This post has nothing to do with taxes, but everything to do with customer mis-service. You’re forewarned.
On Tuesday, May 10th, I logged on to my blog and attempted to write a post. I was unable to save the post — the “Publish” button didn’t appear. I couldn’t figure out a reason, so I called technical support. They didn’t know of anything (it was clearly a call to India), but did let me know that my hosting company, 1&1 Internet, had done an upgrade. They suggested it might be a billing issue.
So I called billing, and discovered that the problem was that I had exceeded my space limitation. I was guilty as charged, but when I went with 1&1 (after my then hosting company announced they were going out of business) I was told that I could upgrade my space quickly. So I told the individual I spoke with I was more than willing to do that.
Before we get into the adventure that’s about to follow, I need to point out that I had exceeded my space limitation for several months. However, 1&1 never told me or I would have immediately taken care of it.
In any case, I was transferred back to India, where the helpful tech person put through the order to increase my space allocation. I was told that the order would take 24-36 hours to process, and then the blog would need to be transferred (they’d walk me through that on the phone).
On Thursday, the order still hadn’t processed. I called technical support and they admitted that the order had failed due to a problem on their end. The tech support person I spoke with told me that they had “escalated the problem so that it would be resolved.” I should hear back within 24 hours.
Well, I didn’t hear anything, so I called back on Monday, May 16th. I asked what the status was, and I was told that nothing had been done; that there was still a problem on their end. I asked to speak with a supervisor, and I was told the supervisor was unavailable. I told the individual I spoke with (again, from India) that I needed this problem resolved, and I expected to be contacted by a supervisor by the end of the day. He said he’d pass on what I said.
I never heard back from anyone at 1&1.
My partner, who is far more tech savvy than I am, took the lead in finding a new hosting company (we began looking on Tuesday, May 17th). On Wednesday, May 18th we signed up with them; on Thursday, May 19th, we began the process of moving the blog. With the aid of Brian Cribb (who has helped me in the past with WordPress issues), we moved the blog by yesterday. We then updated the dns servers and tonight everything is back to normal (other than the two weeks off).
As for 1&1, I shouldn’t say I haven’t received anything from them as that’s not completely accurate. I have received two emails. The first even had the name of their General Manager, Frederick Iwans, listed at the bottom. Mr. Iwans wished me “best regards” as I could win $25,000 by telling 1&1 in 300 words or less where .com will take my business. Here’s my entry:
With 1&1 Internet, http://taxabletalk.com would be taken out of business.
I suspect I won’t be winning one of the prizes.
Today 1&1 noticed that we’ve moved taxabletalk.com off their servers. They note that I can contact their support team for assistance. Hmmm, I think waiting for Godot might have a better chance.