I'm sure anyone here that has reseller services has fallen into this situation before.

You have a reseller client who doesnt pay his bill, has had his account susspended, shows no intent to pay and has basicly told you its not going to be paid because they have lost interest. They have people who have purchased hosting services from them and are now out a host (mind you, only 4 or 5 accounts). Does anyone see it as being moraly wrong telling them the situation and offering them the ability to make a seemless transition over to your complany located on the same server seing as though you sold the reseller account to their provider to being with?

Only if the clients contact you some way.
You should never contact his clients they are his he has the right to sell them or move them or lose them.

You can ask the reseller if he intends on keeping them or if is OK with you offering to continue their service but unless he says yes they are not your clients.

Only if the clients contact you some way.
You should never contact his clients they are his he has the right to sell them or move them or lose them.

You can ask the reseller if he intends on keeping them or if is OK with you offering to continue their service but unless he says yes they are not your clients.

Excelent point. I dont feel so bad now.

As a client of the reseller I would much prefer the upstream provider contacted me & offer a seamless transfer than have my site suspended for no fault of mine. It doesn't matter a damn to the end client about normal protocols. The main thing they care about is their site & it not being affected.

As a client of the reseller I would much prefer the upstream provider contacted me & offer a seamless transfer than have my site suspended for no fault of mine. It doesn't matter a damn to the end client about normal protocols. The main thing they care about is their site & it not being affected.

If all there was to be concerned with is the end user you are correct.
But the provider has a reputation first and for most to maintain. He does not want to be known as a customer stealer. Second the reseller has potential legal recourse against him for stealing his clients and lost income.

Even if he did not pay the bill and it was suspended he could claim he was unhappy and moving clients when the provider swooped in and stole his clients.

Not a good place to go.

If all there was to be concerned with is the end user you are correct.
But the provider has a reputation first and for most to maintain. He does not want to be known as a customer stealer. Second the reseller has potential legal recourse against him for stealing his clients and lost income.

Even if he did not pay the bill and it was suspended he could claim he was unhappy and moving clients when the provider swooped in and stole his clients.

Not a good place to go.

I see your points, but given the circumstances (from a customer view) I would prefer someone deal with the immediate problem & sort the issue using common sense. I doubt the average customer of a reseller cares much & an email saying that their current provider will be closing on such & such a date & offering a seamless transfer would be welcome. They don't have to take up your offer but I would imagine a lot would really appreciate it.

I'm sure anyone here that has reseller services has fallen into this situation before.

You have a reseller client who doesnt pay his bill, has had his account susspended, shows no intent to pay and has basicly told you its not going to be paid because they have lost interest. They have people who have purchased hosting services from them and are now out a host (mind you, only 4 or 5 accounts). Does anyone see it as being moraly wrong telling them the situation and offering them the ability to make a seemless transition over to your complany located on the same server seing as though you sold the reseller account to their provider to being with?

First get the consent from your client to contact his customers as he is moving out of business. Without your clients consent its not ethically correct.

To get the money that your customer owes you can be collected by moving go legally with him and it should not done by stealing his customers. I hope I have put my point across.

Business is a game, where business ethics really matters. I believe that if we do the right things in every sense then one day, God will reward me with success.

Well, It may not be totally wrong but I guess you could say it isnt kosher. it is best to leave it suspended. If your suspended page has a link to your site or support department the clients may contact you which would be best

I would offer the reseller some cash to take the problem off of their hands. Who wouldn't take that over nothing?

I havent touched any of his clients, and dont plan on it. For the time being, I'm just going to leave them as is. The Reseller isnt makeing any contact with us, and has ignored our attempts to contact him for the most part. None of his clients have made contact with us, not even to get their data. Should they try I'll gladly give it to them. I dont think their very active, their bandwidth usage is less than 1000 MB a month and consists of static pages.

What you should do in the future is make sure a provision for this is in your TOS.
Basically that you reserve the right to offer his customers hosting if certain conditions are met (unpaid bill, customers not moved.. etc)

Other than that, I agree that you should not try to take the customers without an OK from your (ex) client.
If you want to feel good about yourself, keep the customers up for a month and let them know the accounts will be suspended due to their upstream no longer being a customer and that they should take all complaints to them.

Does anyone see it as being moraly wrong telling them the situation and offering them the ability to make a seemless transition over to your complany located on the same server seing as though you sold the reseller account to their provider to being with?

Yeah, I see it as a no-no. If you are worried about these customers and buying them from the reseller (or any other understanding) doesn't work out nicely, I'd look for attempts on the end users' part to go to the control panel (supposedly to get their data out). If there are such, I'd reinstate the accounts for a while, to give them a fair chance to get their websites out of there.

I would not establish any kind of contact with the end users on my own.

All of you are wrong.

Go for the money.

Any way you can get it.

Everybody was some one's customer.

Make the dead beat ~ Somebody Else's Problem.

I always do it this way and I don't know how else it could be done.


When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace ~~~~~~~~~~~~ But not today $$$$$$$$$$$$

All of you are wrong.

Go for the money.

Any way you can get it.

Everybody was some one's customer.

Make the dead beat ~ Somebody Else's Problem.

I always do it this way and I don't know how else it could be done.


When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace ~~~~~~~~~~~~ But not today $$$$$$$$$$$$

completely unethical and likely to get you a letter from a lawyer, there are plenty of ways it can be done, all more ethical than that.

If the guys not responding to 'normal' communications,
you might consider sending a reg. letter, along the lines of:

Please contact our office within 1 week to discuss both your reseller account
and your customers.

Failure to reply within said timeframe will be taken as confirmation that:
a. you have withdrawn yourself from your contract with us.
b. you do not wish to provide services / support to your own clients,
but that you will allow us to contact said clients with a view to offering
them a 'rescue service'.

Just my initial thoughts on what is a tricky situation, which you could simply ignore.
I guess ignoring would be the most moral, but least satisfying[to me].

Good Luck

Its not your responsibility to look after the reseller's clients.

Considering that only 1000MB bandwidth is being used collectively, are you sure the accounts are paid clients as such? Might they just be personal sites of the reseller? Just thought I'd throw that consideration into the equation.

Whilst it would be good to save their customers I say stay away from it, they are not your problem.

We've had this in the past, We was in deep discussion with the reseller before he ended the account. We gave him a preview of the email we was sending and we communicated with customers, letting them know their provider was ceasing to trade however as the owners of the hardware their based on, we're pleased to continue the service with 3 months free, and then for us to contact then indevidually to check satisfaction and billing.

Worked for us!! Everyone is happy

This is a great point, and one I never considered.

I'm thinking that if you have a customer who isn't paying, I'd change their email address so they can't retrieve their reseller account password and then change their password so they can't just cut out and run with out paying their bills.

I'd leave his clients up for a month or three while we try to get him to pay up.

And about at this point, I'd have something in my t.o.s. that says we are allowed to contact them if there's no resolution, and offer to bring them on board to be our clients.

As mentioned previously, you should include a clause in your TOS that specifically addresses this situation. (ie: If reseller customer doesn't pay, then you have the right to directly contact the individual website owners...)

Otherwise, I would contact your ex-customer and perhaps offer to purchase their customers from them. Most people like receiving free money.

:)

When i used to do hosting and this situation happened to me. I think that if the host is going to just stop paying. Then yes you are helping their customers by transfuring them. This is because if he lets the account expire. then chances are they wont have backups and they are already going to be upset to its the least thing you can do for them.

This is definitely a no-no situation. Neither should you try to contact his/her clients nor should you do anything to "start" the conversation. Those clients pay the reseller, not you. They are technically not your clients (their his) . A reseller takes your services and pays you a fixed fee (or variable) and brands himself as the owner for the allotment. Though you are liable to their actions (most of the time) you are given sufficient time to remove problems. However, ethically (not just morally) you shouldn't be contacting them to host them. HOWEVER, if they contact you asking you the situation, you can inform them (and should) of the situation. If they ask for options give them that. You may to an extend offer an option (but don't push it). theres a good chance they might complain and bring your company down through the reseller.

BE very careful. Its best to leave alone anything that might backfire and this is a hot cake that might just do the damage though it might look really delicious.

You typically need to wait for the clients to contact you first. Anything else can be morally ambiguous.

-mike

We've had luck with having a reseller communicate their clients and inform them that we'd take over the accounts. Twice this year this they were part time designers so a buyout was the logical conclusion.

As several have stated, contacting your reseller's customers is a definite no-no unless the contact you. Work with your reseller - sounds like they want out anyway.

Other then that the only thing you can really do is to give an additional grace period for the account to allow the reseller's customers to pull their data off. Hopefully the reseller will communicate the need to do so.

Is your reseller using private label nameservers? Is your company listed in the whois? While unlikely you may get contacted that way if you are.

Its not your responsibility to look after the reseller's clients.

For the people who want to "save everyone" (that is, to look after the reseller's clients), that statement can be re-written this way:

Its not your right to look after the reseller's clients.

And about at this point, I'd have something in my t.o.s. that says we are allowed to contact them if there's no resolution, and offer to bring them on board to be our clients.

As mentioned previously, you should include a clause in your TOS that specifically addresses this situation. (ie: If reseller customer doesn't pay, then you have the right to directly contact the individual website owners...)

This is why lawyers will always have a job.

If you contact a customer of your reseller who never agreed to your terms of service and state that their reseller has gone bust and they can continue hosting you 'for a fee' you open your self up for legal action such as extortion/coercion.

That of-course if your client you got in contact with is smart and you are a real company that is worth suing over this matter.

I think the best way of doing this would be to contact your client and ask him if its alright for you to contact his clients. If he is not interested in hosting anymore, the right thing for him to do would be to turn over his clients to you or someone else so nobody loses anything and try to make it a smooth transition.

I think the best way of doing this would be to contact your client and ask him if its alright for you to contact his clients. If he is not interested in hosting anymore, the right thing for him to do would be to turn over his clients to you or someone else so nobody loses anything and try to make it a smooth transition.
It does seem from whats's been said, the 'reseller' is not remotely interested in doing 'the right thing'.
And of course anything the 'provider' does, 'will be the wrong thing'.
For the provider it's a fail fail situation.

If i was in this situation i think id more than likely email the reseller informing them you plan on contacting there clients directly, Give them 7 days notice and time to object, if they dont then proceed to contact the clients.

Obviously this should be listed in your TOS so they know the idea from the word go.

in business there is nothing morally wrong.

Go for it, why would you not. it is simple easy cash.

But, also in business there are law suites so watch out.


Follow these steps
1)Ask if they want to transfer their clients to your host.
2)If no try to buy them for cheap like 5 - 10 dollars a client.
3)If no tell them that his clients may sue him for data loss.
4)refer to step 3.
5)If no tell him that he will be considered fraud and claims will be filled against him if he does not give or sell.
6)If no buy his hosting and then suspended him then sue him.

there you go.

in business there is nothing morally wrong.

Go for it, why would you not. it is simple easy cash.

But, also in business there are law suites so watch out.


Follow these steps
1)Ask if they want to transfer their clients to your host.
2)If no try to buy them for cheap like 5 - 10 dollars a client.
3)If no tell them that his clients may sue him for data loss.
4)refer to step 3.
5)If no tell him that he will be considered fraud and claims will be filled against him if he does not give or sell.
6)If no buy his hosting and then suspended him then sue him.

there you go.Wow, that's an atitude that will endear you to all !
Business without morals, gives serious businesses a bad name.
Cash is a great driving force, but on it's own it will drive any business into an early grave.

I felt sick when I saw unicorn's reply.

I felt sick when I saw unicorn's reply.

I am just telling you this is what business do. WELCOME TO THE REAL WORLD

I am just telling you this is what business do. WELCOME TO THE REAL WORLD
Yeah. In business, showing mercy is suicide.