Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Dreamhost Sucks

I had (have) an account with DreamHost.  I'm currently trying to cancel it, but they are doing their best to thwart my efforts.

I present exhibit A, the "cancel your account" page.
You Currently Owe: $190.80
However, if you close your account you will get a credit of $190.80 for unused services you've already been billed for.
So you're saying I owe money but I don't owe money? Ok, cool, I guess.
You will have to pay for your free domain registration if you cancel your hosting account now though, meaning there will be a charge of $9.95 added to your account.
Something about the phrase "pay for your free..." doesn't seem right.
You are not within our 97 day money back guarantee (it has been 732 days since 2006-12-23)!
To end your hosting now, you must submit an additional $9.95 to pay off your account.
We're sorry, but because you will owe $9.95 after closing your account, we must ask you to first go make a payment for that amount.
How about if you just end my hosting now and send me a bill for $9.95 instead of preventing me from cancelling?

I sent support an email and they said the terms of service clearly states blah blah blah I don't care.

I don't really care what DreamHost's excuse is for this crappy user experience, but I can give a recommendation to never use them to host anything. This is not the first annoyance I have had with them, but it should be the last.