2011-02-04

MochaHost: Was hoping they were going to be reliable Java hosting company; they are not even close

Recently I had the displeasure of trying out http://www.mochahost.com. I noticed their price points, and too they offer VPS for what seemed to be a great price. However, with hosting services, the ability to provision a new server in a timely manner, good customer service, infrastructure which just works, all matter. My experience was lacking in every way.

First, provisioning the VPS took over a week. I used their online live chat, and too I emailed their support. After days I finally had some information. They said their billing system had a bug in it, and they didn't receive my order until later. OK, I can give someone that initially; wasn't warm and fuzzy, but I could deal.

Next, I didn't know anything about their services, so I used a prepaid card to register, and only registered for a month. Thirty dollars US seems a great deal for a 1GB RAM bursting to 1.2-1.6GB VPS. But, I like to try things out in the safest way possible as you never know who is fronting a criminal or poorly managed or insecure business. No lock in and a safer card.

I recommend small businesses adopting the prepaid card trick by the way, and too, never EVER sign up for something over a month on contract until you have tried it out. VERIFY!

Well, they double billed me as soon as they got the server set up. The card declined. They turned off my service. This after they had a history of me writing their support and asking where the system I had already paid for was. Back to support I go.

I write support, and I explain the situation, and I go ahead and copy and forward previous emails. They wrote back apologizing, and said they changed my invoice date etc. OK, server on, lets try it out.

Well, they use WHM and cpanel. During the stint with the card, their automated processes have disabled those. Now, I can't manage things through those interfaces, and too, I'm paying a little extra for those programs; they force you to pay that extra amount on account creation; must have some panel with their VPS.

I'm sitting wondering after all which has occurred why they didn't verify the system. Not looking good. So, I write them again. At this point most would have walked away I'm sure. But, I was wanting a beating.

They tell me they have it fixed. I get into WHM, and there isn't much I can manage there. Too, cpanel isn't setup; I can't log into the system through it. I get some weird error.

I mean, I am using a hosting service right? Kind of the point: I don't have to manage "everything".

I write them and explain that I don't want WHM nor cpanel which they forced me to pay extra for and use at sign up. I tell them it seems it is just not working with their VPS configurations, and it doesn't; even email account configuration seems to not exist. I tell them I don't want to have it on the system at all, and that way I can try out their rest of their services and support without it, and that I use Linux all the time and would just rather the command line. I even tell them I could write about this experience one way or another, and the ball is in their court, but that I'm still willing to see what they have.

I say a) I want the system freshly installed b) no WHM or cpanel or to at least know if that is a possibility c) explanation of whether the "unlimited" email accounts are to be on the VPS or through other hosted services they may have, and roughly that is about all I want less their promised 99.9% up time outside of my own coding or GlassFish 3 crashes if they occur.

I get an email back asking me to detail what I expect. So, I go into the details again. Too, I ask them to review the history of my account, and why I am dissatisfied with their service. I even tell them they should be reviewing this case to help make their business better, because there is obviously something wrong. The whole time, outside of explaining this is something I've paid for, I'm deliberately polite.

I get another email back telling me they can't do anything with my account until I take care of an outstanding balance! This being the double bill. I sent them a copy of my receipt, the transaction ID from the CC company, and asked for my money back.

We'll see if that happens or not, but just be warned. MochaHost is not what you're looking for if you want anything remotely close to good service. At this point, service under par would be good. END RANT

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

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Unknown said...

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