5 days to authorize CC???

I'm just wondering if this is normal.
I've ordered on (USA) Wednesday night the 22nd. and since I had a coupon I had to pay via CC. Fair enough.
I immediately send in the fax form. Expect to be authorized within 24 hours so I switch my domain's dns and cancel my previous hosting. Instead I get an email saying to send the fax again. Fair enough.
I send it again. Still account pending.
I ask what's going on. Apparently it's thanksgiving and no one is there to authorize my CC until Monday. Which is 5 days!. I find it VERY hard to believe that as a hosting company they would not employ someone who can authorize CC over the holiday season.
I needed my website up and assumed like every other hosting outfit that I would be activated immediately ESPECIALLY since I was paying via CC. I don't understand the logic in having to verify CC yet let paypal go through instantly. THEY ARE THE SAME THING if not Paypal even more susceptible to fraud!
Now I have to wait with no access to anything while losing business for 5 days. (that's alot of money)
Advice:
As an internet service, DH should be much more efficient and not rely on ppl to authorize CC but rather have it done automatically I think.
If Im being unreasonable let me know.

Although growing fast, they're still a relatively small company, and having 24/7/52 fraud screening people on staff is more than they've chosen to offer.

Paypal is obviously different. Paypal has been known to freeze accounts much quicker than CCs, to the chagrin of some of their customers.

They are very practical, and use "what works."

It's not clear how you're losing business because of not opening a new account.

They do have automatic fraudinator, with human intelligence added in selected (proprietary) conditions.

There are occasional complaints like yours here, so to some extent your reaction is normal and reasonable.




tor.eff.org

Sorry, If it was that critical that you be up this weekend, you should have ordered wednesday morning. For some reason your transaction was flagged as possible fraud so they have to go through some more steps to get you validated. The holiday should not have been a huge surprise as it does happen every year. The US isn't the most important thing in the world but reality is reality.

I can certainly respect your frustration. Just take it cool and they'll get you set up. I have noticed that support has been working today so they're not totally shut down. But if they're working down sites and DDOS attacks, they'll finish that up before getting you signed up. It's the way you would want it handled if your site was down or caught in an attack.

The reason why paypal doesn't require more validation is that DH accepts that paypal has validated you and authorized your funds. Therefore DH is not assuming the risk. You might be scamming paypal, but that's paypal's problem.

Sorry your torqued. Hopefully it will pop up soon for you.

Wholly

What about paying cc through paypal. Alot of hosting companies do that , maybe they should look into it

I thought paypal was accepted. You could always put the money on your account and then use paypal to sign up - one warning - promo codes apparently require the use of a credit card and only the use of a card allows the 97 day refund policy.

So, it's the price to pay.

Wholly

When you pay with your credit card through your PayPal account, you're still paying with PayPal.

Dreamhost has their own merchant account for accepting credit cards.

These types of queries/complaints seem to be more common lately. It is almost as if DreamHost has tightened procedures a little and more potential customers are being caught in the fraud prevention net.

Mark

I wrote that to the support team, asking if the avoided fraud is better than loosing so many good customers. They said yes.
It's a business decision, what can I say...

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I wanted to pay via paypal but I did have the promo, I think they should look at getting a better merchant or even paypal to process creditcards. This is better for ppl who dont have paypal accounts and I assume curbs fraud as well.

In reply to:

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I wrote that to the support team, asking if the avoided fraud is better than loosing so many good customers. They said yes.
It's a business decision, what can I say...

---

They're 100% right. If you want to keep your merchant account, or at least not pay ridiculous rates, then fraud prevention needs to come before convenience.

I'd also say they're not losing many (if any) good customers over it.

The ones that aren't crooks, but are too impatient to cooperate with much-needed precautions in an industry with a high fraud-rate, will probably end up being more trouble than they're worth anyway.

For your entertainment and reading pleasure, some of DreamHost's trials and tribulations with credit cards are discussed in their blog. (The first article isn't very relevant to this discussion.)



You are welcome to a refund.-Michael;Comparing 'DH of today' with 'DH of old' does not serve much purpose.-Dallas

I hope you are right, but I'm seeing lots, and lots of never-confirmed accounts.
Some people won't send it because they don't have a fax, and are too angry to go somewhere to fax it (post office for example), and some because they don't think it's safe. Those aren't "trouble makers", just people that aren't used to this. I've spend dozens of thousands of dollars, and until now thankfully I never had to send a fax. I would prefer to upload a scanned image to a secure mail or form, not an outdated fax message.
I don't say if it was a good or bad business decision. If they did it, it's because it surely is a good decision.

DreamHost $97 discount code: 97promo лл Check other codes on DreamHost97.com
All money from 90promo was given to Santa's Helpers Charity