.

Added: Just wanted to add, I have been with cartika for some years, but if they ever started providing or should I say "not" providing the service level that I believe to be paying for...I'd be gone from them too. I don't feel anyone should stay with any host if they are receiving bad service...

I will not be going through each post on here as there's quite a bit of trolling clouding any issues, but those who have issues with support (existing issues), please send me a Pm via here and I will provide you my personal contact info to get them taken care of.

Our support system and personnel went through some drastic changes as of late and we accept that we got a little behind the mark on support, which is why our recent announcement was made regarding the introduction of additional staff to offset the massive growth, plus the revamp of our support system as a whole.

I understand the frustrations of folks posting about previous issues, that's not to say I encourage posting on WHT any time a ticket goes unanswered for 45 minutes though, as the case is with a few posts in this thread ;)

Simon

Nice to have a webhosting company with staff all around the place. Gets things sorted faster. When their on forums helps others with the same issue as well.

Well...It's been almost a month now since Simon posted that he would help. I PM'd him immediately as requested and he did respond a day later with a private email address to a blackberry account to send my ticket information for him to take a look. The result...my ticket was only updated with a note that senior management would need to take a look. …and then what? You guessed it. My ticket was closed without a resolution or explanation.

Buyer Beware!

Hi

Does anyone know working phone number of Eirca?

I tried called 888-7649350 number given on the http://www.eirca.net/legal/

No luck at all. I am unable to place call via genius support, also nobody available for live chat.

Not sure if my ticket is reaching them.

Does anyone have a working phone number of Eirca Tech support?

Thanks in advance.

Hi Cybernet.... sorry, I can't help, other than to say that you're not alone. Their whole team has gone MIA. My suggestion? Do like I'm doing and migrate elsewhere.

Glen

It is more than 6 hours of service outage and almost 5 hours I have opened ticket no reply or action taken by them.

This is really un-Eirca like. This is 100% not the EIRCA I once knew.

Stop complaining and move on. I think it's quite obvious that company growth has hurt Eirca.net. If they don't provide the same level of service you once remembered, move on and find a new hosting company.

Waiting more then a day for a reply is pathetic. Don't stand for that.

Hi Meku

I do understand what you mean. Right now the problem is I am unable to access my a/c once I can do that, only then I will be able to move.

In the mean time can you suggest any names / alternaive for cPanel?

Strange to see these issues with Eirca. I'm sure Simon will be along soon to put everyone's fears to rest. Can anyone remember another Eirca affiliated host that was popular on WHT a few years back? My memory fails me.

DIYhosting.com. It was sold, Simon didn't see the money (or not all of them), the customers didn't see the service as it used to be.

Yep, that was it. I'll hit the search function. :)

ldcdc - I am still a DIYhosting.com customer and I started when Simon originally controlled it. I tried to switch to Eirca in May of this year and that's when my opinion of Eirca started falling completely apart. ...ironic that the last part of your statement is now applicable to Eirca. Perhaps another "sale" is in progress?

NextDog - Simon has already stopped into this thread, provided hope, and then FAILED...at least no one has reported back that he has helped them. I certainly intended to if that had been the case for me...but again, all I got was words and no action.

Mekhu - Its not just a matter of moving on. Eirca has fallen apart. Simon is acting out of character. People need to know. There are plenty of favorable reviews of Eirca and Simon on WHT, including one of my own reviews of DIY years ago. The support issues have been on going for months. This seems like more than just a temporary problem and I do not believe it has anything to do with growth.

For me, I have no other choice but to forfeit the year in advance that I paid. At least I managed to recognize a serious problem before migrating all of my accounts...

NextDog - Simon has already stopped into this thread, provided hope, and then FAILED...at least no one has reported back that he has helped them. I certainly intended to if that had been the case for me...but again, all I got was words and no action.

Well he answered my question with this answer:

That ticket appears to be a billing issue that, as best I can see, has been answered and resolved a number of times. Billing profiles are setup via H-Sphere; if you wish to be on automated billing, you can set this up by responding to the initial 'recurring billing' email sent out at the start. PayPal and direct credit card are the same; you must update your preferences with the actual merchant gateway (see your receipt from 2checkout.com for more info on that.

Please create a new ticket with billing if you have any additional questions.

And my reply to this answer:

Part I
Thanks for your answer. Yes you are correct that the first part of your answer “Billing profiles are setup via H-Sphere” has been answered several times. But the second part which I was asking about “if you wish to be on automated billing, you can set this up by responding to the initial 'recurring billing' email sent out at the start” has not been answered in any of the tickets.
Is it possible to get this email resent?

Part II
About my second question (about payment of a bill) you have not answered it:
About the payment - I paid it the 6. June 2009 according to my credit card statement - and it is still not reflected in your system.

When I originally asked this question I got this response from Eirca: As far as I can tell, you were one month behind on payments, so the due amount is still correct.

I do not think that this is correct. If you still think so please let me know what month you think I paid?

Part III
Suddenly about a month ago (approx) I started to get messages from siteuptime.com that some of my sites using SSL was down (only for short periods). Before that they have been rock stable. Your response was that it was siteuptime who had become less reliable. Therefore I have set up a monitoring service with another company and they also tells me sometimes that the server is down (error 500)
Might there be an issue with one of the SSL servers?

I didn't get any answer to my reply.

I really hope that the problems is going to be solved - I'm not experiencing that the SSL servers are down so often any more - and about a month ago they answered a ticket I sent to the billing department - so perhaps it is already beginning to be solved. :-)

By the way - am I the only one who cannot see the benifits of the Genius Portal ?

Unfortunately looks like growth wasn't handled all that well.

I did try to check out this Genius Network and two antivirus progs detect the following link:

http://weblog.eirca.net/2009/04/24/the-genius-network/

As being infected with:

HTML:Iframe-inf

The only iframe I see on this page is about the stats. When i try to browse the site, google gives this report:
http://safebrowsing.clients.google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?client=Firefox&hl=en-US&site=http://74.222.134.170/stats.php?id=2

I am experiencing almost all problems mentioned in this thread for months now.
The worst is that the several problems, migrations, lack or delays in responses are begining to make my clients go away from my service.

Looks like something is going wrong, something is changing, I also recall DIY selling.

I have tickets opened for three days, in the meantime, waiting for an answer I migrated to another provider.

To those who say why don't we migrate instead of complain or post, what you should know is that having 50 or more domains with one provider and moving all sites to another is not a 1 or 2 days job. Is very complex, time consumina and seriously afect company image.

I think that the problem here is that we are probably wrong trusting a one man's company, we should have to move our business to serious companies.

From: http://www.eirca.net/media/news/2009/eirca-announces-acting-ceo-and-splitsale.php

Shelburne, Nova Scotia - September 1st, 2009 - EIRCA Ltd, the multi-platform managed web hosting service provider, has announced that Callum Donaghie has been appointed temporary CEO of the company as a result of a Toronto based private investment group purchasing fourty nine percent of the company.

Current CEO, Simon O'Rourke, will return to his position as CEO on January 4th, 2010 after taking extended leave from the company.

"The sale of 49% of the company is a measured step for EIRCA to establish the company as a major player in the shared and dedicated server markets," commented O'Rourke. "The company has been something of a victim of its own success and in order to re-establish ourselves at the top of the SMB sector, we decided to accept the sizeable offer made by our new partners and re-invest heavily in to the company's future."

With the current activity at the company, Mark Scheaffer has been appointed permanent president of EIRCA Ltd after heading the project of investing in the company, commenting that "our investment in EIRCA at the start of '09 was something we were desperate to make official after seeing how well the company was operated and how much potential for growth the company has. We acknowledge that our clients will see this as potentially disruptive but it could not be any more the opposite."

"EIRCA will still be primarily owned by Mr. O'Rourke and Mr. O'Rourke will still have complete control over the general direction of the company upon his return in January," stated Scheaffer. "Simon has appointed his long time colleague, Mr. Donaghie, as acting CEO until he returns to the company after spending time with his pregnant wife, who is expecting identical twin girls in five weeks and we want to make it abundantly clear that no changes will be made at datacenter or hardware level. We will continue to be partnered with Softlayer Technologies and continue to offer Parallels products."

As a result of Scheaffer's appointment, EIRCA has parted ways with three support staff members and a new team of nine support staff, including four MCSE's (Microsoft Certified Systems Engineers) has been introduced effective September 2nd, 2009.

If you have any questions about that announcement, Xana, please follow the instructions in the email sent to you and all other clients this morning or create a separate thread here for discussion, as it has nothing to do with any support issues anyone may have had, except that such issues will now be a thing of the past.

For the person who said we were struggling with handling our massive growth: I both agree and disagree. Our growth has been massive in the last year, which had put a strain on some parts of the day support wise, but our growth has also been a result of eight years of sterling support since the company's inception and, with this announcement, we expect now to be able to grow even more and have a much bigger and broader support team to handle any issues that may arise.


Thanks,
Simon

If you have any questions about that announcement, Xana, please follow the instructions in the email sent to you and all other clients this morning or create a separate thread here for discussion, as it has nothing to do with any support issues anyone may have had, except that such issues will now be a thing of the past.

I don't have any questions about the announcement. But I certainly think it is of interest to this thread.

I don't have any questions about the announcement. But I certainly think it is of interest to this thread.
It has absolutely nothing to do with this thread. You are, of course, still free to discuss it where you wish in order to serve whatever objective you have.


Simon

Sounds like Erica has experienced some good growth. It's always an issue when a service grows so quickly and the whole setup becomes more complex. Give them a break guys and wait for things to settle down.

Why are so many people so quick to first believe this is due to growth and second defend a pattern of bad service?

My issue has gone unaddressed for FOUR MONTHS!! How much longer should I "give them a break"!?

I read the statement this way - Business was not going well so we looked for an investor to help prop the company up. The investor took a look at the operation and saw potential but said changes would need to happen in order to receive his cash. The result is Simon needs a sabbatical while the operation is put back in order (I mean come on - blaming it on having twins? I work next to a guy who just had twins, premature even - only took 1 week off from work - and he still logged in frequently to take care of stuff).

Notice also how Simon did not offer any hope to people with outstanding issues? A lot of those issues were billing related...adding a new crew of admins will not help that.

Why are so many people so quick to first believe this is due to growth and second defend a pattern of bad service?

The company's history will have this effect on people. It had the same effect on you as well, or you wouldn't have stuck with them for so long. So, don't judge people too harshly. :)

The way I see it is that Simon was the managerial genius and motivational driving factor behind the company. For whatever reasons, for a while now, he probably wasn't as involved in the company as he once was. Now that he's leaving (temporarily) the faith in the company's future must be placed on the new individuals that take on his responsibilities. I'd do my research on them, and stay or take my business to somewhere I feel safer.

It's as simple, or as complicated as that.

(I mean come on - blaming it on having twins? I work next to a guy who just had twins, premature even - only took 1 week off from work - and he still logged in frequently to take care of stuff).

We're not all the same. Priorities differ from one person to the next. His 100% involvement may not be needed, but he may want to be 100% involved. He's making his personal decisions unilaterally; customers can make their business decisions the same way.

I have been watching this thread and so now is the time to actually post my thoughts.

Yes, Eirca has had issues regarding support response the last 3 months for me too. I have had such issues of days without response here and there and tickets closing without response. As a customer with a 4 server hsphere cluster for the last 2 years it is concerning. However, the large majority of major type issues I have had in all fairness to Eirca was because of the hsphere 3.1 panel release. THat is Parallel's issues - not Ericas. (Everyone with hsphere 3,1 with issues galore.....just go to ver 3.3.)
Other then that the last 2 years have been good until recently. I gave the benefit of the doubt for 3 months as Simon stated on the Eirca site the growth is causing support issues that he wants fixed prior to his leave of abscence in Sept. (YES he announced that quite a while ago - before the announcement Sept 1st.It's on the Eira site) I been there and can understand this as a company in the hosting biz since 1996.

I would remind everyone that during the time of trying to improve the support system, the new genius network etc, Eirca suffered a great loss of one of their main team members in a tragic car accident, and lifelong friend of Simon at that. It can take some time to not only get over the loss but to recover business wise and find a person with the same skills, competence and trust.

userBeavis said . "I read the statement this way - Business was not going well so we looked for an investor to help prop the company up".

Whether that is the case, or not, I cannot say. I also after reading the announcement thought the very same thing though. Maybe it is the way the wording of announcement was topped with the announcement of Simon taking off for a while. One thing I have found is that Simon is a pretty straight up and professional guy. Of course, I cannot talk to him anymore it seems because phone suport is gone. (grr)

That said, Simon is not just having twins,, there is more to that story that I will not say as it may be more personal in nature (no, I do not know Simon that well personally.. just heard in a conversation with him once a while back.) And I expected this length of time off would be likely due the circumstances and I wish him well in that regard. So please, let's keep it professional and not personal in regard to the timing of his leave of abscence. It has nothing to do with the 49% sale in my opinion.
Believe me that I am not disagreeing with much of the comments here regarding support issue response times, tickets closing without response, no more phones, no chat working etc etc. I am/was pretty upset over some of these things professionally speaking. And I have given Simon my opinion on that as a customer instead of venting here on the forums as a professional courtesy. Not sure if he read the ticket though as I have not heard back for some reason? Given the announcement yesterday I give him the benefit of the doubt as he is probably just too busy to reply yet. I do hope to get a reply though.

Regardless, if they got an investor coming in and they add support members and dumped the "not so good" support members I for one will be glad! I see nothing wrong with this as long as the investor wants to make improvements too. And why wouldn't he.. he is investing in the success of the company either way.
I merged my company in the last year fro the betterment of my customers being a one man show, and we are growing fast as well. But now I have more resources and staff to handle it. So having an investor come in is not necessarily a bad thing.

I can say, that yesterday my support response was quicker then I had seen in the past 3 months and also more professional response. I am hoping that the issue of response times will now settle down and get back to business.

--->>>>>> But they gotta get phones back! (hint hint Eirca)

QuietCalm

Why are so many people so quick to first believe this is due to growth and second defend a pattern of bad service?
Quite frankly, your opinion is your own and you are welcome to it (it's like back-sides, right?) EIRCA is now a massive company compared to 3-4 years ago, more than my previous staff could handle, as has been said in public many times. We needed money, big money, to be able to do what we wanted. What we wanted to do was make ourselves what many of our clients already believe us to be: the most dynamic company in our catchment range; to take our support staff from 12 to 20; to take our reach from 98 countries to 140+. This partnership will guarantee that we can do that.

It would be remiss of me to say that their was no personal side to this. I'll admit that I also liked the idea of a substantial payout with the option of four months off of work to spend with my wife while she gives birth to my second and third children. Terrible, I know. Business is about two things: money and customer satisfaction. If we have spent 8+ years providing the second of those two, I believe I am entitled to the former, whetehrr you agree or not (rhetorical, I know you have stalked EIRCA posts for four years. Touche.)

The result is Simon needs a sabbatical while the operation is put back in order (I mean come on - blaming it on having twins? I work next to a guy who just had twins, premature even - only took 1 week off from work - and he still logged in frequently to take care of stuff).
OK, your previous greviances aside, I actually care about my wife. She is having identical twin MoMo girls (go ahead, look it up and realise your "jerkiness"; Monoamniotic Monochorionic twins)and I'll be damned if I'll let her handle that on her own. Call me a "modern man" or whatever you'd like, but I am going to actually enjoy my time off with my new twin miracles. How horrid of me. Shame on me, thrice.

Do not dare to suggest that I am "blaming" it on anything. I am taking this time off for one reason: I want to. "Selfish", "terrible", rational, take your pick of the three adjectives, I know which one I'd choose.

Here's a little tidbit for you, as you seem to "know" so much about my company: We grew 497% last year, we grossed more than 99% of companies in our province, and we own more real estate and assets than everyone of our direct and acknowledged competitors. We try our damndest, sometimes to our own detriment, to tweak our services so it's the best available. sometimes we succeed, sometimes we fail. We're human. What we do know, though, is that our company is very, very strong. strong enough infact for us to accept a seven figure sum for only 49% of our company. That aint bad for a company started by a then 21 year old Dubliner.

If your friend only took a week off for newborn baby girls then that's his choice. Personally, I want to help my wife whenever and wherever possible. I also want to be next to her for the multiple weeks they have to spend in the ICU. See www.simonorourke.com for more information.


Notice also how Simon did not offer any hope to people with outstanding issues? A lot of those issues were billing related...adding a new crew of admins will not help that.
Do you mean aside from me posting in this thread for anyone to contact me, and actually resolving all those issues? Or did you mean the fact that I including it in my portion of the press release? Answers on a post card, buddy, you're just trolling. You have been for four years.

You need to get over your greviances. I am sure they were our fault; I apologise. Now please move on, it's been over four years.

Simon

By the way, to confirm my evil genius status, I started planning this "excuse" back in June when my wife and I were told we were having the rarest form of twins in existence: http://www.simonorourke.com/category/the-twins/

Simon

(rhetorical, I know you have stalked EIRCA posts for four years. Touche.)

What the heck are you talking about? Anyone here can view my posts and see this is false.


Do you mean aside from me posting in this thread for anyone to contact me, and actually resolving all those issues?

Its when you outright lie that people get angry an post rude comments. After I responded to you with my ticket number as requested...nothing happened and my ticket was closed again.


You need to get over your greviances.

Easy - solve my issue and I'll gladly post that you did.


Ironically, I was feeling bad about my post this morning as I should not have made it personal...and for that I apologize. I was considering posting a follow up reply as I should know better than to let my anger get the best of me. But I had a simple issue that needed only a simple resolution - "close my account and provide a refund". If you would have responded to this request months ago you wouldn't even see me here. Its bragging press releases and follow up comments that re-piss me off (realize your "jerkiness"). I think somewhere in your "seven figures" you can come up with at least a portion of the three figures that I gave your company in May.

userBeavis, you perplex me. As ldcdc said,
The company's history will have this effect on people. It had the same effect on you as well, or you wouldn't have stuck with them for so long.
You were a DIY customer. And after the sale of DIY, in spite of the negative posts you made, you still then reordered with eirca for another 3 years. If you are so (apparently) unhappy with Simon after DIY, why in the world would you order hosting from Eirca and still be with them for 3 years? Make no sense whatsoever.

IMO, you are just someone who loves to bitch in a public forum, and loves the sound of his own voice.

Just my take on this.

Vito

userBeavis, you perplex me. As ldcdc said,

You were a DIY customer. And after the sale of DIY, in spite of the negative posts you made, you still then reordered with eirca for another 3 years. If you are so (apparently) unhappy with Simon after DIY, why in the world would you order hosting from Eirca and still be with them for 3 years? Make no sense whatsoever.

IMO, you are just someone who loves to bitch in a public forum, and loves the sound of his own voice.

Just my take on this.

Vito

Where the hell are you people getting this? First Simon calls me a troll and then you provide your unnecessary review of the situation with completely inaccurate information that anyone here can verify as false (that makes you a troll - 10k plus posts on this board - Who loves the sound of his own voice?). Until this thread I had around 20 post to WHT in FIVE YEARS!?

I only became an EIRCA customer in May of this year in which I asked for a cancellation and a refund within the first month. I have yet to receive any response to my request for a refund. I paid a year in advance because I believed EIRCA to be a solid company based on my previous experience years ago with DIY. I tried every conceivable way to handle this directly with EIRCA (phone, ticket, email, patients). My postings in this thread are primarily buyer beware in nature; however, if Simon would like to actually solve my issue I would be more than happy to post back that he did.

Simon, I commend you on being dedicated to your family. You are very fortunate to have the financial standing to be able to take so much time away from work. Most of us are not that fortunate. You have $$$ of my money that I could use for my family (yes I have a family and a new baby as well). I do not make money hosting; in fact, I just do it as a hobby to help out friends, bands and family. Most years I don't even break even. But this year I am faced with having to double and triple spend on hosting because I made the mistake of putting my faith in your company. Do the right thing.

Best of luck with your growing family Simon... an exciting time for you! There are times when "business" has to take a back seat to more important matters, and this is certainly one of those times. I can't say I'd do anything different than you're doing.

I understand your frustration userBeavis, and I hope you get your issue resolved. But I think I would shelve the personal attacks and just keep things on a business/professional level.

For the record, this is not personal, this is business.

Simon made his decissons and we can take our own the same way.

Given the fact that the company was sold, again, no matter the %, it was sold, I decided not to trust Eirca anymore and move my business to diffrent providers.

I am currenly client of JodoHost, Cartika and Sphere webhosting, so far they are giving me better support, 24/7 real chat and ticket support and hope ( in the future, because I am new at Cartika and Sphere ) also more technical stability and peace of mind regarding where is the company going.

I had so many problems and headeaches with Eirca that I realy don't won't to remember them anymore. Probably Simon or his people don't see this that way, but trust me, I have had it.

Regarding why stay or choose again after DIY fiasco, I realy think that you have to give people and companies second chances, or more, but this is like a marriage, when the trust is broken, it very difficult to restore it.

I just post this to give my personal feelings and opinion, WHT helped me a lot in my comercial decissions, perhaps this can help somebody to make his or her mind in selecting a hosting company, which in reseller company case the provider is more than only a provider, it should be a business partner ande help and colaborate all the way, shoulder to shoulder along the way.

Luis

The problem with us is we cannot just jump ship. We have over 100 websites hosted with Eirca. Clients with many email accounts, databases that would need to be set up again.. It would take us weeks to move elsehwere. We wanted to stick with a local company as we are in Nova Scotia as well. The service has been sub par all summer long. No replies to tickets, tickets being closed with out being looked at. Our clients are more than ticked off with us, to say the least. It is effecting our company and our business and we fell trapped. What happend to the 9 new techs that were supposed to replace the ones not doing a good job? Are they working yet?

We are begging for a little help here. 15 or more serious tickets closed with out being looked at is effecting how our clients see us as well. Mail issues, php issues that we need techs to help us with. If you are inundated and cant cope just tel us! The silence only stirs our fears of being abandoned. We all pay our hosting yet do not get the service we have paid for.

I am at least glad to know it is not just US who is experiencing this issue, but sad to hear also that it is a global issue with Eirca. How about an email to explain the lack of help? When you do a Google search all you read is how you are the head of Support for a company. NOT this summer you arent.

A little help here!


Tickets unanswered since Fri Sept 11th (the rest are gone/ deleted with out help)

Date Subject Status Urgency

15/09/2009 09:16 #643099 - new domain set up
Open High
15/09/2009 06:34 #427614 - account
Open Medium
15/09/2009 06:31 #870120 - account
Open Medium
13/09/2009 07:57 #714386 - address book
Open Medium
11/09/2009 09:10 #315200 - account
Open High

What company did you go to? We are looking in to switching all 120 to Cartika. It wont take a weekend though. Between hundreds of client webmail accounts and data bases, shopping carts this will take us month.. but we are bailing finally. Since I last wrote we had 7 more tickets close with no response. Got all our sites hacked by some Islamic org and tried to get help and were told "You were not hacked" ya ok, so the red page with a guy holding a gun on all my sites was me? sure, that makes sense. Took an entire night with no sleep to fix it ourselves to get up at 10am next morning after 4 hours sleep to find it happened again.. BUT We were not hacked they said.
No mail support help yet again.. No sense hashing it over and over. It wont change no matter how bought 49% of it. The company sucks. I put in 3 sales support tickets to change our account and no replies there.. They can't be taking in new customers can they?
What a way to ruin a good Canadian company.

Adios to them

For any one reading this thread for research into EIRCA.net as a potential host you may be interested to follow my thread in in the Reseller Hosting category called "EIRCA new applicant experience". Sorry, I am a new member to WHT and can't post links, yet.

Since I wrote my original thread they still never replied to a single trouble ticket. Can't set up new domains, cant get help with a PHP issue. Can't get help with a cart feature. We went to Cartika and WOW is the service ever amazing. ANyone using HSphere and likes it the switch to Cartika is smooth.
We will take the next few weeks and transfer every one over.

SOOOO Long Eirca. I'm sure it is going in the toilet fast.

Yeah, they really took a nosedive starting last year. It's all but over for them. I gave up even talking to them and I'm looking to move in October.

Maybe when they lose enough customers they'll finally do something about it. Or just throw in the towel and go under.

Since I wrote my original thread they still never replied to a single trouble ticket. Can't set up new domains, cant get help with a PHP issue. Can't get help with a cart feature. We went to Cartika and WOW is the service ever amazing. ANyone using HSphere and likes it the switch to Cartika is smooth.
We will take the next few weeks and transfer every one over.

SOOOO Long Eirca. I'm sure it is going in the toilet fast.
Edit: Nevermind, found the ticket number in a previous page. Good luck with your future provider, Rose_Zinck. I can discuss with you in private a remedy to any issues you may have that need resolving, should you wish. If you have any outstanding balances prior to your move, please contact me to get that wiped before you move so it doesn't cost you more than it should.

Simon

We've been with Eirca for over 3 years... sorry... was with them until last week.
And what domain did you have with them until last week?

please contact me to get that wiped before you move so it doesn't cost you more than it should.

Simon

I'm still waiting for you to do the same for me... going on 4mo now.

I'm still waiting for you to do the same for me... going on 4mo now.
I know I had it my pm box but that's cleared now, ran out of space. Can you send me your old client ID or ticket number via PM?

Just as an aside: what I offered in this thread is not part of our offering, it's not something that any staff member would just approve, credits or the like, but I am willing to take a look at any single issue for merit.

Thanks,
Simon

Wow..well what can I say. Simon resolved my billing issue...even provided a credit beyond what I had anticipated. Perhaps there is a new spark of hope for those with outstanding issues.

Excellent news.... glad you got your issue sorted out :)

yeah, make a request ticket to solved your problem. and hope their staff will be response your problem ASAP

Hi,

Anyone here still with eirca? I issued a trouble ticket this morning and no response until now. Is has been 13 hours. My website and all ASP.NET code no longer working since yesterday. :(

thanks for your info :)

I have been watching this thread and I feel is the time to post my thoughts and experiences. I’d wish I could say I am surprised to hear all these issues with Eirca lately.

I’ve been with Eirca 3 years, but with firsthand experience, it’s been a very frustrating 5 months of issues that keep going on and appear to be getting worse. There’s a breaking point. It is very concerning. Patience can only go far when you start losing customers and you listen to customers complains (and your clients have to listen to their client’s complains) on a weekly basis on how their business is negatively affected because their web presence is becoming unreliable and unstable, especially when it’s the same issue occurring over & over.

I can go on in much detail about the past 5 months of negative incidents: the MSSQL migration fiasco in June (which lost us a client and had 3 others offline for days). I can go on about numerous tickets with no responses (auto close after 120h), tickets immediately closing out tickets without answer or notification, even tickets to sales and management go unanswered. Now there’s no more phone support, and the online chat thingie never works, SiteUpTime stats never post. Last week there was an issue with the Genius portal being offline for an afternoon due to a mySQL issue affecting some of our websites. (Scary to know there was NO means to communicate!)

Occasional issues: expected
Reoccurring issues: bad
Pulling tech support teeth for solutions: really, really bad

Now: ongoing email issues that are occurring every Thursday morning for FIVE WEEKS IN A ROW, for at least 20+ hrs of email downtime, where inbound & outbound emails were completely lost (not even queued up for later delivery, just complete lost). And how does it keep reoccurring the same time every week?? Does this not affect anyone else? Every Thursday around 5AM, the situation starts and by 10AM the server is either extremely slow or simply stops responding or processing. It’s like clockwork and we’ve come to expect it. And yes, yesterday (Thursday) it happened yet again, and it continued into this morning (Friday). And I keep insisting the mail server is still not operating properly, but you know, deaf ears.

One week they tell me it’s a network routing issues. Another week it’s a flood of traffic issues. They tell me it’s a bizarre coincidence it occurs Thursday morns. (Really? 5 wks in a row! Coincidences don’t happen 5 times in a row!) Now they are insistent on telling me it’s my ISP that is at fault. Really? Some 8 clients located throughout the country are complaining the past 2 days. Even direct access to Horde proved problematic. (Really, web browser access has what to do with my ISP?) And several independent monitoring services all show some sort of issue. (Again, that has what to do with my ISP?)

Knowing this issues are reoccurring, I wanted to make sure I can rule out other possible issues, seemed the logical thing to do to try and take care of my clients. I set up increased monitoring with such providers as Panopta, Site24x7, and SiteUpTime. (Sheesh, I’m paying more for monitoring than for the hosting charges just to track this!) After 3 Thursdays of these issues, I’ve supplied detailed info to tech support, documented much of this, trying to looking for some sort of solution, trying to work with tech support, supplied them with data from the monitoring services, even offered them direct access so they can have a look themselves. All 3 monitoring services show Thursday problems with the email server and with NS1 & NS2. Thursday morning like clockwork! The other days, whistling Dixie, so there’s a benchmark to work with. I’ve even gong the length of monitoring HSphere’s IPs to rule out possibility of domain resolution issues with our domains. I’ve been working in this field for 10+ years and I am confident to say my experience is well above average and that there’s a big difference between an ISP issue (which would directly affect myself) and a server or networking issue affecting a group of organizations and/or servers. Really, a lot of effort and detail here…

But yet, the past two days, email services are severely disrupted for all the hosting accounts under our realm, for the 5th week in a row.

Sure I can understand growing pains, etc., etc. But when communication because a frustrating struggle, it makes for a bad story. Sadly, I’ve read many bad stories of similar incidents on several threads posted the past several weeks. And for one story, I know there are 9 other stories that go untold.

Being a long time client of Eirca, my intention here is not to badmouth Eirca. (Definitely isn’t meant to be a personal attack at someone. This is a business oriented conversation! A bit disappointed to read the personal attacks.)

I no longer feel this is isolated to one or 2 bad experiences. Something’s going on and I’m hoping this isn’t the new Eirca, yet sadly it appears to be where it’s headed. The confidence level is dropping, dropping, dropping very fast, and several long time clients are threatening to leave our organization, forcing a decision on our end to leave Erica as well. Simon, I am sure you are reading here. Disappointing I have to use such a means to communicated. Trying to give it a chance and stick it out can last so long when the trust is broken. After awhile you start to give up hope when hope is given up by our clients. There’s much less to stick out once we start losing clients.

Yet all we’ve been looking for is a conversation and solution to resolve ongoing issues.

Tom