I am not surprised that they didn't give a refund; most businesses wouldn't. However, I think businesses these days should start integrating a one-time "whoopsie" allowance as part of their customer service (within reason, of course. It may or may not be feasible depending on your business model). You're probably going to have people that try to take advantage of this, but there are some people who make honest mistakes, and I would give them the benefit of the doubt. Just treat people well.
I believe if you take care of your customers, they'll take care of you. In general, the one thing that people will remember for life is how you make them feel.
The benefits of providing awesome customer service outweighs the cost IMO (I haven't done the math, but that's my gut feeling). I remember reading a story on reddit yesterday where a gamer experienced the almost exact same situation with Steam:
that provides a good example of how news of awesome customer service can be spread, and possibly grow sales (Zappos).
For example, I have several sites hosted with WebFaction.com and I'm unbelievably happy with their customer service. They respond within 10-30 minutes on any support tickets. I'll continue to use them in the future. (see how that was a good example of what awesome customer service can do?)
I'm actually surprised they didn't. Think of the goodwill a post reading "I messed up on Heroku, but they were cool about it" would have created.
After all, Heroku could have auto-detected idle instances easily and could have disabled them or alerted the user.
The whole 'dyno' concept without an automated scaling option is a bit strange. Why set an exact number of instances when web traffic is just about the most variable thing you could possibly want to measure. Even apache auto-scales the number of processes depending on how many workers it currently needs to serve your requests.
Auto-scaling and a web app hosting service go together like bread & butter.
It's a tricky line to walk. If there was a post saying how Heroku waived 1000 bucks, there could be a string of scammish people trying to pull the same move. And when Heroku turns them down, they will refer to this post and claim "discrimination".
I think the issue here may be more of tone. It seems from the post that Heroku just gave a cold "no". The user should really post the original exchanges. As a user, I feel a lot better psychologically when I know the other company tried its best--even if they could not help me.
Did Heroku try? I can't tell clearly from the post.
I don't feel comfortable posting their messages without their permission, but it was a no-frills, direct answer to my request.
They are a company. IMO posting their email is fair play. It's not an individual.
And how could this be a scam? They can easily see the traffic on the instances in question. The scam is that I only pay them $300 this month?
I never said you are a scammer. You're not. But this potentially sets a precedent for future users to be reckless and want the same favor granted to you.
A scammer would be fairly easily distinguishable from someone making an honest mistake, the difference being that you've already made x* the turnover of the 'mistake' on the honest customer, and the scammer would actually be using those instances for something.
Scammers, as a rule don't go for solutions with a high up-front investment in their time, they'd be much better of using a few thousand stolen credit cards instead. Why bother asking for refunds on a real life ID when you can get away with someone else holding the bag...
Heroku should sidestep this question anyway and implement auto-scaling and notifications on certain thresholds asap.
Why would you say most businesses wouldn't? I'd think most business would do something to help a loyal customer stay loyal. I agree with you that it's absolutely good business practice to help customers recover from their own mistakes.
On many many occasions, businesses have literally given me money even when it was my stupid mistake. Some examples just over the past few years:
- Sprint credited me $100 when I racked up a $250 bill by not watching my usage
- Bank of America credited me $100 when I left my card in the ATM and someone withdrew $100 from my account
- Hyatt Place gave me a free room when I made a reservation on the wrong date (and never showed, or called)
- Southwest Airlines gives you full credit if you cancel your flight any time
- ATT gave me all my rollover minutes when I changed plans (by rule, you lose them - i had over 2700)
Those are just some examples that I can remember...I'm not sure it's a healthy mentality to expect this, but it certainly leaves a very positive impression. Leaving your customers in a state of feeling ripped off when you can obviously help is not the right business decision.
Expedia has this. I once booked a flight & hotel for the wrong month. I was told they could cancel the hotel free of charge, but for the flight they would be able to take care of it just this time and if it happened again it would be $100.
Canceling ahead of time is one thing. "Canceling" later because you didn't use your reservation is another.
The example in question is more like: you make a reservation for September instead of October. In October you realized your mistake. Then you ask for your money back, after all you didn't use either the tickets or the hotel. And because the airplane and hotel weren't fully booked, you claim they didn't have any additional costs because of you. Well, good luck getting your refund.
I believe if you take care of your customers, they'll take care of you. In general, the one thing that people will remember for life is how you make them feel.
The benefits of providing awesome customer service outweighs the cost IMO (I haven't done the math, but that's my gut feeling). I remember reading a story on reddit yesterday where a gamer experienced the almost exact same situation with Steam:
http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/dcnp7/one_of_many_re...
that provides a good example of how news of awesome customer service can be spread, and possibly grow sales (Zappos).
For example, I have several sites hosted with WebFaction.com and I'm unbelievably happy with their customer service. They respond within 10-30 minutes on any support tickets. I'll continue to use them in the future. (see how that was a good example of what awesome customer service can do?)