Account Suspension

It depends on the nature of the account but I would say 30 days with any contact should put most any account into serious delinquency and require suspension. Sadly sometimes it takes being suspended for some clients to notice messages about past due bills.
 
Steadfast Andy said:
Sadly sometimes it takes being suspended for some clients to notice messages about past due bills.
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I agree, we had a client who was always getting suspended because they never paid ontime, but within 1 hr of being suspended they paid the invoice.

i have even had a client complain about out suspended page message (http://delta.niceday-hosting.com/cgi-sys/templatepreview.cgi?template=suspended) which our reply was 'its a true list of reasons and makes clients more likely pay ontime'
 
LampNetworks said:
TBH, I can understand the client view as the page author sounds nauseatingly priggish to me. There are certainly less brusque ways of getting the message over :)
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I find that page very effective, as the reasons are the main ones a site is suspended.
Just think if you have an ecommerce site and you dont pay your bills it gets suspended with a notice saying a reason for suspension may be that the web owner has not paid his bills, then it will make you more inclined to pay the bills rather than have your customers see that message
 
I don't think a suspension page should be designed to embarrass a client into paying. The client probably knows payment is overdue and a simple message stating "Account is not active, if you are the owner of this website, please contact us" would suffice.

Just sayin' :)
 
LampNetworks said:
I don't think a suspension page should be designed to embarrass a client into paying. The client probably knows payment is overdue and a simple message stating "Account is not active, if you are the owner of this website, please contact us" would suffice.

Just sayin' :)
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yes most clients will be aware they are overdue and think their sites will remain online, the point of a suspension page is to embarrass/remind the client his account is overdue and will not be online until he pays, but it also states other reasons the site may be suspended for.
 
LampNetworks said:
I don't think a suspension page should be designed to embarrass a client into paying. The client probably knows payment is overdue and a simple message stating "Account is not active, if you are the owner of this website, please contact us" would suffice.

Just sayin' :)
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easyhostmedia said:
yes most clients will be aware they are overdue and think their sites will remain online, the point of a suspension page is to embarrass/remind the client his account is overdue and will not be online until he pays, but it also states other reasons the site may be suspended for.
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It doesn't really matter how you word it as once the client can see his/her website is no longer loading they're going to either contact you to sort something out or let it terminate itself (though hopefully submit a cancellation request).

Some will make it sound a little more friendly, some will have a bold suspended page and some will simply leave the default cPanel (which is a bold suspended page). All will do the same job ;).
 
Honestly, I would love to be a lot more flexible with our clients, but unfortunately our current suspension policy was built out of necessity as opposed to desire. We used to provide clients extended periods of time after the due date to submit payment before we proceeded with suspending their account, but unfortunately in the niche we primarily operate we found clients would take advantage of our grace period to the fullest extent.

The abuse of our grace period became so rampant that we were forced to crack down to the point where we provide no grace period at all. We regularly had clients waiting out our 10 day grace period, getting suspended and then ordering a new account just so they could receive the 10 days of service free of charge.

We always work with our clients though, if a client notifies us in advance they need extra time we will go the extra mile (or 5 miles) to make sure they have all the time they need to square away their account.

Necessity over desire, you get enough abusive clients and you end up hurting the honest ones unfortunately.
 
At least send 3 reminders before and after due date.
1st, 2nd & 3rd Unpaid Reminder: 10, 5, 2 days before due date respectively.
Overdue reminder: 1, 3, 5 days after due date respectively.
- Late fees could be added after 15 days.
- Service suspension after around 30 days.
- Service termination after around 45 days.
 
- Invoice generated 14 days before due date
- Reminder sent 10,5, 2 days before due date, as well as on the day of expiration
- Account suspended 2 days after expiration
- Account terminated 10 days after expiration.
The email notifications warn that the account will be terminated 7 days after due date but we usually keep them for ~10 days.
 
We send the invoice 7 days before renewal date and wait 3 days after due date and then suspend the account. We also keep sending reminders during overdue days. Also we never add late fees. If the customer doesn't pay the invoice before 30 days, we consider the service as cancelled and terminate it.
 
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We remind all our clients before 5 days of renewal date to pay an invoice & send a reminder after a day till due date, wait for next 1 day to suspend an account. If the customer doesn't pay an invoice within 15 days, we consider the service as cancelled and terminate it. We still keep a backup file of an account for next 15 days in case a customer come back and pay an invoice. After a month, we remove a backup file from backup tapes.
 
We send invoices 14 days prior to renewal date, send reminder 3 days before due date, send late notice and add 20% late fee after 2 days, suspend on 3rd, terminate on 21st day past due, kill backups on 45th day. Looks like we all have a pretty similar method here :)
 
I had a client who was consistently late every month by a week or two and I needed to put a stop to it. So I wrote in a new policy that if payment wasn't made within 5 days of the due date a 25% late fee would be imposed on the account. They paid the late fee one month, then after that made the payment before that. They still don't pay on the due date, but at least I am not waiting for two weeks every month for the payment.

I also stipulated that if the account is over due it can be suspended and access to our servers blocked until payment is made. Although I didn't suspend the account, I would suspend an account if a customer was consistently late and didn't make it a point to talk to us.

The new policy is only seen by clients who pay late. I write it into the email that sends out over due notices. This way, only the people who are late will be affected by it and not the people who pay on time.

Some of this was a juggling act because I thought, do I send an email to all clients about this? Then I thought, being that I pay my own provider on time every month, if I got a notice like that I'd be offended and would not think well of them. If I got a notice like that because I deserved it, then I have no reason to be offended. So I wrote in the new policy so that only people who are late payers will see it.

I'm also working on a points system. Both positive and negative. For people who are late payers, each month they will receive a certain number of negative points. I have to work out yet how they will be affected by accumulating a certain number of points. For the people who pay on time each month they will receive a certain number of positive points and will receive a reward. That could be most anything, possibly one month free every two years. Maybe an extra addon for one month, or something of that nature. I don't have it down yet, but am working on some of those ideas.

You take for example stores that distribute a card to their customers and when they shop there by using the card they receive a discounted price on marked products. It's a game actually because I know of one store here that uses it and they are actually high priced and I don't shop there. I shop at a different store where I don't receive discounts but the prices are still lower than the other store. But most people don't think that way. So if I implement both worlds into my business, competitive prices and incentives, that not only brings customers, it will help keep them.

Just a few ideas.
 
Point system will work for monthly payers as accumulate points each month, but how would you work the point system for annual payers.

we were thinking of some sort of points system and then at the end of the year those with a certain amount of points get placed in a draw for a shopping voucher
 
easyhostmedia said:
Point system will work for monthly payers as accumulate points each month, but how would you work the point system for annual payers.

we were thinking of some sort of points system and then at the end of the year those with a certain amount of points get placed in a draw for a shopping voucher
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As I mentioned, I'm still working out details. Since yearly accounts already receive a significant cost reduction, the points that apply to monthly accounts would not apply to yearly.

On yearly accounts, one idea is that after two years in good standing, which includes on time payments they would receive a free calculator. It would have my company name on it of course which is another way to advertise in their office. The reward could be a calendar or anything of your choice. You should have your company name printed on whatever you give out.
 
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