Westhost Reviews 899

I was a customer since February, 2000 -- over 24 years! -- and on the few occasions I did have problems, I was always able to resolve them reasonably with Westhost staff. I am sorry to say that is a time gone by. This is no longer the same company -- not by a long shot. Both technical and customer support is virtually nonexistent at this point, and they have absolutely no interest in addressing customer concerns or treating them fairly.

My recent experience: Westhost recently changed their hosted site management platform. They sent out ONE notice of this change. Without any subsequent notice, they then performed the change several weeks LATER than they had originally announced. They provided ZERO notice of the imminent change, which completely broke my domain email for nearly a week. Technical support was abysmally slow in responding to this incident. And when the new platform turned out to be a significant DOWNGRADE in functionality, they simply refused to respond to my tickets pointing out the shortcomings of the new platform. I was left with no choice but to find a new provider. I had paid for a certain level of service and functionality. Shockingly, when they fundamentally changed the underlying product and its capabilities in the middle of my service period, Westhost refused to refund a pro-rated amount of what I'd paid for a full year of service.

While Westhost was once a decent company that stood by its service and product, today I highly recommend you seek service elsewhere. Avoid Westhost. I don't expect that they'll be in business much longer.

UPDATE 5/30/2024: After I recovered a portion of the amount due to me by disputing credit card charges, Westhost has finally agreed to refund the remaining amount due to me.

I wasn't surprised when I came to these reviews and found that there where others having problems with their email service from this company after the email server upgrade. I too had created tickets on the problem and it takes weeks for any reply and when they do it is just stupidity. You get asked for the same information over and over BECAUSE they don't know how to read the previous ticket that was created and the newest ticket I create reads I"M STILL having the same problem, that is a big clue that they should read what the previous ticket says BEFORE they respond to your new ticket, well that don't happen. My wife cannot respond to my emails now after the upgrade, their fix is to whitelist here, that is not a fix it is a band-aid that did not work with the previous tech and the most recent tech wanted to do the same thing, if he had read the previous ticket he would have known that, this is ridiculous. I have also been at this ISP for 18 plus years and before the new UK owners took over we had real techs that knew how to do their jobs and would not close a ticket until the problem was fixed! And if you ask them they would admit that there was a problem and not feed you a line of crap, and they answered the phone usually on the first try. This company is now worthless to me and I for one will be looking for a new provider.
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Great news for me, my email is now working however it took moving my domain to a different provider And the purchase of a new email provider. Service is good again and I can actually talk to a real person. So happy:) GOOD-BYE WESTHOST!

I've been a customer of WestHost of more than 20 years now and they have been pretty good to acceptable over the years while dealing with support related issues. NOTE these guys are not based in the USA and are out of the UK and likely other countries. Support has been SH!T the past few months and especially since mid-April when they sh!t the bed with their forced email migration. Now you have to wait hours for a live chat support, to just restart the discussion about your issue over and over each time without resolution. Like they are going in circles intentionally. FORGET about submitting a ticket, I am STILL WAITING since April 24th to get a reply. I looks like they changed or upgraded their support ticketing system as well as all tickets have date of May 7 2024. RIGHT NOW I am unable to send emails to some very important US Government and Military customers and my business is suffering from this. WE should get all the customers fed up with this lack of support together and file a lawsuit against Westhost and their mother company THG. First Lawsuit will go to Alistair Crane and Richard Ward

I have been a Westhost customer for over twenty years. Suddenly customer support is nonexistent. I attempted to get a new shared user account a month ago. I have had zero response. I believe WH had been bought by a larger company that does NOT believe in customer support, it is apparent that they could care less. Up until a few months ago support was excellent. Not so now

2 weeks now and STILL no resolution from Westhost! Stay away from this company,. They dont care about customer Service. I get auto generated responses here to negative reviews, offering to help if I email to their escalation department, but nobody responds. What a joke. They have taken down their live chat and dont respond to service tickets or multiple emails BEGGING for assistance. Time to Leave westhost and move to a more professional company.

Been a customer for more than 20 years.

The company used to be good, but nowadays, BAD Management.

The support customer service can't even reply chat anymore (been more than 8 hours on chat line, but still nobody replies), phone number is not working as well. Costing us loss of business.

I will stay away and find a different company now.

It is terrible, it was so good and now is so bad, just a disaster, no customer or technical support, you have to wait days to get any help, so disappointed and i was a customer for more than 20 years …

Been uninterrupted Westhost customer since 1998, at a time they even used to send physical christmas cards (yes, via postal mail) to me as customer! I've had a variety of plans and accounts, all of them in shared hosting. Until this year I considered Westhost a hidden gem trough web hosting companies. I remember being trough 2 massive migrations, each had its issues, fixed in few days and most importantly: very well communicated about what was going on and what to expect (I'm writing this on april 22, last official update on the support portal is dated april 12). This year WH migrated from CHI control panel to StackCP. StackCP seems more intuitive, I even like it, but WH is having a horrible time fixing what seems to be a bad planned, massive migration. I have several domains, all of them were reset to the new defaults in the new panel, losing their custom DNS configuration (ie. the MX records since I have them pointed to gsuite and 365 services). I got them manually fixed in few hours after understanding the new panel and changing name servers to the new ones on the registrars. The main domain uses WH for mail, mailboxes where not migrated. I was allowed a lot of mailboxes and now just 10 (I think previously I was capped to 1,000 but used only about 25 or so). Took about 3 days until they removed the 10 mailboxes cap. I had unlimited domains (or 100 can't remember) now I cant add any new domain, because it seems I exceeded the max domains I can have. I erased one to add a new one and didnt worked. Most of my domains have nothing, just parked there, but some do have things important to me. I have a ticket on very high severity, been there for 11 days!!! and no answer yet. They used to have an efficient chat support (lengthy at times, but worked) with agents empowered to fix issues, now they closed the chat support and redirect everything to tickets. Very frustrating experience. I wouldn't create any new account until it gets stabilized (hard to find out that moment tough), and now that I had to open a new plan elsewhere they made me open the exit door, that I had resisted so long to open...

Update: Besides updating my ticket everyday I can, I emailed the address on the reply I got to this review; I got a reply on my ticket @ april 24th claiming it was fixed, well, it was not. Today is april 29th and I have the same status I had when I opened my ticket on april 10th...

I recently purchased hosting services from WestHost to ensure my website stays live. However, my website has been down, causing significant disruption to my business. Despite trying to contact them via phone, I found no customer support available. Their chat support was unresponsive, and the email support was inadequate. As a result, my business suffered due to their lack of reliable service. Beware if you're considering dealing with these guys – they cannot be trusted to keep your website online.

Westhost sends an email saying, "congratulations, your website migration is complete and was successful." Not until several screenloads below does the email say that you must take action within just 7 days or they will take down your website and delete your emails. No forewarning. No urgent reminders. No subject line warning. Furthermore, it says that you must update your DNS records but not exactly what changes to make. The email migration itself causes problems, with email readers on windows, Android, and Apple not correctly reflecting folders and their contents. In short, a nightmare. Yet you cannot get though to costumer support by chat, phone, or email, which is undoubtedly flooded from the mess they have created for their customers. At the same time, hosting prices are rising. In short, time for a new host. Suggestions?

Westhost's move to Stackmail has been a complete disaster for us... Outlook can't connect (most other clients can) forwarding not working, some accounts can't receive. Support chat has been offline for days, and Support tickets are no longer getting a response.
EDIT: 1:00 PM CST - no response from client-escalations uk2group.support
EDIT: 4/18 uk2group has entered a ticket, after I sent an additional email to their Sales dept, but no actual advice.
EDIT: 4/19 Westhost has replied with yet another request for screenshots, and the recommendation to use SSL/TLS. I've sent another series of screenshots, and requested that they actually look at the Outlook/Server potential Autodiscover issue, and for that matter, the server log.
EDIT: 4/22 And still no help - not even any recent effort or contact. Now, one of our site's certificates is coming up 'not valid' and the site is insecure!
EDIT: 4/23 This problem has been 'solved,' at least to the extent that I've figured out that some passwords are just not actually accepted by the server from Outlook (even though they worked with other clients!). First, per Support's instructions, one has to delete the Outlook Account, change the password on the server, then reestablish the account in Outlook! (and use a .us. in the Stackmail server name). Second I found that a 'short' 4-letters-3-numbers-special character pw will NOT work, has to be on digit longer.

We have been out of businsss for four days due to this migration. All support from Westhost is nil. We submitted tickets and they get closed. What's going on? If you are going out of business, please let us know so we can move on instead of losing the business we have due to Westhost not doing their job or informing us of how to fix this. Why do I keep getting kicked out of support chat when I become number one? Just answers, please.

From Westhost:

(Begin Westhost email)

We are writing to inform you of an important change regarding our Email Hosting services. As part of our commitment to providing you with the best possible service, we are in the process of migrating our Email Hosting services to a new and improved platform.

Please note that the migration process is essential to ensure uninterrupted access to your email services.

To ensure a smooth transition, we kindly request your cooperation in completing the migration process.

(End Westhost email)

Over the course of several days, I (along with Westhost support) have tried several migration attempts, and to this writing, all attempts have failed. And now I have no access to my email account. (To his credit, Senior Support Engineer Connor is great in persevering on my behalf, but it's to no avail.)

So contrary to the aforementioned email, the transition was not "smooth" (as it's not yet complete) and my service has been interrupted.

To top things off, Westhost has no active social media presence to update customers to the status of any problems on their end. (Their last post on X, fka Twitter, was 24 July, 2020.) I mean, what good is social media if you're not going to even use it?

This is out of character for what is otherwise a very good hosting service. So with that I can only hope this email migration issue is a one-off, otherwise, I will have to consider, ahem, "migrating" to another hosting service.

**UPDATE 15/04/2024**

After a bit of collaboration, the email migration has been a success. But, as a result of the migration, the third-party email is not working (sigh) so, after writing a ticket, I am now waiting for this new issue to be resolved.

In fairness, Westhost is incredibly busy with this migration issue and if you write a ticket, they *will* eventually get back to you. My *only* frustration, however, is that they promise a smooth, uninterrupted transition, when that was not the case.

My tips to you, Westhost: Please consider either reactivating your social or make customers aware of your status page (status(dot)westhost(dot)com) on your home page. And never overpromise ("...uninterrupted access..."; "...smooth transition..."). It's always better to underpromise and overdeliver.

Thank you and kind regards.

Update #2 - 4-15-24 - 6 days after filing a high priority ticket... no response from support, nor any response from the escalation email address put in all the replies here. In the end I ended up resolving the situation myself and was something that any tech person should have resolved in 15 seconds given the information provided and suggesting what could be the problem. WestHost did a big migration a while back that is ongoing. They did send out an update email on changes. It was a good start but the fatal mistake was that it did NOT mention they were changing the Home Paths for where your directory structure lives for the hosting. This is absolutely CRITICAL when being used for authentication paths put into working files. Discovered the change on my own via the Account Information and fixed the single file and was good to go. Adding further insult was the migration email with the good information espoused they would love to hear feed back.. but the reply to the email was a donotreply email address and no alternative given. Be careful if you are signing on to this service, it isn't what it used to be and tech support is not adequate.

Update - Used the escalation email address they gave below and still no response to my ticket and problems. Chat seems to be permanently closed the last few days. So no chat, no phone support and nobody responding to tickets... hmm... Here's the chat message that will disconnect you immediately... "We apologise for the inconvenience, but our chat support is currently offline. Please raise a ticket detailing your issue and we'll get back to you as soon as possible. Alternatively, you can explore our knowledge base or FAQs for potential solutions. Thank you for your patience."

WestHost has gone downhill... The latest migration to new systems caused some issues and I can't get support to respond beyond level 1 to a high priority ticket as I can't use my existing web tools to manage the site. They only offer chat and ticket filing support. The chat support is not available for half a day, listed as "Too busy". Then when you can get in on it to is 25-30+ people deep and that is over a 2 hour wait minimum, and then the 1st level has to make excuses and apologize about the delays and only the senior technicians can review. Multiple days waiting is unacceptable. Going to have to figure out what it is going to take to migrate out of this service after 13+ or more years with them.

8-18-24 - Westhost put in a reply but did not put in any text so not sure what that was about but I got notified of a response.

After 20+ years with Westhost, I am currently locked out of all access to my domain and email, due to Westhost doing a migration of my email that forced a password reset. I'm supposed to log in to my control panel to change the email password, BUT that requires me to enter a 2FA code that is delivered by, you guessed it my email! My inaccessible email! Westhost has no available phone or website support for anyone who can't log in to their account!

Edit* April 14th, 4 days later and I am still locked out of my email and Westhost control panel. Westhost support contacted me once asking for photo ID, which I sent, but no reply or action from them since then.

Edit* April 16th - I was able to regain access to my email and domain accout today, after being locked out for a week due to incompetence by Westhost's email migration team. I'm raising my 1-star review to a 2-star, but that's it.

Long time (soon to be former) customer with multiple accounts. In the last month I've endured mass file deletions without notification or reason, corrupted and incomplete DNS settings due to migration to StackCP resulting in lengthy email and web outages, a lack of any or rude responses from support. If you have the life to waste trying to reach out to support they'll tell you it will be resolved shortly then disconnect you. If I could give zero stars I would.

Update: Sadly, despite waiting more than a week without response on support tickets, it only took you few hours to respond to this review. I wish your support department was as responsive as damage control. PS: Still waiting on those transfer out auth codes...

Additional Update: Upon review, it seems I gave damage control too much credit given all the responses here are likely automated (or Jane's good at copy/paste). In fact looking at the review's I'd say my service took a sharp decline about the same time as their responses to reviews 12/2023ish.

I received *contradictory* advice from tech support about how to transition my email from their existing chimail platform to their new stackcp platform. When I tried calling them on the phone number they show on their web site, the phone # doesn't work! This place is a joke...tech support can't give a straight answer and they can't keep their phones working.

Had billing issues, called Westhost 1-801-666-3158 and was on hold for 1 hour 40 minutes. When I explained this to Westhost via email about the hold, Westhost replied;

"our billing phone wait time is 5-10 minutes currently, no such call has come in waiting an 1h40min. I believe you may be calling the wrong number "

The number I called was clearly WestHost.
After 100 minutes of listening to their phone messages I was sure I was hearing Westhost. The number called was what Westhost suggested
1-801-666-3158
March 28, 2024 all calls got the busy signal with over an hour of attempted calling.
Westhost does not have phone support, is disrespectful of customers and customers time. I would not suggest using Westhost for anything.
Planning on a BBB complaint and a Utah Consumer complaint.

We moved our domain name and are waiting on a refund for 8 years of domain name hosting. If we get our money back from that I will add to this review.

I have been with Westhost for 2 years, and in the beginning everything seemed fine. I had signed up because of the good reviews and the fact that they are Utah based.
Come to find out my server had been moved to England, it has been downgraded from PHP version 8.1 to version 7.4, i lost part of a database in the process, and worst of all - It is the slowest server in my 30 years for web presence. Still waiting for support to get back to me, i will update this review as time goes on...UPDATE: There seems to be NO support! None of my tickets nor the email sent in their reply had been answered

I've been with Westhost for more than 15 years. Originally their customer service was responsive but now it's almost impossible to get through to someone empowered to help you. They recently migrated our server and neglected to tell us that all of our devices would have to be updated with new settings. I spent a full day chasing down instructions and then found out they have limited our email storage. They used to give unlimited email storage and now we can only get 10GB unless you pay for more. Still waiting for someone from their support department to help so I can send and received emails.