ThisThat

Mar 30, 2019

"Forever will it dominate your destiny" - Yoda

Heb Hosting Hub enticed me to join with a $60/year rate. Then it auto-renewed yearly at twice that rate. While competing rates dropped, my billings stayed the same. I finally decided to get off the Web Hosting Hub freight train. That's when the real problems began. There is no option in the Account Management Panel to turn off auto-renew. There is no option in the panel to cancel. You have to TALK TO support to cancel. Emailing them is apparently NOT an option for cancelling. (Google their support page entitled "How do I cancel my hosting account?" Archived on Wayback Machine 30 Mar 2019 and other dates.) So I called their vaunted 24/7 support on an early Saturday afternoon. 5 minutes into a phone hold with no end in sight... ... so I started a chat session. I was #10 in line! Now, more than 20 minutes into the phone hold, I am #7 in line. At this rate I'll be holding for a chat operator for MORE THAN AN HOUR just to cancel my account. I feel like I'm in Hotel California. I can "check out" anytime I like, but I can never leave. Beware. "Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny." - Yoda They want you in, but they've made it outrageously impossible to get out. Cheap? Count the hidden cost of waiting and waiting on hold. Update: - After 36 minutes on hold: No answer yet, position 5 in chat queue. The saga continues. - After 1 hour and 17 minutes, finally spoke with an operator and got the account cancelled. Made sure I got it in writing/email as evidence, due to online reports of them making unauthorized charges on cards. - At 1 hour and 20 minutes, STILL waiting in the chat queue. Position 2. Outrageous!) - AT ONE HOUR AND 30 MINUTES, MY POSITION IN THE QUEUE SUDDENLY CHANGED FROM #2 to #20. WITHOUT ANY INTERACTION OR WARNING. :-0 Outrageous! It's a good thing I called too. PS. Apparently you CAN cancel an account by email/verified support ticket, but they don't (want to) tell you that on the support page. Operator said that they used to have an Account Management Panel option for clients to just let the account expire, but they DISABLED it. IMO, this company is using coercion to keep renewals artificially high. Avoid at all costs. PPS. Their AMP > Billing > Change Term page showed that the current rate for my account type is only $55/yr. I'm being overcharged. No automatic discount was ever offered.