UK Reseller Hosting Comparison
At the moment I have active reseller accounts with 4 of the UK’s biggest web hosts. To be honest, I’m not really totally happy with any of them and I’m still on the lookout for better options, but finding genuine reviews on the net seems to be a nightmare, so I thought I’d write up a little comparison for you.
I guess I’m still looking for the ‘perfect’ reseller account, so if you have ideas please feel free to let me know. (I need somewhere to keep 200+ domains and 120+ active sites).
The following is based purely on my experiences with these companies and is just my personal opinion.
Daily (daily.co.uk):
I’ve only been with these guys a short while, but all seems ok. I’ll update this when I come across any problems :)
Pros: Full DNS control, keen prices, non-premium rate telephone support, SMTP servers for all, good branding/white label options.
Cons: No Windows servers available, No Exchange email, white lable server addresses etc have to be changed manually (not the default).
Marks out of ten: 8 (so far)
Fasthosts (fasthosts.co.uk):
These were the 1st guys I signed up with and all was good, then they were taken over by 1and1 and things started to go downhill.
Pros: Windows and Linux choices available, good sized Exchange mailboxes, clean and simple reseller interface, MS Office resale options, allow lump sum pre-payments for easy accounting, non-premium rate tel support.
Cons: Very poor DNS options, tel support can leave you hanging for ages and 1st line don’t really know how to tie their own shoes, tons of extra charges for all options - even SMTP server access!!, some downtime, email servers suffer frequent problems with being blacklisted, you always feel like a number when you call support as they have millions of customers.
Marks out of ten: 5
Heart Internet (heartinternet.co.uk):
This is where I headed when Fasthosts started giving me aggro, but I never moved that many clients over as their servers just aren’t up to it.
Pros: Full DNS control, SMTP servers for all, good branding/white label options.
Cons: No tel support, s l o w servers, clumsy user interface, don’t email invoices or remind you when payments are coming out.
Marks out of ten: 4 (server speed is a big problem for me)
ICUK (icukhosting.co.uk):
This is where I ended up after realising that Heart Internet weren’t up to it. (in fact they are hosting this very site right). It all seemed so good and they tick almost all of the boxes, but over the last few months all of their servers have have suffered repeated outages (which they keep blaming it on EDF, but you just never know do you?) and obviously my clients go crazy when their sites are offline and within 5 seconds of things going down I’ve got hundreds of calls coming in telling me the world has ended, and I end up losing customers which is rubbish. There has been at least 24 hours of downtime in the last 4 months and that just isn’t good enough for me.
Pros: Windows and Linux choices available, great reseller interface, full DNS control, great spam options inc scanning for external servers, non-premium rate tel support, outgoing SMTP for all, custom error pages.
Cons: Lots of downtime lately, no Exchange email, no password protection on Windows accounts, no branding for webmail/control panels.
Marks out of ten: would have been 9, but with the recent downtime it can only be a 5 :(
If you think I’m wrong, or if you think you are with the perfect provider, please let me know.
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