“Cruella De Vil, Cruella De Vil.
If she doesn’t scare you, no evil thing will…“
Well, well, well. As a follow-up to my post forewarning my young, nubile readers who are eager to enter the cut-throat world of work-at-home mom online ecommerce entrepreneurship, I am again chronicling my experiences. As a Baby Boomer, I’m a little thicker-skinned than some of you younger moms. But listen-up to Gram here ~keep up your guard and keep your ears & eyes wide open.
I’ll cut to the chase early. One of my businesses got skinned alive by Cruella Hosting Services.
Read between the lines here.
For those who want to continue reading, this may get lengthy. But it’s interesting, so take a chance.
Continuing my experiences in the Hell Hall world of a WAHM, I posted here about all the e-mails I got to sign up for early renewals of this, that and every other thing. I canceled my annual subscription to Cruella’s hosting and design service that my business was on since it was scheduled for ‘auto renewal’ through Paypal. I wanted to make sure this site didn’t charge me again because I was going to use the affiliate links provided through the respective companies, rather than having them all on a mini web site that I had created.
Coincidentally, at the same time, I contacted Cruella Hosting Service to ask for a URL redirect for one of my banners. Days went by, and I heard nothing. Surprise Surprise.
I fired off emails to every address I had from Cruella Hosting Service. This WAHM Dame Houdini has more email aliases than a Moose has Ticks at any given time (per recent news articles, that is about 35K).
I finally got one response today, and I am providing a synopsis of the flimsy excuses here:
…you have a yahoo email and some reason on Julie’s server I am not able to write to people with yahoo. I am not sure why. You need not be immature and treat people with respect if you want to get anywhere in business. I don’t take demands. I must of not got your email request. I removed you from my server you need to find another host. I hold the right to refuse service to anyone who acts in a bad or disruptive matter.
…I am sorry I don’t take demands. Your site is being removed. No one demands me to do something.
Just for your information I didn’t ask for money I offered early renewal for discount rate. You no longer need that…
I told you you were removed from our services. You don’t demand your host and designer to do something imediately. I never got your update email. I have a form everyone fills out for updates. I have a forum for people to get the updated info. You don’t go tell your host to do the work imediately specially when I do free updates. You never paid me to work imediately. Updates are sometimes on tuesdays but mainly 1st and 15th. The form makes sure i get the updates. You will need to find you a new host. You can’t go back to Julie because you left her services. You probably owe her money. (proviso, NOT.) I am not sure. We are on the same server so you left Julie to stay on the same server. Respect is demanded with my services.
sorry for the small amount I charge I offer no refunds.
Judy
Keep in mind that Cruella has the audacity to blame me for being impatient because she didn’t respond to my numerous requests for the redirect. I filed off a grievance to Paypal for services not received, although I don’t believe I’ll see any relief.
Here’s my response:
Your excuse is ridiculous about my using a Yahoo email address.
You have more than 3 email addresses I have been writing to.
There’s this one, there’s xxx
There’s the one that payment was sent to on Paypal, there’s the one that’s listed on Paypal
There’s also xxx
I had written to them all, and never heard back from you. I requested the URL redirect quite some time ago, which more than covered your day of the week that you work to make the requested changes. It’s easy for you to use the excuse that you never got an email. I don’t buy that.And you have the audacity to blame me because you’re not performing up to snuff, and I am the paying customer. And what does bringing up that other person you referred to have to do with our business transaction? Squat.
Not to worry. I have a WAHM tips blog.
No loss on my part.
Some people are just so shady and slick, and operate their market place mama businesses like flea or tick central dot info hell halls.
If you want the down and dirty of it all, just let me know.
Update: And then for some strange reason, after this post went to press, with no warning, I got kicked out of The Mom Pack tonight. No emails, no nothing, just no access. Coincidence? Technical hiccup? Gossip Wag? Wicked Stepsisters from Mom Pack?
What do you think?
July 18th, 2008 at 8:08 am
Cindi,
How awful….
I hope this doesn\’t affect your blogs and cause you to have downtime.
July 18th, 2008 at 8:38 am
Hi Kim.
No, it won’t affect my blogs. What I find interesting is that I never was ‘live’ on ‘Julie’s’ server, because I was trying to build my Shoppes site, and changed servers on my own accord and had it professionally built. I find it interesting that Cruella even knew I was with ‘Julie’ at all. Gossip wags.
July 18th, 2008 at 8:43 am
As a wahm host and designer, I find that type of customer service absolutely deplorable! Unfortunately I find that many Wahms get into the hosting biz without having a clue as to what they’re doing, which reflects poorly on the rest of us. Anyway, I’m glad you got the heck out there!!
July 22nd, 2008 at 2:31 am
What\’s sad..is that the title alone told me who the hosting service was. I love mompacks but I think that a certain hosting service is completely dishonest and unethical with regards to many things. She even blasts (all the time) .asp sites stating they\’ll \"never rank\". Well I got news.. my sites all rank #1 for their keywords and most \"big\" companies (like Sony) have .asp sites. Hmmmmm this is the chihuahua syndrome right?