Domain Hosting alternatives to 1and1

Dear All,

Firstly I am not sure if I have selected the correct forum - so apologies if this is the wrong place it did not seem to sit with the web hosting forum which appears more technical.

An outline of what has happened and where I want to get to:-

I have various domains and e mail accounts hosted via 1and1. These are very small affairs but are nonetheless quite important to me.

I have been with 1and1 for several years and have in this time been more than pleased with their pricing and their package. However getting support and dealing with their administration has been nothing short of a nightmare.

Two recent events have cost me literally hundreds of hours of time involving phone calls and endless circular e mails.

The first event occurred when I responded to an e-mail that 1and1 sent inviting me to cancel an unwanted domain that was coming up for renewal. After following the links and making various calls to their support centre I was assured that the process had been completed and the domain cancelled.

Some weeks later whilst checking my statements I found that 1and1 had charged me a lump sum for a further 2 years worth of hosting for the domain that had been cancelled.

This prompted a bizarre set f phones calls and e mails in which 1and1 repeatedly claimed that I had requested the billing to be extended for a further 2 years. Which obviously I had not.

I have repeatedly pointed out that it was their systems that decided to generate this fictitious date and that I had at no time selected or input this renewal date. Further when I suggested that under their billing procedures it should not be possible to bill a client once a domain cancellation process had been entered into - 1and1 consistently indicated that they felt that it was perfectly normal for a client cancelling a domain to wish to be charged 2 further years of charges for an unwanted and unusable domain.

Ultimately I got my refund. But it cost me dear in time and stress with large clumps of hair frequently being pulled out.

The second problem arose when 1and1 erroneously attached my personal details to an account belonging to someone else. That person went into liquidation and 1and1 sent my details to a third party debt collection agency who subsequently contacted me.

Personally I take this somewhat seriously and am exceptionally upset and distressed by this latest event.

I have been in the most bizarre, mad as a hatter, stressful e mail and phone correspondence regarding this. To date we have exchanged 70 e mails which have gone round the same circuit several times. Obviously this has cost me an enormous amount of time and a massive amount of stress.

Obviously I have escalated these issues to the Information Commissioner and OFT and copied Nominet and Ofcom. I hope that between them they will be able to get 1and1 to at least understand that it is not ok to send my details to a third party debt collection agency in respect of a debt which has nothing to do with me and secondly to disclose to me what information has been sent and send confirmation that the erroneous records have been removed.

So now I am in a terrible situation. Obviously I would prefer to cease all dealing with 1and1. But as I have zero confidence in their systems I am afraid to start the transfer process in case they mess that up as well and I end getting double charged and or my details sent to another third party.

Therefore I would like to know:

1. Is there a statutory procedure for transferring domains that ensures that someone is policing 1and1 as the transfer occurs and that they do it correctly and do not double charge me.

2. Who is reliable and honest with a very high level of integrity within the hosting market? Obviously I can see the main players on various ranking sites. The trouble is that these do not really give any insight in to what they are like to deal with. After all most of the sites are ranking 1and1 highly and yet I would not wish them on my worst enemy. Is HostPapa any good?

3. Has anyone else been through this nightmare. If so how did it end and has there been long term damage to credit rates etc resulting from your experience.

4. 1and1 have no executive office and no route to speak with or e mail the CEO. Does anyone have any clue how to break through the layers of stupidity so that one can actually communicate with a sane rational person at 1and1. If so please let me know.
Note - Recorded delivery does not work nor does [email protected] nor does [email protected] nor does [email protected].

Thank you.

Very poor of 1&1.

Are the domains registered and hosted with 1&1 or simply hosted there? If they are registered and hosted the first step I'd take is to get the registration transferred to another registrar but keep them pointed at 1&1 for hosting services. Once that is complete I'd start looking around for a new host.

Plenty of good hosts for light use domains. If they are busy that's another matter.

Hi John,

Yes they are registered and hosted with 1and1. I had assumed that when transferring the domains that the new hosting service would also have to be the new registrar. Clearly I am wrong in this thinking.

What is the idea behind doing it in two parts. Is it to make sure 1and1 don't mess up the domains during the process.

Looking forward is there any advantage in keeping the registrar and the hosting service separate?

I am a light user.

Thank you for your reply.

To be honest I've never thought about the advantages of keeping them separate. I always think if you share hosts/registrar they can make life difficult if you move hosts. I suppose it's like saying never depend on your ISP issued e-mail address. If you want to change ISP you have to notify lots of people of the new address and fear some e-mails get lost.

The reason for doing it in stages is as you say. Make sure each step is properly completed before you attempt the next.

I'm a bit surprised no one has spoken for or against 1&1. I have no idea if they are a good company or not. Your problems may be highly unusual and unfortunate. In other words you may be "cutting off your nose to spite your face".

Be that as it may I would still move the domain name registrations elsewhere. It is the first step to make if you want to disentangle yourself from 1&1 and I think makes sense even if you want to stay hosted with them.

Have a read of this current thread.

As I say in there, I also have the emails telling me the best way to go about a transfer to Tsohost. I moved 7 domains with their emails, plus a few simple websites, with no hassle whatsoever.

This was helped by the fact that the Purple Cloud "My Account" page has the facility to request the domain transfer authorisation, (similar to an ISP migration MAC), and to alter the email server addresses to the new ones, thus ensuring no possible loss during the transfer. I don't know if 1 & 1 has the same or not.

Note that even if you transfer domain registration and hosting, plus email going to the new target, your existing hosting package should stay at 1 & 1 until it expires. (OK, expiry is one of the problems you have there, but that's a different matter to how you transfer).

I have had domains with 1&1 for quite a few years and hosting for 18 months or so. Never had any problems, but have never had to contact their support. Two of my domains are registered elsewhere and point to 1&1, the other two are registered direct with 1&1. Also use their email. Remember with their hosting packages they include one free .co.uk, .org.uk, so if you move you might lose that cost saving.

I keep seeing horror stories about 1&1, and some are clearly unlucky, but by and large they are as good as anybody and reasonably priced.

I have had quite a lot of experience with 123-reg for domain hosting, and I have never had a problem. On the occasions I have dealt with support (always via their ticket system) they have resolved my queries satisfactorily.

You should be able to switch registrar using the two companies respective control panels. You can do it directly with Nominet if you prefer, but it costs £10 + vat but it is meant more as a "last resort" method (e.g. registrar ceases trading).

Hi Oliver,

Many thanks for your reply. That is very useful to know. I assume using the Nominet service means that you are in control. That to me sounds like it would be well worth paying a £10 fee.

I will most certainly look into to this further.

I think I am already at last resort I wouldn't trust 1and1 with anything, if they can mess it up they will mess it up. My personal opinion is that they deliberately mess everything up. That way you ave to call their support line and they profit from you doing so.

I may be cynical biter and twisted but for the life of me I can't see any other logical reason for their totally irrational actions.

I similar problems when I took over a small church web site. I moved to Hostway (by luck) I can say that they were when I first transfered and still are extremly helpful.

Hi Roberto

Many thanks for your reply.

It is interesting that you are suggesting that the hosting package remains with 1and1 until expiry. Are you saying this from prior experience. Obviously I want to make 100% certain that 1and1 do not charge me twice again. I would rather not leave it til the last minute to find out that they have.

Furthermore I would prefer that not to have any further dealings with 1and1. Quite frankly the stress that they are causing me is too much for me to handle it is making me ill. So I would prefer to cut all relations with them as soon as possible.

Regards

Hi Dsergeant,

Thank you for your post. Well yes that is indeed the sadness and the frustration. I originally selected 1and1 having taken some time deciding who to use. And from a product and pricing point of view I have indeed been very pleased with my choice. The last thing I want to do is spend time effort and energy moving to some one else - especially when the package is spot on for me.

This is one of the main reasons that I have posted on this forum.

In that there are any number of websites listing, comparing and scoring these providers. What all these site seem to, in my opinion lack, is an objective accurate picture of how painful or otherwise, it is to actually deal with these companies.

Obviously once you have invested your time and money with a particular provider there is a natural customer inertia. I feel sure that providers rely on this to profit from support calls resulting from poor service.

Your comment that by and large 1and1 are about average actually speaks volumes.

It implies that the consumer in general is getting very poorly served. I for one would happily pay more if I was guaranteed service. By which I mean speaking to some one who cares, someone who will take ownership of your problem, someone with whom you can communicate rationally and intelligently.

One would hope that one function of forums such as this is to improve the quality of service from providers. I do not know whether think broad band aggregate postings on particular issues good and bad across their various forums. If they do not then I think a great opportunity is being missed.

Hi John,

Well yes as with my response to Dsergeant the worry is that I am indeed cutting my nose off to spite my face.

Hence the appeal for some feed back from users that goes behind the statistics to get a true picture of other providers.

The point being that I don't want to spend a load of effort and then find I am no better off.

Regards

Hi elevator,

Thank you it is always good to get positive feed back. I will look at hostway. I have not heard of them before so that is very useful.

May I ask what problem you experienced with 1and1 and more importantly did you ever get it resolved. Obviously I still need to find a resolution to the latest issue I have been experiencing.

Rgds

In reply to a post by JohnMike:

Yes they are registered and hosted with 1and1. I had assumed that when transferring the domains that the new hosting service would also have to be the new registrar. Clearly I am wrong in this thinking.

Most want to be, but they don't have to be.

What is the idea behind doing it in two parts. Is it to make sure 1and1 don't mess up the domains during the process.

So that you don't end up with the hosting company trying to use the domains as hostage to stay with them.

I use Gandi.net - who are based in Paris, but they have a London office, and I have registered all my .co.uk and .org domains over there. You can use Nominet.org.uk website to check if you're the registrant (owner), and you can use the Nominet Registrants Online website to check and update your details. (1&1 should have sent these to Nominet, its required).

If you have domains that aren't .UK then its less obvious - each registry has its own rules.

I'm using a service owned by IOmart for a virtual server, for webhosting, and for email we use Google's Apps service, the paid for business, and the free "Google Apps Basic" for domestic. You just set up the entries on Gandi's control panel to point at the details Google and/or the webhost tell you.

Good luck !
(Edit - fix broken quote)

Edited by jchamier (Thu 01-Sep-11 19:53:27)

In reply to a post by JohnMike:

Hi Roberto

Many thanks for your reply.

It is interesting that you are suggesting that the hosting package remains with 1and1 until expiry. Are you saying this from prior experience. Obviously I want to make 100% certain that 1and1 do not charge me twice again. I would rather not leave it til the last minute to find out that they have.

Furthermore I would prefer that not to have any further dealings with 1and1. Quite frankly the stress that they are causing me is too much for me to handle it is making me ill. So I would prefer to cut all relations with them as soon as possible.

Regards

Sorry, I did have trouble wording that bit, and have confused you.

What I'm getting at is that you order domain/web/email hosting from whoever you choose, and again Tsohost are really good. At this point it doesn't matter which of the following you do first.

Copy your website to the new host. You now have it on both hosts, so you can transfer the domain hosting to the new one. It can take 24 hours or so for the new server address to propagate round the internet, but because both are there it doesn't matter which address the DNS someone going to your site picks up.

Similarly with the email. You change the target email server addresses, and it takes a while to propagate. But your old one is still valid so as long as you read from both and only send from the new one all is fine.

So within say 48 hours all website readers will see the site at the new host, and all email will end up there as well.

But - and this is the point I was trying to make - the old ones are still there! They don't lapse on moving things the way an ISP service ends once you migrate away. So you can't lose anything during the swap-overs. The old ones only fully disappear when the contract you have paid for expires.

Both Purple Cloud who I used to be with, and Tsohost now send reminders when things are expiring. Both give the option not to renew, or if it wasn't on auto-renewal (which I'm on with Tsohost) it just lapses anyway. It sounds as though 1 & 1 aren't that efficient, or maybe someone has missed the option not to renew.

Hope that clarifies things.

Another option where a provider is acting like this can be to contact Netmag magazine www.netmagazine.com (pick up a copy in Smiths).

They have a problem/investigation section where many people who have had no joy or response from similar providers all of a sudden get everything resolved once Netmag have asked a few questions!

Hi b4dger,

Many thanks for this advice. Anything that gets leverage on 1and1 so that they start acting sanely will be a good thing.

I will try and get a copy.

My time frame for acting is now very limited due to other commitments. I may have to return to the issue in a couple of weeks.

Regards

Thank you that makes sense to me.

Hi Roberto,

Yes that makes perfect sense as like a fail safe have both hosting packages running until you are sure that the new one is working.

But just to make sure that I have this right in my head I cannot have the domain registered in two places. That has to be with one or other registrar.

But the DNS servers can look at both hosting packages while the transfer takes place.

Hopefully I am correct in thinking that once the transfer has happened the original host will still physically exist but it will not be accessed by anyone because the DNS addressing will have been updated.

Regards

Basically, by the end of that, yes. You've got it.

Just to clarify, yes the domain has to be with one registrar or the other, but neither need be the web/email host - just it usually is at our level of expertise.

The DNS servers - there are hundreds/thousands around the world and it takes a while for all to get updated. None of them will look at both places, just some will look at (point to) the new address after a few hours and some could take 24 hours or even a bit longer to do so, so they continue to point to the old until then.

Once all have updated then as you say, the old web and email hosts still exist but no-one access them except you still can. (How varies depending on how you have things set up at your end).

Just I was not then (a little better now) very good at understanding what it was all about dropped on Hostway by luck based as far as am aware in docklands also, when their closed calls/emails seem to be routed the states so you still get rapid replies. Also in the begining they were patient answering my questions.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

The DNS servers - there are hundreds/thousands around the world and it takes a while for all to get updated. None of them will look at both places, just some will look at (point to) the new address after a few hours and some could take 24 hours or even a bit longer to do so, so they continue to point to the old until then.

You can manage this if you have a DNS host that lets you edit your entries (zone) directly. You then reduce your Time To Live (TTL) values on your entries to 20mins, then when you move to a new host, the other DNS servers around the world should expire their cache within TTL * 2. Some ignore TTL, but the majority (over 98%) will be affected.

Then when you're safely on the new size, you increase the TTL again.

Yes, I (sort of) knew that. However that is a workaround for the subject/problem, where the way it worked needed to be explained. Which is what I did.

I never bothered tweaking the TTL on my moves as I didn't see the point. If the old site had been about to disappear then of course that's different.