Billing Issues

Hope this is resolved soon! I was overcharged by $240, and now my bank account is overdrawn! GAHHHH!!!!

I hope this gets resolved soon…
I just noticed that I LOST all my rewards, and I’m still in debt of $148!! That’d make a huge dent on my credit card, and I’d totally not want that to happen!

Yer I was a tad worried when I got an email saying I owed money as I was fully paid up for at least another 8 months.

Hopefully this is fixed shortly.

Nearly had a heart attack when I received the two emails - yikes!
Very comforting to see that it’s not just me though, and that this is a recognised issue. Hopefully everyone who has been charged will be reimbursed accordingly.

I got the email too, It makes me worry about whether the credit card is stolen by someone. Luckily it is just a issue.

Like many others I have been overcharged by over $200, you have billed me 10 months early.

What pissed me off is that you say above

Severity: Medium

Well it may be “Medium” to you but it is not to us.

This is a major breach of Trust, if I am not credited within 24 hours I will report you to VISA and seek the removal of your merchant status.

How you expect anyone to trust you after this I don’t know.

Almost had a heart attack! Hopefully my CC doesn’t get slammed.

I recieved also a bill asking I need to pay something more, I hope it is related with this billing issues and not with something else.

I hope also to recieve an apology by email as I recieved the warning, or a clarification if I need to pay something. This is really scary.

@xphia: Seems so on my end as well…I thought I messed something up while fixing up my forum XD

But then my main page wouldn’t work, nor would the panel.

Hope this is fixed as well.

Re: My post

Looks to be back up again. Rejoice!

I have got a SMS from my bank that you charged me 119.40$. It’s incorrect billing!

Serious shit guys, and I have to try to explain to my boss that this company is reliable.

I guess that the programmer that pressed the wrong button is having a hard hard day

Sure man, this kind of things happens. Every programmer has done one mistake like this one at least once in his life.

You also have $294.55 past due (owed since 2008-11-10), and if by 2009-01-10 you do not pay at least the $294.55 part, your account will be automatically suspended until payment is received.

So I owe you money since November 2008. Oh wait, it’s January 2008…
Luckily my credit card was expired.

I also live in Spain and received a SMS saying that my card was billed 238.80 USD.

Please fix this asap because an unexpected 238.80 USD bill hurts!!!

Thank you for changing the severity, this is obviously a Y2k error just running late or did you have your systems set to recognise 1908 as the beginning of the century?

Glad you guys put up this page.

I’ve just been charged $238.80 also! Hope it gets sorted soon or I won’t have any money to buy petrol to get home from work!

Gosh… nearly $400 overcharge… To me that’s more terrifying than a 24h server downtime

Hope my CC will be refunded soon or I’ll have a *real* problem.

– Wayfarer

Having just dealt with fraud… I’m not to keen on being charged out of my authorization.

If i end up having to pay special interest fees because you trigger an overbalance, I’ll be contacting your billing team for compensation.

I’ve notified the fraud department at my bank to put a hold on my account. If that should somehow fail and the unathorized $262 charge goes through and causes an overdraft I will require complete compenstation for all bank fees that may be assesed.

You billed me for an entire year, and billed me twice for each month.

You need to do something more than just correct this, I think.

Dreamhost need to update this blog (or SOMEWHERE?!) with any new information on the situation. This is major - and it’s disheartening to see that until users piped up, the severity level was a mere “medium”.

Gah! Thank God that A. this is a known issue, and B. the credit card I had on file had expired, so while they tried to charge it, they couldn’t.

Meanwhile, I can’t access my website… (Dunno if that’s connected or not.)

I am BEYOND pissed off. You just maxed me out over my limit! I want you to return my money to me right away please.

I would STRONGLY recommend AGAINST in issuing a chargeback unless you’re ready to face downtimes.

I got a cryptic message saying if I don’t pay by 2009/01/15, my site will go down (my renew date is 01/15 / today). So if you don’t pay for it, your site will most likely stay up for one more year. If you issue a chargeback, they will be notified, and the system will most likely automatically disable your account because you just “took money away” from them… even though it is probably not rightfully theirs, yet.

Personally, I’d say give DH 3 days to resolve this issue, and if they don’t, then consider the chargeback + downtime.

YOU DIPSH*TS NEED TO

*CREDIT*

ALL THE ACCOUNTS FOR THE AMOUNT YOU MISTAKENLY BILLED.

IF YOU RESCIND THE CHARGE, IT TAKES *SEVEN DAYS* OR MORE
TO DROP OFF THE BOOKS OF THE BANK.

CREDIT MY ACCOUNT OR MY BOUNCED-CHECK FEES ARE GOING
TO ADD TO YOUR HEADACHE.

New Dreamhost slogan #2:

Dreamhost ~ Our billing system: 3 retarded monkeys, 1 broken typewriter, 30 minutes.

?!?!?!

yikes, I figured rates went up or something, so I clicked the link in the email to close my account… it wouldn’t let me close until I paid the “balance.” Good thing I went to contact support before going all the way through.

You guys almost just lost a customer, and I would have been devastated, you are my favorites!

It claims I will be charged on the 27th of the month, even though I paid for a year. It claims (on the billing page no less, as well as the email) that my billing cycle is 2007-12-27 thru 2008-01-26 and then bellow it claims STARTED - 2007-11-27 CHARGE THRU (End Date) - 2009-11-26. Now I trust this will be resolved (as I really cannot take an overdraft as this will cause me) but how do I switch my account to manual billing? I’d rather have my account expire when I reach the end of my ACTUAL BILLING CYCLE than have it automatically rebill me.

This is a giant error, possibly the worst I have heard of within a hosting company, and that it seems to have caused some of your customers to unexpetidly go overdrawn is even worse.

absolutely shocking - like may others i can dismiss downtime and other quirks because its cheap, and i dont use it for anything mission critical, but messing up the billing? come on! so unacceptable. My account is due for renewal at the end of this month, and barring something spectacular, it looks like i’m taking my business elsewhere.

You know, there are certain mistakes that can be made and be forgiven for. Mistakes that take a single server offline, mistakes that bring downtime by accident… this is not one of those types of forgivable mistakes.

My account was immediately suspended when the accounting system went haywire. I have yet to see it come unsuspended. I’m lucky that I wasn’t one of those who had set up for automated billing or I would be pissed off to the very max of what a human is capable of.

Dreamhost… I’m honestly more dissapointed then I can even put into words. This type of breach of trust is worse than almost any I have ever had with any company I have ever worked with before. Unless you do something drastic fast, I forsee you loosing many customers over this breach of trust.

How upsetting. DreamHost just charged our credit cards on file? This is the kind of thing that deserves a full explanation of what happened. Was is a technical problem? Was it a hacker? Was it a rogue employee? What is being done to better protect our cc info and avoid such illegal charges in the future? Etc. I expect a full accounting of what happened here.

If I ever needed an excuse not to turn on auto-pay, THIS would be it - thank goodness I have an old card on my account and auto-pay turned off. I hope DH is prepared to pay for any overdraft/CC charges caused by this error.

I don’t mind the odd bit of downtime, but this is very disappointing. I understand that mistakes happen, but… eek!

Good Grief… Not a very good thing to wake up too… Time to fire someone!!!

Yes, this is bad, but it is still only 3:40am local time with Dreamhost.

I’d urge all those calling for urgent action (myself included) to give Dreamhost until 12:00 local time - that’s eight hours from now - to assemble their senior management team, work out a sensible immediate plan of action, and communicate it to us the customers.

well, I wondered how they were going to pay for their new offices and Xmas party (check out their video of that)! Nice. And now, you’ll notice, all emails sent to them do not get a confirmation of receipt email, like 16 year old kids trying to hide a wild party from their folks just back from holiday. It would be nice if one of them could get on this blog and let us know what happened, instead of hiding. Iceberg? What iceberg?

There probably isn’t a hell of a lot they can do, even if they have been woken up. It’s not like their bank managers will be up, and I expect they’ll need senior help from their bank (or billing provider) to sort this out properly.

I think everyone should cool their heels for a while, give DH a chance to make this right. If they fail, then maybe you can start throwing your threats around (or better yet, shut your yap and vote with your wallet).

Suggesting that someone get fired is not a solution. Proposing a class action is not a solution. Calling people names is not a solution.

This is a big mistake. A lot of people can have a lot of problems with their banks/accounts/credit cards if they doesn’t know anything about this charge. I hope Dreamhost can resolve it soon as they can, and compensate their users for this.

I’m shocked. I have been overbilled - and those that I have referred to your service have just called screaming at me for recommending you. They are business associates, friends and family. You’ve put me in a really nasty position with all of them.

I expect compensation and a sincere DIRECT apology or I will be taking this up with VISA and have your processes audited.

Damn, I’m minus 450 dollars and my bank is gonna charge me overdraft fee of 50 bucks!

As happy as I am with dreamhost, this was very unpleasant. My bank has already charged my $45AUD for being overdrawn and I have no way of fixing that until I get paid on Friday. I could deal with this if I didn’t need to buy food and fuel before then. But I do. So now I will have to borrow from friends to simply eat and get to work tomorrow.

Thanks Dreamhost.

This is awful!! I’ve just been charged three times for services starting in Novemeber 2008, $358!! Dreamhost you’ve completely done me over here.

I expect a full and immediate reimbursement of these false charges lest I be forced to contact my banks fraudulent transactions department.

Well, my private site was not billed ’cause it was in a monthly pay scheme and it was under 9 usd… The problem was with another account that I got to my employee… It is on a year plan so I had my Credit Card… Well, you all know what happened…
Hey, I want to believe that this kind of things happen sometimes. And I want to believe that it will be taken care of until the end of the day (even if I cant imagine how). I also want to believe that it will not happen again…
Will it happen again Happy Dreamhost Team?

Our sincerest apologies! I completely understand that when dealing with money, panic is quick to set in. I definitely understand the frustration. The problem has been found and fixed. Erroneous charges are in the process of being refunded now. I’m very sorry for any and all problems this has caused.

Please check back soon for a full accounting of what happened.

Dreamhost is the best host I ever had. Period.

But todays (or yesterdays by now?) fuck-up is truly of astronomical proportions. It’s an eye opener, one should consider his credit card to be in jeopardy at all times and secure it accordingly.

As GT above says, some clients will try to take advantage and ask for a period of free hosting as compensation - well, rightly so, they deserve it.

As a (until now) happy customer of dreamhost this mistake is extreme anger inducing. I have been charged for a full year right before my mortgage payment for the month cleared… making my mortgage payment check bounce.

lets see:
$119.40 yearly hosting fee
$50 bounced check fee
$100 missed mortgage payment fee
30 day late on my credit record (which kills my refinancing hopes for this year)

WAY TO GO DREAMHOST!

Well, I just canceled my plan with Dreamhost because of this. My bank account went south just as many others’ did. I just can’t have this. This completely broke my trust. I will be moving on to somewhere else now. I don’t hope they cover overdraft charge issues. They will have to. It may be a mistake, but it’s a serious one. It is their responsibility to take care of the issues that have ensued due to their mistake. This has not only panicked me, but also, may have messed up my finances for a month or two. I don’t make that much money.

Dimitri: the date in the future is the date of the end of the cycle for the plan that was being charged (that makes sense: you pay in november 2007 for a hosting plan that will go until november 2008).

The charge was in the past and the date was right, but on my case it looks like the billing system thought it was charged twice.

thank god my automatic visa withdrawal bounced for some reason!

Calm down guys. Mistakes happen to anyone. Leaving Dreamhost will not solve your problem, as this can happen tomorrow with any other company. And Dreamhost will be more careful, that’s for sure.

Wow, brutal. I’ve been laid-back about the DH reliability dramas, but this is kind of a different thing — how many of DH’s customers are self-employed folks whose business cash flow is affected by big random charges like these? I think people can deal with a bounced email or three, but when your mistakes hit them in the wallet, you have to get serious and figure out how to make amends. Looking forward to some high-quality communication and transparency from DH management (without the jokey newsletter tone) and some kind of small token of thanks/apology for those trusting enough of DH to have enabled automatic rebill, who bore the full brunt of this screw-up (along with the DH customer support team who is on call at the moment — poor things).

My account is now showing a credit balance, which is a change in the right direction, but I don’t want a credit with DH right now, I want the charge on my CC to disappear, obviously.

DH should be overjoyed that their overseas clients were noisy enough to draw their attention to this disaster, so that they have an opportunity to drag everyone out of bed and fix it and formulate their plan to address their customers before their much bigger US market wakes up and flips out. If they don’t take the opportunity to do that, well, ’selber Schuld’ as we say ’round these parts.

Let’s look on the bright side for a change.
When a problem arises, a solution is made, this solution will be made permanent to correct this error for happening again.

Build a bridge already, they said they are working on it.

I was also very shocked about the news that my credit card was being charged 2 years hosting,,,

what really bugs me is that i don’t even recall having chosen an automatic billing feature in the first place.. is this on by default??

I have been very happy with DH nonetheless and hope this gets resolved as quickly as possible..

Honestly, what’s the big deal? They made a mistake, recognised it, and are in the process of fixing it. I’m one of the many folks due a refund, but I don’t see the need to go bitching about it. Personally, I’m glad they are on top of the issue and working to rectify it and I won’t be loosing any sleep over it. It appears to me that some people just want to complain in the hope of getting something for nothing and to all those big talking idiots threatening to contact VISA, get real. If you are so piss poor this mistake has virtually bankrupted you, you won’t be able to afford to move to a different host company if you disrupt Dreamhost’s operations. Give them a break and let them get on with fixing the problem.

my credit card was being charged $381.60

I hope this gets resolved as quickly as possible

come to the think of it, should I sleep or wait for this to resolve? Its almost 5am and I am still around…

The problem isn’t “resolved” until each and every one of us has our money back safely in our accounts.

lucky me, iam using paypal; so i have a comfortable way to pay and iam also secure agains things like this.

Wow I was lucky to have an expired card but I really feel sorry for those who didn’t. Lets see what dreamhost does about this. Just wait till morning when everyone notices what happened.

#1 on February Dreamhost newsletter: “Big big sorry”!

Hahaha, this is so ridiculous I don’t know what the fuck.

I think some sort of appology scheme involving free service is in order. They have some real big groveling to do and need to go along way to restore peoples confidence and loyalty. I have ben looking at other hosts recently that ofer better features at simalar prices and they have better support ( including live chat ) for noobs like me when it comes to bloody Unix commands and custom php installs and so on.

I know any really important websites ( customers ) are hosted elsewhere is it time to relocate them all….?

How broke are yo ass’s??

$120/$240 isn’t a lot of money (especially on a credit card) lol, and it’s already been refunded - get over yourselves!

Ben, I’m that broke. Get over it? Dude, let me take your money, since you have so much, and see how quickly you get over it.

You see your real loyal friends in a moment of need. Go DH go

Ben said: “$120/$240 isn’t a lot of money (especially on a credit card) lol, and it’s already been refunded - get over yourselves!”

(1) Some people were billed upwards of $3000.
(2) Even $240 can cause serious problems, when the charge that was expected (and planned for) is only $10 or so.
(3) A lot of people pay using a credit card that is directly tied to their bank account, which means that the erroneous amounts were deducted from their balance, which (again because it’s an unexpected charge) can cause other charges to bounce and/or overdraw, resulting in a ‘domino effect’ of additional fees.
(4) It hasn’t “already been refunded”. Not yet anyway. They’re working on it, but the problem is far from resolved at this point.

I was over charged $4325.75 ! ! ! ! Please address ASAP!

it freaks me out when i saw 2 of the emails asking me for money…

luckily i didnt have enough money in this account for them to draft…
if not i’d be damn angry…

wondering whats wrong with their system.. hmmm

Just found this here. I am usually charged for the year in March. They have billed me early and charged me twice for 03-2008 - 03-2009 on an invoice dated in the future (2008-12-27). $238.80 charged to my credit card I was not prepared for… it’s a damn good thing I don’t live close to my limit.

“Comments posted here may not be viewed by DreamHost staff at all.”

I hope they take the time to read through this one.

Great. I wake up and find out my account is overdrawn. So I’ll get your refund, but that sets in motion multiple other transactions to also bounce.

I’m -$163 right now with about 5 pending transactions that would have closed normally. I have a feeling I’m going to get raped in overdraft charges when these start going through. Great. So… estimate $36 for each overdraft and…

Today was supposed to be a good day. Not anymore.

Why suspended my account? Error of the billing system at all users of suspended accounts? I write in support, support does not want to answer. I do not know English in such degree to understand all your talks. This situation extraordinary and putting under the threat work of clients of company of Dreamhost. Nobody talks when hosting will begin to work. Support is quiet. It is an all very bad situation. I think that Dreamhost must give indemnification to all suffering clients.

Hehe,

Thankfully my CC was out of date and the billing page says all paid up now.
Can’t wait to see the next newsletter…

I would like to know why it happened… even if it is one person’s fault for clicking a wrong button! Mistakes do happen, but I have to applaud the quick response in fixing this issue. That says more than the error ever could.

Cheers!

I’m outta here guys. It’s been real.

SUMMARY OF PAYMENT

Amount: $438.90

Soon as I get time, I’m moving my sites elsewhere.

I too, freaked when I got an email that $877 had been charged to my CC. Went to the control panel looking for a phone number and saw the important message. It’s inconvenient, it’s unfortunate, but hey… bugs happen. You can be appreciative that, unlike some huge software companies who have very buggy code and couldn’t seem to care less if they fix it, that Dreamhost was aware of and busting their butts to start resolving this at midnight their time!! I’ve been with Dreamhost for 3 years and I’ve always had excellent customer service. I won’t go anywhere else.

Seriously, please fix this soon, I have to pay bills and my husband is going to freak out!

Those of you worried about overdrafts…. In the past with billing errors (Yes DH isnt the only place) my bank and CCs has removed all overdraft/credit limit charges after the accidental charges have been credited. All you need to do is call your bank or whomever and show them that the charge was accidential and not your fault, and they will refund your overdraft fees. I have needed to do this in the past on visa and bank accounts, the charges were removed without hassle. On a side note, you should always review services/purchases online for any kind of re-occuring charges, many places sign you up for extra services that charge you monthly or yearly. I always pay using my discover card with random CC number generator so that the card can only be charged once. I suggest you do the same, esp if you run your balances near the limit.

Someone should start a fake dreamhost blog … except that they would be hard done by to make it any funnier than what the real dreamhost get up to. And the quote in the newsletter send a few days ago. Oh My God. ‘If your next web hosting bill from us is mysteriously tripled, now you know why.’

Now, who wants to guess the percentage of DH’s customers that were affected, and the amounts that they are dealing with? Millions? This could therefore be likely to go beyond webhosting niggles, and become major business news.

bookem_dan-o said: “This “full accounting of what happened” had *better* not be one of your typical stupid, cutesy, jokey “woopsie daisie” DH blog posts, accompanied by a litany of idiotic images you pulled down from Google Images. Being silly and lighthearted about serious problems like this will guarantee that I cancel my service with you.”

Fully agree with that statement. This isn’t a server outage or a whoops One-Click broke so heres a picture of a rabbit with a pancake on their head. This is BBB/FTC/IRS territory. How your billing system mistakenly rebills, or in my case says that I have TWO accounts with you is enough for me to drop my hosting all together.

This isn’t an error or a mishap. This is a someone is getting pink slipped. Thats the LEAST I would say happens. Not to mention as this has just entered the digg queue, your PR department better be working double/triple time.

Luckily I haven’t updated my account recently, so they can’t couldn’t put any charges through.

If this had gone through I’d be facing overdraft fees. That would’ve been very bad. For Dreamhost.

Uggggh. This better be fixed PRONTO!

i just submitted this thread to Ben Popken at TheConsumerist.com

Hopefully they’ll pick it…fiascos like this are right up their alley.

Cancelled our VISA card and will take a serious look at this webhosting service on renewal date
This is swimply just NOT acceptable

LocumGroup
Delray Beach USA

I’m absolutely furious. Charging into the end of 2009 on a month-to-month account is ridiculous. No wonder your “hard workers” can’t get rails working properly. What sort of massive retardation is this?

I understand software glitches, but there should be some sort of “whoa, what’s going on?” filter that gets tripped when your system tries to charge so many people for two years.

Massive fail. I’m canceling my account when my current month runs (assuming I’ve gotten this fraudulent charge canceled).

Why hasn’t a mass email been sent out to all those who got the email about being charged? Letting us know that HEY you didn’t forget us and you ARE taking care of it?

Luckily I cancelled my card some days ago. It’s kinda funny the second paragraph of the mail DH sent: “You also have $130.20 past due (owed since 2008-11-22)”. God, we’ve travelled to the future.

I thought stealing was still illegal. I hope you guys are prepared to make good on the many lives you just complicated far more than downtime ever could. I’ve never heard of a bigger class action suit opportunity from a webhoster.

I’m using automatic billing and I paid for 2 years 1 year ago and was signed up for another 2 years today.

I am pissed! This better be corrected quickly and there better be a way to remove automatic billing because I am not going to renew!

Customer: ‘What the fig!’
DH: ‘My Bad’
Unemployment line: ‘Hey, who’s the new guy’
Letterman: ‘And the #1 thing that can start your New Year off in a bad way is….’

Can’t wait to read the coming newsletter and followup emails. GL DH

The horrible thing about this is all the people that may now be overdrawn, incurring extra charges and/or bouncing checks. I’m afraid the severity level indicated on here is too low. This should be Ultra-High, Business Damaging, Possible Lawsuit.

Stupid overcharges.. I already called my bank -.-

I agree with Pamela.

i signed up for automatic billing 3 times so far. thank god it never worked i just hope we will get a PERSONALIZED notification that the problem is fixed, as i dont want to stay on top of all the mistakes DH manages to come up with.

I am furious! They disabled mya ccount and charged me $1,395! Fortunately I did not have automatic billing on - but my account is disabled. This is one of the worst errors in billing I have EVER seen!

Yeah, I was charged EARLY (my current hosting does not end until 1/25/08 yet I was charged again) and I was double-billed on top of that (for a total of $238.40).

I fully agree that everyone should get some type of FREE HOSTING (for at least 6 months) for this mistake.

It better be resolved soon or I’ll file with my Amex card.

I have to admit, I panicked when I logged onto my e-mail and saw the bill. Lucky for me, my credit card declined the transaction because it billed as 12 distinct transactions, and the card company didn’t think that was correct.

Dreamhost has been good to me for the last six months - this is just a glitch, and they’re taking care of things. It’ll all be back to normal before the morning is out. Put down the pitchforks, people, and give them a chance to make things work.

If they don’t fix it today - then get really angry. I know I would.

This is why I never EVER do automatic payments.

I am quite happy I just disabled my automatic rebilling stuff

To turn off autobilling, go to your account in panel.dreamhost.com, click on Billing, go to Manage Account and uncheck the box where it says that you agree to the automatic billing. Update and there you are, done.

That’s what I did. I found it easily and turned it off easily. Fortunately this mistake won’t cost me.

$765.60 past due (owed since 2008-11-11)

lol, nice one. glad my CC was already expired

This just had to happen the day my car payment was due. I just can’t beleive this

Thanks for all the fees.

I have to say the same and I hope it gets corrected soon! I couldn’t understand why I was being charged $119.40 and $109.45 (that makes a total of $228.85) when I have been up-to-date with all payments. Dreamhost rebills my account every 30 of each month and I was just rebilled a 15th? You see, I got two e-mails, one with two past due payments which I started freaking out as I read it and the other one saying that my account is completely paid up? If Dreamhost just rebilled me a 15th and if that money does not get refunded, I hope you guys do not charge me again on the 30th! Again, I hope you fix this soon!

And just so you all know, this could take 3-4 days to be refunded to your account. Call your bank.

:-))) Patiently waiting for corrections.

My credit card was not expired, I wish it was though. I was charged $238.80, now I’m overdrawn and I have 3 outstanding checks that I pray to god are not cashed today. This sucks.

Yeah, imagine my surprise when I check my CC its almost maxxed (very small limit) and I check my email, and I’m double billed more than 5 months early.

Holy cow, a lot of really excited overblown replies here!

I can understand people who provided a debit card instead of a credit card being upset (which is why debit cards are stupid and should never be used) but most of us who provided a real credit card should just take a deep breath and calm down.

DH: Thanks for recognizing the error and being really public and up front about it.

Yikes, now I feel silly not to have checked here first.