[PSA] HostDoc - not refunding and filing chargebacks with upstream providers! [IMPORTANT]

InceptionHosting

Hi Folks,

It has come to light that not only is HostDoc not refunding but he is also now filing chargebacks with his own upstream hosts I assume to claw back a bit of money from the brand he said was profitable.

This has been confirmed at (the other place) if you have ever had service with HostDoc the time is NOW to file a paypal claim/charge back yourself.

Even if you were only out $1 file it on pricipal, make the scammers work hard and make it harder for them to get away with this.

He fooled many of us with his nice guy attitude, seems he is no better that a colocrossing offer on blackfriday.

Charging back against his upstream hosts that provided him with service is an absolute scumbag move, unforgivable.

Not the drama I want but people tend to be ridiculously optimistic about hosts doing the right thing sometimes and you need to know this is not one of those times if you are waiting for a refund.

remember you have 180 days for paypal and probably longer for a card/stripe.

edit: if somehow you arrive at this and want context or you were a HostDoc customer and did not even know they were shutting down here is the thread: https://talk.lowendspirit.com/discussion/569/hostdoc-closing-down

Nyr

@AnthonySmith said: seems he is no better that a colocrossing offer on blackfriday

That was hard.

WSS

@Nyr said:

@AnthonySmith said: seems he is no better that a colocrossing offer on blackfriday

That was hard.

As was Ant when he wrote it, TBH.

deank

Surely I am a better dick than him, right?

Mason

@deank said:
Surely I am a better dick than him, right?

It depends, is 'better' defined by stature or girth?

seriesn

By the word of @Lee
CUNT.

Lee

@seriesn said:
By the word of @Lee
CUNT.

See, I wanted to earlier, but I am trying not to be my LET alter asshole over here.

dahartigan

Fucking incredible. That's as low as low gets. I woke up this morning, checked the other place, saw the update. What a cunt act.

When was the last time that a community provider did a chargeback on their upstream like this? Is this setting a new low?

Disappointed and disgusted doesn't even start to cover how I feel about this.

Lee

Well, if you are going to turn go all in. In an odd way, I respect the commitment, I wouldn't have the balls to go as far as a chargeback against all my upstreams.

There is a saying that if you want to be a better criminal, spend time in prison and learn from the best. I don't know, LET seems to be a good substitute to prison.

dahartigan

https://www.lowendtalk.com/discussion/162976/psa-hostdoc-not-refunding-and-filing-chargebacks-with-upstream-providers-important#latest

deank

I chargeback because I can.

somik

Wait, wasn't host doc supposed to be a good host? What happened?

dahartigan

@somik said:
Wait, wasn't host doc supposed to be a good host? What happened?

He was a good host until PMS took over. I think he's gone off the rails in his crazy train.

TL;DR his client area was leaking personal info, was reported to him by multiple customers including myself many months ago, never really addressed the issue, one day it becomes public, hostdoc goes PMS and starts blaming me and others for bringing it to light, instead of fixing the issue he closes shop but promises to pro-rata refund everyone, nobody is getting refunds except a few early refunds where the money was still in the pot, now he's doing chargebacks on the providers that he rented servers from.

deank

My view is slightly different.

LadyDoc was offering borderline free service since I doubt there was much, if any, profit in his hosting service.
He saw no light at the end of the tunnel as people demanded better and cheaper service.

The data leak was the thing that broke a camel's back, so to speak, and he thought to himself, "Fuck you all." and went full PMS.
He wrote a long message that was basically "Fuck you, cunts. I am ditching ya all, suckers. I also blame Brexit."

People requested refund rightfully so. Some were granted. Some were ignored. Seeing no way back to the fold, he figured he'd get extra PMS by trying to get money back from his upstream providers.

Lee

@deank said: Some were granted

Which is really odd, it's like he wanted to go down the right route then decided, nope.

InceptionHosting

@Lee said:

@deank said: Some were granted

Which is really odd, it's like he wanted to go down the right route then decided, nope.

Or the idea was to do a few cheap refunds to keep people off his back thinking he was going to do the right thing so he had time to get his own charge backs in.

Lee

@AnthonySmith said: Or the idea was to do a few cheap refunds to keep people off his back thinking he was going to do the right thing so he had time to get his own charge backs in.

Possibly but on the other site, some were getting back some large amounts rather than small.

WSS

@Lee said:
There is a saying that if you want to be a better criminal, spend time in prison and learn from the best. I don't know, LET seems to be a good substitute to prison.

sigh You gotta pay for your snickers somehow. Bend over.

AlwaysSkint

Well, I got £38 straight back, without asking at all, so I ain't complaining in that regard. The lucky few (for a change).

In the last couple of days, I managed to direct login to virtualizor from the "london" node, to clean up a bit on my Oz server, though much of the functionality is/was broken there. I'd already fully migrated the Dallas instance, after receiving the infamous closing down email. Was unable to boot systemrescueCD on the Oz server though, to give it a good old wipe.

I have now altered my address, phone number and email details in the Client Area - just in case. I suggest others might like to do the same.

somik

As the spammers say, very informative post. Thank you.

Sad to see a good host turn scammer...

poisson

At this point, it seems like he has zero monies and he rather pull the stunt on the providers than to have the bank go after him and make him insolvent for not being able to pay his CC bills. The upstream providers ain't going to get anything back taking legal action and will incur more cost.

Anyway, his name is publicly available on UK's company register and the best thing that can be done is to log him into fraud databases so that he won't ever be able to pull similar shit on others in future. This is a nuclear move, but I think it is justified.

dahartigan

@AlwaysSkint said:
Well, I got £38 straight back, without asking at all, so I ain't complaining in that regard. The lucky few (for a change).

That 38 squid was most likely still in the pot hence easier to refund.

dahartigan

@Lee said:

@deank said: Some were granted

Which is really odd, it's like he wanted to go down the right route then decided, nope.

I have a theory he may have intended to, until he did the math. He basically oversold refounds lol

poisson

@dahartigan said:

@Lee said:

@deank said: Some were granted

Which is really odd, it's like he wanted to go down the right route then decided, nope.

I have a theory he may have intended to, until he did the math. He basically oversold refounds lol

How does it even work? Overselling servers is understandable, but overselling refounds? lol

havoc

Damn.

Well I just checked...I got to near enough to what was promised so fine

Was close though...nearly went for annual billing

sonic

Oh no!
Scam exit!

vimalware

HostdocHarleyQuinn sigh.

WSS

Butts.

sonic

This has been confirmed at (the other place)

Link please. LET?

dahartigan

@sonic said:

This has been confirmed at (the other place)

Link please. LET?

https://www.lowendtalk.com/discussion/162800/hostdoc-are-closing-down#latest

Daniel

Original comment from LET, from an employee of Heymann (who Hostdoc were using):

WootWoot said: we received a $479.40 chargeback (Stripe) from them this morning (on a legitimate / due payment). Their Kansas City location has been shutdown 30 minutes ago. Their status page also shows that their Dallas location was shutdown 45 minutes ago. They've probably been hit, today, with a chargeback too.

https://www.lowendtalk.com/discussion/comment/3081113/#Comment_3081113

uptime

my AZ "dedicated core" deal is still up.

Perhaps this was all just a big misunderstanding?

EDIT:

just ran another geekbench - performance seems to have degraded a bit since fresh install (but I'm running an X server on it now, so maybe that explains it) ... https://browser.geekbench.com/v4/cpu/15221351

not sure whether I should put in a ticket about the performance at this point - will want to check a few things first to be sure anyway

dahartigan

@uptime said:
my AZ "dedicated core" deal is still up.

Perhaps this was all just a big misunderstanding?

EDIT:

just ran another geekbench - performance seems to have degraded a bit since fresh install (but I'm running an X server on it now, so maybe that explains it) ... https://browser.geekbench.com/v4/cpu/15221351

not sure whether I should put in a ticket about the performance at this point - will want to check a few things first to be sure anyway

AZ is still up for now.

Watch it unfold in real time: https://status.kvm.doctor/

debaser

I filed a complaint through PayPal directly after reading this. Still thinking about escalating it to PP rightaway. Normally I'd give him a few days to reply. Of course he won't reply.

key900

Well this feels bad

InceptionHosting

@key900 said:
Well this feels bad

You wanting a provider tag or what?

Razza

I wonder if he going to try to chargeback even OVH, I had a cheap service wasn't going to bother doing a chargeback but he being scummy doing it to his upstream, I might as well add a other chargeback to his stripe account.

vbloods

too much drama.

deank

Waiting for next scam to appear.

3 months ago - Blackboyfriend fiasco
Now - Ladydoc

Who's next?

ehab

@deank said:
Who's next?

its the DEVIL ..... he comes in different ways..... until the end ..... its his job with no rest HE comes from behind and sticks it in no matter what.

rizkiv1

Deposited a few dollars just before closing announcement.
Want to chargeback but bank app is confusing.

joepie91

This smells like panicking behaviour to me, not like a scammer's exit. I think he's just lost control and is trying to limit the damage. Running out of money and, like someone else mentioned, trying to be in debt to the least aggressive parties rather than the ones that will actually claw back the money.

That's not to say that people should hold off chargebacks, of course. Maybe I'm wrong. That's something people will have to decide for themselves.

Daniel

@dahartigan said: Watch it unfold in real time: https://status.kvm.doctor/

Is that "All services are operational" banner just hard-coded? lol

???

WSS

@Daniel said:
Is that "All services are operational" banner just hard-coded? lol

Yes, it's user maintained Hetrix.

https://status.bangpath.tech/

Sadly, the Hetrix tools are getting to be just about as reliable within the last month. I keep getting spurious "Host is offline" which goes for about 3 minutes for one of the monitors and it screws up my former 99.98% uptime. Once I figure out which one it is, I'm disabling that one.

deank

Perhaps in Ladydoc's mind, all is fine.

Unixfy

@WSS said: Sadly, the Hetrix tools are getting to be just about as reliable within the last month. I keep getting spurious "Host is offline" which goes for about 3 minutes for one of the monitors and it screws up my former 99.98% uptime. Once I figure out which one it is, I'm disabling that one.

Yeah, I'm getting this too...

mattharris

Thanks for the heads up.

key900

@AnthonySmith said:

@key900 said:
Well this feels bad

You wanting a provider tag or what?

Why not? ?

dahartigan

@key900 said:

@AnthonySmith said:

@key900 said:
Well this feels bad

You wanting a provider tag or what?

Why not? ?

It's worth it, we're quite active over here at LES :-)

Andrei

@Daniel said: Is that "All services are operational" banner just hard-coded? lol

That is changed by the user alone, not by our platform automatically. So all services may be down, and the status page can still say "everything's OK" unless the user changes this status to reflect the current situation.

@Unixfy said: Yeah, I'm getting this too...

Please open a support ticket so we can further look into this issue. Thank you.

WSS

@dahartigan said:
It's worth it, we're quite active over here at LES :-)

Hence the herpes sores.