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Seeing as nobody ever checks this forum anyway to get feedback from the customers, I doubt they'll ever see this...
Still. It may help a few people from making the mistake of signing up.
It's got to the point now where their service just seems to be taking the p*ss in some cases.
Like when I had about 25meg worth of stuff deleted from my site, they didn't bother to contact people about it, they knew of the problem as Snuggly said he'd talked to people about it but there was no update on the service page.
It later turns out that they had uploaded an index.shtml page to the account of everyone who was affected telling them what had happened. This would be great but my index.php page didn't get deleted, so I wouldn't have seen the page uploaded. (monkey_man, could you see if you've had the page uploaded next time you log onto your site please?)
Now I phone up to change the nameservers on a domain, this is where things get stupid, they want me to fill in a form telling them the details now. I can't do it by email, even if I tell them EVERY BIT of my details including my passwords because someone may be lying, pretending to be me... I personally think it's because they can now charge me a £3.51 admin charge for doing this! It's also per domain! That's the higest admin charge for changing a couple of words I've ever known!
Other hosts do it for free, or even let you do it yourself. But, FREEola charge for this service as it's another way to get money.
Oh, you've gotta dial-up still to access your webspace and pay extra for MySQL. Really good deal there. Why don't they understand or listen to the countless number of pleas I've seen on here for them to launch a new service. I'm pretty sure that if they were to charge £100 to let people access their space all the time from any connection and keep the unlimited deals, plus add the MySQL into it, they'd get far more than they currently do.
OneandOne.co.uk do hosting, for £8.99 a month you get:
1 GB Web space
300 Email accounts
10,000 MB/month traffic
25 sub domains
MySQL databases
£100 a year from Freeola would be £8.33 a month and would easily beat that, apart from the subdomains. There are other things like log files which could be included too to attract people to the service but as far as webspace and bandwidth goes, this package will easily beat some of the other paid for packages...
Maybe they could introduce other cheaper paid for packages?
As for the deal with Freeola broadband, they've got something good there at least...
Still, they need to carry out some MAJOR changes with their service to attract more customers. Being cheaper and attracting more customers will benefit them far far more than just increasing their prices to force all the existing customers into debt...
Still. It may help a few people from making the mistake of signing up.
It's got to the point now where their service just seems to be taking the p*ss in some cases.
Like when I had about 25meg worth of stuff deleted from my site, they didn't bother to contact people about it, they knew of the problem as Snuggly said he'd talked to people about it but there was no update on the service page.
It later turns out that they had uploaded an index.shtml page to the account of everyone who was affected telling them what had happened. This would be great but my index.php page didn't get deleted, so I wouldn't have seen the page uploaded. (monkey_man, could you see if you've had the page uploaded next time you log onto your site please?)
Now I phone up to change the nameservers on a domain, this is where things get stupid, they want me to fill in a form telling them the details now. I can't do it by email, even if I tell them EVERY BIT of my details including my passwords because someone may be lying, pretending to be me... I personally think it's because they can now charge me a £3.51 admin charge for doing this! It's also per domain! That's the higest admin charge for changing a couple of words I've ever known!
Other hosts do it for free, or even let you do it yourself. But, FREEola charge for this service as it's another way to get money.
Oh, you've gotta dial-up still to access your webspace and pay extra for MySQL. Really good deal there. Why don't they understand or listen to the countless number of pleas I've seen on here for them to launch a new service. I'm pretty sure that if they were to charge £100 to let people access their space all the time from any connection and keep the unlimited deals, plus add the MySQL into it, they'd get far more than they currently do.
OneandOne.co.uk do hosting, for £8.99 a month you get:
1 GB Web space
300 Email accounts
10,000 MB/month traffic
25 sub domains
MySQL databases
£100 a year from Freeola would be £8.33 a month and would easily beat that, apart from the subdomains. There are other things like log files which could be included too to attract people to the service but as far as webspace and bandwidth goes, this package will easily beat some of the other paid for packages...
Maybe they could introduce other cheaper paid for packages?
As for the deal with Freeola broadband, they've got something good there at least...
Still, they need to carry out some MAJOR changes with their service to attract more customers. Being cheaper and attracting more customers will benefit them far far more than just increasing their prices to force all the existing customers into debt...
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Okay so that is two questions.
Belldandy wrote:
> When you ring tech support/customer service, does it get answered by
> an english person, y'know, in England ?
It always has been when I've phoned up.
> I'm on another Broadband ISP right now, and the 12 month contract is
> one month from end, if I move to Freeola Broadband, do I have to pay
> another activation fee ?
You will unfortunatly. When you de-activate from one ADSL ISP, BT take out the whole service from your line, rather than just swap it.
> When you ring tech support/customer service, does it get answered by
> an english person, y'know, in England ?
It always has been when I've phoned up.
> I'm on another Broadband ISP right now, and the 12 month contract is
> one month from end, if I move to Freeola Broadband, do I have to pay
> another activation fee ?
You will unfortunatly. When you de-activate from one ADSL ISP, BT take out the whole service from your line, rather than just swap it.
Tom wrote:
> You do realise, sarcasm is the lowest form of wit?
Call me a condescending barsteward if you like, but it is often useful on this forum.
> Just because BTOpenworld and the like don't let you do all these
> things, doesn't mean freeola shouldn't. Maybe freeola should set the
> trend, not follow it? Also, freeola have a NEED to let people change
> these things - there's not really a lot that I'd want to change with
> my .btinternet.com account.
Freeola is set up the same way as your btinternet account. The only difference is the phi11ip wants his Freeola account to come with all the bells and whistles of a dedicated hosting service. It is commonplace for companies to make a bit of money on the side of their deals. Nokia charge £46 for a USB cable for their phones. That HP printer and that Playstation 2 you own were both sold to you at a loss, so they could make money back on the ink/games. My credit card company charges me £18 to send me a computer-generated letter. Stuff like this happens, guys. Freeola charge next to nothing for their hosting, so no wonder they have to make a few admin charges here and there. It's not like they're going to break the bank.
> And another thing, I don't see BTOpenworld creating a forum, then
> constantly referring to their customers as "kids" or unable
> to do even the simplest thing that other hosting companies let you
> do. I've seen companies set up forums, but they always have the
> highest amount of respect for the customer, even to the point of
> saying sorry for things that weren't their fault.
>
> A certain amount of trust is needed between freeola and the customer
> - just customers trust freeola to know what they're doing. If the
> customer screws up, they phone the support line...that's what it's
> for! You could even, perish the thought, consider setting up a help
> section for these new settings.
The thing is, I don't see BTOpenworld creating a forum full stop. NTL only have one as they bought out NTHellWorld. The reason why you shop with a smaller company is for more personalised service - were you to ask these questions of a big ISP, chances are you wouldn't even get an answer, and if you did it'd be some suit coughing his way through a speech which says very much what the Freeola staff say, only in more toffee English.
> You do realise, sarcasm is the lowest form of wit?
Call me a condescending barsteward if you like, but it is often useful on this forum.
> Just because BTOpenworld and the like don't let you do all these
> things, doesn't mean freeola shouldn't. Maybe freeola should set the
> trend, not follow it? Also, freeola have a NEED to let people change
> these things - there's not really a lot that I'd want to change with
> my .btinternet.com account.
Freeola is set up the same way as your btinternet account. The only difference is the phi11ip wants his Freeola account to come with all the bells and whistles of a dedicated hosting service. It is commonplace for companies to make a bit of money on the side of their deals. Nokia charge £46 for a USB cable for their phones. That HP printer and that Playstation 2 you own were both sold to you at a loss, so they could make money back on the ink/games. My credit card company charges me £18 to send me a computer-generated letter. Stuff like this happens, guys. Freeola charge next to nothing for their hosting, so no wonder they have to make a few admin charges here and there. It's not like they're going to break the bank.
> And another thing, I don't see BTOpenworld creating a forum, then
> constantly referring to their customers as "kids" or unable
> to do even the simplest thing that other hosting companies let you
> do. I've seen companies set up forums, but they always have the
> highest amount of respect for the customer, even to the point of
> saying sorry for things that weren't their fault.
>
> A certain amount of trust is needed between freeola and the customer
> - just customers trust freeola to know what they're doing. If the
> customer screws up, they phone the support line...that's what it's
> for! You could even, perish the thought, consider setting up a help
> section for these new settings.
The thing is, I don't see BTOpenworld creating a forum full stop. NTL only have one as they bought out NTHellWorld. The reason why you shop with a smaller company is for more personalised service - were you to ask these questions of a big ISP, chances are you wouldn't even get an answer, and if you did it'd be some suit coughing his way through a speech which says very much what the Freeola staff say, only in more toffee English.
Why does your credit card company charge you £18 for a letter ?
Belldandy wrote:
> Why does your credit card company charge you £18 for a letter ?
It's what credit card companies do, and it's how they make their money. If your payment is overdue they send you a reminder letter, which costs you £18 a pop. I reckon Alliance and Leicester have had around £1000 out of me on admin fees since I got this credit card.
Don't get a credit card, kids.
> Why does your credit card company charge you £18 for a letter ?
It's what credit card companies do, and it's how they make their money. If your payment is overdue they send you a reminder letter, which costs you £18 a pop. I reckon Alliance and Leicester have had around £1000 out of me on admin fees since I got this credit card.
Don't get a credit card, kids.
Miserableman wrote:
> Freeola is set up the same way as your btinternet account. The only
> difference is the phi11ip wants his Freeola account to come with all
> the bells and whistles of a dedicated hosting service. It is
> commonplace for companies to make a bit of money on the side of their
> deals.
It's not that. It's the fact that they're trying to make extra money by not improving the service to attract more people, but by increasing the charges on existing customers.
I'm trying to give them some ideas. I've seen loads of people on these forums (and others) commenting on how Freeola's dial up service is out of date. People have considered it but decided against it after reading that it's not free, and you have to pay call charges.
Surely if they wanted to attract more customers they should introduce some packages where you don't have to dial up. They don't have to have unlimited space for obvious reasons but as I said, try giving accounts away with MySQL, subdomains, all that for a set yearly charge. The packages could easily beat others and it will attract new customers. You could do cheapo packages with like 50meg of space for £10 a year, that's more money than they'd get from people dialing up...
I'm trying to suggest that it's time for Freeola to launch some new updated packages and 'get with the times' if they want to attract new customers. Adding these charges is only going to scare people away and with the increased use of broadband (and the fact that computers are now beig sold without 56k modems) Freeolas package is going to go into decline. Will they have to increase the charges further to fund it?
I'm trying to suggest stuff to them. All this has been suggested before but it's never been acknowledged.
> Freeola is set up the same way as your btinternet account. The only
> difference is the phi11ip wants his Freeola account to come with all
> the bells and whistles of a dedicated hosting service. It is
> commonplace for companies to make a bit of money on the side of their
> deals.
It's not that. It's the fact that they're trying to make extra money by not improving the service to attract more people, but by increasing the charges on existing customers.
I'm trying to give them some ideas. I've seen loads of people on these forums (and others) commenting on how Freeola's dial up service is out of date. People have considered it but decided against it after reading that it's not free, and you have to pay call charges.
Surely if they wanted to attract more customers they should introduce some packages where you don't have to dial up. They don't have to have unlimited space for obvious reasons but as I said, try giving accounts away with MySQL, subdomains, all that for a set yearly charge. The packages could easily beat others and it will attract new customers. You could do cheapo packages with like 50meg of space for £10 a year, that's more money than they'd get from people dialing up...
I'm trying to suggest that it's time for Freeola to launch some new updated packages and 'get with the times' if they want to attract new customers. Adding these charges is only going to scare people away and with the increased use of broadband (and the fact that computers are now beig sold without 56k modems) Freeolas package is going to go into decline. Will they have to increase the charges further to fund it?
I'm trying to suggest stuff to them. All this has been suggested before but it's never been acknowledged.
Miserableman wrote:
> Belldandy wrote:
> Why does your credit card company charge you £18 for a letter
> ?
>
> It's what credit card companies do, and it's how they make their
> money. If your payment is overdue they send you a reminder letter,
> which costs you £18 a pop. I reckon Alliance and Leicester have
> had around £1000 out of me on admin fees since I got this
> credit card.
>
> Don't get a credit card, kids.
Get a Barclaycard - you can manage the whole account online and check statement, balance, make payments, check due date etc 24/7 I have no problems with them, plus (alarmingly) my credit limit seems to get raised for no apparent reason. I've got a Student Barclaycard, it's nice *strokes credit card*
Somehow my limit is now £450 over the maximum allowed for a Student card :)
> Belldandy wrote:
> Why does your credit card company charge you £18 for a letter
> ?
>
> It's what credit card companies do, and it's how they make their
> money. If your payment is overdue they send you a reminder letter,
> which costs you £18 a pop. I reckon Alliance and Leicester have
> had around £1000 out of me on admin fees since I got this
> credit card.
>
> Don't get a credit card, kids.
Get a Barclaycard - you can manage the whole account online and check statement, balance, make payments, check due date etc 24/7 I have no problems with them, plus (alarmingly) my credit limit seems to get raised for no apparent reason. I've got a Student Barclaycard, it's nice *strokes credit card*
Somehow my limit is now £450 over the maximum allowed for a Student card :)
Going off topic...
Miserableman wrote >>
"The thing is, I don't see BTOpenworld creating a forum full stop."
Sorry Miserableman I normally agree with most things you say, but BT have numrous support (and otherwise) forums - they seem to be on NEWSGROUPS, such as btinternet.support - And BT staff often seem to get involved...
GWD.
Miserableman wrote >>
"The thing is, I don't see BTOpenworld creating a forum full stop."
Sorry Miserableman I normally agree with most things you say, but BT have numrous support (and otherwise) forums - they seem to be on NEWSGROUPS, such as btinternet.support - And BT staff often seem to get involved...
GWD.
Phi11ip,
Do you honestly think we've launched our Freeola service and then sit back and watch the money roll in?
Do you honestly think that we've not been working on an Anytime package or personal hosting service free of the dial-up connection? No, we've just sat around drinking cups of tea for the last few years.
Freeola Anytime almost certainly will launch within a month, see http://www.freeola.com/anytime
The personal hosting package is further away but work is being done on this all the time.
Also, some important development regarding multiple accounts on the same Freeola user name with the ability to use different web space directories has been completed and will be introduced soon, free of charge.
One thing you need to know about Freeola's philosophy:
We'll launch services when the time is right for us to launch a product we can support and be proud of. That means that it has to generate a return to pay for our in-house support team. NTL may decide to release 10 Mbit connections for £2.50 a year but the fact is, they are constantly losing money, their customer service is hideous and after a while the price always creeps up. Oh, and don't forget the minimum terms.
Never underestimate the value of watching all of our competitors rush out to release the latest fad, only for 80% of them to mess it up in some way.
Danny
Do you honestly think we've launched our Freeola service and then sit back and watch the money roll in?
Do you honestly think that we've not been working on an Anytime package or personal hosting service free of the dial-up connection? No, we've just sat around drinking cups of tea for the last few years.
Freeola Anytime almost certainly will launch within a month, see http://www.freeola.com/anytime
The personal hosting package is further away but work is being done on this all the time.
Also, some important development regarding multiple accounts on the same Freeola user name with the ability to use different web space directories has been completed and will be introduced soon, free of charge.
One thing you need to know about Freeola's philosophy:
We'll launch services when the time is right for us to launch a product we can support and be proud of. That means that it has to generate a return to pay for our in-house support team. NTL may decide to release 10 Mbit connections for £2.50 a year but the fact is, they are constantly losing money, their customer service is hideous and after a while the price always creeps up. Oh, and don't forget the minimum terms.
Never underestimate the value of watching all of our competitors rush out to release the latest fad, only for 80% of them to mess it up in some way.
Danny
Torquay United! wrote:
> The personal hosting package is further away but work is being done
> on this all the time.
Ah, good.
That's the first that's been said about it though.
I didn't expect you to be sitting around drinking coffee all day. Of course you'll be doing something, it's just that suggestions have been completely ignored in the past...
Similar topics to this have been made and left unanswered. Now that people actualy know what's going to come in the future, it may change their view..
And, what's wrong with NTLs service? I've had no problems. My modem broke and was replaced within 2 days and I always get through straight away.
> The personal hosting package is further away but work is being done
> on this all the time.
Ah, good.
That's the first that's been said about it though.
I didn't expect you to be sitting around drinking coffee all day. Of course you'll be doing something, it's just that suggestions have been completely ignored in the past...
Similar topics to this have been made and left unanswered. Now that people actualy know what's going to come in the future, it may change their view..
And, what's wrong with NTLs service? I've had no problems. My modem broke and was replaced within 2 days and I always get through straight away.
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