A client of mine is keeping his emails on the server where i do provide hosting for him through my reseller account.
he is hitting limit 500Meg space now 2Gig,…keeps on going.
i told him he needs to clean his emails because of the space.he found out that i host with hostgator and hostgator offers unlimited space/bandwidth.
what do i tell my client and how i justify my monthly fee which i charge for him?
No plan is truly “unlimited”. Most folks don’t use a whole lot of storage space, so if they are allotted 1GB of storage, it’s entirely possible they will never reach that limit, and thus from their perspective, their plan is “unlimited” because they never actually encounter the limit.
From hostgator’s note on “unlimited” storage/resources:
we do require all customers to be fully compliant with our Terms of Service and utilize disk space and bandwidth in the normal operation of a personal or small business website. While it is rare, we may need to put constraints on accounts that are using resources that impact other customers on the same server.
Basically, if hostgator determines that you are using too much storage space, they will put a stop to it–they just don’t explicitly say what that limit is.
That said, what services do you offer your client that hostgator does not offer?
Personalized support? Website development? Site updates? Site/email/domain configuration?
One limit that I think Hostgator specifically uses is an inode limits. If you’re not aware, inodes are basically files. Each file/email/page in your account is worth 1 inode. With emails, you can have thousands of small files, and you could easily hit the inode limit.
As to what to tell your customer. One option, get them to use pop3, so that their email actually downloads from their account. That way, they lessen the need to store it on the hosting account.
http://support.hostgator.com/articles/pre-sales-policies/rules-terms-of-service/inode-limits
http://support.hostgator.com/articles/pre-sales-policies/rules-terms-of-service/inode-usage
Especially for older files that may not need to be accessible from anywhere. As a rule of thumb, I usually only keep a month of emails on the server so I can access them on the go from my phone or tablet as I’m out and about. Anything beyond a month, if I need it, I’ll wait till I’m in the office to get to it.
I’d let him know that the way he is utilizing his email does not reflect typical usage and your services are not intended for things outside normal operations. He has options he could employ to stay within the guidelines you’ve set.
Since he knows that you are reselling Hostgator services, explain to him how Hostgator defines “unlimited” and let him know that if he keeps needing more space your costs are going to go up, and if that happens you’d have to pass through the extra expense. Then mention that you value his business, and offer to help him work within the current parameters. One suggestion would be to configure a Gmail account for him, and have all his emails BCC’d through there.
Not true! POP3 must be told to delete from the host after downloading.
hayem,
I have a few clients who use my server’s e-mail services and need to have them clean their e-mail account folders (not just the Inbox) regularly. When they hit the established limit, the server ceases to accept more e-mail - for good reason! A web server is no place to store personal records of a single client and 2Gb is well beyond the absurd (why did you let it get to this point?).
As the former Hosting Team Leader, I know that there have been many discussions of “unlimited” and they all showed that few “newbies” understand the fine print (as ably explained above) that there is no such thing as unlimited (hardware-wise). Any client who demands such is (use your own PC term for “@#$% clueless”). These are the 10% who take 90% of your time and are best asked to go find their own “unlimited” services without your assistance. It’s a business decision you’ll look back on as the best thing you ever did!
Regards,
DK
As standard I offer a 2GB email space on all new clients on their emails.
If he really wants to store all his emails they he must use POP3 and download them on his email client, from here he can backup via Dropbox is something similar. You might need to configure your email to delete downloaded emails, however, by default once you’ve hit your limit it will automatically delete emails, so their online storage would be cleared up, however, all downloaded emails will be present on their email client (presuming it’s configured with POP3).
I had a similar issue with a client. I resolved it by setting up their emails to Thunderbird and downloading a backup plug-in on their Thunderbird. I just let them know they would need to backup their files prior to formatting their system if they must, and they can easily put them back, keeping every email they ever downloaded.
I further explain that webmail will only show up emails on their server, and all downloaded emails will be shown on their Thunderbird. This is the only way to have ‘unlimited space’ as they would call it, which would be restricted to their computer’s hard drive space.
If they wish to access their thunderbird from anywhere, you can configure it to run off Dropbox or similar service, but I’ve never done this as my clients have yet to demand something like this. For now they use a mixture of Dropbox and Thunderbird, either with POP3 to store all emails or SMTP if they wish to have messages synchronized on all devices.
In terms of your monthly fee, you cover many things, hosting, support, updates maintenance and domain charges.
Our hosting is mostly profit, but without it we can’t justify the time we spend supporting, Just to highlight, I spend roughly 2 hours per day answering emails. If I did not do this I would have unhappy customers. I use a reseller account so I sell the hosting for x amounts and then take this as profit to support my clients.
Those clients don’t mind. If they decided to go it alone they would still pay the same amount for a likely to be worse product. The time they will spend supporting themselves to the money they would save (no money) would not be worth the hassle. Let’s not forget they would not get any updates on their plug-ins or technical assistance. The only support they would have would be from a hosting perspective, and in the end clients always demand support on their websites.
Don’t let the client bully you either. 2GB web space is not that much, however, I would not recommend giving him any more. He should use a backup plug-in to store his emails on his local machine.
I really hopes this helps answer your question.