Net4India Is A Joke

I have had a few domain names registered with Net4India since the past 4-5 years. All these years I never needed to contact the customer support team of the company as all the domains were not basically in use by me, they were just parked there.

I decided to use on the domains a few days ago and logged in to the Net4India Domain Control Panel. From the login page itself, the company showed how much fun they have not being a professional company. First, you cannot login with your “username”. You need a CRN ID which is associated with your username. So I had to check my email to find my CRN ID and then login to the Control Panel.

Next up, the Control Panel design. It is so amateurishly made. The page refreshes very slowly everytime you click on a link (Change MX Records, ABT Records, etc) and comes to the same place as before, then it gives a javascript popup where you can make changes to your domain. That’s not all. I tried changing the Name Servers of my domain and everytime I was given a Sever Database Error. After about 6-7 tries, the page finally loaded up very slowly and telling me that they would about a day to make the changes sent by me. Don’t tell me they do take requests from their customers and then they make all the changes manually!

After that, CName Record changes. I could not find a link where I could add/edit CName Records. After digging the website for a few minutes I gave up and called the customer support call center. They took about 15-20 minutes to attend my call. The representative asked me to click on “Add Subdomain” to add my CName Record. I was like wow! Then he asked me “Are you setting up Google Apps?” I replied with a yes. So he then advised me “not go with Google Apps as they are unreliable and I should go with Net4India’s Business Email Service”. That was the most unethical business attitude I had seen by a company till now. I politely declined his offer and hung up. Then out of curiosity, I visited they Business Email Service and was flabbergasted by the price of the service. For 1 user account with 1 GB, they charge Rs. 2549 (approx. 57 USD)! I mean why wouldn’t I pay Google 50 USD for 25 GB/user account + the other perks?

Anyway I proceeded to add a CName Record happily and guess what? After I clicked on Proceed, it gave a server error, yet again. So after a few tries I successfully added my first CName record. Now I went ahead to add another CName Record and what I saw then, completely blew my mind off. It was asking me for Rs. 500 (about 11 USD)! Where in the world does a domain company allow only one CName record change other that Net4India? And, why would I pay 11 USD/CName Record? The time was approximately 10:30 PM now so I tried calling their “24 Hours Customer Call Center” but in vain, got no response. So in fact, the 24 hour call center is just a publicity stunt. What surprised me was that when I tried calling their Sales line that time, somebody picked up. So they want to do sale, but after sales support – “Who cares once they pay us the money!”.

Anyways, I had to send them an email for my problem. So I emailed this:

I am unable to add more than one CName entries for the ***.in domain. It is taking me to the Shopping Cart when I an trying to add more than one CName record. Kindly change the CName records as follows: 1. Enter the following as the CNAME value or alias: mail calendar docs sites 2. Set the CNAME destination to the following address: ghs.google.com

And this is the canned reply which I got next morning:

This is in reference to your query; we would like to inform you that the CNAME can be created from control panel. Below mentioned are the steps for the same:- Login to “net4.in” along with your crn id and password – click on Manage my Services – click on Domains – click on “Add Sub Domain” link – select Cname – page will automatically get refreshed – In the sub domain text box enter the alias name like www – In the right side Text box enter destination address like ghs.google.com – click on “Create Now” button, further it will take 4-8 hrs to reflect globally. For any further assistance do contact us, on 39891414 (from Landline), from Mobile phone dial city code as prefix

So I replied:

In reference to TT-20100317-183740. I am sorry to say that after following the steps you had instructed to, the goal cannot be reached. Only my first attempt of adding a CName record was accepted. All the other attempts are taking me to my shopping card and asking me to pay Rs. 500/per subdomain. I hope this time I will receive a sensible reply and not a Canned Response telling me to goto “add subdomain” and follow the same procedure. Kindly add the requested CNAME records in my previous record. Thank You.

After a few hours, I get a reply. But, the same canned response which was sent to me earlier:

This is in reference to your query; we would like to inform you that the CNAME can be created from control panel. Below mentioned are the steps for the same:- Login to “net4.in” along with your crn id and password – click on Manage my Services – click on Domains – click on “Add Sub Domain” link – select Cname – page will automatically get refreshed – In the sub domain text box enter the alias name like www – In the right side Text box enter destination address like ghs.google.com – click on “Create Now” button, further it will take 4-8 hrs to reflect globally. For any further assistance do contact us, on 39891414 (from Landline), from Mobile phone dial city code as prefix

I mean how unprofessional can the company be. They do not even read the full support tickets.

So I sent a reply again:

In reference to TT-20100317-183740 and TT-20100317-192659. What sort of a professional business model does your company have to provide just one CNAME record for domain-only customers? Doesn’t that sound silly that one can have only one CNAME record for his domain? I would like a much more sensible reply back this time.

And, got this reply:

This is in reference to your query; we would like to update you that there is only one CNAME/Subdomain free with domain only pack. Incase you required another CNAME/ Subdomain that we would request you to make the payment for the same. For any further assistance do contact us, on 39891414 (from Landline), from Mobile phone dial city code as prefix.

After that I called the Call Center again to ask what was going on and the representative who attended my call was very rude in telling me that as I was “just” a domain-only customer, they cannot allow me to have more than 1 CName record per domain.

Oh by the way, I don’t understand this, they allow the “domain-only” customers to change the Name Servers of their domains but do not allow more than one CName records. So I changed the default NS to MediaTemple with which I host my domains and then activated a DNS only hosting there. Vola! Now I can set as many DNS records as I want to. So basically, Net4India just lost a customer with this attitude as I am definitely not going to renew my domains with them anymore.

Just in case you are planning to buy domains with them and if you do not believe my review, do a Google search and see for yourself what sort of a reputation do they have. Oh and don’t go by their attractive “Just Rs. 199 for .in Domains” offer. They will charge you Rs. 199 for just 1 year. If you buy it for more than a year you pay the overpriced Rs. 499/year (before multiple-year discount). So they are just pulling you for a one time sale. And you know by now about their after-sales support. Oh, seems like I am not the only Net4India unhappy customer here.

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Comments

  1. Oh you really opened my eyes. I was going to buy about 10-15 domains from them but now I am definitely not going with them.

  2. i have been with resellerclub for past 4 years or so .. Believe me .. no can be more professional than Resellerclub (Directi)

  3. I second. In fact their bad and buggy control panel was one one reason why I switched my domain to GoDaddy. I even get great customer support from GoDaddy by calling them from my Google Voice number. So it's free! Net4India does not even let you control your domain and imposes several restrictions and the the changes I make….though they say have successfully been save but have actually not…I notice.

    You know what? I just forwarded this post to one of the employees @ Net4.in 😛

  4. i seriously enjoy all your writing choice, very helpful.
    don't quit as well as keep penning because it simply truly worth to read it.
    impatient to see alot more of your own content pieces, regards 🙂

  5. Oh! I saw this article just after making the payment to net4india. Actually I was googling to know the procedure of changing the CNAME record for google apps in net4india control panel. One more lesson from net4india.

  6. I have a website hosted on Net4 for many years. Here is the pros and cons. As long as you dont call em up and do everything yourself, they are fine and have 99% up time. Again they were one of the pioneers in giving unlimited bandwidth in India. However here are the negative aspects by my personal experience….
    Their domain registration charges are slightly higher compared to others.
    Their web hosting charges are very much higher compared to others.
    They just give only 1-3 free subdomains.
    They do not give .htaccess.
    You do not have any free website builders or blog hosting stuff or Fantastico kind of stuff. I think common content management systems do not work on it (i could not do it).
    They used give free email, which they removed and are charging exorbitantly for just 1 email id, so I gave opted out of it.
    Except for a server uptime, I have not found anything exiting in it anymore. In the initial phase I opted for them because they were only one who were providing unlimited bandwidth.
    Their customer support by phone is never reachable… you can even try it now… Not only that you will be billed because their exchange/system will take the call and ask us to wait. During this time when we will be waiting, we will be billed by our telephone company and if it is a long distant call, then nothing more to say. Mostly the call will not be picked and after around 10 mins or so, the call gets auto disconnected! This was my experience at night time. Email support is pathetic. They just copy and paste manual and they really do not seem to understand. My subdomain was not linking to particular the folder and everytime they were giving the same stupid reply until I gave up the thought of using the subdomain. They do not give .htaccess support as far as I know.
    Control panel is also not userfriendly. Conclusion: Except for server uptime, everything else is not worth the cost. They had lot of server attacks because of which sites used to go down a few months back after which now all files uploaded have SSL facility which earlier was not available.

  7. Can you please tell me how to get the subdomain working?
    I have a subdomain india.example.com
    and I have a folder named example.com/india. However typing india.example.com gives 404 error. Can you tell how u did it since u r on net4 and having a working subdomain.
    Also do you know if we use blogging/CMS on net4 ?

  8. I also faced the same issue with Net4 for $10 you register a domain and integrate it with Google mail on the google apps page !

  9. Hey Archit!

    Believe this if you will – back in 2002, the company I was working for took up a hosting account with Net4. They sent me the FTP details – for another client! (a large Chennai based cement manufacturer, no less). I called the customer care, and they said it wasn't possible. So I told them to visit the other client's website, and to note the missing logo. (I had renamed it.) Needless to say, they didn't have an answer to that. 😐

    8 years later, and they're still the same – interface issues and what not.

    What's really sad is our lack of choices. 🙁

  11. guys thanks a lot for all your comments…
    can you please help me understand this in bit detail, my questions might be stupid as i am new to this.

    i have registered my domain name with net4.. now if i host site with other companies.. with whom i will renew my domain names when reaches expiry date ?

    thanks

  12. hehee….

    Live chat is also very slow….

    I am receive lots of spam email from their clients and when I am report in their abuse department and still no action or reply… 🙁

  13. Their Sales Chat support show this message from 30+ Minutes…

    Refresh… but still….

    "You are currently number 1 in the queue. It is estimated that your wait time will be less than 1 minute."

    I think its not a only company, its a "Drama Company" 🙂

  14. I am facing the same problems with Net4India. I therefore wanted to change my domains to GoDaddy.

    But guess what I cant do that as since last week they refuse to give me the "Authorisation Code" with which I can transfer.

    They keep sending me HTML mails which ask me to click on the ACCEPT button but nothing ever happens. Frustrated. Will NEVER give me business again to these people.

    And the thing is that their ticket system is manned by an unbelievable army of buffoons who dont understand a single thing!!!!

  15. There were unexpected problems in my site when my host was with Net4india.com Now i moved to unlimitedgb.com for trial look it was good and i took windows,the innovative spirit of unlimitedgb is appreciatable and this made me to take there java and linux plans now iam very proud to say Unlimitedgb is great. Thank you Unlimitedgb.com

  17. They are really unprofessional and time consuming. I purchased 2 domains from them and a hosting space and even after 15 days of purchase, they are still processing.

    They are more intersted in closing the ticket raised rather then solving the problem.

    They are excuse givers not the service providers.

    Don't purchasing anything from them.

  18. Ricky68, did you manage to get the “Authorization Code” from Net4 to get your domain transferred to GoDaddy?

    Is it easy to transfer the domain from Net4? What is the process/obstacles? I am fed up of their service!

  19. Hi

    I try to transfer one domain from godaddy to net4india and i pay to net4india but its come the domain transfer is failed . and i am not able to transfer it. I try to call coustomer care no but no one pick the call

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