American Septic Company

Hello,We were sorry to hear about the concern Mr. [redacted] had in regards to his billing.In reviewing Mr. [redacted]'s tickets and account we did not find that we had received a request to cancel the hosting service in question as clarified in the Terms Of Service which can be reviewed at...

https://www.hostgator.com/tos and must be accepted before services are provided.  In addition on the order page when signing up for service the following statement is provided:Qualified packages include instant activation and 24 hour support. Introductory prices apply to the first term. Money-back guarantee applies to hosting and domain privacy. All plans and products automatically renew for the same term length at regular rates, which will be available in your control panel. Unless you request a change or cancellation, the payment method provided today will be used for renewals.Mr. [redacted] is a valued client and in reviewing the hosting package in question we found that the use of the package had dropped off recently.  To resolve this amicable we have provided Mr. [redacted] a credit to his account for the time that the hosting package was not being utilized as agreed by Mr. [redacted].At this time the Credit has been applied to Mr. [redacted]'s account and we have not received any follow up questions or concerns.  If any should arise we ask that Mr. [redacted] please respond to our recent e-mail communication or e-mail our management team at [email protected] and we will be happy to offer assistance.

Good Afternoon,We certainly appreciate a chance to review this report and have since taken time to review the events for a better understanding of the situation. First and foremost we understand that there was an impression that Ms. [redacted] no longer had an account with us, however after reviewing...

all e-mails relating to the account, we have not found any communication relating to a charge back from the credit card company or any indication on our end stating that the account had been closed.We did receive a fax at the end of November 2015 requesting that the account be closed at which point we followed up with Ms. [redacted] requesting that she please submit this request via our cancellation form ( [redacted] ) as outlined in our terms of service. Following this response, Ms. [redacted] replied back under the impression that she did not have an account with us, so could therefore not submit the request. We then replied stating that the account was never canceled and was still active, so if there was an issue accessing the cancellation form, a password reset could be used to retrieve the password. We did not hear back after this response until the Revdex.com complaint was filed last week.As the main intention of the cancellation form is to ensure that we have the request to terminate the data in writing, we have decided to allow the previous communication via e-mail and facsimile as sufficient documentation on the request to cancel. As such, the hosting package has now been fully canceled, and both the unpaid invoices and credit card on file have been removed. We have also followed up directly with Ms. [redacted] on this information so if we can be of further assistance, we ask that she please use that communication to reach back out to our management.

[A default letter is provided here which indicates your acceptance of the business's response.  If you wish, you may update it before sending it.]
Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID 10885205, and find that this resolution would be satisfactory to me.

Revdex.com:
This letter is to inform you that HostGator.com, L.L.C. has carried out to my satisfaction the resolution it proposed for my complaint, filed on 3/17/2017 and assigned ID [redacted].
Regards,

Good Afternoon,We'd like to start by offering our apologies for any inconvenience caused by the issue with Mr. [redacted]'s site. After investigation into the matter, unfortunately we found that after Mr. [redacted] had reported the issue, that one of our billing agents had erroneously stated that the...

service Mr. [redacted] used to create the site was no longer available. Although this is true for new customers, any of our customers who had previously used this specific builder are still more than welcome to continue with it's use. We've taken time to forward this error to our agent's supervisor to ensure this oversight does not occur again.Once it was clarified that the issue with Mr. [redacted]'s site was not related to the service no longer being offered, we had the error immediately investigated and corrected. We've now received word back from Mr. [redacted] stating that so far all of his testing of the site has gone positively, however if he does end up finding any remaining issues, we've setup a direct line of communication for him to get back in touch with our management. Additionally, we've provided a few months of service to help compensate for our agent's mistake prior to our correction. We hope this fully resolves the complaint but if we can be of any further assistance, please let us know.

Good Afternoon,We are sorry to hear Mr. [redacted] has had a frustrating time canceling his accounts, however after review of our records, we have not found all information in this complaint to be accurate. To provide background information, Mr. [redacted] had 3 separate hosting accounts all opened...

under separate e-mail addresses which were not linked. As per our terms of service, our customers agree to submit a cancellation request through our request form ( https://hostgator.com/cancel ) for each account opened.We have found no communications from Mr. [redacted] that mention canceling additional accounts, nor did we receive a request to search for additional accounts using his contact information. We have spoken with Mr. [redacted] over the phone to request more information on this claim, but unfortunately he was unwilling to provide any evidence to support these reports. Additionally, the price increase reported was due to the fact that we provide an initial discount on new packages which will then renew at the full price once the initial billing cycle has ended. This information is available upon checkout and also within our terms of service.At this time we have fully canceled all hosting accounts associated with Mr. [redacted] and have confirmed with him over the phone that no accounts were opened using alternative contact information. We have also refunded the most recent payment in full as the account was being canceled, however this was not a fraudulent charge as the account had not been requested to be canceled before the payment was processed.If we can be of any further assistance with this matter, we have provided Mr. [redacted] contact to get back in touch with our management directly.

Good Afternoon,We've since had a chance to investigate this report and contrary to the complaint, HostGator has taken no action against this server as the server was not actually offline. We have reviewed the logs of the server and have found that content was removed by the [redacted] that [redacted]...

[redacted] has used to contact us from. We have these logs available and have provided them to [redacted] however we are not able to restore this content unless we can be provided with a backup of the content that was deleted. Additionally, all customers with dedicated servers do agree to keep full backups in the event of emergencies such as this : https://hostgator.com/tos
==========================
18. Dedicated Servers
HostGator reserves the right to reset the password on a dedicated server
if the password on file is not current so that we may do security
audits as required by our datacenter. It is your responsibility to
ensure that there is a valid email address and current root password on
file for your dedicated server to prevent downtime from forced [redacted] HostGator reserves the right to audit servers as needed and to
perform administrative actions at the request of our datacenter.
Dedicated servers are NOT backed up by [redacted] It is your responsibility to
maintain [redacted] Dedicated servers that have invoices outstanding for
more than ten (10) days may be subject to deletion which will result in
the loss of all data on the server. HostGator will not be liable for any
loss of data resulting from such deletion.
==========================In regards to the live [redacted] we have also reviewed all of the recent live [redacted] conversations and have not found any instance where the [redacted] took 3 hours as reported. We do apologize if the deletion of content was accidental, however
our logs are conclusive that this was not a HostGator staff member and
was performed by an [redacted] out of [redacted] which [redacted] had used to contact us previously. We have contacted [redacted] to go over this information so if she does have any backups available, we would be glad to work on restoring those [redacted] If any backups are found, we ask that she please uses our recent e-mail conversation to alert us and we'll be glad to help in any way we can.

Good Afternoon,We've since had a chance to review this situation and have found that after originally purchasing a VPS package with our company, that [redacted] requested to have cPanel installed onto the VPS. The best way to accomplish this is to order a new VPS with cPanel included, so once the new...

VPS was added to the account, we followed up to confirm that the work was done and also asked that he please request cancellation of the first VPS package once he had confirmed there was no sensitive data that would be lost.Unfortunately we never heard back on that e-mail and have since attempted to call [redacted] twice and also reached out via e-mail but have not heard back. At this time we have gone ahead and credited the account for the payment in question in order to have this apply to his remaining active package and have setup a direct line of communication back to our management if a refund would be preferred over the credit. We hope this fully resolves the situation but if our e-mails were missed for any reason, our management can be contacted via [redacted] where we'll be more than happy to assist.

Good Evening,First and foremost we'd like to offer our apologies
for the trouble reported in this complaint. To provide more
information, here at HostGator we do routinely update our firewalls to
ensure that our customers are protected against malicious activity.
Unfortunately in these two cases, following our firewall update, we did
find that some of our settings had been knocked out which caused issue
with outbound e-mail.Following the two updates we did make sure
to restore access to the outbound ports necessary for Mr. [redacted]'s
e-mails, and have taken steps to ensure that these updates are more
carefully reviewed and tested following the changes. At this
time we have been in direct contact with Mr. [redacted] and have worked
out a resolution to the matter that is satisfactory to both parties as
Mr. [redacted] was actually considering an upgrade to a level of hosting
where he will have more control over certain features. We've completed
the provisioning of the new service and have scheduled a few more
contacts with Mr. [redacted] to ensure that this process goes smoothly
for him and his clients.We are in direct communication with Mr.
[redacted] and have provided him with a method to get back in touch with
us if any issues arise during this upgrade, so if we can be of any
additional assistance we ask that he please use that contact to alert
our management.

Greetings,In regards to this complaint, unfortunately there seems to be an impression that we have guaranteed a time frame for our migrations. To clarify, our migrations are considered a courtesy service and we make no guarantees on how long this process may take. This information was agreed to when...

the account was purchased, and the information was also stated on the migration request form which was filed out by Mr. [redacted]. http://hostgator.com/tos=======================================3. TransfersOur Transfers Team will make every effort to help you move your website to us. Transfers are provided as a courtesy service. We do not make any guarantees regarding the availability, possibility, or time required to complete an account transfer. Each hosting company is configured differently, and some hosting platforms save data in an incompatible or proprietary format, which may make it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to migrate some or all account data. In some cases we may not be able to assist you in a transfer of data from an old host. The free transfer service is available for thirty (30) days from your sign up date. Transfers outside of the thirty (30) day period will incur a charge; please contact a member of our Transfers department to receive a price quote. In no event shall HostGator be held liable for any lost or missing data or files resulting from a transfer to or from HostGator. You are solely responsible for backing up your data in all circumstances. =======================================While we certainly always want migrations to be completed as soon as possible, considering that we did not guarantee Mr. [redacted] a time frame on when the migration would be complete, we are not under any obligation to pay for the original service with a 3rd party provider. We have since contacted Mr. [redacted] and let him know that while we would be happy to escalate the migration request for immediate assistance, we would not be responsible for his payments to another company. This offer was refused and instead a full refund was requested which has since been provided. If there are any remaining concerns we can address about migration time frames not being guaranteed, we ask that Mr. [redacted] please reply back to our current e-mail thread or contact our management directly at [email protected].

Hello,We were sorry to hear that the hosting service did not meet Ms. [redacted]s hosting needs.Hostgator offers a 45 day money back guarantee for all shared hosting packages and provided a full refund for the hosting package that was purchased.  From our understanding Ms. [redacted] used a prepaid...

card and requested that we cancel the refund request and issue the refund instead through another means.  Unfortunately once the refund has been processed those funds are no longer in our control and we are not able to cancel or reverse the refund.Hostgator is not a bank or financial institution and like any other merchant uses a payment processor to handle the payments that are made by credit card and do not have access to the full card number of any credit card that is used to purchase services through the payment portal.Although not all requested information was available to be provided, the information that was accessible has been provided to Ms. [redacted] including the transaction reference number.From our understanding other clients have been able to contact the financial institution that provided the card with the information provided and been able to receive the refund minus any transaction fees the card provider may administer. If Ms. [redacted] has any additional questions we ask that Ms. [redacted] please respond to the recent e-mail communication or contact our management team at [email protected] and we will be happy to assist.

[A default letter is provided here which indicates your acceptance of the business's response.  If you wish, you may update it before sending it.]
Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and find that this resolution would be partially satisfactory to me. I spent countless days and hours working with Hostgator on this issue, and I feel that this was a complete waste of my time. The communication process is lacking on Hostgator's side. Many of their reps do not speak English well over the phone; therefore, my hosting account was not canceled and my credit card was still being charged for services. I did come to an agreement with Hostgator after they offered to refund half of the requested refund. They told me that my two email accounts with them were still taking up space on their server. While I didn't use these emails personally, junk mail was still being sent to them. I felt if I didn't come to some form of agreement with them, I would receive nothing. After negotiating, I did receive my full refund minus $48 for emails. I still believe this is ridiculous as I cannot help the spam mail that was going to these two emails. Hostgator did not leave a good impression on me, especially after using their services for 7 years. Needless to say, I am not totally satisfied. Yet, I am happy that they did refund a good portion of my request.

Greetings,We've now had a chance to review the communication made in relation to this account but have not found that cancellation was requested in October as reported. Please note that while there may have been assistance offered with pointing a domain name to another provider, we will not...

terminate any contracts until a cancellation request has been submitted as this would mean the permanent deletion of all content on the account. We will not make assumptions about a customer's need for their data, and our customers agree to our terms of service which state that cancellation requests must be submitted via our cancellation request form once the content is no longer needed. Additionally, while 4 months of refunds have been requested, there were only only 3 months of payments made in October, November and December prior to the cancellation request in January, so it is unclear why 4 months of refunds have been requested. We were also disappointed to see these accusations about our staff maliciously modifying any of Ms. [redacted]'s content as she has thus far been unable to furnish any evidence of such actions. From review of the conversations we have under the e-mail address on file, we have addressed each instance where a scan of the account was requested and at those points found no evidence of compromised or malicious content. We've reached out to Ms. [redacted] to provide us with clarification on any evidence she has on these concerns but have so far not heard back. Regardless of these allegations, we are willing to discuss providing a refund for the unused time on the account even though our terms of service were not followed in regards to submitting a cancellation request. That said, as the payments in question are nearly 7-10 months old, the credit card payments can no longer be directly reversed, meaning an alternative method will need to be discussed.We ask that Ms. [redacted] please provide the evidence requested in response to our recent correspondence or contact our management directly at [redacted]@hostgator.com for further investigation and discussion.

Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and find that this resolution would be satisfactory to me.  [redacted], the Host Gator representative, did a great job of listening to my concerns, and providing the much-needed clarity and explanation. Thank you,[redacted]

Greetings,We do regret to hear about the issues related to the domain registration transfer from HostGator to [redacted].After further investigation we see that the payment for the domain renewal on June 6th renewed the domain to June 2017. After that renewal was completed the domain registration...

transfer was completed to your current registrar. To discuss the details about the renewal dates of this domain please reach out to your current registrar.We have also sent a follow up email which can be used as a means of direct communication with the Customer Service Management team.

Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this proposed action would not resolve my complaint.  
[Provide details of why you are not satisfied with this resolution.]
Regards,
  Host Gator's characterization of the case is not what the Host Gator rep last told me over the phone when we spoke.Host Gator's rep said he saw an enormous amount of emails (incoming) to me at [redacted] that were not being delivered because my email was deemed spam as a result of the IP address.Host Gator has these records of bounced emails that never made it to me at [redacted] but has never given them to me. The IP address at HostGator for its customers has nothing to do with me and everything to do with Host Gator.Turn over the information on the data related to my incoming emails not delivered as confirmed by the Host Gator rep I spoke with the last time I called. I am entitled to see all incoming emails (or attempts thereto) related to the websites I host at Host Gator.Respectfully,[redacted]

Revdex.com:   I just find that going back and forth for a month with hostgator providing paperwork and getting advised to give the wrong paperwork now they expect me to get a court order to take control of my brothers account is asking a bit much. I have already stated there is no court or [redacted]yer involved in my brothers will. I feel the documentation I have provided should be enough already to put my brothers account into my name.
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this proposed action would not resolve my complaint.  
[Provide details of why you are not satisfied with this resolution.]
Regards,
[redacted]

Hello,We were sorry to hear about the concern that Mr. [redacted] had in regards to a dedicated IP.In reviewing Mr. [redacted]'s account and hosting package we were not able to locate a cancellation request for the dedicated IP and cancelling another service or product such as a domain would not cancel the...

dedicated IP with out that request also being submitted. These products would not be inclusive to each other nor would our agents be able to cancel a service without the clients express permission.Mr. [redacted] has been a valued client since 2013.  Although addon services such as a dedicated IP would not normally be eligible for a refund in order to resolve this amicable a credit in the amount of $48 has been placed on Mr. [redacted]'s hosting account.Mr. [redacted] has confirmed agreement to the credit and we have not received any additional questions or concerns.  If any should arise we ask that Mr. [redacted] please reply back to the recent e-mail communication or e-mail our management team at [email protected] and we will be happy to offer assistance.

Hostgator's billing system works directly with the payment processor and all information that is available from the payment processor was provided directly to Ms. [redacted] in the direct e-mail communication.  For security the payment processor uses a transaction ID which identifies the transaction and does not store the full credit card number. In trying to assist Ms. [redacted] the transaction ID was included in the e-mail communication.Ms. [redacted] is fully verified for the account in question and all information that is available in regards to the credit card transaction has been provided including all time stamps for the transaction in question.  Unfortunately the full credit card number that was used in the transaction in question is not available.

Good Evening,We appreciate the chance to review these
concerns and are sorry to hear that Mr. [redacted] has had issues with his
e-mail delivery. That said, we must clarify that we in no do not allow
spammers on our servers. In addition to our zero-tolerance mail policy (
...

http://www.hostgator.com/mailpolicy ), we have strict policy for
verifying new orders to help prevent any malicious individuals from
purchasing accounts with our company. That said, in rare cases
these individuals will find ways to bypass our systems of checks or in
other cases, legitimate customer's will not take the security of their
account as seriously as is necessary which results in their accounts
becoming compromised and used to send spam. In cases where this
occurs, we have a mail filtering system which is used to check outgoing
mail against known spam definitions to catch these messages before they
leave the server. The problem here is that spammers are constantly
monitoring which of their e-mails get delivered and know to adjust their
messages to bypass filtering systems. If any spam does get around our
filters, as soon as we see any evidence of spam coming from our servers,
those customer's accounts are immediately deactivated.In
regards to the specific reports from Mr. [redacted], we have taken action
to request removal from the blacklists reported either upon or earlier
to each of his reports, however we must clarify that blacklisting is not
an issue that will ever be permanently resolved. As spammers will
always find ways around known filtering options or by compromising
accounts, there is no way to ensure that these types of messages will
cease fully when on shared or reseller hosting where the mail servers
are shared with all other customers.As such, we are constantly
working on improving our spam filtering by recently increasing it's
sensitivity and also checking against known spam lists to increase the
data we're working with, however If blacklisting cannot be risked,
customers can also purchase a [redacted] or dedicated server where they will be
the only individual sending mail from their IP address. At
this time we have escalated the related ticket to ensure that
de-listing has been requested and we've also reached out to Mr. [redacted]
to provide a direct line of communication to request escalations if
further issues occur. If we can be of any additional assistance
escalating these matters, we ask that he please replies back to that
communication or contacts our management directly at
[email protected] and we'll be happy to help.