I have 2 clients at the moment who both have .com domains registered with budget - and in one instance, extremely well known - hosting companies / domain registrars. All each of them need is that .com redirected to their website that is running on the .co.uk.
I do not believe how difficult that is proving to be!
The first company don’t respond to emails, and if you ring either say a) they’ll call you back in 10 minutes, never to be heard from again, or b) they’ll do it right away and 2 days later still haven’t.
The 2nd - and well known, search-engine-topping - company are sending my client (and myself) round and round in circles by a) telling her she can access her domain control panel through her old account but then not having the domain listed there, and b) telling her via a support ticket she will be emailed the correct login details, just to be emailed a message saying ‘please log in here… we look forward to your business!’ without a username or password in sight. And when I just rang them I was informed ‘we are a budget hosting company and so we don’t offer telephone support’. Well if you don’t, you should make up for it in other ways!
We always urge our clients to come to us when we have a problem or a query, and not be embarrassed or self-conscious to pick up the phone and just have something explained/looked into.
2 weeks ago I lost hours and hours trying to get a .co.nz redirected, with the New Zealand registrars eventually claiming it couldn’t be done because my client didn’t have a dedicated IP address! Each response though had a different answer, addressing different issues! If companies would just read support questions properly they’d probably half their work load and double their customer satisfaction!
So - don’t go with a company who don’t offer customer support, and don’t think that the cheapest option is always the best! In the case of hosting it’s often cheaper for a reason - that reason being no one to help you when you hit a problem.
I am said girl being driven insane by, what i thought was, a very reputable hosting company…not so! both lisa and i have wasted hours over the past two weeks trying to gain a ‘human’ reply to my gradually not so polite massages, this is where i have got to:
‘This is completely ridiculous, the details you have sent me, once again, are the same ones i keep being sent which are useless!!! they are the details to the domain that i closed 6 months ago, and there is still no sign of my ollies dolly domain anywhere.
I do not have the time to be dealing with your petty system which doesnt even allow me to speak to anyone and keeps sending me the same automated reply over and over again.
I am telling you that i want you to unlock the domain name and send me the auth code so that i can change it over to 123-reg, immediately as i want nothing more to do with (company name).
I will be filing a complaint today about your awfull customer service.
i expect a reply asap with the details i have asked for.
thank you.’
to which the heartfelt reply was:
‘Thank you so much for your email, we have sent the domain details to you’
which they havent!
the only reason i havent given up yet is the fact that i have lisa to email with my frustration and obcenities and (once she has laughed and calmed me down!) she has helped me immensly!
x