Paid $2400 to Cloudflare, support refuses to help

I signed up for Cloudflare's Business plan and paid for a year in advance. While adding a new domain I made a typo and now the subscription is stuck in a limbo.

I can't change the domain without contacting their support or paying another $2400. When I open a support ticket, their portal shows 'Unable to find your account' and tells me to open another support request for it.

All support tickets are closed automatically by their "AI" which points to the same article that says open a ticket.

Is shaming them on Twitter my only option left?

119 points | by thekonqueror 15 hours ago

11 comments

  • swhitf 14 hours ago
    One of the things I was most surprised about recently is just how buggy and unpleasant to use the Cloudflare dashboard is. We only moved to them recently and I was really shocked. I had one situation where the dashboard literally showed me the wrong domain but rules for another, which I think was a session or caching bug. I really thought it would be better for a company that size!
    • tracker1 12 hours ago
      You'd be surprised... I did a LOT of cleanup work for a private college that had a lot of "clever" developers that didn't understand static variables in C#, or how the ASP.Net lifecycle worked. Race conditions and all kinds of weird errors when the system got busy. Not to mention a lot of "fun" performance issues.

      Just because someone has a CS degree doesn't mean they actually know what they're doing.

  • altairprime 12 hours ago
    This would be an excellent use of small claims court; you want paid-for service provided and they’re giving you the phone-tree runaround. The court would prefer a settlement be reached before trial and their legal team will have no trouble bypassing their support AI to get a ticket opened.
    • PaulCarrack 8 hours ago
      Unfortunately that won't work. Most companies now have an arbitration clause meaning that you can't take them to small claims court.

      Had a similar situation happen with another company. Went to take them to small claims but the judge threw it out because of the arbitration clause. We then spent months and many resources but were unable to continue because we couldn't successfully contact their arbitrator to proceed with the dispute. Long story short, we wrote it all off as it was becoming too expensive both with time and resources.

      This is all by design, and admittedly, a clever way for companies to do what they do.

      • Someone1234 7 hours ago
        > Unfortunately that won't work. Most companies now have an arbitration clause meaning that you can't take them to small claims court.

        They can only enforce that contractual agreement IF THEY SHOW UP TO COURT. Which costs them money, which means they will pay OP's issue attention which is what OP wants anyway as a resolution. Win/win.

        In your case you wanted a cash settlement. In OP's case they want a resolution. Apples Vs. Oranges.

        edit: Looks like someone at Cloudflare responded to OP's issue below anyway.

        • altairprime 51 minutes ago
          > which means they will pay OP's issue attention which is what OP wants anyway as a resolution. Win/win.

          Precisely this. It isn’t always about getting your whole day in court; sometimes it’s just about getting a human to intervene at all.

          That said, arbitration would be just as acceptable as small claims court here. Either way, legal will see the petition and escalate internally. Arbitration costs a lot more than having someone open a support ticket, especially if your complaint says in plain language:

          “This is solely to get a human to tech support my problem because I’m trapped in a phone tree loop that won’t let me file a support ticket. I plan to withdraw my complaint as soon as a human being engages with the technical issue preventing me from contacting support, so I can resume spending my money on Cloudflare.”

          (Notice that this is careful not to demand a resolution to the issue. That’s really important.)

  • jsheard 15 hours ago
    > Is shaming them on Twitter my only option left?

    Shaming them on here works better, if you get to the frontpage then their CEO or CTO will probably show up to defuse the situation.

    • iruoy 14 hours ago
      @eastdakota (CEO)

      @jgrahamc (former CTO, now board member)

    • thekonqueror 14 hours ago
      Fingers crossed!
  • dknecht 12 hours ago
    Hi. I am sorry about this issue. Can you email dane@cloudflare.com, and it will get resolved? I am also working on more systematic fixes for when customers get into this situation.
    • nextaccountic 11 hours ago
      The more systematic fix is to make paying customers speak with actual humans, rather than buggy AI
    • sieep 10 hours ago
      Escalating to a human in a time-appropriate manner seems like what people are asking for.
    • dankwizard 3 hours ago
      Weird how support suddenly answers questions when the tickets become public.
    • thekonqueror 10 hours ago
      Thanks, email sent.
    • johnwheeler 8 hours ago
      Thanks Dane!
  • mjwhansen 14 hours ago
    That's wild! Hopefully someone at Cloudflare sees this and can help you out
  • leosanchez 11 hours ago
    Namecheap support immediately refunded when I mentioned them I made a typo in the domain i bought.
    • thekonqueror 8 hours ago
      That's great. I don't even want to change a domain registration, just need to add an existing domain to Cloudflare.
  • cosmicgadget 10 hours ago
    > All support tickets are closed automatically by their "AI" which points to the same article that says open a ticket.

    Maybe just have a script follow this infinite loop?

  • nullable_bool 7 hours ago
    I have a leak in my ceiling and my landlord doesnt even answer my texts anymore. I feel you.
  • parliament32 8 hours ago
    You should ask an AI to help you file a chargeback.
  • csomar 12 hours ago
    They are more responsive on the Discord channel. I've talked with a few of their support people and am hardly a paying user.