I am definitely up for a class action lawsuit. Listen to this sad sad story below, and beware!

I've been with Gisol since before 2003. As a poor graduate student at the time, they seemed to have the best deal and my trusted and well-respected Web Professor had been the one to recommend them. I in turn became a Professor and have recommended them to my poor students as a first web host. I feel awful now to have exposed them to such a scam.

I've had server issues with them in the past but nothing like what I went through recently in May/June 2007.

I tried to renew one of my web accounts online via their control panel back in March. Their control panel had a glitch and the payment apparently never went through. In May, my site was offline with no notice. I contacted their tech support and spoke with “Shaun.” He told me that I should move that site into my current hosting plan via their control panel. I did as he said, paid $53 to add the second domain name, and all was fixed. The next day my account was suspended and ALL my websites were offline, including a non-profit site I run for needy children, my personal website, and all my class websites I use to teach my University students.

I learned that Gisol said that this action THEIR tech support walked me through was not allowed and that they’d be charging me a $499 violation fee! On top of this, I learned that because I “let” my other account expire, payment was due and a Collection Agency was going to try to collect an additional $399 for that.

After an angry outburst, I nearly dissolved into tears with tech support over the phone. I live outside the US so just calling them costs me money. Amazingly THEY CALLED ME back in one hour. It was “Senior Tech, Shawn Alexander.” He said that the only thing I could do was upgrade to a pre-paid 3 year plan for over $700. Plus there was a $95 “upgrade fee.” He threatened that I could either do this, or pay the violation charges, risk my good credit rating with their Collection Agency, and remain with suspended accounts even though the primary one had already been paid for until May 2008. He told me I’d pay upfront now, but since the violation fees appeared not to be my fault, he’d give me 7 months free and in January I can get a refund. Because I had violation fees against me, this was “already in the system and he could not undo them.” According to Mr. Alexander, his plan for web hosting salvation via an unwanted 3 year prepaid account was the only way...

I asked if I could think about it because I knew of their increasingly poor reputation and recent F rating at the BBB. (The last time I had checked 6 months or so before it was a B.) He told me I had to decide NOW because “they charge violation fees on Fridays and if I waited, the Collection Agency would be after me.” He said that since I live outside the US, they would then have to go after my husband who is living in the US. Also, “The Collection Agency can’t be paid with credit cards so therefore my checking account details were needed.”

I KNEW I shouldn’t have given them this info over the phone but Mr. Alexander tried to placate my fears by giving me his badge number, his personal phone # (which is the same tech support number you can find on their website) and personal email (admin@gisol.com) that no one ever answers. He said that I’d only be charged once and that to abuse this information “(laughs) would be illegal!” Furthermore he stated, “This call is being recorded and a transcript will be available in my control panel. (Of course it never was.) He also explained, “The reason we have an F with the BBB is because we decided not to become a member.”

Argh. I knew I was being bamboozled, but they used my tired mind (in my time zone it was nearly midnight), scare tactics of a collection agency, and a lack of time to think it over all to hook me in.

They did provide the service and as I have transferred now all my domains to GoDaddy and set up hosting with them, I am only using Gisol's crappy service as backup. I plan to eventually cancel. I’m sure that if I try to get the supposedly promised refund in January it will never happen. In other news, one of my domain names is being held hostage by them. They will let me have it if I pay $500. I won’t pay! Thank goodness my other two more important domains were registered with other companies.

I plan to change my checking account info and eventually cancel my Gisol account. I’m trying to look at this as some kind of annoying unexpected car payment and move on with my life, but I am angry. How many other people are they scamming?

Class action! Class action! Class action!