Discover Forumotion Packages: the new way to evolve your forums

[The Godfather]

First topic message reminder :

New: Forumotion Packages

Dear users, As we told you in this topic, we are pleased to announce the arrival of Forumotion packages. A new way to enrich your forum and customize your members' experience through a redesign of paid features management. Presentation of Forumotion packages Forumotion packages allow you to enrich your forum with additional features. As you know, Forumotion offers for many years the possibility to create a free forum, with a rich diversity of features. If, by default, our forums offer most of the tools necessary for the proper use and development of your forum, some paid options can enhance it with new features, and improve your members' experience (ads deletion, SSL certificate, custom domain name, etc.). Until now, these paid options were dispersed in the administration panel. Today, and thanks to the arrival of Forumotion packages, the purchase of a package will allow you to access a set of additional features, while leaving you free to activate or not, step by step, each of these options. These packages are primarily a response to technical issues that disrupt the proper use of the service, particularly because of the international nature of Forumotion. But they are also the manifestation of an evolution of the web, and the world of forums. These have evolved a lot in nearly 10 years, and Forumotion must evolve in the same direction in order to adopt an operating model to guarantee the quality, viability, and continuity of our service. What are the different offered packages ? Forumotion forums offer three packages: Free, Advanced and Premium. Here is a non-exhaustive presentation: - Free package: this is the default package for all Forumotion forums, which continues to offer features that allow relevant use of your forum. These features include access to advanced permissions, image hosting, optimization of your forum for SEO, unlimited number of topics, members and messages, etc. - Advanced package: in addition to the features offered by the free package, the advanced package offers, among other things, more storage space, a higher newsletter limit, the possibility to activate an SSL certificate or to acquire a domain name, etc. - Premium package: it is the most complete package, offering the most functionalities, such as the monetization of the forum, the suppression of copyrights, an improved search which extends to the content of messages, the personalization of the"Popular content" newsletter, etc. You will find a more complete presentation of each package in your administration panel, in the Misc tab. Example: How can I subscribe a Forumotion package? The subscription to a package can be done with two methods of payment: Either via an annual payment: In this case, you pay your package in a single payment, for a validity period of one year. Or via a monthly payment: With no due date and no commitment, it allows you to access Forumotion packages by paying very accessible monthly fees and to spread the payment of your package. Note that the annualized subscription includes 2 months free. Forumotion packages use credits, the virtual currency specific to Forumotion forums. Subscribing to a package on an annualized basis requires therefore to have a sufficient balance of credits on the forum. Nothing changes, the purchase of credits remains made in the same way as in the past, via Allopass, Paypal, Hipay or Skrill. The monthly subscription is only possible via Paypal (the use of a PayPal account linked to a valid card or bank account is mandatory), the only means of payment to set up a satisfactory monthly payment given the technical constraints we know. To subscribe to a package, go to your: Administration panel > Misc > Credit Management - Forumotion Packages We hope that these innovations will bring you full satisfaction. Forumotion team

A Forumotion Important Announcement

[Neptune-]

Hi dannyworld

If you already have linked that domain, i think it needs to be confirmed.

If you have no domain name yet, you need to get at least the advanced pack to add your CNAME (external domain) or to purchase a domain (internal)

Please note that external domains are not compatible with SSL feture (https) since Forumotion cannot deal with external domains because they can't access them.

[Dynaballz1]

From what I have learned the past 8hrs, dannyworld.....no.

[brandon_g]

can i use an external domain name for the free features

That depends, if already have one linked, it will remain free with no expirary unless you delete it or dont renew the domain with whoever you bought it with.

If do not have it linked yet or ever delete it then, no, you will have to buy the advanced pack to link it.

-Brandon

[The Godfather]

hello @dannyworld

the answer to this question you have it in your admin panel...

[TonnyKamper]

I would like to know since I use an external domain name, which doesn't expire for another 2,5 years on my forum if it's still possible to keep that on the free service, or am I forced to go back to the original creation url ?

according to the package you will need to upgrade to the Advanced or Premium package , in order to use your external domain

Thank you for your respons @BlackScorpion I'm totally unhappy with this, we can't afford to upgrade, so we'll lose the abillity to use the domain name which was already bought for a timespan of 5 years.. I'm very confused now.. we're a non-profit organisation which would like to keep access to the forum free of charges for our troubled members, we don't have any money coming in or going out.. in fact I bought the domain name and the removal of ads from my own money.. I can't afford the prices of those packages, so it seems I'll have to convert back to the original creation url

Would it still be possible to disable ads on the free package by purchasing credits for that purpose? That's not very clear to me yet..

[The Godfather]

be careful, what you say is totally wrong! we do not delete anything from your forums! what is in place before the implementation of the packages we do not touch it and will remain as it is.

if you have already installed an external domain via CNAME on your forum before packages update, now that the packages are in place, as long as your CNAME is still active, it will not change anything for you even if you are in a free package that does not include an external domain. however, if you delete the current CNAME and want to set up a new one, you will need to be in a package allowing it.

this is applied for all paid options acquired prior to packages implementation and which are now included as part of a package

[TonnyKamper]

be careful, what you say is totally wrong! we do not delete anything from your forums! what is in place before the implementation of the packages we do not touch it and will remain as it is.

if you have already installed an external domain via CNAME on your forum before packages update, now that the packages are in place, as long as your CNAME is still active, it will not change anything for you even if you are in a free package that does not include an external domain. however, if you delete the current CNAME and want to set up a new one, you will need to be in a package allowing it.

this is applied for all paid options acquired prior to packages implementation and which are now included as part of a package

Thank you very much for claryfying that @"Godfather" that is a great relief to us

[Ape]

Hello @TonnyKamper

you will have to buy the Advanced package to remove your ad's from your forum every month or year.
if you already have ad's removed.


If you don't have any ad's or anything else removed yet

Please remember this may change for each member as I have other things I have added before the package system come out .

[TonnyKamper]

Thank you very much for claryfying that to me @APE one last question, would it still be possible to pay for that via the Skrill system? Because we don't have a paypal account..

[The Godfather]

Thank you very much for claryfying that to me @APE one last question, would it still be possible to pay for that via the Skrill system? Because we don't have a paypal account..

nothing changes concerning the payments. there is only the monthly one which use necessarily paypal. but for the rest, notably the annual payment, you can use all the other usual payment services that you used to use

[TonnyKamper]

Thank you very much for claryfying that to me @APE one last question, would it still be possible to pay for that via the Skrill system? Because we don't have a paypal account..

nothing changes concerning the payments. there is only the monthly one which use necessarily paypal. but for the rest, notably the annual payment, you can use all the other usual payment services that you used to use

Thank you very much for claryfying that @"Godfather" , we're good now

[Ape]

@TonnyKamper as the godfather has said already if you pay for one year then the system will let you use all the ways you did before to pay for your credits.

Also just one thing if you look at the Advanced package you will see you get lots more for your money and you can even get your HTTPS address to make your site even more safe
and 2 months free as well Great deal if you ask me.

EDIT: this is only if you have your domain by us (If you host outside of us then your HTTPS address will not work )

Yes I understand money is hard to come by and you don't make money on your site but the good thing is we run contests here on the support forum so that will give you a chance to win some credits too.

[jkh]

A few months ago I bought enough credits to disable ads for members and guests until 2022 but now it says they're only disabled until 2019.



Have I lost those credits now?

Can the ads now only be disabled for a year at a time?

As brandon_g will confirm, I have problems with credits appearing in my admin panel and have to go through private message with him to give the head office a nudge to sort it out ....which is why I bought a few years' worth last time so I didn't need to keep bothering him.

https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/

[TonnyKamper]

@TonnyKamper as the godfather has said already if you pay for one year then the system will let you use all the ways you did before to pay for your credits.

Also just one thing if you look at the Advanced package you will see you get lots more for your money and you can even get your HTTPS address to make your site even more safe
and 2 months free as well Great deal if you ask me.

EDIT: this is only if you have your domain by us (If you host outside of us then your HTTPS address will not work )

Yes I understand money is hard to come by and you don't make money on your site but the good thing is we run contests here on the support forum so that will give you a chance to win some credits too.

Oh I didn't knew that about the contests @APE can you give me a clue as to where I can find those contests here?

[Ape]

@jkh As far as I knew you could only buy one year at a time before this change but I could have been wrong as I have never been told any other way.

The problem is our new system will only let you buy a pack for one year and the system is made to take what you have already and then change to a pack system after that.

So it looks like it may have just removed your ones you have already paid for and set it to one year only.

If that's the case then you will need to talk to brandon about him talking to the head office about this or maybe if I tag @"The Godfather he can help you more on this matter.

Lets just see if The godfather makes a reply tomorrow before we make a report. @jkh Please can you make sure you edit the post you just made and add your URL to it so we know what forum you are talking about.

Kind Regards.

APE.

[Ape]

Oh I didn't knew that about the contests @APE can you give me a clue as to where I can find those contests here?

@TonnyKamper we don't have none running right now but we will soon be just keep an eye out here


If you want to know more about how to take part on contests Please drop me a line in a PM and I will be happy to tell you all about what we do.

Please Note this is not the place to talk about the contests thou its about the update at this time.

kind regards.

APE.

Please keep on topic

Thank you.

[SLGray]

A few months ago I bought enough credits to disable ads for members and guests until 2022 but now it says they're only disabled until 2019.



Have I lost those credits now?

Can the ads now only be disabled for a year at a time?

As brandon_g will confirm, I have problems with credits appearing in my admin panel and have to go through private message with him to give the head office a nudge to sort it out ....which is why I bought a few years' worth last time so I didn't need to keep bothering him.

https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/

You said that you bought credits, but did you spend them?

[jkh]

A few months ago I bought enough credits to disable ads for members and guests until 2022 but now it says they're only disabled until 2019.



Have I lost those credits now?

Can the ads now only be disabled for a year at a time?

As brandon_g will confirm, I have problems with credits appearing in my admin panel and have to go through private message with him to give the head office a nudge to sort it out ....which is why I bought a few years' worth last time so I didn't need to keep bothering him.

https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/

You said that you bought credits, but did you spend them?

Yes I did spend them.

This is the screenshot I took when I spent the credits a few months ago

[Neptune-]

Hi jkh,

A few months ago I bought enough credits to disable ads for members and guests until 2022 but now it says they're only disabled until 2019.



Have I lost those credits now?

As brandon_g will confirm, I have problems with credits appearing in my admin panel and have to go through private message with him to give the head office a nudge to sort it out ....which is why I bought a few years' worth last time so I didn't need to keep bothering him.

Yes I did spend them.

This is the screenshot I took when I spent the credits a few months ago

Keep calm, you cannot lose any single credit.

Normally you should :
- Be refunded (via a credits back) for ads you disabled but did not use. If i see the last screenshot you paid 4 years of ads removal but used only less than one month. You should have been refunded for the 47 months (and a bit more) not used yet
- Be refunded the same way for copyright disabling and SSL certificate if you bought some of those features.
- Pay for the package including ads removing on the same level (members or members+guests)
With all cash back on unused features the package will cost less the first year, and normal price all following years

Please note there's an issue on current expiration date !
Should be 10 apr 2019 (instead of 02 apr)

Can the ads now only be disabled for a year at a time?

Unfortunately yes. You cannot have an expiration date greater than 14 months : 12 months for package and you can renew up to 60 days before expiration date.

---

@jkh As far as I knew you could only buy one year at a time before this change but I could have been wrong as I have never been told any other way.

That was the case for domain name (why pay for several years since the domain might be offered for free by Forumotion) and SSL certificate.
But before the packages update, it was possible to add one year of ads and/or copyright removal as many times we could afford.
Now it's limited to one year

[Lady Galaxia]

First off, as an active forum with 400,000 messages and being a forum with you guys going on 7 years now, I absolutely hate these changes. No excuses will fix that. If I wanted other services I'd have paid for them, now I have to pay more for extra things that do absolutely nothing for me.

Secondly, my Chrome browser is up to date, and yet your panel is broken. EDIT: Fixed!




Thirdly, forumotion previously "offered" me my domain name for free. 



Are you telling me that I'm now going to have to start paying for it? You want me to more than DOUBLE my costs and tell me to be ok with it? Quite frankly I'd leave your service if you didn't have my forum in a stranglehold with your No forum migration rules.

Current yearly costs:

(Proof of how much I spend a year)



what you expect me to pay to get what I normally buy

[Asciugamano]

@Lady Galaxia
As for the panel, you need to delete your cache or perform a hard reload. (open the browser console, then rightclick on the reload symbol top left and select "hard reload")

I agree with the rest though, we're in the same boat.
Now we have to pay 4x as much as before and we are stuck on forumotion (in my case the German version), because we don't want to give up almost 36000 posts.

[Neptune-]

Hi Lady Galaxia


For your second point, just press Ctrl+F5. It should be fine after that.

For your third point, there is no change for offered domain names. As long as a forum meets the requirements, it will be still offered, even for those running on free package.
But if one day, the forum doesn't meet the requirements any more, it will need to be at least in advanced package to renew it for 1200 credits (versus 1600 so far)

For the first point, i can tell you nearly everybody hates these changes. And i am pretty sure Forumotion hates to need to do that even more than we do. But since 2004 things have changed a lot out there.
Many websites or other forum platforms (ready to use) have closed. Some other became paying (imageshack, photobucket ? Do you remember ?)
So with all these changes the deal is very clear ! Change or die. And personally, i prefer not to die now. What about you ?

---

No, i'm not happy with those price increasing, i dont think you will find a single founder happy there, but i'm still happier than all those founders who had to say to their members they have to stop because their hoster told them they would stop all their activities.

[Chellizard]

I paid for 1000 credits in USD, and then purchased the premium package and it did not use my credits. It charged me 9.60 USD instead of using my credits. I would like a refund or something. I was under the impression it would use my credits before charging me.

[jkh]

A couple of questions

1. Why can't the contribution link be brought back so that members can help buy the credits instead of leaving it up to the forum owner to finance the forum which is for their benefit aswell?

2. Are unused credits carried over to the next year or do you lose them if you don't use them? For instance, if all I want to buy is another SSL certificate then I would need to buy the premium package which leaves quite a few credits.

I don't need to buy things like a domain name, extra storage or disabling of the forumotion copyright, and I don't want to monetize my forum, so all I would need is the SSL and ads removal...so what would happen to all the remaining credits?

3. If I buy the premium package (because I want to disable the ads) do I get unlimited credits to buy everything on that list or is there a limit to what I can choose?

[Asciugamano]

Good point about the donation link.
We can activate the link in the admin panel, but there are only payment methods most user probably never heard of. Could there be Paypal added?

[Neptune-]

I paid for 1000 credits in USD, and then purchased the premium package and it did not use my credits. It charged me 9.60 USD instead of using my credits. I would like a refund or something. I was under the impression it would use my credits before charging me.

Credits are used only for annual packages and domain name purchase (or renewal)
If it charged you in USD instead of credits, means you chose a monthly package and in that case it's paid via Paypal.

For the refund, i'm afraid it will be no. Unless you can cancel your purchase on the chosen payment provider (Paypal, Hipay Skrill ...)
For the something, i let the staff members give you an adequate answer

1. Why can't the contribution link be brought back so that members can help buy the credits instead of leaving it up to the forum owner to finance the forum which is for their benefit aswell?

If you dont have the ability to add a contribution link, it means your forum doesn't meet the payments platform's terms of service. Unfortunately it's out of range for Forumotion, but only to payment providers (Hipay Skrill and Co)

2. Are unused credits carried over to the next year or do you lose them if you don't use them? For instance, if all I want to buy is another SSL certificate then I would need to buy the premium package which leaves quite a few credits.

There is no unused credits. You pay for a pack, regardless of what you use inside it. Like a triple play offer where you can get phone, TV and Internet. And no refund if you dont use the IPTV feature.

I don't need to buy things like a domain name, extra storage or disabling of the forumotion copyright, and I don't want to monetize my forum, so all I would need is the SSL and ads removal...so what would happen to all the remaining credits?

Just check my previous answer !

3. If I buy the premium package (because I want to disable the ads) do I get unlimited credits to buy everything on that list or is there a limit to what I can choose?

If you buy premium package just to disable ads, i would tell you that you're wasting your money. You need only an advanced package to remove ads.
If you choose premium package u can activate all items with no extra fee, except internal domain name which is charged 1200 credits.

[jkh]

I've just clicked on Premium Package and it does rather look as though I'm being refunded for my recent purchases so only have to make up the difference to buy the package:

[Neptune-]

I've just clicked on Premium Package and it does rather look as though I'm being refunded for my recent purchases so only have to make up the difference to buy the package:

Of course you will be refunded for features you hadn't used yet !

First year will cost 5210 credits, second and following years will be charged 7660 credits

[jkh]

So if I buy the premium package now but don't use all the credits, will those remaining credits carry over to the second year or do I lose them?

[Chellizard]

Please.do not answer questions if you're not staff.