DigitalOcean wiped my server because of $6.22

I haven't used Digital Ocean for a while, but if I remember correctly they sent me _multiple_ notices days before my service was set to expire, asking me to pay. Once you stop paying for your service, their obligation to store your data ends.

> If you’re hosting with these guys, make sure to back up your data externally constantly.

You should have done this anyway.

So there's no argument that there was an amount overdue by some time? Even if the amount was $6.22 and the time may have only been a few days?

What are "fair" assumptions to make about how long a hosting company waits before wiping a server? I'm a happy DO customer, and while I'd hope there might be some "grace period", the only _sensible_ assumption I can make is "they won't wipe my servers/storage while I'm fully paid up", the consequence of which is "I assume as soon as my account goes overdue there's a very real risk that my server/data might vanish", and I manage my payments/creditcards/off-site-backups with that in mind.

In my mind, "instant provisioning" and "pay by the hour" servers are inherently ephemeral, and should be expected to vanish as quickly after payment starts failing as they appear when you provision them.

And, with a pedagogical level of snark:

"I’ve been using different hosts since I was 16 and never had any experience like this. Now, three websites, tons of projects, and months of edits and content is gone."

I hope that's been an interesting six months for you - welcome to the real world...

DO's policy aside... to be fair, having a single server (virtual, no less) be the only copy of anything is pretty much asking for it.

I definitely think both sides of the situation have a good point. I'd just like to take the opportunity to point out that I've been less inclined to use Digital Ocean because their invoicing system is rather spammy and has a hair trigger on sending unpleasant emails. Even when I add surplus funds and pay on time, it seems, I get waaay too many invoicing emails from them.

I understand these guys are running a subscription service and that they need as high a percentage of on-time subscriptions as possible, but changing payment details are a fact of life, especially when you accept one-time paypal payments. A lot of the people who use their services are hobbyists, and while I'm not justifying my or anyone else's late payment, I think that any service provider in this game should definitely account for such factors.

I'd certainly hope that they take this into account when they offer the pricing that they've provided; I'd be willing to pay a little bit more for DigitalOcean every month to not be harangued and to feel confident that they aren't going to go under if I don't pay them.

Something as simple as slightly more friendly messaging would go a long ways towards making me feel better about using their service long term. Amazon AWS's messaging about a missed payment, for example, is very relaxed, patient, and assumes 0 blame. Missing payment isn't always something people do on purpose; sometimes it's a genuine mistake and penalizing that person unduly can put a strain on customer relations.

"I didn't pay my bill, and my vendor shut down my service"

Is this really a surprise? Do you also get frustrated when your laptop runs out of battery and won't keep working, or how your car doesn't understand that you'll get gas tomorrow if it just keeps going?

This guy is at fault of course but interestingly the DigitalOcean terms of service suggest this should not have happened. The terms repeatedly use "terminate" and "suspend" to mean delete / disable, with regards to payments:

    Arrearages

    3.3 Payments not made within ten (10) days of invoicing will be deemed 
    in arrears. For accounts in arrears. If any amount is more than ten days 
    overdue, DigitalOcean may suspend service and bring legal action to collect
    the full amount due, including any attorneys fees and costs.

    Suspension for Nonpayment
    
    3.4 DigitalOcean may suspend some or all Services to User for failure 
    to make timely payment.

That seems to suggest they would have suspended his services for non-payment, not terminated.

https://www.digitalocean.com/tos

I think the time the account was past due is important here. I know Linode gives 10 days (IIRC) but I'm not sure about DO. I did have a DO account go past due over a holiday weekend where I wasn't paying much attention to email notifications (I have a dedicated card that I only put small amounts of money on for online use) but luckily I didn't suffer this fate. I don't think it's unusual to have something as low as 3 business days until an account gets axed in hosting though.

> Warning about an outstanding balance and the destruction of your server are two very different things.

Does this mean that max did get warnings about the outstanding balance, but ignored them? And it was suspension of the account that caused max to notice, and then pay?

I'm not going to mention the lack of backup stuff because almost everyone learns the lesson by losing important data at least once.

EDIT: Don't forget to try the wayback machine.

They should have a better grace period, they are afterall a hosting company and this really affects trust with users. I would pay extra if there was a checkbox to enable a 30 day grace period (snapshot, not a live site) because sometimes stuff happens in real life where you are not able to check your email/credit card.

At the very least let users download the snapshots that they pay for.

That's the expected behavior of IaaS. Sorry you learned the hard way.

In fairness if your not paying the bill why should they continue to provide services to you (including storing your VM image).

Hopefully you have your code backed up on github and data on s3 or something similar.

So restore from backup...right? You did have backups didn't you?

Should post this on WebHostingTalk.com to get their attention.

Also, you may not be completely SOL... IIRC they take a snapshot before they destroy it. Not sure if that applies to this situation, but I could see it happening.

Fingers crossed.