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NetDepot - I've Overpaid by over $10,000 - Billing Team Non-Existent
| Posted by MarlowMedia, 06-15-2016, 10:48 AM |
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Hi,
I'd like to think that I'm a valued customer at NetDepot as iv been with them for years, i spend thousands each month with them on Dedicated Server. Its now that time of the year for me to sort out my annual company accounts and a few things dont look right at all. During looking at all of the invoices for NetDepot i noticed a number of things, on one of the invoices we pay each month the total cost comes to $1094.00 USD, on the invoice it lists 4 dedicated servers and a number of extras, how ever we've never had access to one of the servers thats on the invoice and its not even showing in our NetDepot account, so my question to NetDepot is why have i been paying for a server that i've never had nor is it linked to my account. I've been paying for the invoice since 04 April 2014 so thats 26 months (2yrs 2 months), the mising server I've been paying for costs $288 a month, times that by 26 and it turns out im owed $7488!
Another issue I've come across with them is that for some reason even though i only get 2 invoices from NetDepot each month i seem to have been paying 3 times to them via Paypal. After a look into whats been going on it seems I've been double paying for another invoice, somehow not sure how there seems to be 2 paypal subscriptions for the same invoices (i think as its the same amount). So i login to paypal and can see that I've been overpaying since 3 March 2015 so 15 months at $168.99 a month. so thats $168.99 X 15 = $2534.85 we are owed.
So overall I'm owed $10,022.85!!
I've opened a ticket to Billing and because i class his as an urgent matter iv been trying to get hold of the billing team for AN HOUR on the phone and each time no one answers the phone, as i live in the UK id hate to see what my phone bill is going to be with me making a load of overseas calls to NetDepot just for them to make me wait on the phone and then be put through to a voicemail. I then decide to go on Live Chat to get someones attention to take a look at my ticket ASAP and for someone to call me to resolve the matter as a matter of urgency. I'm on live chat for an hour! Yet even though it says im connected and my messages are delivered i get no reply what so ever, so Pam (if thats even your real name on Live Chat) please tell me why you ignored me for over an hour and didnt reply once to me?
I've never really had to use NetDepot support for anything, but now that i've had to this is shocking support from them! Can anyone who works at NetDepot that is on this forum please get in touch with me, my support ticket ID is 568032. Also improve your Live Chat as whats the point in having it if your team is just going to ignore me? Also the same for Phone support, attached is a log of all my calls trying to speak to someone.
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| Posted by MarlowMedia, 06-15-2016, 12:16 PM |
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Can i also get peoples opinion on costs, iv noticed that NetDepot are selling the exact same server $20 cheaper a month than what i am playing. Is this normal practice that hosting companies dont change everyone onto the lower price?
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| Posted by HostWithLove_Cody, 06-15-2016, 12:21 PM |
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That is a relatively huge amount, so perhaps it requires a senior member of the billing team to investigate and authorize any refund, etc which may be the cause of the delay.
All things aside, have you considered using Skype or some other VoIP software to make an international phone call to them? Might be much cheaper for you.
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| Posted by SenseiSteve, 06-15-2016, 01:17 PM |
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I highly doubt anyone on live chat would be able to help with a billing issue of that amount. In all fairness, both sides here created this issue (long term), the provider and the OP. Let's hope this is able to be resolved amicably.
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| Posted by (Stephen), 06-15-2016, 01:57 PM |
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This is totally normal, if pricing goes down, you still pay what you bought it at, pretty much always, even on cloud systems that you have a contract with for a term. Pricing can go down, you stay the same.
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| Posted by 24x7group, 06-15-2016, 02:45 PM |
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I see you tried to call them multiple times but I would certainly get this looked at on their side.
Gather your proof and mail them the information, I am sure they can't just 'leave it like this', they need to resolve this in a normal matter.
Although it might be possible they do need some time to sort it all out Especially for this amount.
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| Posted by RodneyGiles, 06-15-2016, 04:05 PM |
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Please submit a billing ticket at NetDepot.com
We dont respond to customer specific issues in forums.
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| Posted by kirkatronics, 06-15-2016, 04:12 PM |
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I would raise a ticket and wait for a response. Usually people on love chat can only help with small issues.
It isn't much help now, but I would suggest checking invoices and payments much more regularly in future and know what you should be paying.
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| Posted by SenseiSteve, 06-15-2016, 05:02 PM |
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This reminds me of a firm I was consulting for (many years ago) that found out they had been paying Southwestern Bell for a phone line they no longer had (for six years). They moved locations and didn't take that phone number with them. Unfortunately, SWB did not refund their money as they never actually cancelled the line. Hopefully, this issue will be resolved on a more positive note.
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| Posted by YourLastHost LLC, 06-15-2016, 05:24 PM |
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That's a staggering amount! Hopefully all will get resolved soon. I see NetDepot has contacted you via this thread, so let us know how it goes and make sure to get back!
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| Posted by MarlowMedia, 06-15-2016, 06:00 PM |
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I already have 8hrs ago and no one has replied to me yet, not even to say you guys are looking into it.
The support ticket id number is in the original post.
Thanks,
Mike
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| Posted by Mike_A, 06-15-2016, 06:53 PM |
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I doubt they will refund all of the money owed back, most providers cringe at the sight of having to pay out money back to a client. I do wish you luck, for four servers that's quite a bit of money each month, unless they are managed.
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| Posted by MarlowMedia, 06-15-2016, 07:26 PM |
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I dont see how they can legally keep the money. I mean i wouldnt ask for it back id just get them to apply it as credit to my account so that all future invoices are taken care of.
Ill keep you all updated anyway.
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| Posted by hivelocitygm, 06-15-2016, 09:05 PM |
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If what you say is true, they owe you that money. I am sure it was an accident on their end and I am sure they will hate refunding money they already put on the books. But I cannot see how they could justify keeping money for services they did not provide. Keep in mind, it is not as easy as just clicking a button to refund your credit card. I believe the merchant processor will only let them refund 3-6 months or so and they might have to cut a check for the difference. Give them a bit of time to sort it out. As someone else mentioned, this will certainly require management's involvement.
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| Posted by Lakjin, 06-16-2016, 03:25 AM |
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I get that this is a large amount, but aren't you overreacting a bit? You've tried to contact them for a few hours and they haven't responded. Okay, so relax and give them some time to respond. It isn't like you charged this amount yesterday by accident and need a refund ASAP. This has been ongoing for a few years now. Having to wait a few more hours -- or days -- to get it resolved won't kill you. Plus, they need to be given time to figure out what is going on.
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| Posted by Maple-Hosting, 06-16-2016, 11:20 PM |
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Because we're talking about $10k, this is not a walk in the park. If they do not refund it - do not even think twice and sue. There has never been a more rightful lawsuit and you deserve your money back.
Unless there is something we're missing here, not refunding this payment turns this whole incident from a shady "mistake" to a complete fraud and scam.
Just want to +1 this and say this is absolutely correct and normal in the hosting industry.
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| Posted by whmcsguru, 06-17-2016, 01:20 AM |
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My 0.02
You need to audit your finances better if you're just now noticing this. That's pretty poor accounting on your end.
I wouldn't count on a response from NetDepot in this matter until you get the lawyers involved, unfortunately.
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| Posted by CentexHosting, 06-17-2016, 03:12 AM |
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When you start getting into accounts that have several servers it makes things a little harder to deal with depending on the company.
I agree with you They should have responded and at least said something like we got your ticket we have to look into it or something.
Now if you have been paying for that server and not used it nor is it listed in your control panel Yes I would agree that you should get a refund. I would go ahead and do a screen shot now so you have proof that its not there so it just doesn't show up one day. Not saying they would do that but you never know.
With that said usually when a server is ordered then it gets billed to the customer until they cancel it out. So if you ordered and then never used it and never canceled it you would still own the Money.
The deal you have to go on is that you may have ordered it and for whatever reason you never got the server login info nor did it show up in your control panel so no way to use it.
really I would say its a toss up on the refund or not I could see it both ways one for the host and one for you.
I am not sure they would issue a refund But I could see them giving a credit or something but if you are a long time customer you would think they would try to do something to make it right to keep you happy.
Now to your other question. No most if not all host will not lower your payment if they come out with a price drop or promo. Now maybe if you are doing year contracts or agreements I could see them adjusting pricing then for you.
The way I explain it to customers is sure I will give you the new promo price for the server. But when we raise our pricing I will also adjust the server price up at that time. I tell them it has to work both ways if you are going to be adjusting pricing. Most seem to understand that.
Best of luck with your deal.
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| Posted by ayksolutions, 06-17-2016, 09:54 AM |
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Unfortunately NetDepot is a far cry from what it used to be. After it was taken over and the old team pretty much left, they are running on a skeleton crew it seems like. It's very difficult to get a response and reach someone on the phone these days.
With that said, they should correct this mistake for you.
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| Posted by SenseiSteve, 06-17-2016, 01:19 PM |
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There probably needs to be an audit on both sides to compare what each determines to be accurate, and for both to work on a compromise. Twenty six months is entirely too long to let discrepancies like this slide under the table.
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| Posted by HostMantis, 06-17-2016, 04:01 PM |
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That's what I was thinking and that goes for BOTH the client and the host.
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| Posted by allanw, 06-17-2016, 08:48 PM |
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If the host permanently drops prices on the server, then I don't see why they shouldn't lower the invoice price for the customer. Because what's to stop the customer from ordering a new server and cancelling the older one? It just wastes everyone's time. If you had a dedicated server for a few years, the price of memory and hard drives will have dropped by then, and the hardware costs were long since paid off.
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| Posted by Ash, 06-17-2016, 09:01 PM |
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As stated, give them some time.
Did somebody else have that job last year?
Regarding the extra server. Did you simply 'never have access' or did you never order it? There's a difference and after so much time it might be relevant.
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| Posted by Silvatech, 06-17-2016, 10:19 PM |
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WOW, did you even bother to read the OPS post. He clearly showed that he did submit a ticket and even gave you the ticket number.
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| Posted by domainbop, 06-18-2016, 06:41 AM |
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One of the main reasons many providers (especially budget providers like OVH, Hetzner, etc) charge a setup fee is to discourage churning like that. The other thing that will stop many customers from cancelling the older server is that the value of the time (i.e. employee labor costs for x hours of work) involved in setting up and transferring everything to the new server may exceed the amount saved.
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| Posted by MarlowMedia, 06-27-2016, 09:51 AM |
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UPDATE: Its been nearly 2 weeks now since i opened the ticket, since opening the ticket i have not had a single update from NetDepot to let me know whats going on. The only replies I've had is from them telling me to make sure i pay my invoice which is now due. But i keep telling them theres no point in me paying them when i've already over-paid and they'll be adding all the money they owe me as credit on the account. I understand it will take some time for them to see what exactly has gone on but i would i thought by now they would have found out and notice iv over-paid or given me some sort of update. But i've not had a single update!
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| Posted by SenseiSteve, 06-27-2016, 02:39 PM |
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There should be some dialog back and forth so that this doesn't leave you sitting there wondering what they're doing on their end to figure this out. Two weeks is way too long for them to not respond with an update. I understand they don't discuss this on WHT, but it seems they're not discussing this with you privately either.
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| Posted by Mark-Hall, 06-28-2016, 01:34 PM |
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It is better to sue them as soon as possible, so you can get your money back. $10K is not a joke for anyone
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| Posted by Jasonsite, 06-28-2016, 01:46 PM |
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This is certainly a stinky deal, but I would hope that the provider would work with you. At the same time, you need to pay better attention to your expenses instead of just paying the invoices that come in. A good friend of mine always says, "You can make a year of salary just by going through your bills carefully."
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| Posted by SenseiSteve, 06-28-2016, 01:49 PM |
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I think it's always better to amicably work things out first. The time to get a lawsuit on the docket here locally is one year to a year and a half. I don't know how long it would take in this instance for the OP. If I'm correct, small claims court has a limit of $5000. There's also lawyer fees and court costs to consider. No matter how you address this, it's a bad situation that never should have escalated this far.
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| Posted by MarlowMedia, 06-29-2016, 10:28 AM |
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UPDATE: After managing to get hold of someone from the billing department on the phone (Mitch) he told me it was being dealt with by the President (Rodney Giles) and he was waiting for him to send his findings/report over to him. I also managed to chat with Rodney on Skype and he apologized for taking so long, he said the reason for this was because apprently NetDepot are buying out a big company (wonder who that could be). Anyway today i get a message saying the following:
To what i then reply with saying:
Attached is proof we dont even have the server attached to our account and also that we've been double paying. It really does annoy me when it takes 2 weeks for a reply back and i get told they've done extensive digging around and yet they clearly havnt. *banging my head against a wall*
Attached Thumbnails
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| Posted by SenseiSteve, 06-29-2016, 02:35 PM |
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Clearly, there hasn't been any competent research by your provider as this appears to be obvious overcharging for one server and billing for another that doesn't show on your account.
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| Posted by Daniel B, 06-29-2016, 03:10 PM |
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Your double billing issue is a result of having a paypal subscription paying them as well as you paying the invoice. That's why one says recurring and one doesn't. You can cancel the recurring subscription in pyapal to at least stop future double billing while they work on the refund aspect of things.
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| Posted by Jasonsite, 06-29-2016, 03:19 PM |
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Unfortunately this is one of the major downsides to PayPal subscriptions. We have clients who have subscriptions setup. Sometimes they were setup late and so they're always behind, they make a payment and it's like a double payment.
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| Posted by Prolime Servers, 06-29-2016, 04:34 PM |
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I am sorry to hear about your issue, we are also facing same problem. one of our client made multiple duplicate payments for same invoice and now we are struggling to find a permanent solution for this. though i strongly feel that customer is responsible for cancelling there subscription as we don't have login to there paypal account, at the same time it is impossible to monitor when you have hundreds of active subscription.
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| Posted by Daniel B, 06-29-2016, 06:13 PM |
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You can cancel it from your end as well, it's not impossible.
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| Posted by Prolime Servers, 06-30-2016, 02:50 AM |
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i know we can but its too hard to cancel it for every client, most probably it is there responsibility to cancel the subscription from there account.
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| Posted by NortheBridge, 06-30-2016, 05:35 AM |
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Honestly, based on their initial statements I would forgo any non-court process to try and reclaim the money you are rightfully owed and file suit in federal district court. Small claims has a maximum of $5,000 USD in most jurisdiction but some have a limit of $12,000-$25,000. I have seen this in Fairfax County, VA in certain rare circumstances.
You likely won't end up in court after filing suit as the moment NetDepot is served with the legal papers they will refund you your money faster than you can blink an eye. Otherwise, from what I have read so far, although a judge [and jury] will likely "rip into you" for waiting two years to realize what had happened, you have every right to recovery of the money, legal fees, and likely additional compensation related to this incident.
Please speak with an attorney in regards to your options as you do have them. Please note however that we disclaim any liability in relation to this subject and the expression here is not legal advice but an opinion.
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| Posted by MarlowMedia, 07-13-2016, 01:06 PM |
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UPDATE: Finally i get another update, and to be honest i'm really annoyed at NetDepot as they are trying to get out of adding thousands of $ in credit to my account as what they've told me doesnt make any sence. Here is what they have told me in short:
Regarding the double payments they admit there was an error and will be adding credit to my account, how ever they have only mentioned about 2015 double payments and nothing about the 2016 double payments, so in my reply iv asked them to yet again check their records including 2016 payments - how hard can it be to sort this out!?!?!
Regarding the missing server they have said the following to me:
So then below is my response:
Is it just me or are they trying to get out of it as what they said to me doesnt make sense?
EDIT: Just as a note they have offered me 2yrs free 4GB Cloud Hosting. Not too sure what this is and doubt id use it since i have 4 (should be 5) dedicated servers with them already.
Last edited by MarlowMedia; 07-13-2016 at 01:13 PM.
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| Posted by MarlowMedia, 07-13-2016, 01:26 PM |
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Also here is more proof (attached), back in 2015 we did a support ticket as we questioned the money was was paying saying that we couldnt work out the why we was paying so much with the servers we had as it didnt add up correctly.
EDIT: also just said this to them:
Attached Thumbnails
Last edited by MarlowMedia; 07-13-2016 at 01:34 PM.
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| Posted by hivelocitygm, 07-13-2016, 01:31 PM |
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If you have other servers with them would you accept a credit for future services equal to what you say they owe you? Not their cloud offer but on your dedicated servers. I understand that may not be fair or what you want but it might be a solution they are more willing to consider.
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| Posted by MarlowMedia, 07-13-2016, 01:35 PM |
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Yes iv always said to them from day 1 to just credit the account so they dont need to offer any refunds etc...
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| Posted by SenseiSteve, 07-13-2016, 02:40 PM |
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If you're open to the credits on your existing servers, that would seem to satisfy both sides. So the amount of the credit is the stumbling block right now. You would think they'd compromise to put some resolution to this.
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| Posted by Violent Injection, 07-13-2016, 10:17 PM |
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File a lawsuit they will change their tune quickly.
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