Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Web Hosting : What can i do if my host becomes unreachable?

[chillax]

hi there...

i have a server from a layeredtech reseller and i have been informed by one of their customer relation managers:
This message is to notify you that your ticket has been updated.

Ticket ID: 1936015-4201031339

Last Post:
----------------------------------
The head-quarters internet line went out because the whole city is having issues. As soon as it goes back up one of the techs will assist you. Sorry for the inconvience.


Xxxxx Xxxxx
Director of Customer Relations

The reason why the line went out is a severe storm. Since they are totally localised (as in they dont have techs located around the world) there is no way i can contact them.

i dint care till the time my server was fine. then day before yesterday my server went down. i (needlessly) opened a ticket with my reseller and (as expected) it went unanswered.
then, i decided to contact layeredtech directly and see what if they respond.

i was pleasently surprised to have the issue resolved within minutes! layeredtech support was responsive even though i was not their direct client. but the server went down again yesterday, i contacted LT again... they said:
Hello,


The power supply on your server had failed so I replaced this, however, upon reboot of the machine, I am unable to get response from ping or ssh requests. in order to escalate this ticket, your reseller will need to contact our support team. Thank you.

Now i am waiting for my reseller to get back online... its been more than a day already and may be this 'downtime' will exceed a week (NOOOO!!!!!!!!)

what can i do in such a situation?

[Patrick]

Hopefully your downtime doesn't exceed a week, let alone more then a day because that's already really pushing it... but I think the only option you have is to wait for your reseller.

[chillax]

now i know why they cover this point in TOS!
"uptime guarantee... bla bla... except circumstances beyond our control... bla bla..."

quick update: the reseller is OFF since march 2nd... i wonder what a mighty storm it was...

[WireNine]

Do you have a backup of your data so incase you have to move you can do it without having to redo everything?

If not, ask LT to help you recover your files, hopefully they will be able to help you with this.

Looks like the reseller has run away.

[net-trend]

Originally Posted by WN-Ali

Looks like the reseller has run away.

That's jumping the gun, wouldn't you say? At the same time, I doubt LT will release the files to him as he isn't their direct client.

[chillax]

OMG... never thought of my reseller running away...

i dont have a backup of all files (though i have the sql DBs backed up) ..

[David]

Originally Posted by chillax

OMG... never thought of my reseller running away...

i dont have a backup of all files (though i have the sql DBs backed up) ..

Chillax,

Middlemen can become a hassle quite quickly as you can see.
The good side of this is you can 'most likely' contact layeredtech again and see if you can become the direct contact for your server.

While it's not something they'd normally do, I'm certain in this case they'd hate to see you continue to incur further downtime.

Note: The above is only if it's 100% dedicated to you, if it's shared I'd say you're out of luck until the reseller responds.

[DDT]

Ah...the problems with resellers.
Many are good, don't take me wrong, but all you have to do is look at the ads here and you can see many make it sound like anybody can get rich quick with a reseller account.
Thus the % of those with issues like you have or those that just disappear or quit without notice taking people's money with them, (or get hooked up with a bad reseller provider and get burned themselves).
That's the main reason we don't offer reseller accounts. We couldn't screen everyone who got one and if they turned out to be a "bad apple" their customers would be looking to us for help which depending on the situation we might or might not be able to provide.
At least in your case it sounds like LT is trying to be helpful. That's a lot better than many of the horror stories we see here.

[chillax]

Originally Posted by David

Chillax,

Middlemen can become a hassle quite quickly as you can see.
The good side of this is you can 'most likely' contact layeredtech again and see if you can become the direct contact for your server.

While it's not something they'd normally do, I'm certain in this case they'd hate to see you continue to incur further downtime.

Note: The above is only if it's 100% dedicated to you, if it's shared I'd say you're out of luck until the reseller responds.

ummm on second thoughts (and 10 second research) i feel the reseller is reliable (if not reputed) so he might not have run-away.
A whois on his site tells me the domain is registered from past five years.. SSL is still valid for another 280 days..

As for what you say, i CAN NOT become a direct contact for LT.. i dont know anything about managing a server may be i have to wait for some more time and then look for some professional server mgmt and try to convince LT for making me a direct contact.
Yea, the server is 100% dedicated to me.

[DLee]

Regarding the OP, you might want to wait for this "entire city" thing to calm down before looking thinking about moving. Give them the benefit of the doubt... most complaints of hosts involve not even getting a reason for being down.

But...

Hello,


The power supply on your server had failed so I replaced this, however, upon reboot of the machine, I am unable to get response from ping or ssh requests. in order to escalate this ticket, your reseller will need to contact our support team. Thank you.

NO redundancy? Ouch...

Good Luck!

[chillax]

Give them the benefit of the doubt...

thats what i am doing

but its costing me dollars...

PS: emailed LT

[chillax]

sorry for consecutive posts.
Got a reply from LT:

Thank you for your recent Layered Tech Sales inquiry. I am very sorry but at this time, we will not be transferring any servers from XXXXXX. For more information please correspond with XXXXXX himself.

and thats the irony! i cant contact him even if i want to... so its official now.. i HAVE to wait and its turning out to be a LONGGG wait ...

anyone else had a similar experience ever?

[chillax]

i had to bump this one since i cant even contact layeredtech...
----
The original message was received at Fri, 24 Mar 2006 07:22:20 -0600 (CST)
from mail.layeredtech.com [216.39.90.80]

----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -----
"|/usr/local/sbin/cerberus /usr/local/etc/config.xml FATAL /var/log/cerberus.log"
(reason: Internal error)
(expanded from: <sales@support.layeredtech.com>)

----- Transcript of session follows -----
554 5.3.0 Internal error


Final-Recipient: RFC822; sales@support.layeredtech.com
X-Actual-Recipient: X-Unix; |/usr/local/sbin/cerberus /usr/local/etc/config.xml FATAL /var/log/cerberus.log
Action: failed
Status: 5.5.0
Diagnostic-Code: X-Unix; 70
Last-Attempt-Date: Fri, 24 Mar 2006 07:22:21 -0600 (CST)



---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To: "Sales Related Requests" <info@layeredtech.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Mar 2006 18:52:13 +0530
Subject: Re: [LTSALES #DHT-82810-168]: plz read
i hope the server is not suspended yet.

IP: 72.232.20.82

How long do you plan to wait for xxx xxxx to respond, before handing over the server directly to me.
Site downtime has been over 2 weeks now.

regards
--------------------------


how can i get someone from LT to reply here ::??

[twhnman]

Lol, get the heck out of there, set something up somewhere else. A weeks downtime!? Was this city Atlantis? You're getting a line of bull.... my 2Cents

[rois]

Originally Posted by twhnman

Lol, get the heck out of there, set something up somewhere else. A weeks downtime!? Was this city Atlantis? You're getting a line of bull.... my 2Cents

He would get the heck out if he could but the problem is that he is unable to gain access to his server.

So either get out without any data, except the few db's he has backed up or wait till his reseller decides to come back online.