I was originally drawn to this firm by their recommendation from a respected friend. Since setting up an account, I experienced a series of problems that Technical Support could not resolve;
- Loosing Email
I subscribe to various email lists and archive the content, posting it for others as reference material. The EmailListServer immediately flags account errors to the list admin. No errors occurred but my inbound emails just stopped arriving. I opened a complaint on 20070605 with Tech Support and furnished everything they needed to isolate the problem. They said they would escalate the issue to the “Admins” and they would be in touch.
- No response to open Technical Support requests
After 30 days with no follow-up from the “Admins”, I contacted Technical Support, worked through their outsourced Level 1 support staff. I find out Technical Support cannot even contact the “Admins” because “Tech Support is in the Philippines and Admins are in Virginia or Germany, I’m not really sure.” The Tech Support supervisor arranged a billing deferral while the issue was resolved.
- Internal policies not followed
30 days more transpired (still no contact from Tech Support or the Admins) and I received a Billing notice that the account will be suspended for non-payment. What the heck, I have a billing deferral! I write to complaints@1and1.com to inform them of the situation. I got a response from Technical Support asking to tell them about the problem I opened the ticket for in the first place. Huh, you lost the open ticket and all the related documentation that lead to the billing deferral? I responded that they already had the required data and they acknowledged the problem existed. All of a sudden, the responses halted, leading to,
- Account Suspension
With no activity on the tech issues, I finally cave in and figure I'll just switch to another hosting service when the committed-to one year contract expires. I enter my revised billing info and find the account is now locked out.

I am sure this saga will continue but you are smart enough to learn from my mistakes. If you are even thinking about 1 & 1 hosting, just go elsewhere.