As you've been witness of - this company, Bliksem Hosting, is terrible and I'd hate to see any of you make a mistake and have to go through what I've gone through with them.The empty promises from Javier Vidueira and his staff at Bliksem Hosting have caused such a nightmare for me and I know it's been super frustrating for all of you as well not being able to get on the forum or the store and so as soon as I get email access back I will be moving all of my sites to a differet server.
Also, 2 weeks ago I noticed that they charged my credit card again for the year of hosting and so I notified them and they promised it would be removed and must've just been a glitch. Well the charge hasn't been removed yet and since the forum was down today, as well as email, and the store, I decided to look through and see if anything else was fishy. I noticed that there was not one charge from Bliksem like there should be but three. Wow. I never really look at my credit card statements and they are paid automatically so I didn't even know that these guys were charging me almost every month. It makes me wonder because I notified them of the problem and they knew there was a duplicate charge but wouldn't they have seen 2 duplicate charges in their system?
08/16/06 BLIKSEM WebHosting 877−3196600 FL $937.50
10/17/06 BLIKSEM WebHosting 877−3196600 FL $937.50
11/03/06 BLIKSEM WebHosting 877−3196600 FL $937.50
Oh yea...and I never really use the phone but everytime I've tried calling them this is what I've gotten - CLICK HERE to hear it.
dj, www.ochosting.com
ReplyDeletethey are awesome. i have a dedicated server and the have 24 hour live tech support. they are not the cheapest, but the are so good. anytime i add a new url to my account, i just call them, wait on hold for like 2 or 3 minutes, then a live person helps me out. trust me... you should call and ask for tim.
I have heard of others running into the same problem with them. I would suggest one of the 3:
ReplyDeleteDream Host
Eleven2
Media Temple
Hey DJ - I've got http://www.BanquetBuzz.com hosted with http://www.dreamhost.com. Never a day's problem and a working phone # too!
ReplyDeleteEric
Hi DJ! It doesn't seem like they are very inexpensive to begin with, I would be so disgusted if I were you! Sorry, this is happening. The good news is everyone is giving you lot's of other companies to choose from. I hope you can recover the money you've already lost to them.
ReplyDeleteCandy
I use http://www.alwayswebhosting.com and they have awesome support with a very knowledgeable staff. one of the few companies that let me even host a blu site and configured everything no problem!
ReplyDeleteI've heard great things about http://www.serverbeach.com and they seem to have good prices too on dedicated servers...
Bummer man, this whole thing is just a big headache. You should call your CC company and just report them to them and get those charges taken care of and be 3K richer :-)!
DJ, I know this goes without saying, but THANK YOU for enduring this headache on behalf of OSP. You don't have to do it, but you do...so thanks! :)
ReplyDeletej*
oh yuck!
ReplyDeletei've had a webhost totally disappear on me before. no notice, just suddenly it was all gone. i had to call the automatic payment company to get them to stop charging me. luckily it was $5/mo and while I lost some good php code, it was still just a personal site so no real harm. in your case, i'd really start looking around and preparing for what to do if it was a scam. that really really sucks. thanks for the heads up.
I had tons of problems with different companies as well, and ended up moving to mediatemple.net they rock!
ReplyDeleteIt was also comforting to see how many big corporate companies trust these guys as well. They are a no joke company that I've never once had a problem with.
Actually, I have no clue if they have a phone number because I have NEVER needed to call them for anything...
As much as I love my host, after the last outage i did a LOT of research and OSP WANTS Media Temple. These guys aren't your average Joe Shmoe hosts - they're like Joe Buissink for hosting. They are definitely the best of the best.
ReplyDeleteI tried rebooting the mysql earlier but it won't work. We are obviously on a shared server because I took OSP down for a few mins and it was still "full" - which isnt really possible since persistent connections are turned off - when I took the site down it should "boot" everyone from mysql. I then rebooted the forum and we were still over the user limit. That means someone ELSE is using our database host as well...probably another bliksem client.
Matt
It really stinks, DJ that you have to deal with all of this! Thanks so much for going to this trouble not only for your company, but for the couple of thousands of us that meet because of you!
ReplyDelete(where is that little "you rock" emoticon??!!)
Thanks so much!
Hey Deej.
ReplyDeleteI have used 1and1.com for the past 3 years with no issues at all. For a dedicated server, they are not the cheapest out there, but I can't complain at all about my hosting for my business package.
Thanks guys! Yea this is such a royal pain! Can you imagine sending an email to 7k people and then having them not be able to access what they wanted from it - wow!
ReplyDeleteI agree with Matt - they seem to be the most legit gig around and so I contacted them with all the info this morning and we'll see what they can set us up with.
I'm in the process of starting my own hosting company, and would like to help you out. You'd have my cell number so you'd always be able to get a hold of me if there was ever a server problem, if you're interested email me at jt [@] rackconfig.com
ReplyDeleteHi DJ,
ReplyDeleteman i think we all have been there,
Here are my 3 tips on the path of finding a good hosting provider.
1. Find a provider that can deal with you on the PHONE,as well as e-mail,with technical, finance or other issues.
2. make sure they have their OWN dataware house THEY control.
3. dont look at price!
(do that a bit later!
4. avoid providers with dodgy names..:)
TextDrive or Media Temple, they are the only ones I would trust.
ReplyDeleteNot sure if you're aware of Bliksem's 99.9% uptime guarantee DJ, but you can read more about it on their website.
ReplyDeletehttp://bliksemhosting.com/sla.html
I'm sure that they'll say that the database issue is not their problem, and therefore no credit is due to you, but you never know. For the inconvenience alone, they should have credited you some complimentary months of service.
have you looked into Site5?
ReplyDeletewww.site5.com they are bomb and cheap.
Cool - If Media Temple will do the trick I'll jump on with them. Seems like they're a big enough operation to take on OSP :)
ReplyDeleteI've asked for a full refund from Bliksem because the downtime has been unbelievable and of course reimbursement from Bliksem for the extra charges.
DJ
ReplyDeleteThanks for all that you do for OSP. Sorry you are going through this headache right now, but please know how much you are appreciated by everyone!
that totally sucks!
ReplyDeleteDJ - If Bliksem denies (or ignores) the request for a refund, definitely use your credit card company to challenge the charges. They're likely to be able to take care of it pretty quickly, esp. if you have documentation. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteI'm with Media Temple, and apart from some DB's not being supported (check before you buy!!) on my plan - they are good :D
ReplyDeleteNathan,
ReplyDeletecould you email me about which databases not supported?
Kaitlin - when you have a chance I'd love to talk Web-shop too. I'm looking into helping move this over soon and I want a 2nd opinion on my plans.
M
damn dude, down again huh? i can't believe those guys! hope you can find a new host soon... what a pain in the ass though.
ReplyDeleteanyway, take care and good luck
-Trevor
sorry Nathan - matt@pictureinfinity.com if you happen to see this.
ReplyDeleteMT says they can run zencart - not sure about IPB so I'm checking into it more probably early tomorrow.
I am running into similar problems with someone right now. It has been ongoing for 3 years!! Also, I just tried to order ShowIt Version 2 and I keep getting a server error. Bummer, because the special ends today.
ReplyDeleteI know you just got a bunch of hosting suggestions, but we use www.EV1.net (for the past 5 years) and they have been very steady.
ReplyDeleteOne of our sites contains over 40 gigs of high-res photos (a stock agency site with instantenous downloading capability) and we've never had a glitch with EV1.
Good luck !!
Looking forward ~
Brooke
We will of course extend the special because the site was down for the whole day.
ReplyDelete:)
Thanks for all your hard work for all us OSPers!!! YOU ROCK :O)
ReplyDeletegodaddy is my pick. I just moved over. has anyone had any trouble with godaddy?
ReplyDelete