GoDaddy.com

Thank you for the opportunity to address the additional concerns presented by our customer. GoDaddy stands by its original response. The domain name automatically renewed on April 28, 2016 as the Protected Registration was still on the domain. The customer’s initial purchase of Protected Registration service was done so via online transaction, without the assistance of GoDaddy’s customer care teams. The service functioned as intended and advertised, keeping the domain from being canceled without proof of identification. Our customer provided the information requested in order to cancel the Protected registration service.  Account management is solely a customer responsibility and our customer agreed to this upon conducting business through GoDaddy. While we make a best effort to partner in our customers’ successes, our customers must also be responsible for their actions or lack thereof.When a customer transfers a domain name to another registrar, any time left on the domain until expiration carries over. As such, we have only refunded $32.97 back to the customer’s original payment method for the cancelled Protected Registration service.Thank you again for the opportunity to address the additional concerns presented by our customer.Kindest regards,Ken C[redacted]Office of the CEO - GoDaddy

Thank you for the opportunity to address our customer’s additional concerns.As previously stated, our customer will need to connect with our Facelift team directly at [redacted]@godaddy.com for assistance.Thank you again for the opportunity to address the additional concerns presented by our customer.Kindest regards,Terri H[redacted]Office of the CEO - GoDaddy

Dear Dispute Resolution Consultant

Thank you for bringing this matter to our attention.  We have reviewed our customer's complaint and account and present the following.

Prior to purchasing their GoDaddy products our customer acknowledged the following agreements:...

•         Universal Terms of Service Agreement

•         Website Builder Service Agreement

 

The latest version of these agreements and other legal agreements may be found at: https://www.securepaynet.net/legal-agreements.aspx

 

Last year our customer contacted our Customer Care Center about purchasing our Website Builder plan. This interaction will be reviewed to address any service improvement opportunities that may exist.

 

RESOLUTION:

 

GoDaddy appreciates our customer's business and has acted in good faith to uphold its agreements with them. We attempted to contact out customer to discuss our refund policy which will be applied to all transactions going forward.  

 

As a courtesy, we have processed a refund of the transaction specified in the complaint and now consider this matter successfully resolved. The return of funds may take 5 to 7 days to be reflected at the customer's financial institution.

 

Thank you for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the concerns presented by our valued customer.  

Kind regards,

Office of the CEO

[redacted]@GoDaddy.com

GoDaddy.com

Phone: ###-###-####

Fax: ###-###-####

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this proposed action would not resolve my complaint.  For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.Godaddy claims to have sent an email on 23rd Jan. It was received on 24th Jan (I am in India and am 12 hrs ahead) Saturday post close of business. 24th and 25th were weekend and 26th Jan was a national holiday (Pres [redacted] was in India for republic day on 26th Jan). Like all businesses, we resumed work on 28th Jan, when we realized we have been locked out.Since then I have been repeatedly requesting to restore access so that files not needed can be deleted. I have also said I would like to move two sites out from godaddy to another host and need the databases for the move to be seamless, however even after being our host for more than 6 years (without any major infractions), godaddy refuses to allow us to move out sites to another host.Deleting cache files via ftp is taking very long. each day the sites are down, rankings and all associated marketing activities fall behind, not to mention the hurt on serps. If this is the way godaddy wants to conduct business with a customer who has been with them, since the time they were not even in India, so be it. I would have expected a response from the ceo office to reflect maturity and status of the chair, however seems even the ceo is not concerned with what a customer is asking for and what he has already said in his emails to his staff. These are your rules that I have accepted so you claim. Were they the same when I took hosting from you before 2009? Does anyone read the small print at the time of purchasing or just before payment is completed. Do you read the fine print on a bottle of laxative when you are buying for use? I am not saying I will not follow them, all I am saying is I have been with you many years, I need access to control panel for me to move two sites out to another host. I am already in the process of deleting cache files and files not required, however treatment like this is neither warranted nor appreciated, especially when there seem to be multiple delivery issues with your services including uptime (which was also brought to your customer service's notice multiple times, including in writing) Against a guarantee of 99%+, I received 88%.It would be better if you helped resolve the issue rather than throwing agreements in my face. 

Regards,[redacted]

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this proposed action would not resolve my complaint.  For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.When I load the website domain that I wish to purchase it loaded an ad for GoDaddy.com. The domain name is unique enough that if I didn't put it in on GoDaddy the name would NEVER have been "purchased" in the first place. It's VERY shady business practice for them to purchase the names under an affiliated company and then try to sell them back to the customer at an increased price. This business practice needs to be stopped! I'm writing the AG to let them know how GoDaddy conducts business.

Regards,

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this proposed action would not resolve my complaint.  For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.From the overview of GoDaddy's 'Domain Services', it states:"DOMAIN TRANSFERS   Transfer your domains to GoDaddy - it's fast, automated and risk free!  You keep all the time remaining on your registration and get a 1-year extension at no extra charge."  This information is plainly stated regarding the terms of service before signing-up.  It only makes sense to know what the terms of service are before embarking on anything like purchasing web hosting - or purchasing anything at all over the internet.  That's why terms are stated immediately and up front - and in plain english.  I am referring, of course, to:  "a 1-year extension at no extra charge"Again, this is information that is known to the customer before being introduced to such docs as "GoDaddy Universal Terms of Service Agreement" or "GoDaddy Domain Name Registration Agreement" (which only appear during the sign-up process).  However, any such docs are not needed in this case because the information of interest is plainly given in the Product and Services Overview (before signing-up).  Revdex.com:The following is information in addition to a response I made on 3/31/15 ("I do not accept the response made by the business ..").   (I did not see a link to add information directly to the web site):  More information regarding the Product Overview for GoDaddy's services (see attachment):"Transfer Your Domain  From only $7.99 and Free 1-yr extension" This says you are entitled to a free one-year extension.  The clause, "From only $7.99 .." is not exactly clear.  Most web hosts do not charge anything for domains (new or transfers).  I recall I stated that I am a current domain-owner and that I will purchasing web hosting and not 'parking' a domain.  If one is not purchasing web hosting, there could be a charge for 'parking' a domain and this could account for $7.99.  However, whichever terms the customer is dealing with, it appears the second year should not incur a charge.  [redacted](Consumer)

Thank you for the opportunity to address our customer's concerns. Upon conducting business with GoDaddy, our customer acknowledged and accepted our agreements, found at https://www.godaddy.com/legal-agreements.aspx.GoDaddy will sometimes offer promotional items or bundles with new...

purchases of certain items, such as domains.  In this case, our customer appears to be unhappy with the free addition of 1 month of [redacted] email added to the shopping cart when purchasing a new qualifying domain name registration.  RESOLUTION:GoDaddy upheld its agreements with our customer in good faith and honored its terms of service.Our customer has already canceled the [redacted] email plan that was included in their most recent domain purchase on July 31, 2016, and therefore should not be billed for its renewal. Our customer is under no requirement to purchase/utilize the [redacted] plan(s) included in the promotion, and can remove the plan from the shopping cart during the checkout process, by clicking the “Remove” link.  Thank you again for the opportunity to address the concerns presented by our customer.Kindest regards,Mike L[redacted]Office of the CEO - GoDaddy

Dear Dispute Resolution Consultant,Thank you for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the concerns presented by our customer. We have reviewed this matter and would like to present the following.Our customer acknowledged and agreed to the following agreements upon...

conducting business with GoDaddy:• Universal Terms of Service Agreement • Domain Name Registration AgreementThe latest version of these agreements may be found at: http://www.godaddy.com/legal-agreements.aspxOn July 26, 2012 our customer purchased a Domain Name Backorder via an online transaction. Our Domain Backorder service helps our customers attempt to acquire a domain name if it becomes available for registration. Placing a Backorder does not guarantee acquisition of the domain name.On July 26, 2015 our customer cancelled their Domain Backorder Service.Resolution:GoDaddy has upheld its agreements in good faith with our customer and honored its terms of service.The article our customer mentions is correct. Refund requests for our Domain Name Backorder service  made after 45-days of purchase will be provided in the form of In-Store Credit. As such, GoDaddy has provided a full refund in the amount of $20.99 for the canceled Domain Backorder service as In-Store Credit, available for future purchases with GoDaddy. Education:Our customer may find the following GoDaddy support articles helpful:What are Domain Backorders? https://www.godaddy.com/help/what-are-domain-backorders-597Refund Policy:https://www.godaddy.com/help/refund-policy-8849Thank you again for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the concerns presented by our customer.Regards,

[redacted]Office of the CEO - GoDaddy

Dear Dispute Resolution Consultant,Thank you for bringing this matter to our attention. We have reviewed our customer's correspondence and would like to present the following.Upon purchase of services, on May 10, 2014, our customer acknowledged and accepted the following...

agreements:• Universal Terms of Service Agreement• Domain Registration Agreement The latest version of these agreements may be found at:  http://www.[redacted]As part of an ongoing effort to protect our customers and credit card holders from unauthorized online purchases, GoDaddy routinely requests payment verification for new purchases.  In conjunction with our Universal Terms of Service Agreement, our customer was requested to provide a copy of the payment method account holder’s government-issued photo identification, such as a driver’s license or passport.  They were also informed that if we do not receive the requested documentation that that order may be canceled.Because our Verification Office did not receive the required documentation to validate the order, GoDaddy canceled the services and issued a full refund back to the credit card holder on May 13, 2014.Resolution:GoDaddy has upheld its agreements in good faith with the customer and credit card holder.  We encourage our customer to continue working with our Verification Office and provide them with therequested documentation to fully resolve this matter.  Thank you again for the opportunity to address the concerns presented by our valuable customer.Kindest regards,[redacted]Office of the CEO - GoDaddy

Thank you for the opportunity to address the concerns presented by our customer.  Our customer acknowledged and agreed to GoDaddy's agreements upon conducting business with GoDaddy. The latest version of these agreements can be found...

a[redacted]On March 3, 2016, several domains expired within our customer’s account. Per our customer’s account preferences, GoDaddy was instructed to automatically renew the domains utilizing their associated payment method and attempted to do so in a good faith effort to honor its agreements with our customer; their financial institution declined payment(s).While GoDaddy sent expiration notices via email to the customer before and after the expiration date, GoDaddy has no control over what happens to the notice after it leaves our system. If a customer changes their email address, we have no way of knowing the new one is unless they inform us by updating their account. Account management is a customer responsibility. On April 14, 2016 our customer contacted our Chat support team and was properly informed the domains may be recovered with applicable redemption fees from within the customer account. The customer stated they will recover the domains online and ended the interaction. RESOLUTION: GoDaddy upheld its agreements with our customer in good faith and honored its terms of service. Our office has been unsuccessful in connecting with our customer.  As a one-time exception, our office will reduce the normal $80 redemption fee, allowing our customer to redeem each domain for $20 plus the cost of a one-year registration renewal. Our customer must contact our office directly while the domains are still in an eligible status to reasonably ensure the customer is able to recover the domains.  Thank you again for the opportunity to address the concerns presented by our customer. Kindest regards,Gary H[redacted]Office of the CEO - GoDaddy

Thank you for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the additional concerns presented.Our administrators were able to restore the content for all five websites associated with the hosting plan that was canceled due to non-payment. As previously stated, hosting restores are not a service GoDaddy regularly offers and are not guaranteed.  Furthermore, when our customer’s hosting plan had been canceled, the email forwarding services which they had received with the hosting plan were subsequently canceled.  Account management is a customer responsibility. This includes the renewal of products and services in a timely manner and maintaining independent backups of website and database content.  Had our customer maintained their own backups, they may have simply purchased a new hosting plan to replace the plan that was canceled and uploaded their properly maintained website files.WordPress provides multiple options to back-up a website and database content. We recommend our customer visit https://wordpress.org/ to review their backup options.  Thank you again for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the additional concerns presented by our customer.Kindest regards,Gary H[redacted]Office of the CEO - GoDaddy

Dear Dispute Resolution Consultant,Thank you for bringing our customer's additional comments to our attention. We have reviewed the comments and documents which they had supplied, to which we would like to present the following.Our customer had attached two documents to their additional comments; one referencing a cancellation of a specific .COM domain name registration.  The other document references a .NET domain name registration.On March 2, 2013, our customer had transferred their .COM domain registration from GoDaddy to another Registrar.  Upon successful transfer, a system-generated email confirmation was sent to our customer, which they had attached a copy.  That message informed them of the .COM domain name being canceled from the GoDaddy account.On November 28, 2013, the .NET domain name was automatically renewed upon its annual expiration in accordance with our customer's account preferences.  That domain remains active within the account and has not been canceled as the other attachment which our customer had provided seems to suggest.  To clarify, the Item Cancellation Confirmation details for the .NET Domain Name Registration which had been attached with our customer's additional comments did not originate from GoDaddy.RESOLUTION:Contrary to the attached information which had been provided to us, our customer's .NET Domain Name Registration which automatically renewed on November 28, 2013 in accordance with their account preferences, remains active in their GoDaddy account.  Our customer has since disabled the automatic renewal preference for the domain name, instructing our systems not to attempt to renew upon expiration. However, the domain remains active within the account.The document which our customer had provided with regards to the .NET domain name cancellation cannot be verified as sent to them by GoDaddy. If our customer does have an email from GoDaddy which references the cancellation of their .NET Domain Name Registration, they may send the message and header information to us as an attachment in .EML format for further review.  We stand by our previous offer to refund the domain name renewal which occurred on November 28, 2013, provided the domain name is canceled within 45-days of that date and encourage our customer to contact us directly at their earliest convenience to resolve.  Thank again you for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the concerns presented by our customer.  [redacted]Office of the CEO - GoDaddy

Dear Dispute Resolution Consultant,Thank you for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the concerns presented by our customer. We have reviewed this matter and would like to present the following.Our customer acknowledged and agreed to the following agreements upon...

conducting business with GoDaddy:• GoDaddy Universal Terms of Service• GoDaddy Hosting AgreementThe latest version of these agreements can be found at: [redacted]While GoDaddy has customized the graphical interface (GUI) of the cPanel control panel, the API-based access and functionality remains the same as the standard cPanel.  When the hosting administrator (e.g. our hosting customers) sets up FTP accounts, they designate the home directory (or folder) to which the FTP user has access.  Likewise, when the administrator deletes an FTP user, they are also presented with an option to delete the home directory associated with that FTP user.  In the case of our customer, they associated the public_html directly to the FTP user.  The public_html directory stores the publicly accessible website files that make the website work.  When our customer deleted the FTP user, they also opted to delete the user’s home directory.  This action deleted the public_html directory, effectively taking their site offline.It is evident by their claim that our customer had no intention of taking their website offline; however, our system worked as intended and the cause of the file deletion was due to our customer’s actions, not a GoDaddy or cPanel system error.Regarding the $150 hosting-restore fee that our customer referenced, GoDaddy takes weekly full backups and nightly incremental backups of our server environments.  To restore the customer’s individual website, a GoDaddy server administrator would need to provision a new and different server, restore the weekly full backup and then the nightly backups incrementally to the time of requested restoration.  Once the server has been restored to the correct point in time, our server administrator would then FTP’s into the server and make copies of the customer’s website files.  They would then upload these copies to our customer’s current hosting account.  This process is costly in both time and manual effort.  To cover these costs, GoDaddy charges a nominal fee of $150.  If this restoration process must occur due to an error on GoDaddy’s side, we do not charge our customers.In our customer’s case, we are happy to learn that, in accordance with our Hosting Agreement, they were maintaining their own independent backups of their website files and were able to re-upload their website, bringing it live once again.Resolution:GoDaddy has upheld its agreements in good faith with the customer and honored its terms of service.  Our hosting systems worked correctly and as intended.Education:The following third-party and GoDaddy articles may be useful to our customer.• What is cPanel?  [redacted]• Removing Additional FTP Users from Your Shared Hosting Account [redacted]• Deleting the public_html directory when deleting an FTP user account:  [redacted]We hope this information will be useful to our customer to prevent any future issues.  If they have any questions, our friendly and knowledgeable customer care team is standing by to help and can be reached at ###-###-#### or by visiting [redacted] for live chat, help articles, and more.Thank you again for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the concerns presented by our customer.  Best regards,[redacted]Office of the CEO – GoDaddy

Thank you for the opportunity to address the concerns presented by the complainant. We would like to present the following:The complainant acknowledged and agreed to GoDaddy's agreements upon conducting business with GoDaddy. The latest version of these agreements can be found at:...

https://www.godaddy.com/legal-agreements.aspxOn November 12, 2012 the complainant registered a domain name via online transaction. During the purchase, they opted to add GoDaddy’s Protected Registration service, the highest level of protection for a domain name that GoDaddy offers. This premium, add-on service provides private registration and also protects against the cancellation, expiration, or transfer of a domain name. Domain names, which have this service, cannot be cancelled or transferred until the Protected Registration is canceled. This is done by way of submitting a valid government issued ID, Business ID if applicable, and a signed form to our Domain Services Department.The complainant has now requested to cancel their domain name without providing government issued identification.Resolution:GoDaddy upheld its agreements with the complainant in good faith and honored its terms of service. The Protected Registration service functioned as advertised, keeping the domain from being canceled without proof of identification.The complainant has submitted a notarized affidavit in lieu of a government-issued photo ID and GoDaddy has cancelled the Protected Registration service.  The complainant remains responsible for canceling the domain name and may contact our Customer Care Center for assistance if necessary.The complainant may find the following article helpful:Cancel My Domain-   https://www.godaddy.com/help/cancel-my-domain-412Thank you again for the opportunity to address the concerns presented by the complainant.Kind regards,John M[redacted]GoDaddy – Office of the CEO

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and find that this resolution would be satisfactory to me.  I will wait until for the business to perform this action and, if it does, will consider this complaint resolved.

Regards,

Dear Dispute Resolution Consultant,Thank you for bringing the complainant’s additional comments to our attention.  As previously stated, the domain renewal purchase and our terms were agreed to by the complainant.  Registration time added to a domain after renewal is unable to be removed. GoDaddy cannot incur these cost for the complainant. Per our terms all of our products are prepaid and we do not offer payment schedules in these matters. RESOLUTION: We sincerely appreciate the complainant’s business and have upheld our agreements with the complainant. Previously we refunded the complainant $89.99 for their Domain Discount Club purchase as a gesture of goodwill.Kindest Regards,[redacted]Office of the CEO – GoDaddy

Godaddy accessed a new debit card that was not on file with my Godaddy account. Godaddy charged me $19.99 for a domain renewal claiming the account had an automatic renewal. I only became aware of this charge as I reviewed my bank statement and saw a pending transaction from Godaddy for $19.99. I contacted them immediately. I was told that they sent an email to an email address that was no longer in use. That was a lie, because I received an email from Godaddy a few months before, letting me know that my domain was about to expire.I do not understand how they obtained a new debit card that I had recently received.

Secondly I had no domain with an automatic renewal! I would never set up any account with an auto renewal. They had no proof that I had agreed to anything regarding an auto renewal. They need to be investigated for fraud.

Thank you for the opportunity to address the concerns presented by our customer. Our customer acknowledged and agreed to GoDaddy's agreements upon conducting business with GoDaddy. The latest version of these agreements can be found at:...

[redacted]On February 10, 2016 our customer purchased their domain name for a one year term through the GoDaddy website. The Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) requires accredited registrars like GoDaddy to publish the registrant's contact information, domain creation and expiration dates and other information in the WHOIS listing as soon as a domain is registered.The Whois database is an Internet service that finds information about a domain name or IP address. False information is a violation and may lead to the termination of a domain registration. GoDaddy takes our customer's privacy very seriously. Other than as described in the GoDaddy Privacy Policy, found at [redacted], GoDaddy does not provide information to others without express permission. Our customer’s contact information may have been gathered from the Whois information on their domain name(s).RESOLUTION:GoDaddy upheld its agreements with our customer in good faith and honored its terms of service.GoDaddy offers private registration services as an add-on service for select domain names via an affiliate company, Domains by Proxy. This service masks the registration information required by ICANN and replaces it with Domains by Proxy’s information. If our customer wishes to add privacy to their domain name they can contact GoDaddy’s Customer Care Center at [redacted] Thank you again for the opportunity to address the concerns presented by our customer.Kindest regards, 

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this proposed action would not resolve my complaint.  For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.

I am not happy with this resolution, the "office of the CEO" offered no result of being baited and switched.  The problem still comes down to several employees misleading me in my purchase, and when prompted by an associate as to where the details were on the "free email" accounts, they nor their supervisor could locate the spot.  So at this point I am not going to be spending more money with a company that even in their recording says "Let us help you with your business needs" well again I was mislead by being told they were the same.  I also find it misleading that no where on the site it says that there is any difference between the offered accounts with the website builders to the separate email accounts other than the 365 offered by [redacted].  So once this contract is dome I will be moving the site elsewhere. It is apparent that godaddy does not value their customers. 

Regards,

Dear Dispute Resolution Consultant,Thank you for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the additional concerns presented by the complainant. The Virtual Private Server (VPS) service that the complainant originally purchased did not include data backups as part of the service rendered.  Data backups were an additional option available to them to purchase at an additional cost, which the complainant did not opt to do.  Additionally, as part of the terms of service that the complainant acknowledged and agreed to upon doing business with GoDaddy, they agreed to maintain independent backups of their VPS data.As previously stated, GoDaddy attempted to proactively notify the complainant of their failed billing for the service.  Account management and renewal of products is solely a customer responsibility and the complainant agreed to this when they purchased services through GoDaddy. While we make a best effort to partner in our customers’ successes, our customers must also be responsible for their actions or lack thereof.The complainant has since purchased a new 2 GB Linux Managed VPS, opting to purchase the tier of services that include data backups.  Regarding the complainant’s pricing concerns, as with many other businesses GoDaddy reserves the right to potentially increase product pricing as business needs arise.  GoDaddy retail and renewal pricing is competitive across the industry, and we also work to provide a much richer value proposition than our competitors through our service.As the complainant has purchased a new VPS plan, they can restore any files they have from independent data backups.  If they did not maintain these backups as they agreed to do, they may want to review sites such as https://archive.org/ to determine if they may be able to recover any of their content.Thank you again for the opportunity to address and bring clarity to the concerns presented by the complainant.Kindest regards,[redacted]Office of the CEO - GoDaddy[redacted]@GoDaddy.com[redacted]Scottsdale, AZ 85260