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Looking for honest 'what happens after promo' pricing threads

Deals & Offers by srelet 24 replies 1.2K views
srelet

Member OP

3 #1

Transparency request: I need actual renewal data, not "contact sales" or "up to 40% increase." Blameless postmortem culture applies to purchasing too.

My error budget for hosting surprises: zero. Last quarter we ate a 340% renewal jump on a "promo" VM because finance assumed the sticker rate. I did not. I was overruled. Now I have data.

I am compiling renewal multiples. Contributions requested. Format: provider, promo $, term, renewal $, notice days given.

Current sample biased toward my own stack. Need broader coverage for statistical validity. Transparency.

pam3

Member

Latency Witch

#2

Observed renewal latency: 8.64 × 10^4 seconds between promo expiration and first charge at full rate[1]. No intermediate notification observed. RFC 5322 email delivery not guaranteed.

[1] n=3 providers. Data available upon request.

100% packet loss at hop 3
kate3

Member

#3

OpenVZ hosts are worst offenders. The virtualization tax is hidden in "vCPU" definitions that evaporate at renewal.

  • GreenCloudVPS KVM: promo $3.50, renewal $8.99, cgroup v2 limits unchanged
  • Leaseweb KVM: promo €4.00, renewal €12.00, actual vCPU reduced from dedicated to burstable
  • Time4VPS OpenVZ: promo €2.99, renewal €9.99, "vSwap" redefined to exclude disk cache

Kernel-level transparency required. Check /proc/cpuinfo and /proc/meminfo at purchase and renewal. Document everything. The virtualization tax increases at renewal.

virsh list --all | wc -l: 47
cleardmitri

Moderator

Moderator

#4

What notice period does your contract specify?

No logs, no proof. I have logs.
srelet

Member OP

#5
cleardmitri said:
What notice period does your contract specify?

California B&P Code 17538.9 requires "clear and conspicuous" disclosure of renewal terms. "Contact sales" is neither. I have filed two complaints. No remedy yet, but the paperwork generates its own pressure.

Adding to sample: DigitalOcean, promo $4/mo via GitHub Student, renewal $6/mo, 7 days email notice. Not a multiple but a data point.

larryjeong

Member

#6

RamNode promo $15/year, renewal $48/year. No notice. Just the charge. I only noticed because my prepaid balance went negative and they suspended the VM.

Texas consumer law worthless for this. Business account by default even when you sign up as individual.

$3/year. 128MB RAM. Pure happiness.
pam3

Member

Latency Witch

#7
srelet said:
7 days email notice

RFC 5322 delivery confirmed via MX route to Google Workspace. Intercepted by Promotions tab. Effective notice: zero days.

I now run a cron that screenscrapes billing portals. Sad but necessary.

100% packet loss at hop 3
kate3

Member

3 #8
larryjeong said:
RamNode

KVM or OpenVZ? Their OpenVZ 7 templates still show /proc/cpuinfo with fake model name "QEMU Virtual CPU" but the vCPU scheduler changed from fair to throttle-heavy around 2022. Renewal timing correlates with migration to new nodes.

Document /proc/sched_debug before and after. I have.

virsh list --all | wc -l: 47
DU

Member

#9

Vultr promo €2.50 via referral credit, renewal €5.00. 30 days notice by email, actually arrived in inbox. Only provider in my sample with acceptable performance.

Dublin consumer protection office says hosting falls under "digital content" rules but enforcement is complaint-driven and slow.

Ricardo77

Member

White Label

#10
DudeKlx said:
Vultr

I resell Vultr. Their API exposes `next_billing_amount` which I poll daily. My customers get 30 days warning because I give it to them. The provider gives me 30 days. Transparency is possible if you build it yourself.

I also resell a provider whose API returns `null` for renewal price until charge day. I dropped them.

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