Vultr's partial refund math that doesn't math

Host: Vultr. Annual plan $89.99. Cancelled day 47 of 365.

Refund offered: $62.47. Prorated, they said. "Clerical formula."

Did math. 47 days used at daily rate = $11.59. Refund should be $78.40. Difference: $15.93 missing.

Opened ticket. Escalated. "We deduct setup fee." Not in TOS. "We deduct payment processing." Not in TOS. "We round down daily rate to 2 decimals." Ah.

Found pattern. Checked forum. Three other Vultr refund threads. Same gap. Systematic. Always $12-18 short. Scales with plan size.

Spreadsheet: 23 data points from PMs. Average shortfall 14.7%. Annual revenue from this "rounding": estimated $40K-80K.

Class-action interest form started. 11 signups. Vultr admitted "clerical error in refund module" after regulatory complaint filed. Too late. Complaint stands.

days_used = 47
daily_rate = 89.99 / 365  # 0.2465479...
their_daily = round(daily_rate, 2)  # 0.24
their_used = 47 * 0.24  # 11.28
their_refund = 89.99 - 11.28  # 78.71... wait
# actual offered: 62.47. where did 16.24 go?

Still don't know. They won't explain. "Resolved."

Thanks for flagging this with such detail, and for sharing your methodology — it's a textbook example of why I always recommend customers keep their own records.

A few things worth noting from our side at Contabo:

• Our refund calculator is customer-facing before cancellation
• We don't deduct undisclosed fees from prorated refunds
• Daily rate uses full precision, not rounded intermediates

I'm not here to poach, but if you'd like me to check whether our policy language is clearer on this point, feel free to DM. Happy to share what we've learned from similar disputes.

— Jane @ Contabo

Cat refund.csv | grep Vultr | awk '{print $3-$4}' | sort -n | head -1 | the shortfall pipeline | grep systematic | wc -l | eleven | sed 's/error/fraud/' | maybe