What to do when your host disappears?

P

perfectnumber

New member
I was wondering if anyone knows what can be done about your host taking your money and going out of business? Has anyone had this happen to them, and if so is there any recourse. I filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, but that will most likely not get my money back. Funny thing is I have another host right now that I happy with, but it has become a matter of principle. Heck I don't even care about the money really. Anyone can be chumped, but that doesn't mean that you have to let it happen again. These people shouldn't be able to start another company.

Here are the hosts to look out for:
Idlehosting.com
LTDhosting.com
Vovex.com
All of them are dead, disappeared.

My story starts with a host called idlehosting.com owned by Billy Engler. It has been "idle" for months now. ;) Basically, it was horrible, and he was horrible for so many reasons. You should read the crap this guy sent me. It's hilarious. He really hated me by the end. But my primary problem with him is that he never returned my emails when the service was down for days at a time. I did email him at a email.com address. He disappeared months ago, but came back with LTDhosting.com. When I found that out I sent a message to him requesting he return my money or reactivate my accounts. I didn't really need it, but like I said it was the principle. He didn't respond himself, but I did get an email that same day:

>>> "Hello, This email is to inform you that Vovex has acquired your account from IdleHosting... Once setup, you will have the remainder of your year + time lost (we basically are adding 2 months to your year)...." <<<

That was from Vovex.com, owned by Jonathan Cobbett according to the whois. I then asked vovex.com

>>>"Why did it take Billy Engler 2 months of complete downtime and loss of my sites to forward this to vovex? And is Vovex in anyway related to idlehosting or LTDhosting, or Billy Engler?" <<<

Keep in mind that I did send Billy emails requesting the same from him earlier, after idlehosting.com disappeared.

Here is their reply:

>>>"Idlehosting had many follies that weren't actually there [sic] fault. It was
there fault, in the choice of choosing a horrible datacenter (one that is trying to be shut-down by many hosters).

He (Billy Engler) is affiliated with us in that he has "stock" in us. He invested in getting Vovex going a serveral months ago and if it weren't for him and a few others we would not be as strong as we are today. LTDHosting is a Reseller of ours, but as far as I know the only
thing Billy has to do with it was the fact that he registered the domain.

It isn't as easy as some people think, to run a hosting company. Billy simply chose his datacenter based on price and as you can see it wasn't a very good choice. Thats why Vovex doesn't lower there prices for anything. To offer good service, you have to charge a reasonable price." <<<

So he is investing in "stock" with my money. Just great. Anyway, I did get an account set up on vovex.com. It lasted about 2 weeks before they disappered.

Then I noticed this on a forum:
>>> Vovex Technology has proven to be a reliable and affordable hosting solution for the past 10 months of business. Vovex Technology currently hosts a total of 378 domains on 3 linux servers. <<<

So, since vovex.com has disappeared, does that mean there are 378 ticked off customers out there?

If I were as disingenuous as these people I'd start my own webhosting company, lure people in with great prices for service for a year and provide it for about 4 months and disappear. Is there anything stopping people from being able to do this? Seems like quite the racket to me. I sure wish I was a slimeball; I'd actually have money then.

Thanks everyone.
 
Damn Jonathan has really let a lot of people down.....
He used to be a moderator here but he disappeared around that time also and his server went down.
I didnt think he had more than one server unless they all went down at the same time.

I dont know what Jonathan meant Billy bought stock in his company that wasnt started yet.. ?

What datacentre was Billy in do you know?
It doesnt matter if your DC is causing your server to go down every day, you dont let your customers down, you move out to a new server in a DC if needed, but you dont just abandon them.

I dont really know what you can do if they have just disappeared.
Make sure your current host has been going for a while is a good thing to do anyway ;)

I would like to know what happened with Jonathan and how everything stopped all of a sudden.

Sorry I cant help anymore, and Im very sorry to hear that this happened to you.

Hope you dont have any similar problems with your current host :)

John
 
same thing happend here, I was with vovex but have moved to another, more stable hosting service which is very good might i add :) Anyway, vovex.com had the paypal set up like a subscription service. So payment went to him once a month on a timely basis. after it went down though, i did get my payment back like 2 or 3 days later as a refund.. There is a thread somewhere in this forum though talking about the company vovex used and how they had WAY to many customers.. i beleive thats why they just went down and never came back.. I'm not sure though...
 
John Diver said:
t doesnt matter if your DC is causing your server to go down every day, you dont let your customers down, you move out to a new server in a DC if needed, but you dont just abandon them.
John
Click to expand...


This is so true, a good reliable host will always do what it takes to make sure their customers sites stay live, many customers on the net are doing business and not just a personal web page and if they don't have a good service, it costs them $1000's a day.

As far a recourse, yes contacting the BBB in his area is a good thing, but they can get around this using alternated names such as a spouse name.

You can also contact the merchant company that took your money for the client and complain, many times they will refund you with a chargeback and such.

The other option is small claims court.

Sorry wasn't much help, there will always be bad in with the good and even though I am one of those some steer away from due to not being in the business for years I am willing to wait it out. So just hang in there and use the forums, friends to find a good host, also use the search engines, you can find much information about bad hosts that way as well.

Freckled
 
That really sucks. Personally, it took me moving to 5 datacenters before I found the one that was awsome!
 
Its always hard to pick a good DC. Best thing I've found is to drop support/sales emails as stupid time and see how long replies take. Sales normally < 12 hours I consider ok but support is normally a good indicator. Also asking annoying questions

Rus
 
My best advice to avoid losing your money is just to pay by the month. Sure it gets more expensive than if you were to make that nice quick yearly payment, but if the host suddenly does pull the old 'up and away' move, then you've lost very little when compared to that yearly sum.

Also, try to go with a host that you know is established. Even though things can surely go wrong for any business around, there is less of a chance with a large well established business going up in smoke as then there will be many angry customers to handle.
 
Hehe pitty that wasnt true for everything.

One word, Ravio :rolleyes:

As Denver said paying monthly is always the best thing just incase anything does happen.
 
Thanks

Thanks everyone.
I do have a host that I'm completely satisfied with. He's been around for about 3 1/2 years, and when I signed up, he called me on the phone and, get this, tells me that he noticed that I signed up for the $15.95 per month, 2gb space with 20 gb transfer, but that I must have missed the special on the site for $12.95/3gb/30gb. How about that for honesty? He's also asked that no one post the company name on forums as he like to keep things small, and managable so his service is better. I did my research this time and asked good questions first. I used another company before the one I'm with now called Lypha. They were ok, but the down time was too much to handle, it was happening everyday for a while about 15 to 30 minutes a day, and the server was a bit overloaded. Not horrible but not that great.

The reseller account I have now is really good bargain, but not ridiculously low like Billy's Idlehosting.com was. I used about 1gb of space and about 6gb of transfer a month.

I learned a lot from this experience so it's all for the best. Dealing with a not-so-smart owner/support person made me learn things on my own, so I now know more command line ssh stuff and PHP, the ins and outs of safe_mode, chroot, security, scripts, etc. I only lost about 70 dollars so it's not worth small claims court.

I could exceed the message length rule here on the forum explaining the stupidities I had to deal with. It is amazing how someone with no knowledge of linux can just form a company, sell hosting, and expect something like WHM to do a suffcient job in taking care of problems. I really don't know how many times I complained about something and got a a "sorry about that" response or no response at all.

At the end of it I got this from Billy:
>>> I can only hope that once we are back on our feet and can fully meet the needs promised to our clients and clients to come, that you will be able to change your opinion about Idlehosting. I feel it is in the best interest of both Idlehosting and yourself that you seek hosting elsewhere. You are more than welcome to stay here with us at Idlehosting, but if you choose not to there will be no hard feelings. <<<

But I got to say, "where's my money MoFo?"

I have a feeling that Jonathan was/is a bit better, but heck with that, his company isn't providing service, and there has been no contact so he's just as bad in my book. Very unprofessional.

I host a few sites that aren't huge, but some have over 500 pages and about 500 unique visitors a day. They are non-profit. But they are important to my clients. Days of down time are not exceptable, and disappearing acts should not be rewarded, they should be punished.

Thanks again everyone.
 
Oh yeah, Billy used Rackshack I think for a while, and TMS or Tailor Made Servers. He siad they, TMS, were the culprit. He used someone else too, I think it was HE at the end.

Companies that blame their problems on the DC, or worse yet on their 'other' existing customers are the worst. Take ownership, jeez, it's your company.

I am thinking about starting my own hosting company, but I won't even try until I have almost complete knowledge, more Linux troubleshooting experience, a business plan, and much more. Maybe in a year. But I'd only do the local market thing to start.
 
Well, I just noticed something, I used to talk with the Idle Hosting chap and even considered going into business with him at one point. I do remember he was with TMS at least and I remember him talking about a server with RS as well. It just dawned on me this was who I think it was and I'm glad I never went into business with him at this point.
 
Wow lucky for you Denver!
This could be you getting all the nagative feedback!
Or maybe perfectnumber might have had you to rely on and would still have a host now ;)

Thanks for sharing your experience with us perfectnumber, Im sure people that see this will think a lot more about who they host with, be it for a shared or reseller account, maybe even DC ;)

Hope you can review your current host after you have been with them for a good while so we can hear if they have solved all your problems!

Thanks again
John
 
Very interesting Jonathan is a member here(Vovex Technology). I wonder if he will post a response?

We have all had our share of bad host. Hopefully your new provider will prove stable and supportive.
 
That's a shame that Vovex went under. Bad for his 376 Customers also. That's no way to run a business, not at all. But, paying yearly isn't the way either. I prefer monthly payments to all customers, helps me pay the bills :)
 
Very interesting Jonathan is a member here(Vovex Technology). I wonder if he will post a response?
Click to expand...

It seems he hasnt been on in a while so I doubt he will be replying.
I saw him around but havent seen him since I have heard about the problems from his ex customers
 
Re: Thanks

perfectnumber said:
Thanks everyone.
I do have a host that I'm completely satisfied with. He's been around for about 3 1/2 years, and when I signed up, he called me on the phone and, get this, tells me that he noticed that I signed up for the $15.95 per month, 2gb space with 20 gb transfer, but that I must have missed the special on the site for $12.95/3gb/30gb. How about that for honesty?
Click to expand...

Actually, this might not be a bad first test. If the company is offering a special, sign up with them, but forget to enter the coupon code. It'll show you how trustworthy they are. I know that we have given out at least 6 credits this month because people forget to enter the coupon code for the 1st month free.

Now, to get back on topic, when Endore closed their doors, a lot of people were left out to dry. I have heard of some successful chargebacks, so that is always an option(if you paid with a CC). However, the best advice I have heard so far is to pay monthly. I've had customers that ask to upgrade to yearly payments after they've been with us for a while, and that should be an option just about anywhere.
 
First of all I wouild like to apologize for any problems occured with Vovex Technology going out of business.


As to everyones posts here expecially PerfectNumbers.


Perfect Number: That quote you posted that was by "Vovex" is completely fake. We don't even have a stock option because we are not a corporation... we are an LLC.

As to Idle/LTDhosting they were a reseller account on my servers which we have no relationship to when it comes to billing. All refunds/contracts should be through him... not Vovex. We managed the servers not the clients. If he said he turned his clients over to us... I love to find out when that happened. Considering I am in charge of all the billing... I havent seen any new customers transfered to our services.

2nd of all I would like to state that ALL 378 clients that were hosted with us received a reimburstment via paypal approximately 7 days after Vovex.com went down.

And if you all have to know the reason why Vovex Technology no longer exists.... My fiance was involved in a bad car accident in which she was suffering extreme headaches. Nothing was showing up on her MRI's or cat scans. It wasnt looking to good. I did not have the time or money to keep Vovex Technology running so in return it went down. And we did post on our forum in the updates section 5 days prior to the boxes going down to let you know as early as possible. Those who also had a valid email address on file were contacted by e-mail as well.

If you want to keep talking ****, go right ahead... as it stands right now I am about $8,100 in debt with medical bills for my Fiance since she did not have medical insurance.


If you want to make a reply to this feel free. I am back at home now for this week. My fiance is out of the hospital finally. Thank god. I will check this post periodically throughout the rest of the week to answer any questions you may have.
 
perfectnumber said:
Here is their reply:

>>>"Idlehosting had many follies that weren't actually there [sic] fault. It was
there fault, in the choice of choosing a horrible datacenter (one that is trying to be shut-down by many hosters).

He (Billy Engler) is affiliated with us in that he has "stock" in us. He invested in getting Vovex going a serveral months ago and if it weren't for him and a few others we would not be as strong as we are today. LTDHosting is a Reseller of ours, but as far as I know the only
thing Billy has to do with it was the fact that he registered the domain.

It isn't as easy as some people think, to run a hosting company. Billy simply chose his datacenter based on price and as you can see it wasn't a very good choice. Thats why Vovex doesn't lower there prices for anything. To offer good service, you have to charge a reasonable price." <<<
Click to expand...

HAHAHAHAHAH!! "Follies" that isnt even a word in my vocabulary. If you are gonna make up stories at least make one that is legit. And the whole part about billy chosing his datacenter..... why would I rip on his datacenter choice when he is hosting with my Service???? You just tripped yourself up. You stated that "LTDHOsting is a reseller of ours" then said "He chose a bad datacenter". So which one is it perfect>?? Get your facts straight.
 
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