webhostingpad.com

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/07/22) */ Contact Name and Title: Customer Care Contact Phone: XXXXXXXXXX Contact Email: [redacted] @webhostingpad.com Hello As was explained in the email sent from our billing manager and was pasted in this complaint description, all of our accounts are set to automatically renew to avoid interruption of serviceIn order to cancel an account you would have to fill out a cancellation formTo avoid renewal this would need to be done prior to the renewal date, as outlined in our terms of service as well as all renewal notifications sent Per our terms of service, no refunds are provided for renewals of servicesThese are the terms of service that are agreed to at the time of sign upThe terms of service can be located at http://www.webhostingpad.com/billing_policy.html

Hi, I'm sorry to hear about the trouble you've experienced, and I'd like to apologizeWith a site receiving that many hits, you likely outgrew our shared hosting servicesSimply put, sites that put that big a strain on our servers can cause fluctuations and outages that affect the whole serverA better solution for you would probably be VPS hostingOur support reps should've suggested you upgrade, but if they didn't, I apologizeWe do monitor our own servers and report those uptimes because that's what our server monitors reportThird-party monitors can often be unreliable, and the outages you experienced may not have been the server, but your own site, due to the number of hits and the frequency of problems you reported experiencingThis is why I still strongly suggest VPSWhether that is through our sister company or through another VPS hosting service, you will not run into the same problems you've been experiencingYes, it costs more money, but when a site is as popular as yours, the strain it puts on a server with other people on it causes problems for everyone, and there are no solutions we can offer besides an upgradeI do apologize for any inconvenience you've had with our service, and I hope that however you decide to move forward, you consider alternative solutionsI honestly think they would work better for you, and we want your site up and running in whatever way possible

Complaint: [redacted] I am rejecting this response because:I was no longer on the account and the account did have valid contact informationBy removing myself from the account I felt I was ending my agreement with the companyIt is highly unreasonable to be able to charge an expired credit card, especially when it doesn't belong to the contact on the accountNo effort was made to contact me (they could have looked though the history to the original account holder) and as far as I know only email was sent to the person on the account and not any phone communication [redacted] does send out spam so I wouldn't be surprised if it was simply missed.Forcing someone to pay for years of cancelled service and not working with them is unacceptableIn present or past terms or not, these terms are unconscionable as well as their dealing with customers.Webhostingpad.com company's agenda is simply to get money from customers and keep it regardless of whether or not the customers past or present are happy or even want their services Sincerely, [redacted] ***

Complaint: ***
I am rejecting this response because:you are putting words out of context - I said that I used *** to do a backup of system and database and then tried to restore the system and satabase from those good backups that I took - from there the entire site was destroyed. if I take a backup of something in a good state and then do a restore from that backup, one would think that things would go back o the state when the backup is done not destroy my siteI did not try to restore my entire site from a backup I did for one part of my site - your company and sales staff have misrepresent the level and quality of service you provide as it is complete garbage - from the hardware - to support - to management. as far as response time, you have got to be kidding me if you think you responded in a timely manner - perhaps on one or occasions for this issue I received a timely response, but over all I waited hours if not a day for a response. I escalated this to management who only responded after I placed the complaint with the Revdex.com.your support staff ties up the online chat regularly by not disconnecting once the session has ended - I have see *** do this on more than one occasion - I have not received what I had paid for and want my money backif you were a company of any integrity, you would man up and accept responsibility and perhaps even try to better yourself, but from my experience so far this company lives on excuses
Sincerely,
*** ***

The customer admittedly restored a backup he took on his own, through a third party tool (*** Admin) which in turn caused his website not to function properlyThis is not any fault of ours nor are we responsible for backups/restores the customer does on his ownWhen our support team looked into the issue they replied letting the customer know that the backup file he tried uploading from was incomplete which was causing his website not to function properlyDespite this, our support team tried their best to recover the missing files from his backup.He insisted on us telling him why the backups he took from his third party script were incomplete which we simply can not answerWe didn't take the backups ourselves, nor were they done through our backup systems, so we have no way of knowing what went wrongWe do not take automatic account snapshots or anything of the sort when accounts are backed up/restored so we have no way of telling what was missing from the backup, how the account looked before the backup was taken, or how the backups themselves even function to see what could have happened to make files not be included.The customer, after restoring an incomplete backup, now is requesting that we pay for the cost for him to fix his mistakeWe are in no way liable for the customer's individual account content or the activity he does on his own accountNone of these backups were done using any of our programs or scripts, they were done by the customer through his *** admin area, a third party script that he put on his account with us. We can not be blamed for something that the customer does on his own account using third party scripts.We are sorry that the backup the customer restored didn't work properly and we certainly wish we could help him more, but unfortunately there isn't anything we can do in this caseWe did nothing on the account to make the website not function properly, this was something done by the customer.Our support staff was very responsive with the customer with ticket responses coming no later than minutes until he requested the issue to be escalatedWe were short staffed due to the holiday season and managers only work business hours so responses from management do take longer than our support representatives. If I could use it in a different context, think of it in terms of your personal computerYou have backup software on your computer from company XYZYou take a backup using their softwareOne day you decide to restore a backup but the restore breaks your computer because the backup was incompleteYou then take your computer to *** *** who informs you that the backup was missing some important files which is causing your computer not to workThere's not much they can do because they don't know how the XYZ backup software works, nor were they the ones to take the backupThey try their best to find a workaround to get your computer working again but unfortunately there's no way for them to recover the files that are missingYou wouldn't blame *** *** for your backup not working properly, nor would you expect them to know why the backup didn't include all of your files because they didn't take it, nor is the software something they createdYou would blame the backup software for not functioning as you expected it would.The backup software, in this case, is ***, which is what the customer said was used to back up the websiteWe are essentially in the same position as *** *** in the exampleWe can (and have) try our best to do whatever we can to help get the rest of the files, but we weren't part of the backup or restoration process in any way, so we're working on very limited information. No refund will be issued because the issues with the account were not something caused by usThey arose from the customer restoring an incomplete backup that he took himself which caused his website not to function properly

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 9, 2015/08/07) */
Hello,
Our cancellation policy is very clear on our required procedures for closing an account: we require the submission of an online cancellation form for documentation purposes which can be found at WebhostingPad.com/cancellationWithout
this cancellation form on file, accounts will continue to be active in our systemAs stated in the Day Renewal Notice that was sent to you, cancellation forms must be submitted no later than (3) three business days PRIOR to the renewal dateYou submitted your cancellation form on June 21st, 2015, which was a Sunday (Non-Business Day) so it could not be processed by a representativeThe Billing Department is closed on Sunday's because it is a non-business day
Nowhere within our ticket system nor renewal notices did we state that you will receive a refund within five to ten daysWhen we sent you the link to cancel your account, we stated that if you are within the Day Money Back Guarantee (which applies to NEW accounts that are canceled within the first days of signup) then you will receive a refundYou signed up on 06/22/2009, which is well outside of the Day Money Back Guarantee
Cancellations
Hosting plans will automatically renew until a plan is cancelledIn order to cancel service, you must fill out our online cancellation formPlease be aware that there are no pro-rated refunds after the first days of service
Cancellation requests must be received by WebHostingPad a minimum of three (3) business days prior to the end of your Billing CycleCancellations submitted later than this time may result in automatic renewal of your hosting planCancellations become effective on the day processed by WebHostingPadWebHostingPad is unable to cancel your account effective for a future dateWebHostingPad will confirm the cancellation request when it is processedIf you do not receive a confirmation, please contact WebHostingPad as soon as possibleCancelled accounts are immediately terminated from the server and no backups will be kept, meaning no data can be recovered after an account is cancelledIf a backup of the hosting account is needed one must be taken before the account is cancelledIn the event that a customer would like to restore a cancelled account, or that a backup is requested after an account is cancelled, a $service fee will be billed for the restoration or creation of the backup
WebHostingPad does not monitor, and will not automatically cancel, plans for problems related to domain name transfers, non-usage, Internic, your ISP, or any other secondary issues not directly related to WebHostingPad servicesCancellation of services does not relieve the customer from paying any outstanding balance owed on the accountWebHostingPad Corporation reserves the right to cancel any account, at any time, without notice, for any reason WebHostingPad Corporation considers appropriate
http://www.webhostingpad.com/billing_policy.html
Your account has been canceled in our system due to the submission of this cancellation form which follows our procedures correctlyBecause of this policy, the account is not eligible for a refund within the terms of the day money back guarantee
Please let me know if you have any further questions in regards to our policies or procedures or if there is anything I can do personally to foster this time of mediation between our two parties
*** H
Billing Manager
WebHostingPad.com
Initial Consumer Rebuttal /* (3000, 11, 2015/08/07) */
(The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)
I'm not using the service, and I do not intend to use the service ever againI cancelled the service before it renewedYou can say anything you want in your policy, it still doesn't mean I have to pay for something I never wanted in the first place, and which I decided not to buy before you charged me for it
Final Business Response /* (4000, 13, 2015/08/10) */
Hello,
As previously stated in our other response, your account has been canceled in our system due to the submission of this cancellation form which follows our procedures correctlyBecause of this policy, the account is not eligible for a refund within the terms of the day money back guaranteesince our third party licenses attached to your account have already renewed
We can reactivate your account within the requirements of our terms of service but we can not provide this account with a refund
Please see our Billing Policy that you read and agreed to upon sign up for more information regarding this matter
http://www.webhostingpad.com/billing_policy.html
Please let me know if you have any further questions in regards to our policies or procedures or if there is anything I can do personally to foster this time of mediation between our two parties
*** H
Billing Manager
WebHostingPad.com

We certainly appreciate you renewing with us and I do apologize for the issues you faced after the server switchWe do our best to make sure all of our servers are secure, but unfortunately we can't account for all of the content on every customer's accountIt's just the reality of shared hosting
What happened in this case is another customer hosted on the same server had their account hacked and the hacker attempted to send thousands of spam emails at one time which caused the shared IP address to be blacklistedWe have since quarantined the account in question and changed the shared IP address on the server but unfortunately it does take some time for the blacklists to recognize this and remove the server from their listingsUnfortunately we don't provide refunds for account renewals, per our terms of service, but I would be happy to do whatever is necessary to make sure your service is up to your (and our) standards

When a customer signs up for a hosting account with us, they must agree to our terms of service and billing policyThis policy states that all of our accounts are set to automatically renew, and the only way to cancel an account is online through the customer's billing areaThis billing policy can
be accessed any time on our website at http://***We send multiple renewal notices to the customer prior to any invoice being chargedThese notices are sent days before and days before any charge is attemptedThese renewal notices clearly state how to cancelThe renewal notices also state that having invalid credit card information is not a form of cancellation A screenshot of the email sent to the customer days prior to the invoice being charged has been attachedAs you can see, in bold, there is a PLEASE NOTE section explaining the procedure of cancellingThis email was sent on March 1st, days prior to the invoice being charged (due date of March 31st)We understand that people may not remember the billing policies when they signed up several years prior, which is why we include instructions on how to cancel in every renewal notice we sendWe don't try to hide this in any way.Another email was sent on March 24, days prior to the renewal date, which included the same exact text. PLEASE NOTE: If you do not want to renew your account please submit a cancellation request through your account managerYou can log in to the account management area by clicking hereHaving invalid billing information (expired credit card, old *** address, etc.) on an account DOES NOT signify cancellationYou must submit a cancellation request in order for an account to be cancelled.A screenshot of this has been included, as well.The customer emailed us April 1st expressing his wishes to cancelApproximately hour later our billing manager responded with the procedure on how to cancelThis is the time in question when the customer left the countryWe still informed him days prior and days prior to the renewal date how to cancelWhile it's understood the client left the country on April 1st after he emailed us, this has no bearing on the renewal notices that were sent to him prior to that date. Unfortunately a refund won't be issued because the customer did not cancel the account prior to the renewal being processed

I apologize for the spam issues you've been facingWe do not have any account in our system under the email address, name, or street address provided in the Revdex.com complaint so unfortunately I cannot address your specific issue but I assure you our support staff will do everything we can to help quell
any spam issues you're facingThe reality is there are many reasons why your inbox may be getting spammedSomething as simple as having a contact form on your website without a captcha, or listing your email address on your website leaves you at risk for getting spammed because there are spambots that crawl webpages for that information.Our ***s are available by email only so if you were trying to speak to one over the phone unfortunately you wouldn't be able toWe request that all *** issues are handled via ticket system so we have written documentation of everythingYou should have been directed to send an email to ***@webhostingpad.com when you requested to speak with management.I'd be happy to look into your specific issue further, but in order to do that I would need your account information so I can pull up any past support requests you've had

Complaint: [redacted]
I am rejecting this response because:I was no longer on the account and the account did have valid contact information. By removing myself from the account I felt I was ending my agreement with the company. It is highly unreasonable to be able to charge an expired credit card, especially when it doesn't belong to the contact on the account. No effort was made to contact me (they could have looked though the history to the original account holder) and as far as I know only email was sent to the person on the account and not any phone communication. [redacted] does send out spam so I wouldn't be surprised if it was simply missed.Forcing someone to pay for 5 years of cancelled service and not working with them is unacceptable. In present or past terms or not, these terms are unconscionable as well as their dealing with customers.Webhostingpad.com company's agenda is simply to get money from customers and keep it regardless of whether or not the customers past or present are happy or even want their services.
Sincerely,
[redacted]

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 13, 2015/07/20) */
I do apologize for any poor experiences you've had. After reviewing your ticket history I see that our support team has moved your account to a different server. I hope that this has worked out for you and you're experiencing better uptime. If...

not, we'd be happy to help resolve the issues you've had with reaching your website.

The customer admittedly restored a backup he took on his own, through a third party tool ([redacted] Admin) which in turn caused his website not to function properly. This is not any fault of ours nor are we responsible for backups/restores the customer does on his own. When our support team looked...

into the issue they replied letting the customer know that the backup file he tried uploading from was incomplete which was causing his website not to function properly. Despite this, our support team tried their best to recover the missing files from his backup.He insisted on us telling him why the backups he took from his third party script were incomplete which we simply can not answer. We didn't take the backups ourselves, nor were they done through our backup systems, so we have no way of knowing what went wrong. We do not take automatic account snapshots or anything of the sort when accounts are backed up/restored so we have no way of telling what was missing from the backup, how the account looked before the backup was taken, or how the backups themselves even function to see what could have happened to make files not be included.The customer, after restoring an incomplete backup, now is requesting that we pay for the cost for him to fix his mistake. We are in no way liable for the customer's individual account content or the activity he does on his own account. None of these backups were done using any of our programs or scripts, they were done by the customer through his [redacted] admin area, a third party script that he put on his account with us.  We can not be blamed for something that the customer does on his own account using third party scripts.We are sorry that the backup the customer restored didn't work properly and we certainly wish we could help him more, but unfortunately there isn't anything we can do in this case. We did nothing on the account to make the website not function properly, this was something done by the customer.Our support staff was very responsive with the customer with ticket responses coming no later than 31 minutes until he requested the issue to be escalated. We were short staffed due to the holiday season and managers only work normal business hours so responses from management do take longer than our support representatives. If I could use it in a different context, think of it in terms of your personal computer. You have backup software on your computer from company XYZ. You take a backup using their software. One day you decide to restore a backup but the restore breaks your computer because the backup was incomplete. You then take your computer to [redacted] who informs you that the backup was missing some important files which is causing your computer not to work. There's not much they can do because they don't know how the XYZ backup software works, nor were they the ones to take the backup. They try their best to find a workaround to get your computer working again but unfortunately there's no way for them to recover the files that are missing. You wouldn't blame [redacted] for your backup not working properly, nor would you expect them to know why the backup didn't include all of your files because they didn't take it, nor is the software something they created. You would blame the backup software for not functioning as you expected it would.The backup software, in this case, is [redacted] which is what the customer said was used to back up the website. We are essentially in the same position as [redacted] in the example. We can (and have) try our best to do whatever we can to help get the rest of the files, but we weren't part of the backup or restoration process in any way, so we're working on very limited information. No refund will be issued because the issues with the account were not something caused by us. They arose from the customer restoring an incomplete backup that he took himself which caused his website not to function properly.

All of our accounts are set to automatically renew, per our terms of service and billing policy. All customers must agree to this when signing up for a hosting account with us. We send out renewal notices via 30 days prior to any invoice being charged letting the customer know how much they will be...

charged, on what date, and that it is an automatic payment. This email also includes a link to our cancellation form if the customer does not wish to renew the account. Unfortunately since the customer changed the email information on the account these renewal notices were sent to someone else which is why he did not receive the notification. This isn't something we can be responsible for.Our billing system always has had the ability for customers to update and change their billing/credit card information through their account. The customer could have also contacted us at any time to have his credit card information updated or changed if this is something he wasn't able to accomplish himself. It is the customer's responsibility to update the billing information if he does not want to be charged for renewals. It's an unfortunate situation, but the customer, by his own admission, did nothing under the assumption that since he changed the name/email address on the account that his credit card would no longer be charged. We have no way of knowing if a customer doesn't want a card to be charged unless we are told, or the card is changed on the account. Per our billing policy, since accounts are set to automatically renew, we work under the assumption that the card we have on file is the one that the customer wants billed. Per our terms of service, no refunds are provided for account renewals. We will send all proof necessary of the valid charge to the credit card company once we receive word of the dispute.

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2015/07/22) */
Contact Name and Title: Customer Care
Contact Phone: XXXXXXXXXX
Contact Email: [redacted]@webhostingpad.com
Hello
As was explained in the email sent from our billing manager and was pasted in this complaint description, all of our...

accounts are set to automatically renew to avoid interruption of service. In order to cancel an account you would have to fill out a cancellation form. To avoid renewal this would need to be done prior to the renewal date, as outlined in our terms of service as well as all renewal notifications sent.
Per our terms of service, no refunds are provided for renewals of services. These are the terms of service that are agreed to at the time of sign up. The terms of service can be located at http://www.webhostingpad.com/billing_policy.html

Hi, I'm sorry to hear about the trouble you've experienced, and I'd like to apologize. With a site receiving that many hits, you likely outgrew our shared hosting services. Simply put, sites that put that big a strain on our servers can cause fluctuations and outages that affect the whole server. A...

better solution for you would probably be VPS hosting. Our support reps should've suggested you upgrade, but if they didn't, I apologize. We do monitor our own servers and report those uptimes because that's what our server monitors report. Third-party monitors can often be unreliable, and the outages you experienced may not have been the server, but your own site, due to the number of hits and the frequency of problems you reported experiencing. This is why I still strongly suggest VPS. Whether that is through our sister company or through another VPS hosting service, you will not run into the same problems you've been experiencing. Yes, it costs more money, but when a site is as popular as yours, the strain it puts on a server with 1000 other people on it causes problems for everyone, and there are no solutions we can offer besides an upgrade. I do apologize for any inconvenience you've had with our service, and I hope that however you decide to move forward, you consider alternative solutions. I honestly think they would work better for you, and we want your site up and running in whatever way possible.