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Hetzner Invoices for 2 months (AX51)
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Hetzner Invoices for 2 months (AX51)

mrclownmrclown Member
edited August 2021 in General

Do they change their billing terms or billing cycle?

I have a few dedi with hetzner for last few years but never have to settle for two months in advanced. When I opened the ticket, they told me all dedicated servers must be paid 2 months (current month and next month).

None of my earlier servers (SB, AX, EX) are charged for 2 months in any of the invoices.

@Hetzner_OL - please do feedback here for all of us too on such changes since when we need to start paying next month in advance despite billing cycle.

Comments

  • FalzoFalzo Member
    edited August 2021

    this sounds weird. does it affect mutliple servers or just one? also is it one you ordered recently or took over by a transfer?

    afaik there is nothing changed. you have a fixed date where you get your invoice, but the services have their own billing period, so usually you'll see a mix of pre- and post paid periods.

    there normally won't be two month for the same service, unless you were in the initial 14 day period on your previous invoice date and only now get charged for that month and the next period or took over a server by transfer that wasn't invoiced yet for the period it was running in.

    however, all services have a detailed date next to it for which the charges are. I doubt you'll have anything on it that already says october anyway.

  • mrclownmrclown Member
    edited August 2021

    @Falzo said:
    this sounds weird. does it affect mutliple servers or just one? also is it one you ordered recently or took over by a transfer?

    afaik there is nothing changed. you have a fixed date where you get your invoice, but the services have their own billing period, so usually you'll see a mix of pre- and post paid periods.

    there normally won't be two month for the same service, unless you were in the initial 14 day period on your previous invoice date and only now get charged for that month and the next period or took over a server by transfer that wasn't invoiced yet for the period it was running in.

    however, all services have a detailed date next to it for which the charges are. I doubt you'll have anything on it that already says october anyway.

    That is my understanding. I took over a server recently few weeks back, so I understand past month bill is applicable (if any) but not the next month.

    Product: AX51-NVMe #12******, xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx (25/07/2021 - 24/09/2021)
    Qty: 2
    Unit Price: € 59.0000
    Total: € 118.0000

    That is how they billed me. At first I think the invoice is wrongly billed for 2 servers instead of 1. But support told me that is for next month and all servers must pay in advance for next month. But I have never paid such way in hetzner for at least last 3-4 years even with the fresh new order with setup fees.

    So wondering hetzner is pushing for prepaid suddenly.

  • Latest Update:
    Support replied me to cancel the server if I don't want to pay in advanced.

  • FalzoFalzo Member
    edited August 2021

    @mrclown said: So wondering hetzner is pushing for prepaid suddenly.

    no, it has always been a mixed of post- and prepaid and defaults to one month of service.

    here is how it works:

    your date of getting an invoice is probably something like 28th each month.
    on that day you will be billed for all active service.
    however the billing period for each service is individual and depends on the date it got provisioned (in this case 25th).
    so on each 28th you'll get an invoice which covers the time from 25th (3 days before) till 25th next month.
    to make it more clear: if you instead ordered a server on 3rd you'll get an invoice from 3rd (actual month) till 3rd next month - obviously this would be more post than prepaid then.

    what make things different for only this recent invoice of yours is, that they do not invoice during the first 14 days, because you could cancel your order free of charge in that period.

    hence you ordered a server on 25th last month and did not get an invoice on 28th like in regular months. now the next 28th arrived and you'll get charged for the month missing and for the regular billing period, which is (more or less) the new month.

    this will only happen this month and next month you'll see 25/09-25/10 on your invoice only.

    TL;DR; nothing changed, if you want to have less prepaid you need to order shortly after your invoice date ;-)

  • @Falzo said:

    @mrclown said: So wondering hetzner is pushing for prepaid suddenly.

    no, it has always been a mixed of post- and prepaid and defaults to one month of service.

    here is how it works:

    your date of getting an invoice is probably something like 28th each month.
    on that day you will be billed for all active service.
    however the billing period for each service is individual and depends on the date it got provisioned (in this case 25th).
    so on each 28th you'll get an invoice which covers the time from 25th (3 days before) till 25th next month.
    to make it more clear: if you instead ordered a server on 3rd you'll get an invoice from 3rd (actual month) till 3rd next month - obviously this would be more post than prepaid then.

    what make things different for only this recent invoice of yours is, that they do not invoice during the first 14 days, because you could cancel your order free of charge in that period.

    hence your ordered a server on 25th last month and did not get an invoice on 28th like in regular months. now the next 28th arrived and you'll get charged for the month missing and for the regular billing period, which is the new month.

    this will only happen this month and next month you'll see 25/09-25/10 on your invoice only.

    Understand about their server billing cycle and invoice date to me are different. Also there's no free cancellation period for server transfer. But this time is totally off, the date is really clear but they added another month in the same bill as 2 quantities of servers.

    Since support replied me to cancel, no reason to continue further. What a waste for IPv4 attached to this server.

  • FalzoFalzo Member
    edited August 2021

    @mrclown said: Also there's no free cancellation period for server transfer.

    ah sorry, I missed that it was a transfer. then the server had not been billed to the old owner before you took it over. he probably has a different invoice date and did not make it clear, that the server was not paid for when you got it.

    the receiver of a transfer has to pay for everything that's still open, they don't split invoices at transfer date or similar.
    hence it can be dangerous to take over servers without knowing the exact billing status of it.

  • @Falzo said:
    hence it can be dangerous to take over servers without knowing the exact billing status of it.

    Yah. I am fine to pay for past and current billing cycle for any server transfer. I cleared bill for many of them.

    But the problem right now is asking me to settle in advanced for next month. Not only that that support is telling me they always charge in advanced.

    If what he said is right, our understanding for billing cycle and invoice date could have been wrong. But now I don't think I misunderstood the dates as you have same understanding.

  • FalzoFalzo Member
    edited August 2021

    @mrclown said: Not only that that support is telling me they always charge in advanced.

    I think both is correct depending on the point of view. they'll alway say it's prepaid, as that is kind of the default/fall back/worst case to be expected.

    if you order something directly on/before you invoice date, you will have to pay one month in advance. it's always been like that.

    only if you order or take over other service which are closer to but after that invoice date you'll have a bigger postpaid portion. maybe you just were rather lucky before to always be in that range, but I'd bet if you check your old invoices in more detail you will see, that most of the services always have an end date of their individual billing period that is after your invoice date, so there has always been a prepaid portion there ;-)

    it seems just unlucky coincidence this time, that the dates are very close the other way around and on top you took it over probably a bit later without the old owner having paid for it already. sh*t happens.

  • Mods. plz close this thread.

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