What to expect from Dreamhost?

A while ago a friend of mine registered an account with Dreamhost using the 777 promotional code. The registration went fine, no problems. As there shouldn't have been since he perfectly complied with the fine print of the 777 promotional action. He has been a user of Dreamhost in the past, but he didn't have an active account anymore so according to the fine print that shouldn't be a problem. 30 minutes later his account was active and he could start using it. He only wanted his old domain to be transfered to his new account, so he emailed them. Dreamhost was still holding this domain but not because he paid them to do it. So only fair that he had to pay the transfer costs, after all the domain wasn't his anymore. But instead of getting an email back about having to pay the transfer costs he got an email back that Dreamhost would remove his account. In other words an other rule was made up on the fly that not only currently active users aren't eligible for the 777 action, but also past Dreamhost account holders have no rights (the legal validity of this is questionable of course).

Emailing Dreamhost doesn't help since they don't reply to him. That's why I'm posting on this messageboard. Hopefully they don't remove my account. Mine is perfectly valid as well but that doesn't seem matter to Dreamhost.

I always liked Dreamhost a lot, good service, lots of options available on accounts, even a shell account. But I just can not recommend people Dreamhost anymore since I don't know what I can expect from them. Neither does the friend this post is about. His account is still active, he can still use it but Dreamhost doesn't reply. So running a website on it might not be a good idea because the moment it gets popular they'll probably remove it. So all I want to know is: what can he expect?

In reply to:
In other words an other rule was made up on the fly that not only currently active users aren't eligible for the 777 action, but also past Dreamhost account holders have no rights (the legal validity of this is questionable of course).

How does legality enter into the picture? Our sale, our policy, our rules. And this rule wasn't made up on the fly - the promo stated that it only applied to new customers. Someone who was once a customer isn't a "new" customer. I don't have the fine print in front of me, but I'll doublecheck the exact wording - I'm pretty sure it was clear that it applied to new customers only.

As far as support not responding to your friend, that sounds unlikely to me (though support has been pretty hectic this past week and it may have taken longer than it should). Since you don't mention your friend's domain or user ID, and since my crystal ball is a bit foggy today, you'll need to be more specific if you want someone to actually check into this particular case based on your post here. Really, though, customer support would be a better place to address your concerns.

In reply to:
So running a website on it might not be a good idea because the moment it gets popular they'll probably remove it.

Not quite sure I follow your logic - that's not at all the situation we're talking about here, is it? It wouldn't make sense for us to remove sites that become popular - we /want/ our customers' sites to become popular so that they can pay us lots of money for bandwidth, upgrade to dedicated servers, and do other things that pay us more money.

In reply to:

How does legality enter into the picture? Our sale, our policy, our rules. And this rule wasn't made up on the fly - the promo stated that it only applied to new customers. Someone who was once a customer isn't a "new" customer. I don't have the fine print in front of me, but I'll doublecheck the exact wording - I'm pretty sure it was clear that it applied to new customers only.

Luckily I do have the exact wording.

In reply to:

This offer is for new customers only - those who do not have an active account with DreamHost.

It indeed says new customers only. But after that it explains what new customers means "those who do not have an active account with DreamHost" - That friend did not have an active account with Dreamhost. You would have been right if it only said new customers. Any way you look at that rule it’s is open to different interpretation. I would be very disappointed with Dreamhost if they would cancel that account because of the vague rule. I don’t think I’m being very unreasonable with my interpretation of this rule.

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As far as support not responding to your friend, that sounds unlikely to me

He emailed support twice already. Both emails were ignored or not replied to anyway. The discussion board seems to have more effect.

In reply to:

Not quite sure I follow your logic - that's not at all the situation we're talking about here, is it? It wouldn't make sense for us to remove sites that become popular - we /want/ our customers' sites to become popular so that they can pay us lots of money for bandwidth, upgrade to dedicated servers, and do other things that pay us more money.

Well the situation we're talking about here is: his 777 account is still active and he can still use it even though he got 1 email that Dreamhost would remove it.. So should he consider it removed or should he just use it with the risk of getting removed once the website becomes popular.

I think I’m more annoyed with this situation than normal because it’s not something I expect from Dreamhost to act this difficult about something. I’ve got several friends at Dreamhost and they hardly ever complain about the service or attitude.

Hey,

Actually I think support was wrong to say that your friend was inelligible for the 777 sale. Anybody without an active account (including past customers) should have been able to use it. If you can reply with the web id or domain of your friend's account, I'll check the support history and hopefully be able to sort things out!

Your friend should not worry about having their account turned off, they're fine.

Sorry about this!

josh!

The domain this was about is 'emptysouls.net'. I hope you'll be able to sort things out.

Thank you.

I don't think Dreamhost has any fees for transferring a domain from one account to another, as far as I know.

Now, on the subject of special deals for new customers only, these can be pretty annoying for us long-time customers... how come I'm a second class citizen with Dreamhost just because I've stayed with your service all along?

-- Dan

In reply to:
Now, on the subject of special deals for new customers only, these can be pretty annoying for us long-time customers... how come I'm a second class citizen with Dreamhost just because I've stayed with your service all along?

Consider yourself lucky that you weren't stuck with a crappy host for many years. I wish I hadn't been a new customer and instead had had great service for a reasonble price for many years.

There are always similiar deals around.

Hey,

Okay I checked out his account and it's in good standing and we won't be disabling it or anything! I let him know too..

sorry again!

josh!

Thank you Josh for sorting out this unfortunate situation. It seems everything is fine again now :)

In reply to:
Now, on the subject of special deals for new customers only, these can be pretty annoying for us long-time customers... how come I'm a second class citizen with Dreamhost just because I've stayed with your service all along?

Well, hey, we run sales because we want to grow really quickly, even if that growth doesn't make us much (or any!) money. It's not really feasible for us to run any kind of sale if we just cut all the prices of our current customers.

Plus, compared to, say, a cellphone company, we're super nice to current customers! We ALWAYS retroactively give customers more stuff whenever we add more storage/bandwidth/domains/users to our plans. You don't even have to ask, we just do it!

nate.

>We ALWAYS retroactively give customers more stuff whenever we add more storage/bandwidth/domains/users to our plans.<

Unless one has the "My Strictly Business SALE!", which admittedly is still a great deal, but hasn't experienced a single upgrade in the well over a year that I've had it. :-(

Oh yeah, good point.

On the other hand, that deal is insane. It came with so much stuff that we have to pay for up front--like a Miva license, secure cert, domain registration, etc.

The sale we just ran was a good deal, but you got a crazy deal.

nate.

I agree, it's an awesome deal...

although I haven't yet used the miva merchant, secure id...etc.... I will gladly use my "rewards" for the extra domains, etc.

Dreamhost is a great company...yeah, they have their ups and downs...but with as many companies that I have hosted with in the past...you can't beat DH. I host over 30 sites with dreamhost.

As for email support...I have had many support questions...*mostly due to my poor knowledge...but I have received timely support, answers and helpful solutions.

I think I know the "other hosting" company you are talking about...I still have my main site on it, but just can't seem to take it down for fear of potential clients not finding me. I will switch during christmas...when I know most won't be looking.

I happily give a "thumbs up" for dreamhost. They will listen, upgrade when they can, give you the best software, allow you to add services most won't.

And, one of the major things I have noticed is that their client base is very very knowledgeable and can help with almost any problem. Sometimes it is easier to come here to ask for html, php, mysql, css, etc..support than macromedia dreamweaver's newsgroup.

Well, my 2¢ tonight.

Hope you all vote tomorrow!!!

> Hope you all vote tomorrow!!!

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It's gonna be another loooong night. ;)
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What to expect from Dreamhost?