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Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

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Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#231

Post by rglullis »

lelanthran wrote: post #210
rglullis wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Properly" means that the automakers should pay a fine per vehicle sold that was producing more emissions than allowed, and that fine should be so high as to effectively get them into bankruptcy. It should also put in jail anyone that was aware of the violation and did not report to the authorities. Everyone , from the CEO to the test engineer who knew about the cheating devices. Anything less than that and all you a…

> Anything less than that and all you are getting is an incentive for the make a risk calculation between profit and losses of being caught. But that logic applies to anything that any company does. You want to effectively kill any company for any infraction? That sounds a little too severe.

If the infraction was intentional and with the sole purpose of getting unfair competitive advantage in the market, yes, the company should be dissolved for it.

Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#232

Post by laegooose »

klohto wrote: post #142
intellectronica wrote: post #115

Generally, all cloud providers have two ways of engaging with and billing customers. One is using a credit card, which is very easy for getting started. The other one is having an established relationship with a sales / account team and setting up billing by invoice. Smaller companies sometimes don't understand that and stick with credit card billing for too long. Once you move to production and have your own custome…

What is this fud? Both AWS and Azure won't suspend your account for several months, even with charges failing. Especially not if you're communicating with them. It's incredibly easy to get a hold of human support in case of the other clouds.

yes, in my experience, AWS keeps running everything as is when there is a problem with the payment method or a disagreement about bill

Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#233

Post by Aeolun »

rb666 wrote: post #173
baobabKoodaa wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the record, I was being sarcastic and do not actually believe it was the customer's fault. I believe this is an abhorrent way of running business by Google.

And then you get hit by the car, even though the light was green. Doesn't help you, does it?

Using Google is kinda like trying to cross a 10 lane highway without getting hit.

Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#234

Post by smileybarry »

madeofpalk wrote: post #154
dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm very happy Hetzner has all these options built in from the very start. There's no need to make any "extra effort". Actually, most of my servers are on yearly billing to make things even easier for everybody.

It's not really the payment method that's key here, it's having a relationship with sales / account manager.

Right, but Hetzner also just doesn’t auto-charge you (from my experience, at least). You get invoiced and pay it manually (there’s a link in the invoice), then the invoice is settled immediately in your account panel. I’ve even been late once by forgetting about it and they didn’t cut me off in any way.

Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#235

Post by Beltalowda »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #158
baobabKoodaa wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah yes, it was the customer's fault. Stupid customer using method recommended by service provider.

Hang on - what would you do if you were running a business with hundreds of thousands of users and someone doesn't pay? Was it an accident? has the customer gone bust, or died, or are they trying to defraud you and get a month or two of free service. Credit cards are exceptionally finicky, very susceptible to fraud, and payment can often fail. They're great for one off purchases and services that don't matter if they…

I actually had some payment troubles with Linode a few months back; I had cancelled one of my bank accounts and forgot the CC there was tied to Linode, and because credit cards are not very common where I live and it can take a bit to request one so I couldn't "just" pay. Oops!

100% a mistake on my part of course; I emailed Linode, explained the above, and they said "sure, is 3 weeks time enough to sort it out? I've delayed any action on your account until such-and-such date but let us know if you need more time".

I've been a Linode customer for several years, paying about $100/month. Just a guy running some small things, hardly a big customer.

If Linode can do it, then surely Google can. Yes, you will probably have the occasional non-payment, but is kicking your people off your platform for a simple administrative mistake/mixup that much better? Accepting the occasional non-payment is better than kicking off people at the drop of a hat. I've since paid several more $100/month to Linode and everyone won in this situation: Linode because they kept a customer who will keep paying, and me because I could get my stuff sorted without having to worry about having my services cancelled.

Google's policy is simply short-sighted on every level, and harms Google's business interests too. The reason they can do things like this is because they have money to spare. Every business that's not swimming in cash like Scrooge McDuck treats their customers like this; the "big tech" company are the exceptions.

Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#236

Post by smileybarry »

cinntaile wrote: post #219
dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, it was exactly finance in the case of one of my clients. "Dear Mr dvfjsdhgfv, we're receiving invoices from this Hetzner company for some ridiculously small amounts each month which adds to our overhead, could you kindly ask them to bill us yearly? Thanks!"

It's quite unfortunate that your parents decided to call you dvfjsdhgfv.

“Mr. Dvfjsdhgfv is my father. Please, call me Shcyahudd Dvfjsdhgfv”

Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#237

Post by vidarh »

silisili wrote: post #36

Seeing all these horror stories, I can't help but wonder when people are going to switch back to on prem, or at least some hybrid. It's pretty apparent we can't trust cloud providers...

The pendulum will swing over cost, not over outages like these, because the cost challenges are real, while these outages are rare.

It won't go all back to on prem because cloud providers will slash their margins once they struggle to maintain growth, and doing so they'll diminish the advantages of on-prem/hybrid setups for a lot of people, and so we'll find some equilibrium or other.

I'd expect more emphasis on hybrid between multiple clouds rather than cloud vs. on prem to happen first. E.g. layers to threat more parts of cloud services as commodities.

Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#238

Post by laegooose »

weird-eye-issue wrote: post #23
mrcartmeneses wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do we see much of this for AWS? Asking for a friend...

AWS will email you for months and months about billing issues before they terminate anything

I confirm this, had this multiple times

Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#239

Post by mrtksn »

unity1001 wrote: post #199
pontifier wrote: post #103

Murfie died because of Google cloud costs. It's a bit of a long story, but from what I was able to piece together, a Google cloud service provider recommended some changes to the way the storage was done to save money. Mostly, because of those changes they got hit by a surprise $30,000 bill for data egress. It was basically the last straw for a company that wasn't profitable due mostly to cloud costs. It killed the c…

> data egress Google, AWS are still charging people mid-2000s bandwidth prices. Its outrageous. Digitalocean's egress price is 1/10th of Google's cheaper egress pricing. Same with Hetzner. And with Hetzner dedicated servers? Its unmetered.

If I recall correctly, there was a story on HN about Hetzner threatening to shut down an "unmetered" server for using too much bandwidth.

here it is: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32242987

Re: Tell HN: Google Cloud suspended our production projects at 1am on Saturday

#240

Post by croes »

intellectronica wrote: post #115

Generally, all cloud providers have two ways of engaging with and billing customers. One is using a credit card, which is very easy for getting started. The other one is having an established relationship with a sales / account team and setting up billing by invoice. Smaller companies sometimes don't understand that and stick with credit card billing for too long. Once you move to production and have your own custome…

And then an account error happens and your server goes down.

I don't think OP's post is about payment options but about problem handling.

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