IPOWER Problems

Let me start off by saying Im not here to bash this host. Im here to share my culmination of over 5 years of experience with this company. I want to make fellow webmasters and IT proffesionals who run small buisinesses aware that this provider is in trouble. There is no accountablility at this company, they grew too fast and you are never going to get any sort of "technical help" if your site is down or if your having any problems. What you will get is legions of cut and paste experts reading a scripted dialouge. That being said, lets look at the meat and potaotes of what prompted this post.

Today is 2/2/2006 I have a dedicated server with these people and I am a reseller with over 20 sites hosted with them. The dedicated server went down a day ago, and I have called and spoke with 3-4 "technicians" to get it back up. All they can tell me is they will try to "page" someone to reboot the server and then hang up. I pay $99 a month for this thing and was promised 24/7/365 monitoring.....its false. When one makes the decision to get a dedicated server they do so for reliability issues, I have clients to answer to, what do I? Bottom line. I move my accounts, I learn my lesson. Do not use these folks if you want reliable hosting and solid tech support. They will leave you hangin and not look back. I am totally at these peoples mercy right now and I have clients calling every ten minutes.

The tech guy who works in the dedicated server area actually told me that his day would be good no matter what happened once he got off of work. He honestly did not care and said there was nothing he could do to help...all he could do is send a page to some guy. When asked to speak to a Supervisior I got put back on hold for 20 minutes, after 1 hour of waiting only to find out, "He just walked out"

To make matters worse they changed a bunch of settings and protocols on their shared hosting (cpanel) servers without letting anyone know. This has completely disabled several of my clients ability to send and recive email. They have no answer and I currently have clients going on 1.5 weeks with no email service. Again, no one can tech the issue on their end, they give you cut and paste responses and there s no chain of command you can go through to escalate a problem.

I tell you these things being one of IPOWERS oldest reseller customers. I have had enough success to stay with them over the years but have also had several times like this and the honest truth is they rely on the technology too much. When everything is working well, things are fine. The moment there is an issue, of any sort, they completely fall apart.

If you want more info on any of these claims, or written proof in the form of emails let me know.

sales@causatech.com

Can't imagine what spurred you to post a thread that sounds so negative about ipower . . . (Too much sarcasm to fit in post)

As I google on the worlds "ipower server down" a slight variation of this thread pops up in at least a dozen different webserver forums. Now this might seem like manipulation, but I interpret it as a public service.

I've had very similar experiences with ipower over the last few months. I'm on hold with them right now (just put on hold for the second time) originally called and waited to talk with someone for 43 minutes (which is about average) Spoke with a very confused help deskp rep (tech support) for about 9 minutes, before the tech support person put me back on hold 4 minutes ago(and waiting). This scenario happens almost everytime I call, so I try not to call more than 3 times per week. I live in a 2 story house and its not high enough for me to climb to the top, jump off and effectively end my relationship with ipower. My luck, I'd end up in a hospital unable to move my limbs and only able to call iPower and wait on hold.

I'm currently documenting the medley of their hold music (which I despise)

I've had more problems with iPower than I can cover in one post. If you are a lawyer and want to get together a nice class action lawsuit, please contact me! Through my clients we have about 150 domains and a few dozen web hosting accounts. That's just a drop in the bucket for ipower. I'm sure there are thousands of unsatisfied customers that are ready to act here.

brettbum@yahoo.com

brettbum, sorry to hear you hav such serious problems with them, affecting so many customers of yours.

May we know one domain that you host with Ipower?

PS. Odd thing, the thread title could read : "I power problems". ;)

Ive heard this about IPower more than once. I don't believe they are as bad as Hostgator but they are working on it :P

I've seen hosts go through this troubled times before, lets hope they can recognize the problem and patch the leaking hull and get this ship back into service.

Anyone who has a account with them should be sure to make backups a little bit more frequently. Although it is always a good idea to make backups of your hosting data, it's an even better idea to do it when you think that the hosting company might be falling apart :)

www.aemgmt.info is one of the domains that I still 2 months after my first call to their technical support cannot get turned on. They will not even give me a help ticket number. I just have a chain of emails from them, which they will now not answer.

this domain as well as 7 others that I have with them has kept me locked out of vdeck for almost 2 months now with no response from iPower in 6 weeks and no successful action to fix the problem.

I've got two other issues with them that I'm working to resolve. I was forced to give up trying to fix them at the same time and am addressing them individually. This issue is next up in the que.

I am shocked to hear that. Try calling their sales staff

Wow brettbum! That's over 1 month after your first review here! :eek2:

Im Back!!

The server went down again and no one was there to help (as usual) Im getting used to this every few months.

I wanted to share this info with any perspective new consumers. IPOWERs biggest problem is with billing. They utilize fraudulent billing practices. For instance, they do not send out renew notices and renew any accounts you have automatically. There is no choice to manually renew like most other companies (godaddy)(netsol). They continually bill me for domain that I no longer want to renew then refuse to issue credits. And if they do the credit is often not in the same amount as the charge. What you are left with doing is calling and beggin for help. At the end of the day they cannot be trusted with your credit card. They continually try to renew my server for a 3month period when I pay for 6. Think about that. They wont send confimations of renewals either. I cant complain about overall uptime but their billing is costing me huge money and if there is any investigation or class action it should focus there becasue they are totally trying to get over on each customer.


Ask for help you say? I tryed to get in touch with anyone that was willing to help me. I contacted a senior managment member and look at this email chain.

To: 'Warren Lanier'
Subject: RE: Trey (Incident: 040301-004080)

I am having billing issues and a few other concerns I was looking for help on.

Are you able to help?
--------------------------------------



From: "Warren Lanier" <wlanier@ipowerweb.com>
To:
Sent: 4/5/07 6:05 PM
Subject: RE: Trey (Incident: 040301-004080)

Probably not- as billing is a separate department from mine and they have their own rules and regulations that enable them to address every customer concern on a fair and equitable basis.

Thanks

**note this guy doesnt even give a ---- a five year customer is trying to go up the chain asking for help, he doesnt even offer to help, at all.

----------------------------------------------------
To: Warren Lanier
Subject: RE: Trey (Incident: 040301-004080)

Thanks.
You must be pretty high up the chain to formulate a response like that.

Yet..knowing you work for the company don't you think you could have atleast offered to pint me in the right direction instead of leaving a 4 year customer out to dry?

Customer service shouldn't be limited to a department.

---------------------------------------------------
Your are welcome.

Perhaps my email was somehow not clear. In my response to your inquiry of my ability to assist you in resolving some issues you are having concerning the billing area of your service; my goal was to point out that I am not able to assist you in rectifying any billing concerns you may have as a result of our billing department having autonomy over all such concerns.

In referencing this observation in my response back to you, my presumption was that you might seek additional assistance from our billing department about your concerns. If I did not convey that directive clearly, please accept my apologies for any confusion or misgivings that may have resulted from this.

Regards

Warren Lanier, Jr.
Marketing Sales Manager-Los Angeles
IPower, Inc.
wlanier@ipowerweb.com

-----------------------------------------------
To: Warren Lanier
Subject: RE: Trey (Incident: 040301-004080)

Even after reading this and realizing that you prefer to create long winded emails, I'm left wondering. Why havent you offered to help, even if you offered to try to have someone in billing contact me or perhaps even giving me a persons number. I honestly think this sense of customer service you present is the worst thing about your company. It bleeds through from tech support to billing, the attitude is, "its not my job!"

Please don’t reply unless you have either a contact number for me or are able to contact someone on my behalf. I have been a customer of IPOWER for about 5 years and don’t want to be patronized.

** I have been trying to get 3 domains refunded for over a month. They have my money and refuse to refund it. The domains are down and not renewed yet they dont credit me. For sure thats against the law?

Well, I finally had it and have moved to another provider (almost complete with transition). My server went down for over a week and I lost a handful of customers because of it. The phones were busy and no tech support was available. I wish I was exaggerating (I have gray hairs to prove I’m not). Finally, I am migrating all of my accounts from IPOWER and just in the nic of time.

Apparently they are merging with another company and will be moving all of their machines to Boston (From AZ and CA) and there is no doubt this will be a disaster of the highest degree. They plan to lay off over 300 people so the support won’t be there either.

They just sent me an email saying they are upgrading their servers and to expect down time for "FALL". They didn’t have a time frame beyond an entire season.

As my company has grown I find I am not able to, in good conscious, offer IPOWER as a solution anymore. They simple grey the company and sold it. The OWEN has a reputation for doing this in other areas...Google it..


If you are thinking about moving hosts, now is the time to do it, things are sure to only spiral downhill from here.

Thomas Gorny, CEO
IPOWER, Inc.

Thomas Gorny, CEO
IPOWER, Inc.

Who's this???

Updated. I have since migrated over 50 accounts from IPOWER to Go Daddy. Amazing the level of service difference and the technology offering. Its been painful and I have lost some money but I feel much more confident with the service my customers are getting. That being said, of the remaining few accounts I still have with IPOWER they are doing something interesting. As usual, they do not give you the option to (ReNew manual) and they will charge any card you have on file with them, when they like. Best part? Even after they charge you for a domain and hosting renewal and you have a confirmation letter, they send another one saying its overdue. They are trying to double dip so please please be careful. I have eaten about $200.00 because of this and since they are half IPOWER and half some other company at the moment I think they are operation off of 6 different billing systems. BUYER BEWARE!!!