Beware of website hosting and domain auto renewal contract
Need for extreme caution.this seems to be more like a protection racket
In this day and age everybody is interested in having a domain name or website even the free blog sites tempt you with the ability to have a distinct personal web domain. And the offers in the beginning are pretty cheap and it's very easy for us to fall into this temptation of having our own domain name.
I have in the past registered a number of domain names whenever I talked about starting a new business but later on most of these ideas fizzle out. But one forgets to follow through and go back to the domain registration and website hosting companies to cancel our accounts. Even when we cancel them they usually do not provide us with a confirmation number or a confirmation email. Sometimes these emails get into your spam folder and get deleted when you delete all your spam mail.
Although the amounts may be small $15-$20 if you have more than one domain or a website it adds up and becomes a large amount over time.
It especially important that these loose ends are tied when things are going well for you or before you are in financial dire straits. For example for the last two months my income has been zero. And I get slammed with an invoice from a website hosting company for a domain name which are registered with them three years ago. I distinctly remember calling the company and telling them to discontinue all services. And today I got an email saying that they were not able to process my credit card for a domain name registration. Any other day I would've reflexively paid this amount but this time I spent almost an hour on the phone talking to customer service and the cancellation department (it's funny that the customer service center cannot do the cancellation using the same computer system)
as I did have some substance in my contention they canceled my services and promised me that they will send an email and also cancel the invoice. I am going to carefully look at my spam folder for the next few days to see that this email as and when it comes is not deleted.
So all you ordinary people out there who are dreaming of starting companies, businesses and registering domain names and website hosting services. Pay attention to the small print (I know it is boring and difficult to make any changes) and make sure that you cancel your subscriptions to any website or domain hosting accounts as soon as you think that you are not going to be of any more used to you.
Hopefully you will not get calls from collecting agencies and spoil your credit rating so that you can think about the next paradigm shifting business idea.
Need for extreme caution.this seems to be more like a protection racket
In this day and age everybody is interested in having a domain name or website even the free blog sites tempt you with the ability to have a distinct personal web domain. And the offers in the beginning are pretty cheap and it's very easy for us to fall into this temptation of having our own domain name.
I have in the past registered a number of domain names whenever I talked about starting a new business but later on most of these ideas fizzle out. But one forgets to follow through and go back to the domain registration and website hosting companies to cancel our accounts. Even when we cancel them they usually do not provide us with a confirmation number or a confirmation email. Sometimes these emails get into your spam folder and get deleted when you delete all your spam mail.
Although the amounts may be small $15-$20 if you have more than one domain or a website it adds up and becomes a large amount over time.
It especially important that these loose ends are tied when things are going well for you or before you are in financial dire straits. For example for the last two months my income has been zero. And I get slammed with an invoice from a website hosting company for a domain name which are registered with them three years ago. I distinctly remember calling the company and telling them to discontinue all services. And today I got an email saying that they were not able to process my credit card for a domain name registration. Any other day I would've reflexively paid this amount but this time I spent almost an hour on the phone talking to customer service and the cancellation department (it's funny that the customer service center cannot do the cancellation using the same computer system)
as I did have some substance in my contention they canceled my services and promised me that they will send an email and also cancel the invoice. I am going to carefully look at my spam folder for the next few days to see that this email as and when it comes is not deleted.
So all you ordinary people out there who are dreaming of starting companies, businesses and registering domain names and website hosting services. Pay attention to the small print (I know it is boring and difficult to make any changes) and make sure that you cancel your subscriptions to any website or domain hosting accounts as soon as you think that you are not going to be of any more used to you.
Hopefully you will not get calls from collecting agencies and spoil your credit rating so that you can think about the next paradigm shifting business idea.