4 ms·

Unrelated to the ipv6 subject, but does anyone else just find the whole concept of "credits" that gandi is using absolutely irritating? I know that it lists "o

Unrelated to the ipv6 subject, but does anyone else just find the whole concept of "credits" that gandi is using absolutely irritating? I know that it lists "or about $xx.xx per month" next to the credit cost, but why in the hell even have the credits in the first place? It's easier to just use the actual costs in the customer's local currency than have them try and figure out what exactly a credit/"coin" is worth.

michaelt 13y ago
According to [1] French law means they can't store credit card information or directly debit bank accounts. So I can see why a prepay account would appeal to them. [1] http://wiki.gandi.net/en/billing/faq/direct-debit http://wiki.gandi.net/en/billing/faq/direct-debit
- mz23in 13y ago
  we can not store, but we also do not want to store this information (credit card) for our customers safety BUT, our bank does it for us, so you can now auto-credit your prepaid account using probe (no more credit, auto credit every month, ...)
  - Tobu 13y ago
    By probe, you mean scripting? It sounds a bit complicated compared to a checkbox on the payment screen.
    - yanndinendal 13y ago
      No, he meant that it makes it automated to add money to the prepaid from the CB when some conditions are reached. It is indeed just a simple process to register the card at the bank and configure the minimum amount before adding money.
- icebraining 13y ago
  Prepaid doesn't mean you have to deal with credits, though. My phone is prepaid, but the carrier still lists the price in real currency, not fake money.
mz23in 13y ago
This concept answers to many issues Gandi faced. * Being "cloud-ish" and have a pay-as-you-go system * Computing a price to use a 256MB of RAM for 3 hours in real currency was too complicated (like, for example : 0.0000174€) * Having no surprise at the end of the month, as some hosting providers compute the global use and bill the consumption at the end of the month (you may have surprise) * Using credits, to create a new server, adding a new network interface, etc, you do not need to buy 'resources' like it was before * There are two interfaces : historic usage of credits by resources, display the credits consumption as what you use in real currency * No multiple expiration date by product/resource * ... Many of those advantages are described here : http://wiki.gandi.net/en/iaas/references/billing/credits http://wiki.gandi.net/en/iaas/references/billing/credits As usual, any enhancement/improvement is welcome :-)
- eli 13y ago
  I get what you're saying, but other providers (e.g. Amazon) manage to solve this problem without prepaid credits.
- idupree 13y ago
  I prepay for many services that are still able to list prices in real currency: https://www.fastmail.fm/ https://www.fastmail.fm/ https://www.tarsnap.com/ https://www.tarsnap.com/ https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/ https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/ The latter two do keep track of fractional charges. They deduct $0.01 from prepaid credits once that much is owed. Since you accept multiple currencies, this becomes a bit more complex but still doable. For example, let the user choose the currency to display, or pick a single standard currency (euros?) and use it as your units. Tarsnap and NFSn choose to refund your prepaid credits if and only if you close your account with them. Not every prepaid system lets you get your prepayments back at all. I am fine with this: I am willing to pay a bit more (prepayment without refund) in order to limit my liability to the amount I intend to pay.
corobo 13y ago
Good lord yes. They introduced it as a much easier way to calculate billing but it's actively turned me off renting a server there. Just tell me how much per hour and per month. Even if it's broken down by resource, it works for Rackspace - that's all I need. Considering their motto is "No bullshit" you'd have thought they'd just give you the prices and leave you to it
zeograd 13y ago
advantage of credits vs local money is that the cost of credits is lower as you buy it by larger batch. It's a way to reward bigger buyers which would be confusing when using local money ("get credited of €215 when paying €180" ? what about refund ? invoicing unit ?) And as resources can be micromanaged (per hour, via their api), you'd end up with tiny fractions of local currencies and rounding issues while all credit operations are done on integer afaik.
- asdasf 13y ago
  And also a way for me to have wasted money left over when I stop using the service and can't use up all my credits.
asdasf 13y ago
Yes, it is the only reason I don't use them for hosting, even though I've had my domains with them for over a decade. For a company with a motto of "no bullshit", it is really disappointing. Sketchy credit nonsense is about as bullshit as you can get.

michaelt 13y ago

According to [1] French law means they can't store credit card information or directly debit bank accounts. So I can see why a prepay account would appeal to them. [1] http://wiki.gandi.net/en/billing/faq/direct-debit http://wiki.gandi.net/en/billing/faq/direct-debit

mz23in 13y ago
we can not store, but we also do not want to store this information (credit card) for our customers safety BUT, our bank does it for us, so you can now auto-credit your prepaid account using probe (no more credit, auto credit every month, ...)
- Tobu 13y ago
  By probe, you mean scripting? It sounds a bit complicated compared to a checkbox on the payment screen.
  - yanndinendal 13y ago
    No, he meant that it makes it automated to add money to the prepaid from the CB when some conditions are reached. It is indeed just a simple process to register the card at the bank and configure the minimum amount before adding money.
icebraining 13y ago
Prepaid doesn't mean you have to deal with credits, though. My phone is prepaid, but the carrier still lists the price in real currency, not fake money.

mz23in 13y ago

This concept answers to many issues Gandi faced. * Being "cloud-ish" and have a pay-as-you-go system * Computing a price to use a 256MB of RAM for 3 hours in real currency was too complicated (like, for example : 0.0000174€) * Having no surprise at the end of the month, as some hosting providers compute the global use and bill the consumption at the end of the month (you may have surprise) * Using credits, to create a new server, adding a new network interface, etc, you do not need to buy 'resources' like it was before * There are two interfaces : historic usage of credits by resources, display the credits consumption as what you use in real currency * No multiple expiration date by product/resource * ... Many of those advantages are described here : http://wiki.gandi.net/en/iaas/references/billing/credits http://wiki.gandi.net/en/iaas/references/billing/credits As usual, any enhancement/improvement is welcome :-)

eli 13y ago
I get what you're saying, but other providers (e.g. Amazon) manage to solve this problem without prepaid credits.
idupree 13y ago
I prepay for many services that are still able to list prices in real currency: https://www.fastmail.fm/ https://www.fastmail.fm/ https://www.tarsnap.com/ https://www.tarsnap.com/ https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/ https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/ The latter two do keep track of fractional charges. They deduct $0.01 from prepaid credits once that much is owed. Since you accept multiple currencies, this becomes a bit more complex but still doable. For example, let the user choose the currency to display, or pick a single standard currency (euros?) and use it as your units. Tarsnap and NFSn choose to refund your prepaid credits if and only if you close your account with them. Not every prepaid system lets you get your prepayments back at all. I am fine with this: I am willing to pay a bit more (prepayment without refund) in order to limit my liability to the amount I intend to pay.

corobo 13y ago

Good lord yes. They introduced it as a much easier way to calculate billing but it's actively turned me off renting a server there. Just tell me how much per hour and per month. Even if it's broken down by resource, it works for Rackspace - that's all I need. Considering their motto is "No bullshit" you'd have thought they'd just give you the prices and leave you to it

zeograd 13y ago

advantage of credits vs local money is that the cost of credits is lower as you buy it by larger batch. It's a way to reward bigger buyers which would be confusing when using local money ("get credited of €215 when paying €180" ? what about refund ? invoicing unit ?) And as resources can be micromanaged (per hour, via their api), you'd end up with tiny fractions of local currencies and rounding issues while all credit operations are done on integer afaik.

asdasf 13y ago
And also a way for me to have wasted money left over when I stop using the service and can't use up all my credits.

asdasf 13y ago

Yes, it is the only reason I don't use them for hosting, even though I've had my domains with them for over a decade. For a company with a motto of "no bullshit", it is really disappointing. Sketchy credit nonsense is about as bullshit as you can get.