Complaint Review: iPage - Internet

Two years ago, I was looking for web hosting for a new website. iPage claimed to be offering a deal: $77 for three years, payable in three monthly installments. Their website information was confusing, and when I finished going through the process, the amount was considerably more than the advertised deal. And there was nothing about it being paid in three monthly installments, as advertised.

I called an iPage representative, hoping someone could help me figure out what I was doing wrong. The young man assured me that, once I clicked on the 'accept' button, I'd only be charged one third of the cost shown, with the rest payable in two more monthly installments. "That's just the way the screen shows it," he said. Reassured, I clicked on the button—and the entire amount was taken in one gulp!

I'm a older, disabled individual on a fixed income, hoping to make a little money from home, so the money taken represented a large chunk of my monthly check plus a world of financial hurt. I was told I'd have to speak to a manager but that there wouldn't be anyone available until the next day. The following day, I tried to cancel the order but was told there would be a $50 dollar service fee deducted from the money they'd taken if I did so. Since I couldn't afford to throw away such a large sum (at least it was to me), I was stuck.

Almost from the start, I had difficulty with technical support. They were rude, most of them didn't speak understandable English, and those that did speak English talked in rapid cyber-babble that made absolutely no sense. I had trouble with just about everything, from putting the site together to accessing my email, and the so-called 'service personnel' were a bunch of lazy, self-important snots with no respect for the customer. Personally, I think they deliberately talked circles around me in order to hide their own ignorance; I called four times seeking help to link my cell phone to my email, and none of them had the slightest idea how to do it. Never did get my email linked to my phone. They couldn't answer the most basic questions. I came to the conclusion they were all a bunch of under-educated hackers drowning in bitterness because they didn't have the intelligence to even acquire an AA in computer science, and used their positions to vent on their hapless customers.

I had also been told that I would only have to pay $10.99 per year to keep my personal information private, but they didn't tell me I'd also have to pay for the domain name registration per year, and also for Site Lock to keep the site secure. Now my yearly fee had suddenly tripled! I scraped up the money at the beginning of the second year because I had no other choice. Even though I had paid, I kept getting notices that my fee was due. I'm sure they were hoping to fool me into paying twice; I'm in my 50s so this wasn't the first time I'd run across unscrupulous companies who've tried to fool me that way. (If you call them on it, they always claim it was a 'billing error.')

On January 12, 2015 I received a notice that they had withdrawn the final fee, so I figured everything was fine. Then, today (February 20, 2015), I found a strange message on the screen when I tried to access my iPage email, saying there was something wrong with my "MX Record or Name Servers." I called and was told that I owed $239, in addition to the $10.99 they'd already withdrawn from my account. According to them, I was only signed up for TWO years and my contract had now expired! I told the rep that the deal I had signed up for was for three years, and demanded to speak to a manager.

The manager then attempted to sign me up for another year, for what he called a "sweet deal." Since I'd already paid for three years, there was no way I was giving them any more money for a year I'd already paid for. He never denied that I'd paid for a three year promotional offer, just told me the original customer service rep had erroneously signed me up for two years so there was nothing they could do. I asked him to refund the $10.99 they'd already taken from my account, since I no longer had a site that need privacy, but he refused to return it. My account was shut down immediately, and I wasn't even given time to get my contacts out of my email.

I did a little digging, and discovered that iPage is a subsidiary of a larger company called Endurance International Group, which has a whole bunch of web hosting companies operating under various names. One of them, Fatcow, is partner to a registrar called Tucows which registers illegal websites with rogue Internet pharmacy bestkenko.com. Another Endurance-owned company, BigRock, operates a number of spam websites which keep all the Endurance web companies in the upper percentage of registrars of recurring spam web names. That might explain why, at one point, I found a link posted right across my header that directed traffic to a bogus website offering personal loans, despite the money I'd paid for SiteLock to protect my site from malware!

Here's a list of other Endurance companies you should avoid in addition to iPage: 2slick.com, AccoumtSupport, Arvixe LLC, A Small Orange, ApolloHosting, Berry Information Systems L.L.C., BigRock, BizLand, BlueDomino, BlueHost, BuyDomains, Directi, Dollar2Host, Domain.Com, DomainHost, Dot5Hosting, Dotster, easyCGI, eHost, EntryHost, Escalate Internet, FastDomain, FatCow, FreeYellow, Glob@t, Homestead, HostCetric, HomeClear, HostGator, Hostnine, HostMonster, hostwithmenow.com, HostYourSite.com, HyperMart, IMOutdoors, Intuit Websites, IPOWER/iPowerWeb, JustHost, LogicBoxes, MojoMarketplace, MyDomain, MyResellerHome, NetFirms, Networks Web Hosting, Nexx, PowWeb, PureHost, ReadyHosting.com, ResellerClub, Saba-Pro, SEO Hosting, Southeast Web, SpeedHost, Spry, StartLogic, SuperGreenHosting, TypePad, USANetHosting, VirtualAvenue, VPSLink, WebHost4Life, webhosting.info, Webstrike Solutions, Xeran, YourWebHosting.

If I were you, I'd stay FAR away from all of these companies. I made a coply of these names for my files, and I intend to avoid them like the plague they are. iPage will suck you in, lie like Pinocchio itching to get to the carnival, cheat you like a back-alley w****, and then try to sell you ocean front real estate in Arizona. Do NOT trust these people. There only goal is to separate those who aren't computer experts from every penny they can squeeze out of their helpless victims. They don't care if you go hungry or even die. They are a plague of techno-vampires on the dark side of the World Wide Web.