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Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

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Re: Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

#61

Post by havaloc »

pmontra wrote: post #47
havaloc wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do some tech consulting on the side and beg people (literally) to switch from Comcast (US TV and Internet Provider) to say YouTube TV, saving them hundreds of dollars a month. They WILL NOT do it, even though I would do all the work, show them how to do it, explain how it's essentially the same but much cheaper, how to use it, and not charge very much to do so (I bill typically less than $60 an hour, and it would o…

I think that Comcast is a USA only service so have no idea of what people watch or listen to on Comcast. But above all, why do they need a consultant to do the switch? There is more to it than a credit card and a subscription?

Just because it's easy for say you and me, does not mean it's easy for others to do. Helper seems like a more appropriate word here, consultant being a loaded term these days!

Re: Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

#63

Post by ClarityJones »

pmontra wrote: post #47
havaloc wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do some tech consulting on the side and beg people (literally) to switch from Comcast (US TV and Internet Provider) to say YouTube TV, saving them hundreds of dollars a month. They WILL NOT do it, even though I would do all the work, show them how to do it, explain how it's essentially the same but much cheaper, how to use it, and not charge very much to do so (I bill typically less than $60 an hour, and it would o…

I think that Comcast is a USA only service so have no idea of what people watch or listen to on Comcast. But above all, why do they need a consultant to do the switch? There is more to it than a credit card and a subscription?

Comcast is an ISP and Cable Television provider, with a terrible reputation. When I cancelled my service when them I had to mail the modem back to them. I did it UPS shipping with tracking, because I know not to trust them. They never-the-less claimed they did not receive it, and billed me for the device. Eventually - armed with the shipping confirmation - they acknowledged receipt of the package, but insisted that the box was empty and that I mailed them an empty box.

I forget the other details, but remember to never do business with Comcast or their subsidiaries / partners.

Re: Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

#64

Post by kstrauser »

freediddy wrote: post #18

The message is obviously: If Bending Spoons buys your vendor, then gtfo as quickly as possible. Don't wait, don't sit around like a sucker and hope you won't get screwed over, you will.

Absolutely. You have until the end of your subscription to migrate. After that the thumb screws come out.

Re: Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

#65

Post by SyneRyder »

havaloc wrote: post #44

Something seems off here, I don't see a huge climb in pricing. I feel $9 a month a seat is inline with SAAS pricing. Today's pricing: https://www.getharvest.com/pricing Pricing in 2023 (I looked at various years): https://web.archive.org/web/20230530052857/https://www.getha...

The small print here is the gotcha:

"Your base rate includes core features. As your team grows, additional invoices, projects, clients, and tasks are billed based on what you use, so you're never overpaying."

Harvest / Bending Spoons moved to charging for usage on top of the per-seat cost. Want to bill a new client? Now you need to pay more per month. Client gave you a new project? That's now a higher monthly fee again. Previously the Solo plan could have as many projects as you liked.

I commented when it happened to me on HN here:

"They took my ~$100/yr Harvest time-tracking Solo plan, increased the price by 2.5x for a more restricted plan than I had... or I could get back the plan I had for $20,000/year."

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48849810

Click through to the comment if you want the punchline on how I solved this for myself.

EDIT: Found my Twitter post at the time with my screenshot from inside the Harvest interface: "Your plan is changing soon! You're on a Solo plan and will be moved to the Enterprise plan." mhermann above has an even better screenshot.

https://x.com/syneryder/status/2060707054709567582/photo/1 https://x.com/syneryder/status/2060844948250087816

Re: Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

#66

Post by toomuchtodo »

SyneRyder wrote: post #65
havaloc wrote: post #44

Something seems off here, I don't see a huge climb in pricing. I feel $9 a month a seat is inline with SAAS pricing. Today's pricing: https://www.getharvest.com/pricing Pricing in 2023 (I looked at various years): https://web.archive.org/web/20230530052857/https://www.getha...

The small print here is the gotcha: "Your base rate includes core features. As your team grows, additional invoices, projects, clients, and tasks are billed based on what you use, so you're never overpaying." Harvest / Bending Spoons moved to charging for usage on top of the per-seat cost. Want to bill a new client? Now you need to pay more per month. Client gave you a new project? That's now a higher monthly fee aga…

Can you share what you vibe coded? Well done!

Re: Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

#67

Post by kstrauser »

ClarityJones wrote: post #63
pmontra wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that Comcast is a USA only service so have no idea of what people watch or listen to on Comcast. But above all, why do they need a consultant to do the switch? There is more to it than a credit card and a subscription?

Comcast is an ISP and Cable Television provider, with a terrible reputation. When I cancelled my service when them I had to mail the modem back to them. I did it UPS shipping with tracking, because I know not to trust them. They never-the-less claimed they did not receive it, and billed me for the device. Eventually - armed with the shipping confirmation - they acknowledged receipt of the package, but insisted that t…

Oof. I upgraded my wife’s business from Comcast to AT&T. This is the only context, ever, where you’ll hear me describe AT&T as an upgrade to anything. I returned Comcast’s modem to the local office, photographed them accepting it from me, and archived the receipt and photos for safekeeping. I do not routinely do that sort of thing with other vendors.

Re: Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

#68

Post by ffsm8 »

swiftcoder wrote: post #54
dboreham wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This argument is unfortunately flawed. If the customers had been handed the software on day 1, by day 100 it would be full of security bugs, would need to be re-written for the new version of Node.js (the old one having been deprecated and also full of security bugs). They'd have to find somewhere to run it and pay someone to keep an eye on that deployment for when it does something weird that affects service. Oh and…

> If the customers had been handed the software on day 1, by day 100 it would be full of security bugs, would need to be re-written for the new version of Node.js (the old one having been deprecated and also full of security bugs). We don't have to make everything a javascript app running on the open internet. Though even an insecure node server could be perfectly fine if deployed on the corpnet behind a VPN...

Thats a very spicy threat model post the age of IoT.

Any stray device you may not even be aware of can rip that assurance apart.

A fully locked down network can in theory enable this however, very few enterprises actually are strict enough for this to be enforced across the whole network.

Re: Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

#69

Post by kstrauser »

csomar wrote: post #50
kstrauser wrote: post #17

Every now and then I check out the Evernote Reddit out of morbid curiosity. One person recently announced they’d finally had enough and were leaving because Bending Spoons increased their monthly bill from $20 to $30. They’d been paying $240/yr for freaking Evernote. I’m astonished at how much abuse many people will tolerate as an alternative to changing their habits. Bending Spoons made the same discovery, but gleef…

It’s not habit. Some people build complex workflows on these and hold substantial data. Moving requires re-building these workflows which is both time and money consuming. Not everyone will have the proper time and capacity to move at a moment’s notice.

I get that. I do. And yet, once things like this start to happen, it’s exceedingly likely to continue, and you have to start making contingency plans. Evernote increased their annual prices like 40% in early 2024 and it’s been nothing but up since then. That $360 plan was a $125 plan in 2023.

At some point you have to either migrate or smile and accept the hikes.

Re: Harvest hikes bills by 1500% after purchased by Bending Spoons

#70

Post by jimt1234 »

I helped a friend-of-a-friend around 2010 with a 'computer issue'. She ran the original version of QuickBooks on an old-ass PC, connected only to a dot-matrix printer (no internet). Everything worked fine, except the printer was toast; she wanted me to fix it. She said she went to Best Buy for a replacement dot-matrix printer, and the staff pretty much laughed at her, told her to just upgrade. I asked her why she has never done that, upgrade her setup - PC, Windows, QuickBooks, printer, etc. She said everything worked fine for her, so why pay money to upgrade? Back then I thought she was kinda crazy, just being stubborn. But after a few years of reading about companies like Broadcom and Being Spoons, I get it. Good for her.

Oh, and the 'fix' to her busted dot-matrix printer was eBay. I found an exact model for less than $100. Ordered it. Connected it. And she was back in business. She was so happy she made me a big plate of lumpia. :)

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