The Move…

After many (many many) problems with “I power web”, I finally moved to better hosting (hopefully). The move itself was not an easy one. I was with my previous host for nearly 4 years, and haven’t received any real problems. It’s a small personal website for pictures and a blog, and it shouldn’t really receive any technical problems. That was until this year.

They had been receiving system failures starting around May, and many customers were left in the dark about the situation. It would of been nice to see some sort of news about it on their website or (at least) an email. The only email I received was the yearly renewal message telling me that it will automatically renew my domain with them. I even called, making sure my they used my new credit card # and billing information was up to date. The billing guy assured me that everything will be updated automatically (should of gotten his name). After I made the call, I received an email saying that all my info was updated and my domain name was renewed. Everything looked fine and dandy. Boy, that was a big mistake!

A few days after the expiration date, my domain updated for another year, but my website was still acting funky. I couldn’t even ftp and database would not connect. So, I called customer service again, and I found out that they did not update my billing information. ARGGGGGGGG!!!! The customer service guy (again should of wrote down his name) said this was probably the reason why my website wasn’t working. So he pushed me along to billing to solve the matter. Then guess what happened… When I finally got connected to billing…”I’m sorry the billing office is closed. Bla, bla, bla!” This was the weekend, so I figured I’d wait until Monday.

Monday comes along and I contacted billing. I found out from Adrian, that my domain was owned by Michele Something-or-other and that my contact information was completely wrong. Excuse me… Did I just hear that right? I made sure that she typed the domain correctly. She said yes and then asked for the last four numbers of my old credit card number. I told her to hold on since I had to look for the old credit card number. Ok, bad move on my part… Well needless to say, the bitch hung up. Now granted my voice was sounding rather bitchy at the time I found out that Michele Somethingorother owns my domain. Yet, I have every right to sound bitchy! Right?

A half a Cadbury bar later, I calmed down. I realized the woman didn’t have a clue what she was talking about because I can still manage my domain at the opensrs.net website. All my information was intact. Talked to Jeff this time. I hold him what had happened and that I was one unhappy customer. He apologized and looked up my info. It appears that my domain renewed, but the hosting was not. Now I distinctly remember being told that my hosting was renewed and that all my credit card/email information was updated. Sadly, it wasn’t. At this point, I did not want another year hosting, but Jeff managed to convince me to give it another go. After that conversation, every thing was fine. My databases were working and I can ftp. Yay! Yet, I still felt uneasy about the whole thing. So that very day I transfered my domain name to godaddy.

Couple days later, I received the bill and found they charged me for two years worth of hosting. What the…I’m on the year subscription. My call to James was not pleasant. He tried to persuade me to reconsider. Hell no! I want my money back!. Seeing that it was futile to convince me otherwise, he complied. Forty-eight hours later, I see that they return the credit to my card in the full amount. I guess I’m fortunate that I got a full refund because from what I read from some web hosting forums, most people never got their money back. Applause for James for actually doing his job right.

So now I’m at host gator. I signed on for the three months of hosting. Iif all goes well, then I will sign on for a year. As for ipowerweb, I’m sad that the company has gone down hill. They offered a good deal with many options, but their incompetent customer service was what probably led to their down fall.