Web hosting - AVOID 1&1!!!

[retro]

Trading Standards say that a customer receiving bad service will tell at least nine people about it, but a customer receiving good service will only tell two people. Well, this is me telling at least 5,820 people about the poor service I received from 1&1 lol!

I have been with 1&1 for 10 years. A loyal customer, I hosted quite a few domains with them, used them for my POP3 server, recommended them to many people... you get the drift. They used to be great. They used to be the big company that still looked after the little guy. I guess times are hard even for them - whilst they have their ad on the TV, they are also calling customers touting for extra business.

I got a call from an American woman offering me some web hosting package. She told me the wrong price - it sounded expensive. Not very professional! She told me I could try it free for a month. I was in a hurry, to get her off the phone I said whatever. Big mistake!

I then read up on the package they offered - it's basically a Fisher Price web creation package. In my mind, that's pretty insulting - obviously from my DNS settings, I'm pointing my sites elsewhere. Oh yeah, and she called specifically about one of my domains, which I hadn't done anything with yet. So snooping around my account too, eh? Nice!

I e-mailed them saying I've looked it up, it's not for me - please don't give me it.

A reply came -

We understand you’ve been upset with the recent call you received concerning our MyWebsite service. This is something that I can only apologize for. This is an aspect of our service that we're always trying to improve. This is why your feedback is so important to us. We can now look through and see where and if improvements can be made.

You will no longer receive any calls from our Sales Department, as we have added your account our Do Not Call list. As well, your account will not be upgraded to the MyWebsite service and will remain in its current state. Again, we can only apologize for this frustration that you've suffered.

A week later, I got an e-mail. Welcome to your new hosting package! Ugh. And a second, most bizarre e-mail...

please note that your credit card details have expired and we therefore cannot send you the software package you ordered on your control panel.

Please update your credit card details using the control panel so we can process your order.

Umm, what software package?! I hadn't ordered anything. Had my account been hacked? I had to call them (0844 number - expensive! 5.105p/min from a BT landline, probably 25p/min from a mobile) and speak to someone completely incompetent who couldn't grasp what I was trying to tell her. She told me she would have to e-mail the complaints department and have them investigate. Hmm, I could have done that for free! I think I was on the phone half an hour and accomplished nothing. So I e-mailed, complained about the e-mail, complained about her.

The response was:

This e-mail serves as confirmation of the successful cancellation of your 1&1 MyWebsite - Plus Package package as of 25/02/2012. We will deactivate all package features on this date.

We thank you for your trust as a 1&1 customer and we look forward to welcoming you again as one of our customers.

Hmm, that didn't answer my questions at all! I replied, asking why all my questions and points were ignored bar one, requesting this complaint be escalated. The response?.....

At the time that Zachary replied to your e-mail, the contract was not yet set-up by our system. We were hoping to prevent it, but it was indeed automatically processed in the end. We promptly reversed that process and you will not receive any future invoices for it as a result. Your telephone number has been placed on our Do Not Call List and you will not receive any future offers. Our apology again for the inconvenience or confusion caused. Thank you for your patience here.

Wow, can they only respond to one point at a time?!

I replied (on the 24 February), stating her response didn't cover all my questions and I felt that my complaint wasn't being taken seriously. I wanted both her response, and the incompetent telephone operative's call to be investigated. I requested that she passes this on to her manager as previously requested, and I will look forward to hearing back from them.

I will pass your concerns along to our Quality & Assurance Department for further review. That department can review the level of customer service you have received and apply additional training or discipline if/where they deem necessary. This process is handled internally. Thank you.

Now I'm being fobbed off and told that they handle complaints internally and won't discuss them with me! This doesn't answer any of my questions that were left unanswered, nor does it apologize for the poor service I've received or the inconvenience of having to call them at my expense, only to have the person e-mail the complaints department! It certainly doesn't tell me where the hell this supposed software order came from, or what software it was.

So, naturally, I reply - pointing out that at this point, the website package was still showing up on my account.

Apart from some spammy advertising e-mails, and the automated ones telling me my Direct Debit was going to come out soon, I didn't hear back from 1&1. So I made a fuss on Facebook. Their social networking person contacted me, telling me she has spoken to complaints and they are looking into it and would be contacting me. They didn't.

A month later, I contacted the social networking woman again, pointing out that I have now been charged for renewal, and I should really have just transferred my domains out and left before that. I told her that I expect a response from complaints by the end of that week, even if only to apologize for the delay and let me know when to receive a response. She replied...

I apologize for the delay. I have escalated your concerns to a senior member of our Complaints Team. I am monitoring the case to further ensure that we will be in contact with you again shortly.

...but they did not.

On 23 March, I started transferring my domains out. I wrote to them, pointing this out, asking where my reply was. I got no response.

On 30 March, I wrote back to the social networking woman - a long e-mail pointing out that I was transferring my domains and leaving them, as I was disgusted that I had not received a response. I made clear bullet points of the responses that I wanted from them. I carbon copied this to both the UK and US complaints e-mail addresses. Oh yes, 1and1 is a German company, I believe. They're big in the US, have operations here... but I'm not sure how UK based they are, as I always get an American in Pennsylvania when I call! I also tried a name.surname e-mail address for Oliver Mauss, CEO of 1&1. It didn't bounce.

I did not receive a reply from anyone.

Then, on 4 April, I received a reply. It didn't seem to be a reply to my e-mail of 30 March, but in fact a reply to the one of 24 February. Yes - it took them nearly six weeks to respond! Here's what they said...

Thank you for contacting us.

We can assure you that this MyWebsite service has since been cancelled. You will not be billed for this service again in the future. In addition, this is correct. We are currently looking into the customer service aspect of this account internally. Thank you.

If you have any further questions please do not hesitate to contact us.

What?! I spend over an hour writing an e-mail, and you send a five sentence reply? Actually, some of those sentences should be merged - that's poor punctuation!

How does it take six weeks to write that?! And why have they STILL not addressed my questions?

On top of this fiasco, I've noticed several issues with their website.

Firstly, the new control panel is horrible. It's really hard to do anything on it, and you keep coming to dead ends where you can't go back, and have to reload the home page. Secondly, there are parts where there are missing pictures with German text in the X box, or in fact there are other parts with German in amongst the English text on the page! Very unprofessional!

Also, their cancellation method for .com domains, as stated in their FAQ, doesn't work! Yes, it transfers the domain, but it remains on your control panel and you have to cancel it manually in their cancellation control panel! Oh yeah, and I asked them to shut my account down, but they didn't - again I had to find out how to do it myself.

This is by far the worst customer support I have ever seen. They don't seem to value their long-standing customers at all. I would never recommend 1&1, and would urge you all to never even consider using them!

[Hellcat]

Have to agree.

Stay away from ANYTHING carrying the 1&1 name, they do more than websites, they also do phone, DSL, mobile.... I tend to avoid them at any costs.

1&1 is kind of a legal mafia, they are only after your money, once they have it they make it unpleasently hard for you to ever get out again.

Their support is no better here in Germany as well - given that's a german company, that tells a lot....

[HEX1GON]

That's horrible to hear! The amount of stress you would of went through would be annoying.

I've had similar troubles with companies and their customer service, and many "businesses" on eBay. People never seem to fully read your emails at all, and just copy and paste answers. Usually the best way to get proper response is send around 5 copies of the same email, then they'll know you're not one to be messed with.

It's horrible to even hear that a customer of 10 years gets treated this way, you did the right thing and jump off their service completely. I'd even go about changing your account details so they can't sneak any money out of your accounts... That may seem very extreme, but sometimes you have to take the plunge JUST to be extra safe.

[Druid II]

My former boss uses 1&1 for his .com domains - given that I hate his guts a lot, this is good news.

[retro]

Oh, it gets worse! HeXiGON was pretty much spot on, sadly!

I cancelled on the 5th. On the 9th, I get an e-mail reminding my that my Direct Debit is due for renewal and will be taken out on the 23rd - £28.70! I called them up yesterday to find out what this was all about. I called technical support. The person who answered the phone was in the US. He explained that my account was closed, so he didn't have access to it, but I should call billing in the morning, as they've gone home. He turned out to be in dedicated servers - why is he answering the tech support number?! I asked for contact details for Oliver Mauss, CEO. Naturally, he wouldn't give me an e-mail address, stating he didn't have one (I tried oliver.mauss@1and1.com, it didn't bounce, but I didn't get a reply). I asked for his street address, he said he didn't have one! I said surely you have a headquarters, in which you're probably sitting and Mr. Mauss has an office? He said yes, told me it was in Pennsylvania, but wouldn't give me the address - although it's specifically in Chesterbrook, he said. (It's 701 Lee Road #300 Chesterbrook, PA 19087 in case anyone is wondering). Apparently he does have an office there, but is rarely in it, or the building! I said it seems very odd that a CEO would never be in the headquarters, or even contactable.

Today, I called billing. I asked about the e-mail. He didn't know. I asked whether they owe me any money. He didn't know. I asked why not - it was because my account is closed, so they don't have access to the information! I pointed out that they charge per month. He confirmed this. I pointed out that they bill annually, in advance. He confirmed this. Surely, therefore, they should keep records of closed accounts, to see whether they owe the customer a partial refund? And surely the department to do this would be the billing department?

So... I'd been on the phone 22 minutes yesterday and today, on an 0844 number (which costs 5.105p/min from a BT landline, more from another landline and significantly more from a mobile - like 35p/min), to get nowhere! I did start getting annoyed at this guy, explaining my frustration and how disgusted I was that they kept ignoring me for months. To his credit, he remained calm, apologetic and said he would raise the issue for me.

Oh yes, he also told me that I shouldn't have been e-mailing complaints@1and1.com, but complaints@1and1.co.uk! I explained to him that I have been e-mailing both - when I e-mailed .co.uk in the beginning, the reply always came from .com!

I expected it was an error - an automated e-mail had gone out, but I wanted confirmation. After all, I left them with nothing outstanding, and in fact, knew that I was in credit. Maybe I was due a refund?

Well, 9 minutes later, I received an e-mail from complaints - fastest response yet! It was only about this issue. It told me that the £28.40 outstanding bill had been cancelled, so I don't owe anything any more. What?!?! I never did! It was a genuine bill? For what?!?! Oh yes, and it was .com again!

Actually, that reminds me - the guy in servers told me to e-mail his manager (name.surname@1and1.com), which I did. I got a response from his manager, saying that he would talk to their complaints manager and get him to personally address all of my complaint. His reply came from name.surname@1und1.de - so I guess all the companies are very tied if the manager of a guy in PA has a German e-mail address!

I remember when I started up with 1&1, they insisted that .co.uk and .com were entirely separate companies and you couldn't order from the .com site in the UK. It seems now that they're all very related!

I cannot believe that a company can be so rude and incompetent. It is truly shocking.

[Cyantist]

What a clusterfuck. Where are you moving your hosting to?

[retro]

My own hosting company, lol.