My HostGator Experience

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Posted by JVWright, 08-11-2004, 02:39 PM
I signed up for HostGator's Gold reseller package a couple of weeks ago, and got a refund last week. I'll detail why below. I waited a while to post this message so that I wouldn't be quite so agitated as I was. Also so that when HostGator inevitably responds, they'll be in the position to say what they've done in the intervening weeks to make changes (if at all). First, a positive note. HostGator had me set up within minutes, literally. I started my account with them as a very happy camper. In fairness, this may have raised my expectations of their level of service to an unrealistic level. But that's why I'm posting this, so you can be the judge. I did a lot of research on hosting before I made my decision, and posts in this forum were the best source. So I'm adding my two cents. This is a VERY long message because I'm posting the actual IM and Email conversations. Rather than paraphrase and characterize what I thought was very poor and unprofessional support from HG, I'm posting their actual words for you to decide for yourself. I had set up two sites on my HostGator server. One night at about 10:30 PM I noticed that I wasn't getting email on either of them. I had been getting email, but at some point in the evening it simply seemed to stop. Again, to be fair, I'll tell you that when all is said and done, HostGator says it was my fault for misconfiguring the CPanel mail controls. More on this later. I IM'd support, who answered quickly, but they were unable to diagnose or correct the problem. Here is the actual conversation: ___ AIM IM with HostGator 8/2/04, 10:29 PM JW: Hi - I have a potential problem with my server... I'm not receiving email from either of the two sites I currently have on my reseller account - ###### ( the other site not receiving email is ######). Can you take a look and see if you can tell what the problem is? 10:30 PM HG: hi HG: let me check the domains JW: Thanks JW: They had been receiving mail just fine, and then some time today they just stopped... 10:35 PM HG: k 10:50 PM JW: Any luck? HG: ckecking JW: ok 11:20 PM JW: I'm stepping away from the computer for a bit. I sent an email to your support address to create a paper trail for this problem. Please let me know ASAP what you're able to find. I'm expecting some important emails. Thanks! HG: k 11:25 PM HG: may i know the cpanel login 12:25 AM JW: cpanel login: ######## password: ####### HG: tahnkz HG: thankz JW: Any idea what's happening yet? 12:50 AM JW: It's been 2 and a half hours now, any progress on this? I'm happy to help you diagnose it, if you have any insights so far. HG: i have forwarded this to our sr admins HG: plz HG: leave your email HG: will send you the response HG: i tried creating test account HG: no luck JW: My problem is that I'm not getting email. HG: any yahoo account 12:55 AM JW: You can use ###@###### HG: k HG: i will JW: Or call me and leave a message ## ### #### HG: k JW: Please do whatever needs to be done, this could be bad if it's not online tomorrow morning when my clients come in. I'm planning to move all their sites to this server, and it's going to be ugly if I have to tell them my mail is down with the new hosting service they're looking forward to. HG: k HG: will leave a msg JW: Thanks HG: you welcome 1:45 AM JW: Nothing yet? HG: hello HG: i will call you JW: Alright. ___ As the IM mentions, I also send a support ticket (via email, which is the only method HostGator currently supports). The call never came. No emails came in to any address. I checked in the following morning and there had been no change. I IM'd again. ___ JW: Hello - I'm not receiving any email for either of the two sites on my reseller account - ######. The other domain on that account is ######. I was speaking to a tech last night, who said he'd forwarded it to a senior admin and that he would call me. But I haven't heard anything, and I still have no email on either domain. It's been over 12 hours now. Can you give me an update on this issue please? HG: hello HG: k HG: please wait ...... checking JW: thank you 11:10 AM HG: please let me know if you use OEXP JW: What's OEXP? HG: outlook express JW: Ah, I don't personally, but many of the people who will be getting email from my account will. JW: I'm on a Macintosh HG: k JW: Why would that matter? 11:15 AM HG: to see the mail server settings JW: I'm using mail###### and mail###### respectively. Is that correct? HG: yeap JW: It worked yesterday, and then just stopped working at some point in the early evening. HG: please let me know the email address you are facing problem with JW: everything at ###### and everything at ###### - I'm getting NO email from either of the two accounts set up on my reseller account. JW: Can I ask, isn't there a log of outstanding support issues, or an open ticket you can reference from last night? 11:20 AM HG: just send email at our yahoo account HG: and it was recieved successfully 11:25 AM JW: Yeah, I seem to be able to send mail, but I'm not getting any. HG: please try using your ISP's mail server JW: I can use my ISP 11:30 AM JW: I can use my ISP to SEND mail, but that's not a problem. I need the mail server under my own domain to RECEIVE mail, and that's where the problem is. No mail addressed to my domains is getting through. JW: I have sent test mails from many different email accounts, using many different SMTP servers. None arrive in my email box. JW: Please answer my question - is there an open support ticket with a record of this problem that you're able to reference? HG: k 11:40 AM JW: Will you please answer my question about your records of my problem. I've asked it three times. Do you have a record of my IM last night, my previous support ticket, or any indication that my account is having problems other than my IM with you and the ticket I just now sent in again? HG: no 11:50 AM JW: The person last night said, "i have forwarded this to our sr admins". Is there a senior admin on duty right now? HG: he's not yet come JW: It's noon. JW: This has been going on for 13+ hours, and you guys don't have a senior admin available at noon? Wasn't he or she called in, or notified? HG: he'll be here soon HG: i have contact the tech 11:55 AM HG: he'll update you accordingly ___ You'll notice that I asked three times if there was any information on my problem from the night before. The tech answered only after the third time, and said only, "no." So the alternate email and phone number I gave were gone. The ticket I submitted was also gone. Since I sent it from my email address that was not working, I could not receive the auto-response that contained the ticket number. This is apparently the only way for HG to track problems. I had to submit FOUR tickets until I got one to auto-respond to my alternate email address. You'll also notice that the tech on IM couldn't get a grasp on my problem. They tried to tell me to use my ISP's server, but I wasnt' haveing a problem sending. You'll also notice that the senior admin wasn't available until after noon on a work day. It appeared HostGator was unable to offer support in this person's absence, and had not method or motivation to bring him in. Five hours later, I got an email from support saying that both my addresses worked. I checked. They did not. HG had created test accounts and gotten them to work, and assumed the problem was corrected. I IM'd one final time. ___ JW: Hey - this is Jeff Wright again, ticket #DGX-36491-208 I still don't have email coming into jeff@###### or jwright@######. What are my next steps, who can I talk to get someone on this? It's 20 hours now. 6:00 PM HG: plz give me a minute JW: alright HG: thankz 6:15 PM JW: Been twenty minutes... any ideas? HG: i will update you in two minutes JW: ok 6:30 PM JW: I don't want to be a jerk, but two minutes was fifteen minutes ago. Seriously, what's going on? HG: it working at our end JW: What's working? JW: Specifically. HG: we created a test account and check the fuctionality of mail HG: was able to send and recieve emails on that account 6:35 PM JW: I know. It's well documented in the support tickets that TEST accounts are working. What's NOT working is mail to jwright@###### and mail to jeff@######. JW: Though mail to jwright@cadillac.websitewelcome### and jeff@cadillac.websitewelcome### DO work. JW: So the boxes work. The mail server works. It seems to be a domain issue possibly, or something like that. I don't know. HG: i got the update from my admin HG: you did not configure the mail properly HG: it was looping JW: I didn't configure mail at all. HG: you forwarded it on to your own email address HG: please check it now JW: I set up a new account and it did all the work. Both of those are cpanel user accounts created automatically. HG: please check it now JW: It now works. Where is mail that has been sent over the last day? JW: And why did this take 20 hours to resolve? HG: our mail server was always working 6:40 PM HG: you did not configure properly HG: our sr admin checked the entries in the server HG: you had your email address forwarded on to your own same email address HG: and it was looping JW: I didn't set up forwarding for either of those addresses. JW: I didn't set up any forwarding at all for ###### JW: I didn't even change a single setting in the mail section of cpanel for that domain. JW: And where is all that mail. If it was looping, it should be free now. I'm not getting any in. 6:45 PM HG: loop emails are discarded JW: You lost all my mail for today. JW: 20 hours I've been on IM, mail, and forums. I don't know how many times your techs told me the problem was fixed. Including you. Time and time again I had to keep coming back to tell you it was still broken. And in the mean time, you're DISCARDING my emails? JW: That is NOT cool. ___ I got a different explanation of the problem from another tech at HostGator via email: "You had set the default address for both the domains to ::blackhole:: and so the emails for the default username account for both the domains was not working. I changed it back to the username." Obviously, setting my email addresses to point to themselves, and setting the default to ::blackhole:: are two different things. Neither of which, I'm sure, I did. Though HostGator disputes it. I wrote a letter of complaint to HostGator which is excepted below: __ I've recently signed up with HostGator, and I have to say, after today, I'm astonishingly upset with your support staff and your company's customer service. Last night my email stopped working. I sent an IM to your tech, and sent an email ticket in as well. It's now almost 21 hours later and the problem has finally been fixed. But not until after I've been told, erroneously, that the problem was fixed, or a different problem, or just told to wait at several points throughout the day. The following email was sent to me at noon, from Josh, "Your emails are working fine we have tested it check the heaaders as below:" Clearly the problem wasn't fixed. Now I find out that, while all this was going on, the emails that were not being delivered to my inbox were discarded. Excerpts from my IM conversation follow. The level of professionalism of your staff is unfathomable. I felt like I was pulling them out of something else important, that they could hardly be bothered to help me. They couldn't be bothered to even write complete sentences or answer questions without me asking and asking again. One tech said he would call, he never did. Another told me there was no record of problems on my account from earlier in the night. More than one told me the problems were fixed, and that test accounts worked. When the actual problem turned out to have nothing to do with test accounts. I got one response in the forum, and it had no technical explanations or advice. As things are, there's no way I can continue to work with HostGator. I've done a lot of research on web hosting, and HG is not so far superior to my second choices that I'm not seriously thinking of making a switch before I move the rest of my 20 or so domains. This is exactly the kind of experience I did my research to avoid. Had I read a transcript like the one below while researching you on hosting forums, I'd never have joined. I'm in business. My sites and my email are my lifeblood. It's clear your IM staff are limited at best, and it's clear that your primary support personnel are not kept to any schedule. The senior admin wasn't available at noon today. That's not the kind of support I can feel comfortable standing behind my business and my clients who depend on me. ___ Their entire response follows: ___ You opened a ticket at 11:02am 10 minutes 11:12am_ 10 minutes later you received an email back_saying_your email was address was_receiving mail. It was receiving but because of the forwarder you setup it was forwarding the mail after it received it. 11:34am you emailed saying not working still. 12:10 you said you didn't know were mail was being routed. 97 minutes 1:47pm you were emailed back saying "You domain's username is jeff and so you do not need to create a seperate email account for jeff . Mails sent to jeff@yourdomain go into the default user's inbox and also as jeff is a system user jeff@cadill... is also the same account. " which is correct. 4:48pm You emailed back saying mail wasn't in your inbox. 49 minutes 5:37pm we figured out you setup forwarders to forward to yourself. 156 minutes Your problem took 2 and a half hours to solve based on the above ticket. Any problem that isn't server related and is user error requires trouble shooting. During this time trouble shooting took place. If there was a problem on the server not receiving mail it would have been fixed in minutes. We are here 24/7 at our 800 number. You could / can call in 24/7 to speak with a tech or manager who will assist in solving your problem. I'm sorry we didn't idenfity the problem within seconds of you contacting us_however that's not possible when you have to email the user back and forth to trouble shoot. __ So no apologies. No attempt to make things right for me. They put forth the case that they solved the problem in 156 minutes, even though it was 20+ hours of real time. They suggested I should have called, though I never had a problem getting in touch with them, and they had my phone number the whole time. If a phone call was the solution, they could have placed it. I gave my number to the first tech I IM'd and never got the call he promised anyway. The email above also came with no signature. I don't know who wrote it. The owner, a tech, I don't know. So I wrote back that they had lost a customer: __ You have lost a customer. I contacted support at 10:29 PM on August 2, 2004. To say my problem took 2 and a half hours to solve is a false statement. If opening a ticket was a requirement to gain a solution, it was the responsibility of your tech on IM to tell me so. I DID open a ticket at roughly 11:20 PM on August 2, 2004, as the IM record indicated. It was sent from an email address that could not receive a reply. Perhaps my mistake, but I don't think it's my responsibility to understand how the ticketing system works. At 12:55 AM on August 3, 2004 I gave the tech on IM an alternate email address and my desk phone number. He told me he would call me. You can see that for yourself in the IM record. Again at 1:45 AM on August 3, 2004 he tells me he will call me. You say I submitted my ticket at 11:02 AM. I submitted my FOURTH ticket at 11:02 AM. Hence it's title, "FOURTH TRY". This because your tech on IM said you had no record of my problem, no open tickets, no nothing. Now, that should not have been the case. Even though I sent tickets from an address at which I could not receive a reply, the problems HAD BEEN SUBMITTED, and should have been documented. Though I received many "correct" replies throughout the course of this problem, it would also be correct if they replied "the sky is blue". Their "correct" replies had nothing to do with the eventual source of the problem. HostGator had 20+ hours of opportunity to solve this problem. When you assumed it was solved, you didn't double-check. You didn't ask me to check, you simply replied, "It's fixed." or you didn't reply at all, as in the case of the tech to whom I gave my phone number. And when faced with a dissatisfied customer, your stance is not to make things right, but to tell me it was user error. User error is possible, but no one has every addressed the basic technological fundamentals of the problem: 1) How could I have set forwarding up to myself if I never tinkered with any of the email controls for ######? 2) How could it have been a problem of setting up forwarding to myself if the default addresses were listed as ::blackhole::, as Shane told me in a response to the trouble ticket this afternoon at 6:53. 3) How could it have been a problem with the default email address, as Shane explained, if mail was not being delivered to a distinct user name, "jwright" and "jeff" respectively, at each domain? 4) How could it have been a problem with the default email address, when the default address of ###### had been set to "contact@######" and not ::blackhole:: as reported. It seems like, even if this was my fault, HostGator's incompetent staff had every opportunity to fix it, but didn't have the infrastructure to record the problem accurately from first awareness of it. You didn't have the expertise on hand to correctly diagnose it, or the interest in investigating it. It wasn't until I KEPT prodding that you finally got around to determining the true problem - after being told by you it was fixed. And to top it off, I get a reply back from you that contains no professionalism, nothing to attempt to maintain this business relationship, and not even a signature to identify yourself. How am I to know if I'm talking to the president of the company or a tech? Your professionalism is a joke. You sign off with a crack about wishing you could solve every problem in seconds. What do you take me for? Nobody expects resolution in seconds. And you didn't have to email me. YOU HAD MY PHONE NUMBER. YOU HAD MY IM. MY MESSAGE WAS IN THE FORUM. And at no time did any of the various people I talked to suggest a phone call or any other course of action. I would have been happy if the problem was solved in hours, not even minutes. But it took a day. And it didn't have to. I'm sure you're aware of how the well-spoken opinion of one customer posted in the right forum, with a copy of the communications, can hurt a web hosting company's ability to generate new business. So it astonishes me that you'd treat me with such disdain. Even if the initial problem was caused by me - which I still doubt - your support and customer relations incompetence created the much bigger problem of a day's worth of lost email, and, for you, one extremely upset and dissatisfied customer. ___ They responded: __ All I have is the ticket number you provided to go by. Can you provide the other ticket numbers where this has been going on for a day? I haven't read your post in the forum nor was I ever given your phone number or IM. And the problem was the email was set to forward to yourself. We didn't set that up , and I'm not sure who if anyone has access to your cpanel but that is the only way it's changed. _ I hate anyone leaving disatisfied and at this point I'm more intertested in reading your other tickets if I see you were "played" with or not treated in the fashion you should have been I will be more upset then you. When your ready to close your account please fill out #### we'll even refund you for the month if your past the 30 days. We hate to see anyone leave on a bad experience but it does happen now and then we are far from perfect. Thank you for your business! Hostgator### __ My response: __ _Whoever you are - I don't have other ticket numbers because I originally sent tickets from jwright@######. So I couldn't get the auto-response ticket numbers that were sent to me. You should have them on file, though, and should be able to find them depending on how many tickets are opened over the course of an evening. I opened four until I realized that you were assigning ticket numbers via auto-responder, and the second IM tech hadn't heard of my problems. My post is in the forum, the fact that you haven't read it, even in response to my emails this evening, is telling. The fact that the initial IM tech, as documented below, never put my phone number or alternate email address or IM as part of an overall trouble ticket, or note for the next shift, or in whatever notification he or she supposedly sent the senior admin, is also telling. There doesn't seem to be any consistent policy for recording those kinds of details and keeping track of customers' issues and information. The second tech I spoke to even admitted he had no record of my problem, though the first tech told me he'd contact a senior admin and would call me. The call never came, of course, and I have no reason to believe the senior admin was every brought in. The fact that there was no senior admin even available as of noon today is also telling. I also have to say the responses of "k" and "thankz" and "plz", which I understand are IM shorthand, are indicative of a very young, or very unprofessional tech staff. It makes me feel like HG is run out of a bedroom by some 13 year olds in t-shirts. If they're cutting corners in their communications, are they cutting corners in their service activities as well? Can they just not be bothered to present themselves as professionals? Added to the fact that they would tell me they would get back to me in two minutes, and they took 20, or didn't respond at all until I prodded them, and I am woefully unimpressed. I can't imagine what these peoples' qualifications are. I wasn't "played" with. I was the recipient of sub-standard service from disinterested people who didn't check their work, failed to respond with professional customer service, and didn't make sure the customer's problem and information was communicated effectively between shifts. Nobody took care of me. I took care of myself, and basically prodded HostGator's staff until the problem finally got resolved. In addition, I am not satisfied that it was my error in the first place. I understand that the most likely scenario is that I mucked up the controls somehow, especially from your point of view. I freely admit my mistakes, and they are legion, but I don't think this was one of them. I changed nothing when the system stopped working. I changed nothing on ###### at all. If test@###### worked, why didn't jwright@######? Especially when contact@###### was the (supposedly) troublesome default address? Your explanation of how this came to pass makes no sense to me. Nor does Shane's explanation in the support ticket that, "You had set the default address for both the domains to ::blackhole:: and so the emails for the default username account for both the domains was not working. I changed it back to the username." That seems like two different explanations to me. Which was it? Or was it both? And, if Shane is correct, how on Earth do you expect me to believe that I set my default address to ::blackhole::. The only possible explanation if he's right, is that the default setting for a new cpanel account is ::blackhole::, which would be stupid, and would make this HG's fault, not mine. In short, I'm not getting a detailed, coherent description of what went wrong and why, and that only makes me doubt HG's honesty and/or competence all the more. I've also noted how in all the explanations, nobody has told me where to find information on correctly setting cpanel, or offered to talk me through it. All of the emails seem to say, "this was your fault." And, again, I'm not saying it wasn't. I'm saying that the awful support process allowed a small problem to become a huge one for me, and, at the same time, I'm not sure your explanation of why it was my fault has any merit. I don't expect perfection. I expect solid effort on my behalf, and I don't feel like I got that. The effort I got was from prodding, and the result was a worse problem than this needed to be for both of us. I appreciate your offer of a refund. But you can't make this right again. A day's worth of email and time spent prodding your staff is lost. $75.00 in hosting fees doesn't begin to cover it, and none of this mentions that I'm barely a week into my account with you. So this was a horrific first impression, and I'm well in line for the money back guarantee anyway. Jeff Wright ___ They never esponded to this email. I waited a bit, moved my domains, and got a refund. This was my HostGator experience. My opinons on their service is detailed in my letters to them. Make your own decisions.
Posted by Derrick, 08-11-2004, 03:54 PM
Jeff, Glad to see you waited some time before posting a comment on their services. It is never good to make judgements when you are angry or annoyed at something. It is also nice that they refunded your money for you in a timely manner. Good luck with your future host! Derrick
Posted by BrentOfHG, 08-11-2004, 08:02 PM
The only thing I feel we did wrong was when one of our chat techs said you would get a call back and you did not. For this I am very sorry for and upset over. We had no notes of any call backs to be made. Call backs are against our policy for this very reason since we have an 800 # with a manager available 24/7. (Unless lines are busy and a voice message is left) You opened 4 tickets with us total. 1st on Mon Aug 02 2004 10:21pm was responded to within minutes. A test email was setup on your domain and it showed to be receiving mail fine. Ticket also said Please let us know if you need any other assistance and we will be more than glad to assist you. Thank you. This ticket was never responded to. Tue Aug 03 2004 10:41am you emailed in saying email wasnt working (duplicate ticket). You were asked to keep a single ticket going with all of the details. Aug 03 2004 10:46am 3rd ticket you opened saying the same thing as the other emails you sent. We created a test email and showed proof of it receiving mail. This ticket was never responded to either after the below response from us. {Kindly open one ticket to explain your problem and your email are working fine : Return-path: Envelope-to: test@edited Delivery-date: Tue, 03 Aug 2004 10:26:17 -0500 Received: from [206.190.37.27] (hello=web53706.mail.yahoo.com) by cadillac.websitewelcome.com with SMTP (Exam 4.34) id 1Bs1BB-0006hh-7v for test@edited; Tue, 03 Aug 2004 10:26:17 -0500 Message-ID: <20040803152613.2324.qmail@web53706.mail.yahoo.com> Received: from [61.11.112.66] by web53706.mail.yahoo.com via HTTP; Tue, 03 Aug 2004 08:26:13 PDT Date: Tue, 3 Aug 2004 08:26:13 -0700 (PDT) From: Test Email from Yahoo account Subject: Re: Test Email To: test@edited In-Reply-To: <3964.61.11.112.66.1091546435.squirrel@cadillac.websitewelcome.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="0-1614619885-1091546773=:98217 Please let us know if you need any other assistance and we will be more glad to assist you. Thank you. Aug 03 2004 11:02am is the ticket you opened and the first ticket you responded to out of the four. This ticket was then resolved within a few hours thanks to some trouble shooting being done based on your responses. Counting the time it takes for you to respond to a ticket is very unfair especially when the problem is user error and trouble shooting is involved. The biggest problem I see is you not being familiar on how a ticket system works. This I am also sorry for that we didnt pickup on you bouncing from tech to tech on newly opened tickets. I changed nothing when the system stopped working. I changed nothing on editedffweditedt.com at all. Either you or someone you gave access to your site setup the mail forwarders to forward to themselves which was the problem. This is a fact unless cpanel has some new bug that creates forwarders randomly without any human interaction. However it doesnt matter who creates the problem its our job to help you and this is what we did in a little over 2 hours time after you started responding to the ticket with more information compared to opening multiple tickets with the same duplicate info. Im sure we both regret what this has transpired into, and do wish you would have had a better experience with us. I wish you the best of luck with your new host. Sincerely, Brent Last edited by BrentOfHG; 08-11-2004 at 08:06 PM.
Posted by FTPguy, 08-11-2004, 11:05 PM
JVWright, more than most would care to read. However also wish you the best with your next host.
Posted by JVWright, 08-12-2004, 01:29 AM
In advance, my apologies to the people who don't want to read such long posts. When I did my research, I did a lot of reading. I wanted all the information available. So I include all the information available for those who do want to read it. Hosting is mission-critical stuff for my clients, and therefore for me, and I relied heavily on other peoples' input on hosting companies. HG, in your reply to me: "The only thing I feel we did wrong was when one of our chat techs said you would get a call back and you did not." 1) I opened four tickets because your IM staff kept asking me what my ticket number was, saying they couldn't find any records of my problems. I didn't have the ticket number(s) because the autoresponder was sending them to my non-working email address. Remember, the problem was that I wasn't getting emails. Hard to get emails from support when you're not getting them from anywhere. You'd think that you wouldn't have so many tickets opening up in the space of a monday night after 10PM, that the IM tech at HG would be able to look up the last few and figure out which one was mine. You'd also think that whoever was responding would think, "Hey, this guy's email isn't working, so maybe sending this note to his email isn't the most reliable way of getting in touch." Splitting hairs, I know. 2) You can say that the only way to screw up the forwarding as was done was to log into CPanel and do it manually. Entirely possible. I have said that the initial problem isn't even the true source of my complaint. However, this possibilitly doesn't account for the two separate and conflicting diagnoses of the problem from HG staff. What was it, forwarding to myself or forwarding to Blackhole? Do you consider it an error on your part that separate diagnoses were made as to what happened? The email was set to loop or set to go to blackhole - which one was it? 3) You can say that you can't count the time you were waiting on me to respond. Fair enough. I accept that. My take a harder look at it. I began my IM conversation at 10:30 PM. I opened the first ticket at 11:20 PM on Monday night. I don't know when you responded to it, obviously, because my email was down. I checked back in with your IM support at 1:45 AM, and they said only that they would call. No note of a test message, no nothing. I'd have kept working on it if they'd have told me a test had been sent, or even noted any response to my ticket - I'd have noticed I didn't get one. So that's another 3 hours and fiteen minutes right there. 3a) And I would even care about the time so much if it was 20 hours that were needed to solve the problem. But it wasn't. It was 20 hours of people sending email to an account that had been reported TO THEM as non-functional and waiting for a reply. I mean seriously. It was 20 hours of continuous IM conversations where the person on IM didn't know what was in the emails that had been sent to me. Didn't realize I hadn't gotten them, and telling me that had no information and were waiting for people to come in at noon. This you want to pin on me? I'd have stayed up all night working on the problem if I had any indication that there was any movement whatsoever on your end. 3b) Or are you saying that it's my responsibility as a customer to know that you assign ticket numbers via an autoresponder and that you can't be expected to know that when there's an email problem, it's probably not best to communicate with your customer via a primary email address? I had given a secondary address and a phone number. I had no indication whatsoever that you were wating on me. 3c) If, as you say, the ticket was responed to within minutes, saying that a test account had been created and was working, how come at 1:45 AM that night, the tech on IM was still saying he had no idea what was happening? You don't consider that something that should be addressed? The evidence seems to indicate that HostGator's IM staff doesn't have access to the trouble tickets, or this certain tech couldn't be bothered to look and see that a resolution had been mailed to me three hours after the fact. That's possible because this same tech didn't call when he said he would. 4) Do you consider it a mistake, or at least unusual customer service, that someone responded to my later complaints without identifying themselves and without any more professional demeanor than to list the times of my notes and calculate 156 minutes of HG responsiblity? If it were me, I probably would have just said, "I'm sorry this happened, we do our best, what can I do to make it right?" Intead of working so hard, with such calculations, to tell me it was my fault and that your guys did great work. Again, I never complained about losing my email access. I never said it was your fault. I only said your service left something to be desired afterwards. 5) You don't consider it at least unprofessional, if not something you "did wrong" the way your IM techs communicate with one word slang answers, and don't answer questions posed to them until the third time? I didn't mean to harp on this, but your "the only thing we did wrong" attitude has me baffled. I'm not saying you're a bad hosting provider, or that I did nothing wrong myself. It's just that if I were in your shoes, I might have said, "Yeah, we could have done a lot of things better. We could have caught the problem the first time. Maybe not relied on contacting you through an email that we were told didn't work. Maybe we could have been a bit more professional on our IM, or looked up the ticket for you when it was clear you didn't get the autoresponse. We also might have identified who you were taking to in emails, and told you what the cause of the problem was with certainty, rather than give you two conflicting answers. Maybe, too, we didn't need to go out of our way to tell you that we did everything right and you screwed it all up. That's probably not the best way to provide customer service. Things got messy. I'm sorry. It's an abberration, and not a reflection of who we really are as a company. I'll speak to the people involved and see if we can't do better next time." But maybe that's just me.
Posted by Website Rob, 08-12-2004, 02:53 AM
A most interesting thread, to say the least. Having taken the time to be detailed and un-emotional is points for you, JVWright. May I point out though, that Communication is an art and a science, requiring work on all sides. I can see errors on both sides here, but there are some things you could have to done differently, to expedite the solution. You start your thread by saying you got a "reseller package" then proceed to detail your experience with "your HostGator server". That is confusing (to me anyway) as the two descriptions are not mutually exclusive. One either has a Reseller account or their own Server -- regardless of who it is from -- but they do not have both. And it goes without saying that anyone having their own Server is expected to have a working knowledge of it and basic troubleshooting skills. You did not mention any troubleshooting you had done on your own to fix the problem? When you initially ran into your problem it would have been helpful to describe the troubleshooting methods you already tried. This not only helps Tech Support to know where to start, saving a lot of time for all, it also establishes a "base-line" that everyone can agree on as a starting point. On the Tech Support side, when something is working fine and then is not, first question to ask is, "What changes did you make?" That was a mistake on their part for not asking. You also stated that you submitted Trouble Tickets and used an eMail address that "you knew was not working!" I'm sure you will not make this same mistake in the future, but again, it was part of the communication problem. On the Technical side, anyone who has used WHM/Cpanel for any length of time will know that Documentation is skimpy at best. Only from personal experience or the experiences of others can one really know, how that Control Panel operates. I've dealt with some that claim to be Experts with it, only to find out it was a typical Marketing slogan -- not true but it sounds good. Individual Techs have individual knowledge since no DC can justify the cost to train all their Techs, on all aspects of any Control Panel, actually. Tech Support did look into your Trouble Tickets and regardless of the eMail address used, there should be a record of it; which they should be able to find and provide. Their first concern was the Server itself and not the Control Panel. Having determined that eMail Service was not the problem and after your continued reports there was still a problem, they expanded their support to include the individual eMail address(s), eventually finding & correcting the problem. I cannot see where they can be faulted for that. Could this whole situation have been handled better? Without a doubt, yes. Nobody is perfect though and both sides contributed to the amount of time it took to fix the problem. You could have picked up the phone and dialed their 800 number at any time, for a faster response. And why does HostGator send anonymous Support eMails? That does not make sense. It also seems that from the other information regarding specific Tech Support replies, better communication should be a consideration.
Posted by BrentOfHG, 08-12-2004, 03:01 AM
1. I might have missed this in the chats but how did you expect receive a response if you email in from an email not receiving? Did you tell chat that you kept opening tickets from not working emails thus not getting responses? I now understand why you didn't reply back to any of our responses. Thank you 2. The problem was fixed and you were told a few times what the problem was. Because of the ticket problem it might have got relayed incorrectly. (not sure) 3. I apologized that you weren't called. The 24/7 800 number is on our site to help those such as you. Chat has access to tickets but since most tickets are done within minutes they become closed and once a ticket is closed access is limited until ticket is reopened with a response. You kept going to sleep, out, etc, come back and have to start over with a new tech. Not a pretty situation. Tickets save people from this problem. 3b. I don't think any of the techs realized you would be emailing in tickets from non working email accounts. 3c. tickets and chat are different techs, now and then they cross over. Again without a ticket and a new tech coming into the picture he wouldnt know. 4. I tried explaining the situation and giving a recap. I forgot to sign the email, I would have gladly said who it was if you had asked. No matter how I would have replied you would have posted here since you had already decided you made the wrong choice and moved your business. 5. You know how many hosting companies offer 24/7 chat support? Close to none. When someone has a problem they message every few seconds till they get a response. They will be asked to put a ticket in, and they still will message every few seconds. Its all about communication not what lingo is used. Chat is for questions and low tech support issues. When they cant handle something they admit it and ask a ticket to be put in. In this case chat could not help you. If they had asked you did you or anyone in your site setup email forwarders. You would have answered no. When you say my email address isnt working and you are asked are to email in a support ticket one would assume you dont email from non working email or at the very least ask if its ok to email from broken email. But we did screw up as we assumed this. If we had said sir please email from a working email You could have came here posting we insulted your intelligence. I got reamed out today because someone thats not even a customer of ours called in started yelling about their designer not registering the correct domain. I said please email sales@hostgator.com she said saleshostgator.com what? I repeated sales@hostgator.com she repeats saleshostgator.com I say again sales@hostgator.com she says sales attttt stumbling. I said you know the a with a circle sign She blew up on me! Saying how dare you dont look down on me you think your better then me she went on for minutes. I said Im sorry if I offended you. She hangs up. I honestly thought she didnt know what the @ was. My mom doesnt understand how email works Shes always sending to places like brenty or brent without the @ or even a domain, and then wonders why I dont receive. My point is one has to assume some things. We get people who call in saying their hosting is down every day when they dont even have internet access. A week ago some guy called in saying hosting was down. I went back and fourth with him for 30 minutes. Id tell him go to aol.com and read me what it says. He would say it loads page not found my internet is connected why would aol load page not found if I wasnt Ive had another person call in before saying site was down when it loaded fine for me. I asked if he was connected to the internet. Guess what? This guy got so insulted saying we were horrible support that we treated him like an idiot, etc, he cancelled on the spot. And Yeah, we could have done a lot of things better as you could have. Thats how support works. If we were all perfect support wouldnt exist. Im sorry I have to even post another post you wont like. Nothing I can say or do will make you feel better about the situation. If I could start over I would and Id tell you what the problem is before you even contacted us. I mess up multiple times a day, I wish I never did but I do. I try to make up for these mistakes with honesty. My honesty gets me in trouble a lot. I feel Im being completely honest with you and giving my opinion on this. For many I will be right for many more here I will be wrong. So from the bottom of my heart I wish this was handled better, but I feel given the circumstances they werent handled bad at all other then a tech saying youd get a phone call. Im done responding to this thread Im having troubling keeping up with it =) If you would like to talk more feel free to call or email brent@hostgator.com
Posted by BitOMagic, 08-12-2004, 05:31 AM
This is the exact reason that if someone puts in a ticket and IMS we tell them we'll deal with it in the Support ticket.
Posted by Protagonist, 08-12-2004, 05:37 AM
I always tell my customers to have a non-domain email account for helpdesk or our user account system. In that way, when the domain is down or not working, they would still get announcement. I have heard of the email problem from one of my existing customers who has 3 sites with hostgator. His exact words "I am getting fed up with the fact that every single day there are problems with their mail servers whereby it can take up to 3 minutes to download a very small email. Using 1.2Mb ADSL I find this very annoying." . I wasn't sure if the problem was his ISP but since he had an existing account with me, he was able to verify that it wasn't his ISP. Yesterday he got a reseller account from me. Hope that email problem gets fixed soon.
Posted by hostinganddesign, 08-12-2004, 11:07 AM
Whatever happened to the customer is always right? Even though they may be incorrect the level of service to customers can always be improved. I find it interesting that HG is splitting hairs with a client that is no longer with them. Take this offline and remedy it. The more you write the more you are in danger of exposing yourself! -d
Posted by ldcdc, 08-12-2004, 11:17 AM
Protagonist, that email problem that you're referring to apparently has nothing to do with the email problem that was discussed in this thread (which I've been reading with the utmost care). That doesn't mean the problem did not exist, but it doesn't confirm anything with respect to what's being discussed here. Maybe you were just skimming through this thread and only saw that it was about an email related problem. The very long posts might lead to that.
Posted by JVWright, 08-12-2004, 12:19 PM
HG, sorry to hear you're "done posting on this thread". I think the person who replied that you're splitting hairs is correct. Virtually every paragraph you write tells me what I did wrong. I dispute none of it. Virtually none of what you write is an objective appraisal of HG's support performance, execpt where it's indisputable, such as the promise of a call back. To answer some questions for clarity: 1) I had a reseller package. I refer to it as "my server" probably mistakenly, but I am used to having a server to myself with my previous host, so it's probably just my mind using a familiar term for the situation. 2) I used a non-working email address probably mistakenly. I provided an alternate to the IM tech, including a phone number. I didn't know that HG's staff was compartmentalized, as you revealed, so that IM staff didn't have access to ticket info and vice-versa. I'd suggest you remedy that. 3) The problem was never fixed until the very end. Your techs assumed it was fixed as various tests worked, but mail to primary email boxes was still not working. Other tests and more complete diagnosis of the problem would have been helpful. 4) You say you don't think the techs realized I would be mailing tickets from a non-working account. Fair enough. Except that I reported the specific accounts that weren't working, and I assume they can see the reply address when they do so. Obviously I could have done this better, but I'd been with HG for a week and was not familiar with how your internal systems work. 5) I noted in my final two emails to you that you'd sent them anonymously. I even addressed the last one to "Whoever you are" and noted the unprofessionalism of sending an email in that way. 6) All of my final contenders for hosting offer 24/7 chat and phone support. It is indeed a short list. But if you SAY you offer it OFFER it. NOW we learn that your IM support is limited at best. That's not what your sales materials say. In fact THAT'S pretty much my primary concern here. 7) You keep pushing your 800 number. Would that be any different, and if so, why? And if so, why didn't the IM tech call the better support on it? Or why didn't he tell me to call it? It seems like another convenient excuse to pin on me, when it likely would have rang on the desk of the same limited support personnel, and would have added to the same outcomes. 8) I went to sleep once, at 1:45 when it was clear that your IM tech had nothing for me and assured me he'd call. I slept with the phone by my head. Other than that I was at my desk, trying to be patient. I stepped away once for about 10 minutes and told him so. Your IM staff NEVER checked in with me until I wrote to them. They never volunteered an update unless I prodded. They never asked about the ticket I should have receieved already, which would have illumanted the problem. You describe your IM support service as limited. That's enlightening. I can see what you mean now. 9) I did a lot of diagnostic work before and during the ordeal. In fact, it was me that discovered that mail sent directly to the websitewelcome address would work, even though mail sent to my domain usernames would not. I omitted from this thread the work I did in diagnosis. My intial intent was not a who's right and who's wrong forum, but a dispassionate account of my experience for those doing the kind of research I had done. I'm no expert when it comes to this stuff, to be sure. Hence my decision to go reseller with a company with "strong" support. But I know a few things about a few things. Notice for example that HostGator NEVER discusses that they gave me two separate diagnoses of the problem - one that I set up forwarding to myself and the other that I had mail sending to blackhole. On two different accounts. I find that revealing and suspicious. Either way a comedy of errors, and even though this is a long thread, I find the discussion very interesting.
Posted by silent_l, 08-12-2004, 05:45 PM
I tried to read this thread very carefully, especially because I have an interest in hosting with HG. My opinions: 1. When did the word troubleshooting become two words? 2. Why HG didn't put an name at the bottom of their emails makes them seem (to me) very unprofessional. 3. I would hope IM support would check the support database for tickets with JVWright's username. Even if the tickets were closed. JVWright even said at 11:20 PM that he "sent an email to your support address to create a paper trail for this problem." He TOLD the IM support he created a ticket! Also, why didn't HG read the IMs? He even wrote, "I might have missed this in the chats..." which he did. 4. The whole "my server" vs. "reseller package" is crap. I would easily interchange them. Either is acceptable by me. 5. Being a computer geek, I don't like to talk to people on the phone. Seriously. I wouldn't have called the 800 number. 6. I probably would have used a different, working email from the start. That is the only thing I think JVWright did to delay the resolvement of the problem. 7. Why would a tech support person send an email saying the ticket is closed to an email that was reported not getting email?! "I don't think any of the techs realized you would be emailing in tickets from non working email accounts." What, they can't see that the email in the ticket is the same as who it's from? 8. Why did the IM support keep saying they would be back in 2 minutes when it was closer to 15? 9. HG first email reply should have been, "I'm sorry things got so screwed up. What can we do to keep your business?" Don't try to pin it on the customer! 10. Does cPanel have a log? Could that be looked into? 11. FTPguy wrote, "JVWright, more than most would care to read. " I'd rather have a long thread with all the details than a "HG sucks!" kind of post. 12. I don't tend to IM, so I would rather see please written as "please" than "plz". And why is thanks written like "thankz"!? You're not saving any key strokes! 13. HG's "I'm sorry we didn't idenfity the problem within seconds..." was very... I don't know, but it wasn't necessary. 14. HG's response of "Tue Aug 03 2004 10:41am you emailed in saying email wasnt working (duplicate ticket). You were asked to keep a single ticket going with all of the details." Don't you think this would have clued you in? 15. Why is "Chat is for questions and low tech support issues."? 16. I'm sorry HG gets reamed for giving support. Part of the job? I don't know. Again, just my opinions. JVWright, which company did you go with?
Posted by JVWright, 08-12-2004, 06:12 PM
I decided on InsiderHosting when I left HostGator. They have great reviews from (seemlingly) everyone here, solid forums, phone and IM support, as well as a ticketing system (other than just email). Also, their recent acquisition of HTTPme (and other companies previously) is a sign to me that they're a company in this for the long haul. I know you're going to encounter problems wherever you go, and I'm not looking for perfection, but I do feel like I want someone on the other end of my business who knows the value of a happy customer.
Posted by Protagonist, 08-13-2004, 12:25 AM
Well, it started with an email problem and the support this person got. I won't delve on the problem of another HG client with smiliar problem in this thread. Anyway JVWright, you made the best decision in moving to Insiderhosting. I had a reseller plan with them for a full year (moved to a dedicated server now) and had superior service, excellent uptime and reliable servers. My customers vouch for this. You will certainly be happy with IH. Steven rocks!!
Posted by Skyview, 08-18-2004, 11:52 PM
I can't believe I just read through all of this, but I did because I have been trying to decide on a host for a reseller account. Please don't shoot me if I'm wrong here, but I believe that Hostgator's IM support is outsourced to a company in India? I think I saw this in another message somewhere after I had signed up for a shared account for the company I contract with. BTW, uptime and performance have been great on that account thus far. This sort of reminds me of the India story on dateline or 60 minutes the other week. If this is the case, I feel that Hostgator has simply made a poor business decision in doing so. I have called their 800 number a couple of times and always gotten an English speaking person on the phone as soon as I called. This is the very reason I used the 800 number vs. IM, etc. after having read that somewhere. Obviously, this is just my opinion but whether you are a geek or not, common sense would tell me to use whatever other means may be available to me to resolve the problem if IM is not getting anywhere. That is why I have never tried to use the IM support. To me, if my clients were depending on this getting resolved, I would call a toll free number if one was available, as an example. I am not trying to defend either point of view here, just offering a 3rd party opinion. From the looks of it, the folks at HostGator (particularly the IM support staff) dropped the ball here. This happens from time to time in any business. Also from my viewpoint JVWright probably didn't explore other support avenues available to resolve the problem in a more timely manner. I know we all expect to get what's advertised, but if something isn't working for me, I try something else. If I am wrong on the Hostgator outsourcing IM support to India thing, please disregard this paragraph. I spent several months in India (2 companies ago) running a joint venture development operation. Most of the people were very nice, but again just my viewpoint, they were not worth paying 3 of their developers for what one Sr. level US based developer would have cost. What you read in eWeek and Infoworld and see on TV about oursourcing, etc. is not necessarily how things really are. Perhaps there are some parallels with IM or phone based support as well as development. I am sure in some cases this type of arrangemnt can be a good thing, save money, and both parties win. But most of what I have experienced and observed shows otherwise. My hope is that Hostgator may see this reply (no need to respond to it) and at least consider going with a highly trained and qualified US based support company if my outsorcing assumption is true. I know the economics of outsourcing these type of functions to India or otherwise are compelling, but the potential (and in this case realized) damage it can do to your company's reputation can be hard to recover from. David (Skyview)
Posted by NeoGen, 08-19-2004, 12:17 AM
BTW: the 800 number you called, could have been outsourced and routed to India. When companies like DELL, IBM, Microsoft can source the support from India, then what is wrong if HostGator goes for outsourcing. The performance related issues depends on how you have laid out your SLA with outsourcing company.
Posted by JVWright, 08-19-2004, 01:02 AM
My thought at the time was that I was already talking to a representative of the company, paid by HG to solve problems for customers. I had also sent in an email support ticket and posted in the member forums. I didn't see that calling would do anything other than annoy the staff of a company I intended to work with on a long term basis. It didn't occur to me (unfortunately) that the phone would ring anywhere but on the desk of the person I was IM'ing - an on-call technician. Besides, I prefer IM for the simple reason that I have a written transpcript of the entire conversation. I don't have to ask a tech to repeat something, and if it goes bad (as this did), I can look back over it and share it with whomever needs to see it. I don't think HG outsources their IM support to India, though who knows. It seemed more like high-school chat-speak than foreign to me. I think they outsource the management of their 100% dedicated servers, but they say so on their web site.
Posted by Alperen, 08-19-2004, 01:08 AM
When companies like DELL, IBM, Microsoft can source the support from India, then what is wrong if HostGator goes for outsourcing." That is great and logical to go for outsourcing but you have to be sure about whom you are getting this service from. Thanks
Posted by Skyview, 08-19-2004, 02:19 AM
I'm glad you mentioned Dell. The company I am currently contracting with has decided to never do business with them again because of their support that is outsourced to India. A couple of the female members of the company had terrible support experiences and "comments" made to them on a different occasions. Like I said before, I know this type of arrangement can work if you get hooked up with the right provider, but the bulk of what I have seen doesn't support that. I guess I am also a bit sensitized to it given my experiences there. David
Posted by Skyview, 08-19-2004, 05:36 AM
Hi, I knew I wasn't going crazy here is where I saw the reference to outsourced support. Don't know if it's accurate or not, but that's what I was referring to earlier. It about half way down the page. Outsourced Support I understand about you wanting to have a trail of communication with the IM or email vs. phone. I just prefer phone support (assuming they actually answer the phone which they have thus far) because it is usually more efficient for me. I can talk and explain things faster than I can type them. That, plus I can usually tell after a minute or two on the phone with someone whether or not they will be able to help me. If so, great. If not, I can always try back and attempt to speak with someone else. Just different preferences I guess. I am glad you are happy with your new host. David
Posted by ldcdc, 08-19-2004, 09:17 AM
AFAIK Hostgator's will not be routed to India. The phone will be answered by an american (usually by the owner). Here's a thread that where Brent, Hostgator's owner, explains a few things: http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showth...+support+phone
Posted by effusionx1, 08-19-2004, 09:21 AM
thanks there
Posted by ldcdc, 08-19-2004, 10:18 AM
I meant "AFAIK Hostgator's phone will not be routed to India." I apologise for any confusion I might have caused.
Posted by NeoGen, 08-19-2004, 01:34 PM
For sure that is very very important. As we have backyard-hosting companies in US, there are number of BPOs that have mushroomed in Inda to ride the outsourcing bandwagon. One has to be very cautious in terms of company, quality, measurement and service level agreement. There are companies like British Airways who have their almost entire Call center and ticketing system operating from India. Somebody can have bad experience with any service provider whether the provided is in US, India, Hungary or China.
Posted by IHSL, 08-19-2004, 02:01 PM
Microsoft's support isn't in India. I speak to Microsoft at least 3 times per month, and can tell you that unless a texan moved to New Delhi, he isn't outsourced. The same is with Dell. Our account manager is called Sharon, and is from Toronto, Canada. Simon
Posted by NeoGen, 08-19-2004, 02:15 PM
FYI Microsoft has its support office based out of Gurgaon, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Banglore. Similarly Dell has office in Hyderabad and Banglore. That doesnt means that 100% support is in India. So may be talking to some who is either based out of US or based out of India with neutralized accent. That is the difference in type of support quality outsourced.
Posted by denisdekat, 08-19-2004, 03:22 PM
One former boss/mentor of mine a long time ago said that the customer is not always right, most often the customer is wrong. The key thing to remember, so he said, is that the customer is always the customer
Posted by IHSL, 08-19-2004, 04:31 PM
Having an office in a country, and being outsourced to a country, are two entirely different kettles of fish. We still have our original office (where we started) in Ireland because two of the guys didn't want to move to Canada. We now have the new one in Nova Scotia.. does that mean we outsource? no, because they are still employees of our company. Outsourcing means going to a third party. Simon
Posted by NeoGen, 08-19-2004, 09:55 PM
So Microsoft have support office in India and that provides support to Microsoft products and services across world(except China and Eastern ASIA) Yes, its not outsourcing to third party, but most of the big companies have opened their offices in India that provide support to US based and Europe based customers. BTW: Other than existing offices, Dell is openining its new office in Bangalore that has capacity to house 2000 support persons and programmers.
Posted by Skyview, 08-19-2004, 11:48 PM
Harsha, You seem to know a lot about the operations in India. Is that where you are based? Most all of my time there was in Mumbai. I was staying in Powai and offices were in Anderi (forgive me if the sp. is wrong, it's been a while). I did get to take a nice trip to Goa, but never went to Bangalore. The Taj has nice Sunday Brunch or at least it used to. I believe its much easier to control your quality and sla when done internal (regardless of location) vs. truly outsourcing. I'm not exactly sure what Dells practices are, but they definitely lost a corporate customer with that fiasco. David
Posted by NeoGen, 08-20-2004, 12:12 AM
Skyview: Internet and especially google is a great tool that will let you know what is happening around the world.
Posted by Website Rob, 08-20-2004, 12:20 AM
Is that a "yes" or "no" answer? I can't tell.
Posted by ashokwrd, 08-20-2004, 09:33 AM
Hi Can you tell me about your new host?
Posted by kaon, 08-20-2004, 10:55 PM
Hello, I had same issue with HostGator. It is actually a problem with hostgator control panel that each account when created has by default its primary account sent to ::blackhole:: I moved with them from crediblehost and crediblehost had no such settings there (by default there primary account is set to username) so I was unaware of the fact. For two days for my sign-up I couldnt receive emails (It took me one days to realize that I am not receiving emails and the second day I solved it) but as I have already told you that I was coming from crediblehost so I was use to solving problems on my own coz of virtually in-existant support. So I wandered in CPanel and found out that it was set to ::blackhole:: which I fixed. Since then its smooth sailing. I have been with them for one month, for this period I am satisifed with there support, uptime, daily backup feature and server speed. But I lost two days of email, I was upset at that but I didnt issue ticket or anything. HG if you are listening, please fix those default settings to username coz I have to manually fix it whenever I create a new account in WHM. Thanks Salman
Posted by JVWright, 08-20-2004, 11:02 PM
I thought I remembered seeing the "deafult" email set to ::blackhole:: in their cPanel set up myself, but I decided I was wrong because that would be idiotic of them to do. HG, in one of two diagnoses of my problem TOLD me I had by default set to ::blackhole::. So, Kaon, if you're right, that would explain a lot. But HG has SINCE sworn up and down that I'd set two accounts to forward to themselves, which I can't believe I'd actually have done. If they ham-handed the set up of the default settings in new cPanel accounts, there must have been more than a few folks that have had similar problems... right?
Posted by tfk, 08-23-2004, 05:37 AM
I just signed on with hostgator - the person who answered the phone wasn't the best but once I got in the email support loop, I found their admins to be fast and very good. I have had afew reseller accounts and hostgator is the best by far.
Posted by Alperen, 08-23-2004, 06:51 AM
hostgator is expensive!!!
Posted by ldcdc, 08-23-2004, 10:04 AM
Alperen, many people here would consider Hostgator to be more on the cheap side than on the the expensive one. In the end though, cheap and expensive mean different things to different people.
Posted by kaon, 08-23-2004, 11:44 PM
JWright, I am right, I can even proof, I have a reseller account, whenever (even now), I create a new account that new accounts setting in control panel are set to ::blackhole::, so whenever I create new account, I tell my clients to either fix it themselves or I fix it for them coz most of the time people use primary email address. To me hostgator is very expensive. But I had no other option, i was at much cheaper host but couldnt afford downtime so had to move to more reliable.
Posted by < ! --, 05-24-2005, 03:38 PM
See, i think this is a HUGE problem. i've been w/3 hosts so far that use ticket systems, some better than others, but basically i find it useless that someone replies to my ticket and then immediately closes it! and they do this all the time, even when a response from me is necessary in order for the issue to be resolved. bad bad bad! the thing is tho, that the guys on chat should have stated a few things. a possible better scenario like the following would be more ideal: JW: i have a problem with my email. it quit working out of nowhere! HG: chat is for misc stuff and pre-sales questions. please submit a ticket. JW: i HAVE submitted tickets! what's going on? HG: what was your ticket # please? JW: how do i know? i never heard back. HG: how long has it been? can you check your email for me now? JW: i can't. my email isn't working. please call me at XXXXXX HG: it is against our policy to give call backs, but you can call us anytime at 800gatorrulez... JW: i just want an answer to my ticket. can you send it to jw....alt addy @ yahoo.com HG: not sure what you mean. the ticket will autorespond to whatever address you used to submit it. this should not take more than a few seconds (minutes/ whatever) JW: but i just told you, my email isn't working! HG: did you submit ticket from nonworking email? If so, please submit a new ticket with an email that we can respond to. JW: ok then. i'll try that. thx. ----------------- then. ideally, the ticket person is helpful and troubleshoots everything til it's fixed. ---------------- also the chat tech ought to *know* that tickets are often handled in minutes and then closed, making them hard to find. so even without knowing it was submitted from a non-working email, just saying 'we have no record' isn't putting forth a reasonable effort. i think that sending ANY communication from a non-working email is not in one's own interest, and personally, i know better than to think the guy on chat is the same guy on the phone and the same guy who sold me my acct and the same guy handling the tickets. we all know better. so sometimes the customer has to be very sure to do everything perfectly, and we don't always do that, especially when we're stressed and it's late i'm not saying JW thinks those preposterous things, but i had to word it that way to make it obvious. nobody thinks those things, but what connection do any of those ppl have? it's hard to know where to draw the line, and one would *think* they can all get to each other *somehow,* unless told otherwise, which is why it's the chat rep's job to make that statement. ("I do not have access to closed tickets," etc.) i think this whole problem could have been avoided by JW using a correct email 'just incase' someone tried to respond without looking at the return addy, but then again he honestly didn't know anybody would reply especially if he was complaining that it didn't work! i also think HG can put forth a level of effort that shows they actually give a care, not just the top guys apologizing for bad chats and closed tickets. the chat ppl need to be instructed on what to say, and to redirect customer issues to the right avenues when necessary. not 'yes we'll call you back' and 'no we have no tickets' only to later say 'your ticket was fixed in 10 mins' -- that's just poor communication inhouse imo. also, if JW started a thread on the hg forum, that would have been a good place to go over things in one spot, as he obviously had no problem posting there. but then again, would he have mentioned that he submitted tickets from a non-working addy? probably not. don't we hate to tell our entire story 900 times when we feel someone already knows it? this was just a huge mess and it's too bad, because with a little common sense and some accurate communication, it could have been avoided. it also it helps if tickets can be accessed thru member area of the hosting provider's website. that, in itself, could have solved this problem. i really should be working now heh -- >
Posted by Plexi_Hosting, 05-24-2005, 03:57 PM
Insightful, but babies have been conceived AND born in the time between your post and the last post in this old thread
Posted by < ! --, 05-24-2005, 05:59 PM
oops. :\ srch function pulled up old stuff by mistake, and i don't read the tiny dates unless someone's drawing attention to the time/date of a certain post. there was enough here to read already! -- >
Posted by rbrowme, 05-27-2005, 03:08 AM
2. Why HG didn't put an name at the bottom of their emails makes them seem (to me) very unprofessional. I had said that a long time ago and they claimed that was not possible. Further proof that they used to all the time write you and there would be no contact information of any kind
Posted by GnomeyNewt, 05-27-2005, 04:28 AM
Well since this post is open and I couldn't help myself... You simply type Sarah :c) (don't forget the smiley) at the end of your message!
Posted by haligi, 05-27-2005, 11:53 PM
whew... i finally made it to the end of the thread. wow, i now feel like such a loser when this does not even affect me. oh well... time to move to the next thread...