Last weekend I had an issue with my hosting provider, WPWebHost.

I switched to WPWebHost 2 years ago, and recommended them because they promised wordpress hosting at an affordable rate. Wordpress hosting is where the hosting provider would support wordpress specific features, e.g. help troubleshoot plugin and theme issues, perform nightly backups, and offer ‘higher availability’ for Wordpress sites. If you’re still wondering what Wordpress is, take a look at one of my previous post.

My latest experience with WPWebHost has left me wondering if indeed this was actually Wordpress hosting or just regular hosting in disguise. I’m now wondering if I should stay with them.

Was my server really getting the 99% uptime promised by WPWebHost? Nope. Did I get the Wordpress Specific support that help identify theme and plugin issues? Nope. Does WPWebhost cost more than regular hosting from other providers like GoDaddy, Dreamhost and my previous provider NearlyFreeSpeech? Yup. So why I am still with them? Read more to find out.

Below is the full un-redacted transcript of my email correspondence with WPWebhost–I’ve left out the customer service agents name because I believe they have a right to privacy. However, nearly every time I sent an email, a different rep would respond making the whole conversation very messy and difficult to keep track off. Some emails were left out to simplify the flow.

You may have noticed that my site recently got a spanking new design. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my previous wordpress theme (compositio by Design Disease) and my previous web host (the ever awesome, nearlyfreespeech), but there were 2 real compelling reasons for me to switch web host.

First, maintaining wordpress was taking a lot of time, this included the usual backups and updates and that was eating into time I could have spent researching other stuff or just plain blogging. Secondly, the site had grown both in size and visits, previously I received my first notch up the Google Page Rank, and now I’m a Page Rank 1 site (woo hoo!!). The additional traffic and storage cost were increasing to the point where it made more sense to have a fixed cost monthly payment than worry about the topping up my account (that being said, it would have still been cheaper to host on Nearlyfreespeech).

My first choice was dreamhost, but I’ve tried them before, and while they were good, they weren’t exactly out of this world. So I decided to look for a Wordpress specific hosting service, these are web host that specialize in Wordpress. They cover stuff like daily backups and offer free wordpress themes etc. Unfortunately, most Wordpress host cost quite a bit, but with some google searches, I manage to come across a Wordpress host that was well recommended, was at the right price point, and best of all–based in Malaysia.