My take on CloudAtCost surprise maintenance fee

Note: this post goes beyond the interest of the main audience of this blog. But it is the only way I have to share my thoughts. If you have no business with CloudAtCost you can skip this post. But please don't do business with them.

Few years ago I bought a virtual server from a company called CloudAtCost. It was sold with a one-time risible fee that left me wonder what kind of business model was behind it. Now, on June 15th 2017, chickens are coming home to roost. I received an email from them titled "24 Hour Server Suspension Warning" stating that there is an unpaid invoice. So I logged into their user panel to discover that they changed their Terms of Service, and now they include a recurring annual maintenance fee (9 USD). The invoice was issued one month ago, and no email warning had been sent. Also, as I recall, no email warning was issued when ToS were modified.

Over these years their service has been quite lousy, and got worse month after month: I could live without my overseas basic server.

But but but.

I have an invoice of 9 USD expiring in a couple of days. I looked everywhere on their user portal for an "account termination" button, but I couldn't find any. I took the time to read their current ToS and found these worringly interesting points:

9.9 All bills and receipts will be sent to Customer electronically at the current email address provided by Customer in the Customer Account. Customer is responsible to keep such email address up to date with CloudatCost. [NOTE: I got no bill for the maintenance fee, but first pay then complain - in 30 days - ]

9.11 Interest will accrue on any amount not paid for thirty (30) days following the billing date, as and from the billing date at a rate of 2% per month (26.82% per annum) or the maximum legal rate, if less.

9.18 Customers with a onetime payment service is subject to an annual maintenance fee of $9 which will be invoiced 12 months after using our service. This does not apply to users that have a monthly paid service. This Maintenance fee will ensure proper hardware upgrades and maintenance to reduce degradation of onetime payment services. [this generated the current mess]


And, last but not least:

20.1 The terms of this Agreement, including fees, charges, features, content or any other aspects of a Service, may change at any time and without prior notice. The Customer is responsible for frequently reviewing this Agreement posted on CloudatCost' web site to obtain timely notice of any such changes.

Paragraph 20.1 struck me: they don't care to notify their Customers of ToS changes! And they can change the fee of §9.18 anytime, without giving any notice. I am speechless.

Given their Customer-unfriendly manners, I have a strong feeling that all those unpaid maintenance fee invoices generated by "forgotten" accounts will end up at a debt collection firm(s), together with the 26.82% interest rate: what a great way to financially support their "business". A note to European users: their debt would be transferred to a EU-based firm and then subject to EU laws. Improbable? Maybe. But in 5 years such a debt could turn into a request of 100€/$.

My strategy is to pay the invoice and begin the account termination procedure in due time. UNLESS, they REALLY improve their service.