Fasthosts taking money that I don't want?

picturesofsky

I've seen something else about Fasthosts' customer service being awful. They have a "recurring" billing structure where they charge you for a year's service in advance. They've just sent me an invoice for 117 pounds for a year's webhosting and domain registration. The domain doesn't expire until April 2009, but they're saying I can't refuse to pay because I didn't query it 3 days before the invoice was sent (I didn't know it was due!), and they've already taken payment.

I've asked my bank to not let them take the money, but it might be too late - their terms and conditions (which they've ever so kindly sent me when I've disputed this, note sarcasm) says

http://www.fasthosts.co.uk/terms/?page=domain
"All fees must be prepaid and are non-refundable, in whole or in part, even if the domain name registration is suspended, cancelled or transferred prior to the end of the registration term."
"To ensure your domains are not lost we operate a positive renewal system on all our domains - your domain will automatically renew for the term it was registered for unless you opt-out of this service through your control panel. This is not refundable and it is your responsibility to ensure valid contact and payment details are on your account at all times - failure can lead to suspension."

Surely they should be informing me BEFORE taking over a hundred pounds out of my bank account, not just sending an invoice and doing it anyway??

ARGH!

Steve

hollydays

Unfair contract terms?Speak to Consumer Direct.

picturesofsky

Thanks. I gave them a ring. They've referred to trading standards - the T&Cs need examining to see how they've covered themselves for things like this. I can't believe they can get away with charging people a yearly fee without warning them first!

macminiuser

hi there - was just wondering if you got anywhere with this?

I am in exactly the same boat - except I had a dedicated server with them and they've taken over £1,000 out of my account without prior notification. The first I knew about it was an email saying "thank you for your payment" with an invoice attached - usually, one would expect to receive an invoice BEFORE payment is taken not at the same time! They gave me the same story as you and have refused to refund the money.

As I was not expecting this money to go out, it has sent me way over my agreed overdraft limit and because it's for such a large amount even when I get paid on Friday I will not have enough money in the bank to cover my mortgage repayment.

Clearly being called FASThosts, the only form of peaceful protest available to me would be to stage a hunger strike outside their headquarters (geddit - staging a FAST outside FASThosts - something I am perfectly prepared to do as I literally now have nothing to lose) - I will be setting up a youtube channel to video my rapid decline in health, updating a twitter page and creating a facebook group so people can follow my progress.

If nothing else, I hope that this action will raise awareness so that no-one else falls foul of their heavy handed and unfair terms and conditions.

Any thoughts/advice/support would be appreciated.

If anyone out there has contacts in the press who might be interested in following this story, please get in touch.

Many thanks.

bitsandpieces

If they took the money via Direct Debit - and didn't have the right to do so - I think you could get it back through the Direct Debit Guarantee. If FASThosts were within their rights, though, this will not get you out of payment in the long term.

macminiuser

thanks for your reply, bitsandpieces - unfortunately, they took payment from my debit card, not via direct debit or credit card so I have no entitlement to a refund from my bank or the possibility of setting a chargeback in motion.

sparky883

I have 2 domain mames registered with Fasthosts they both expire at the end of April 09 and i do not wish to renew,I have just gone into the control panel on thier site and changed the domain settings from "Automatically Renew" to "Let Expire" and i am within my 30 Days,It was pretty straightforward and warned me in changing the settings i could lose the domains,Hopefully thats sorted-Do not see how they can charge me now,But will telephone to make sure,Have always found them pretty helpful on the phone.

Have just phoned Fasthosts 0870 8883600 )free on my phone) They answered straight away and its all sorted-They would have automatically renewed had i not changed setting-But i also got an E-Mail a few weeks ago telling me the expiry date,Did the OP not get reminded by Fasthosts as well???

bitsandpieces

Ouch. Sorry, I should have thought... You could try CAB and/or Trading Standards?

LeeSouthEast

The main reason I left fasthosts and will never ever do business with this bunch of thieves ever again!

macminiuser

@sparky883 - the dedicated server control panel is the "old style" control panel, not the whizzy new UKreg-style one (which affords complete visibility over your domains, hosting packages, emails etc and their respective renewal dates) - nowhere within the dedicated server control panel does it tell you when the account is due for renewal, nor is there a handy ticky box to disable the "auto-renewal"

I received no reminder of their intention to renew my dedicated server by email, letter or phonecall - the first I heard about it was an email at 11:15pm on 21st February saying "thanks for your payment" with an invoice attached.

In subsequent conversation with fasthosts they say that for dedicated servers they claim not to have a "reminder email" policy, however when my debit card expired in November 2008, they sent me continuous reminder emails to update my debit card information and until I did they disabled my control panel access thereby limiting my ability to change any settings!

I am serious about staging a hunger strike outside their headquarters.

macminiuser

@leesoutheast - it's reassuring to know there are many disgruntled (ex-)fasthosts customers out there.

it's about time someone did something to raise awareness - I've elected myself as I literally have nothing to lose.

if you have a blog, please help me to get the word out; I'll post details of the youtube/twitter/facebook pages in due course.