Answers to the questions we're commonly asked before people signup. Please be sure to email if you have any other questions.
Quick-Start Guide to Getting a Website Online
Switching your website to us, from another provider
Am I able to create customised error pages for my Website?
Are your hosting plans PCI Compliant?
Can I also connect to the internet with you? Are you an ISP?
Can I have more than one Domain for my site?
Can I host my e-mail with you, and my website with another host?
Can I password protect certain web pages in my website?
Can I register my own SSL certificate?
Can I resell space within my own hosting account?
Differences between ‘subdomains’, ‘parked domains’, and ‘addon domains’?
Do I have access to update my site 24 hours a day?
Do you allow me to host CGI Scripts in my hosting space? What is CGI?
Do you allow modification of file/folder permissions via FTPs CHMOD?
Do you allow Telnet / SSH / Shell access?
Do you have a Shopping Cart that I can use for my website?
Do you have a web based console, that allows me to manage my hosting?
Do you offer free trials or a initial moneyback guarantee?
Do you offer IMAP access?
Do you provide DNS servers?
Do you support Microsoft Frontpage™?
Do your Control Panels have phpmyadmin?
Do your email accounts have SMTP?
How come your website hosting prices are so cheap?
How easy is it to switch my Website Host over to you?
How long does it all take to switch my Existing Website over to you?
How long does it take for you to setup my account?
How many websites can I have with my hosting plan?
How much bandwidth is 10 GB?
How much hosting space is 1000 MB?
How reliable are your servers?
I have found cheaper hosting services elsewhere, will you match their price?
If I join a hosting plan, do I have to register a domain through you too?
Is email included in my accounts diskspace quota?
My computer is Windows or I own an Apple Mac, can I use Linux hosting?
What are the addresses of your Primary and Secondary Name Servers?
What happens if I exceed my allocated bandwidth?
What happens if I need to cancel my hosting?
What hosting plans do you offer?
What is a Sub Domain?
What is a Web Host?
What is considered excessive usage on our NZ based shared hosting plans?
What is the difference between Linux(UNIX) and Windows Web hosting?
What is your policy on SPAM?
What restrictions are there on hosting my website with you?
What sort of functions and features do you offer?
What support do you offer?
What's the difference between 'Premium' & 'Standard' Hosting Plans?
Where are your web servers located?
Why choose us to be your Hosting Provider?
Why pay to host your website, when I can get hosting for free?
Will I have access to my website statistics?
Will people need to type ‘www’ in the domain to access my site?
Quick-Start Guide to Getting a Website Online
Basically the steps to getting a web site up and running are very simple, and we will guide you through all the steps:
(1) Choose a Domain Name.
Your domain name (eg. www.yourdomain.co.nz) will cost you a small amount every year - this is to keep the domain in your name, and prevent anyone else from registering it. The domain registration fee that you pay for your domain name goes to the domain registrar, and is effectively like a licensing fee, providing you with a license to use a particular domain, for the period you have paid for.
Start your domain search by clicking here...You can also register and pay for your domain name online now, in Real-Time using your credit card.
We strongly recommend that you secure your domain name as soon as possible, to prevent domain speculators registering the domain, and then trying to sell it back to you at an inflated price. You will also be given the opportunity to register your domain name when you join one of your hosting plans in step 2 below. Please note that the domain registration/renewal fee is NOT covered by your Web Hosting fee. You are now able to register and pay for your domain name for up to 10 years in advance!
(2) Sign up to one of our hosting plans through our Joining Page.
Website hosting in simple terms, is the place your store your website where it can then be viewed by anyone on the internet, and you pay us a monthly web hosting fee for this service. For more information on what website hosting is, please click here.
You will NOT need to change your ISP if you host your web site with Lounge Network. Your ISP stands for (Internet Service Provider) and is only the company that you connect to the internet with.
On the Joining Page, you'll be asked for relevant details, including the domain name you want to use with the plan. Within a short time of completing the signup form, you'll be sent an email explaining what you will need to do next, including payment details.
Your hosting space will be setup shortly afterwards, and details of it will be sent to you, with your full account setting allowing you to setup your web site and email with your hosting account. It's very important that you keep this email, and print it off of future reference.
Upon receiving payment for your Website Hosting and Domain Registration, your domain will be registered. Though your domain will be registered almost immediately after payment, 'propagation' means that your site may not be visible for between 6-48 hours. Basically, this occurs because the internet is a big place and it takes time for all parts to become aware that a new site has been added. If you can see the Lounge Network, 'page not found' when you type in your domain name into your internet browser, then your web hosting space is all ready to go, and you can then upload your web site!If you only want to register a domain name through us, but don't require a hosting account at this stage, you can register a domain through our 'Domain Manager' by clicking here.
If you are ready to sign up for web hosting and a domain name, please click the Join Us button on our hosting web site!
(3) Design yourself a web site, or get one designed for you.
Software for designing a web site is readily available from your local computer store, or by downloading it over the internet. Such software includes Adobe Dreamweaver, Microsoft FrontPage, to name but a few. There are also free and low cost web design tools available, which can be found by clicking here. If you want to leave the design of your web site to the professionals, we can help you in getting a professional looking web site up and running. Getting a designer to produce you a web site can be very cost effective, especially with the cost of web design software being in the thousands. You can enquire about getting a web site designed by clicking here.
(4) Upload your web site onto the server.
This is usually done via your standalone FTP software, or your web design softwares inbuilt FTP Client. Free standalone FTP clients that you can use, can be found by clicking here. Full information on how to upload your website to the server can be found by clicking here. cPanel plans do also have an inbuilt FTP program inside the cPanel control panel, although using a proper FTP client is better. If you have got a web designer to build your website, they will upload your website for you.
Switching your website to us, from another provider
Switching to a new host should be a very smooth process, and following the steps below, should allow for an uninterrupted transfer. These steps are applicable to any provider that you are switching your web hosting to.
1. The first step is to choose and then to sign up to your new Web Hosting Plan, by going to our 'Join Us' page. You can find our joining page, by going to our hosting web sites homepage, and clicking on the 'Join Us' button.
2. Once you have done that, and you have received your new hosting account details from us, you will now have two hosting accounts, one with your old provider, and one with us.
At this stage you will now need to upload your entire web site from your old host, to our servers. This can be done by connecting to your old providers FTP server and downloading all the web site files off their server. (You may already have your web sites files stored on your personal computer, so you can skip this step.) Then once you have got a current copy of your web site, you can then connect to our FTP server and upload all your web site files to it.
If you are using databases, you will also need to copy these from your old provider, and then set them up on the new server.
To allow uninterrupted email delivery, you will now also need to setup your email accounts that are currently setup with your old provider,and set these up in the new control panel on our servers. Failure to do this, may mean that once your domain has switched over to our servers, your email may not be able to find it´s delivery address, and your email may end up bouncing back to the sender until the email accounts are setup.
3. Once you have uploaded your web site onto the new server, and setup your email, you are now ready to modify your domain names DNS Settings (Domain Name Server Settings). You would have been provided with your Nameserver settings by us, in the ´Account Information´ Email we sent you. These will be in a similar format to those below.
ns1.nameserver.net.nz
ns2.nameserver.net.nz
To modify your DNS, you will need to visit your Domain Registrars website (eg. the company that you purchased the domain name from) to make the changes. If you purchased your domain name from your old web site host, they may request that you transfer your domain name to another provider in order to make the changes to the DNS, which you may need to do before you are able to modify your domains DNS. If your domain is a .NZ (New Zealand) domain, then you will need to ask them to provide you with your domains UDAI code, to allow you to transfer your domain to another provider.
If you have a .NZ (New Zealand) Domain, you can transfer your domain name to us, and we will handle your future domain renewals. You can transfer your domain to us by using your UDAI code, by visiting our Domain Manager by clicking here.
If you need help with modifying your domains DNS we can help you modify these, if you provide us with the login details and the web site of the registrar for your domain name.
4. Once your DNS modifications have been made with the Registry, you will need to wait between 6-48 hours (maybe longer) before your site will load off our servers. This waiting period is called Domain Propagation, and during this period your DNS is propagating all over the internet. During the propagation period your web site and email will either be loading from your old web host, or from our servers. The time that the Domain Propagation takes is beyond our control.
During the ´Domain Propagation Period´, you should have both your old email accounts, and your new email accounts setup in your email client software (eg Outlook). This is because during this period, your email may get split between your old and new host. You however should not lose any email, as it will be received by either one of the servers.
If your web site has a database that you have also transferred, and this is constantly being written to, we recommend that you temporarily pause the databases during the Domain Propagation to prevent database corruption.
After about 48 hours your web site and email should now only be loading off our servers.
5. Once your web site and email has fully switched over to our servers, it is now safe for you to contact your old web site host, and ask them to cancel your web site hosting account with them.
Important Information When Transferring Your Web Hosting From An ISP:
If you are using an Internet Service Provider (ISP) for your existing Web Hosting, then it is very important that you let them know that you are switching your web hosting to another provider. Your ISP is the company that you connect to the Internet with (either by dial up or broadband), and some of the more popular ISP´s that also provide web hosting are XTRA(Telecom), iHug, Orcon, & Telstra Clear.
If you are transferring your web site from an ISP, you will need to contact them,and request that they remove the "DNS zone record" for your domain name from their network. If this is not done, then your ISP will still have the DNS zone record for your domain name in their system. This means that when you (or anyone else) connects to the internet via this ISP, and tries to visit your web site, or tries to collect your domain based email, it will not work. However if you connect via another ISP on another network, it will work. This is because your ISP network still thinks the domain is hosted with them, so is not able to find the web site or email on the new server. Therefore it is very important that you do ask them to specifically "remove your DNS zone record".
If your ISP is XTRA (Telecom), it is especially important that you contact them to both "remove your DNS zone record" and to cancel your hosting account. From our experience, they can Xtra take a number of days to process any removal. Unfortunately because of this delay with XTRA, it is possible that you may experience some downtime during the web site and email transfer.
Am I able to create customised error pages for my Website?
For most Linux hosting plans, you can. This can usually be setup from within the Hosting Control Panel. For linux plans that don't have a control panel, custom error pages can be setup by setting up a .htaccess file in the home directory of your hosting space.
Are your hosting plans PCI Compliant?
As our web hosting plans are all on shared web hosting servers, they are not PCI Compliant. Virtually all providers offering shared hosting are not PCI Compliant. For PCI compliance you will need either VPS hosting or dedicated web hosting, and it needs to be audited and must comply with PCI compliance requirements. We don't offer any of this. We recommend that if you are accepting credit cards on your website, that you use a third party provider to process those credit cards, such as Paypal or Payment Express / Windcave
Can I also connect to the internet with you? Are you an ISP?
No, we purely specialise in Website Hosting and Domain Registration, and this is where we concentrate all our efforts.
If you also require an ISP, we recommend that you visit the NZ Consumer website at //www.consumer.org.nz/ . This website has a list of ISPs based on your requirements.
Can I have more than one Domain for my website?
Yes, we can set it up so you can have multiple domains pointing towards your website hosting space. Additional Fees may apply.
Can I host my e-mail with you, and my website with another host?
Yes this is possible, by modifying your domain template. It is also possible for you to have your website hosted with us, and all your e-mail pointed onto a separate specialised e-mail server. You can do this by modifying your MX records in the hosting control panel.
Can I password protect certain web pages in my website?
For most hosting plans you can, and this can be setup from within the Hosting Control Panel. This features password protection to webpages located within certain directories within your website.
Most modern content management systems now have this built in.
Can I register my own SSL certificate?
Most of our CPanel based plans now include a free SSL certificate when can be setup inside CPanel. If you require a better certificate, please read below.
To order one of the products, then please send us a support request with the package name, the domain name and also if the certificate is to be installed on a Apache (PHP / Linux ) or IIS (ASP) server.
The following are our current packages:
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Note: All of the prices are GST exclusive. Also, there is a $59.95 + GST charge extra for the installation if the website is hosted on our servers. Payment must be made prior to registration and installation.
All secure certificates require you to have your own dedicated IP address. Depending on the hosting plan you are on, there maybe an additional monthly fee for this. Please contact us for more information.
Can I resell space within my own hosting account?
We do not allow reselling of sub domains within your own hosting space. Your hosting account is licensed to you only. Reselling or Adding your "Friends" web site (e.g. bob.somedomain.co.nz) may lead to an account suspension.
We do not provide reseller hosting plans. Reseller hosting can be unreliable and means that we don't have any control over what websites resellers are setting on the server. This may cause high resource usage and / or can be open to abuse, which then could affect other users on the server. This may cause loading issues or the servers IP to be blacklisted. Reseller hosting plans were popular back when most websites were small and more basic, but these days websites are becoming larger and more and more resource intensive.
Differences between ‘subdomains’, ‘parked domains’, and ‘addon domains’?
With our Premium CPanel hosting plans clients are able to create ‘subdomains’, ‘parked domains’, and ‘addon domains’ inside CPanel.
1. Subdomains
Subdomains are used to create ‘sub’ websites from the accounts main domain name. A subdomain is recognised by a prefix before the primary main domain name, e.g. subdomain.yourdomain.co.nz. The subdomain is linked with a corresponding subdirectory in the account. e.g. subdomain.yourdomain.co.nz would point to the ‘subdomain’ subdirectory.
2. Parked Domains
Parked domain is a domain that is "Parked" on top of the main domain.
Suppose that you have a domain “yourdomain.co.nz” that you are using with your website.
If you want the domain “abcd.com” to serve as an alias for your "yourdomain.co.nz", you would set up abcd.com as a parked domain, and park this onto "yourdomain.co.nz", in CPanel, so that whenever any one opens the “abcd.com” they'll be directed to "yourdomain.co.nz"
3. Addon Domains
Addon domains work in a similar way to Subdomains, but in case of Addons domains, the domain must be already registered by you, and the nameservers for the addon domain should be pointing the same nameservers as the main accounts domain name, before you set it up in CPanel.
Like a Subdomain, the Addon domain is configured to point to subdirectory inside your hosting account, and this is setup inside CPanel. Addon domains are useful where you manage several websites, and you want to manage them all under the single account.
An addon domain is viewable by your visitors as a normal domain but you have the ability of managing multiple websites within one control panel.
Do I have access to update my site 24 hours a day?
Yes you will!, You have access to your site, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
There however may be certain times that some services maybe unavailable due to server maintenance or software upgrades, which is perfectly normal. Aso they maybe times when they aren't available due to issues beyond our control.
Do you allow me to host CGI Scripts in my hosting space? What is CGI?
Yes we do. Some Hosting Control Panels also come with preconfigured CGI scripts that can be installed directly from the Control Panel interface.
CGI is short for Common Gateway Interface. A CGI script will run programs on your web server that use the Common Gateway Interface, a method of sending form data from a web page to an external program for processing.
To use CGI scripts you must have CGI access, which Lounge Network provides. When looking for a website Host having CGI access is essential for extra website functionality. However if your website is hosted by the same ISP that you get your Internet access from, you may find that your ISP may not be too supportive of you using CGI scripts in your website. This is due to the hassle of setting it all up, and the potential security problems due to badly written CGI scripts. Also your ISP may charge you an extra fee to upload your CGI script. Usually CGI scripts are located in the cgi-bin subfolder, if you have a cgi-bin subfolder you more than likely do have CGI access.
Do you allow modification of file/folder permissions via FTPs CHMOD?
Yes, our Linux plans do. Windows hosting plans don't, so you must request us to change permissions on files/folders for windows hosting plans.
Do you allow Telnet / SSH / Shell access?
Lounge Network enforces a strict "No SSH" policy, across ALL shared web hosting plans. This includes Telnet, SSH, & Shell access. This is now a standard policy of most quality web hosting providers in New Zealand. By having a "No SSH" policy, gives all of our clients the extra peace of mind in knowing that other clients on your server, do not have command line access to the server. This makes our hosting more secure, and less prone to exploits.
Most tasks that you use SSH for, can be accomplished using features in the hosting control panel, and using FTP. If you are on a CPanel hosting plan you can also use FTP over SSL.
If may also be possible to execute a shell script, by setting up a cron job in your control panel, with the commend. Just make sure you delete the cron, after you have finished with it.
Please note, the we will also instantly suspend any account that uses a script which can be used to elevate privileges or enable SSH services. In the event that this occurs no refund will be payable to the account holder or payee.
Do you have a Shopping Cart that I can use for my website?
Our cPanel Web Hosting Plans come with a few very advanced shopping carts, which are fully customisable and can be integrated into your existing website. These carts are called 'OS Commerce' & 'Zen Cart' which can be setup within the cPanel console. Please note that we don't provide any support for these shopping carts. Support can be sourced from the developers website. Full information on how to set it up, is available in the cPanel console. These shopping carts can also be setup on our other linux hosting plans, but users need to set it up manually using the developers installation instructions.
If you are just starting out in the e-commerce world, but don't require a fully featured Online Shop, we can also point you towards you onto a very good, simple and free shopping cart with full SSL credit card encryption. Please contact us for more information on how we can setup a Shopping Cart for your website.
Do you have a web based console, that allows me to manage my hosting?
Yes most of our hosting plans now have access to an advanced Website Hosting Control Panel. These control panels allow you to manage almost all aspects of your webhosting, email, database and FTP accounts.
You will be able to find more information on our Control Panels by visiting our hosting website.
Do you offer free trials or a initial moneyback guarantee?
Sorry we don't. This is mainly for security, as hackers could potentially signup to our services, and abuse our networks. Also as we setup all accounts manually for security reasons, there is a labour cost involved in us setting up accounts, and allocating resources.
It is very rare for a client to signup to our services, and then decide that our hosting isn't suitable, as our hosting is compatible with most websites. As web hosting is a relatively low cost service, there is no real risk in signing up to our services, and then quickly discovering that our services aren't suitable, as the most money you will be out of pocket by, is a month plus a pro-rata month of hosting fees.
Do you offer IMAP access?
Yes our Corporate and Business Class Hosting Plans do support IMAP access.
If you are on one of these plans, you can connect to imap.domain.tld where domain.tld is your domain name. If that does not work, you can use imap.mydns.net.nz
Our cPanel plans also support IMAP, and you can connect using mail.yourdomain.co.nz (replace yourdomain.co.nz with your domain name.)
Do you provide standalone DNS servers?
Yes, we provide DNS server hosting for $60+GST per year. Please contact us is you want to set this up.
Do you support Microsoft Frontpage™?
The servers no longer support MS Frontpage™ extensions.
Microsoft Frontpage Extensions have reached their End Of Life (EOL)
During mid 2006 Microsoft announced that they discontinued the development of Microsoft FrontPage and server extensions, and will cease supporting it, due to it having reached the end of it's economical life.
Since 2006, we have continued to support FrontPage Extensions to clients, however as Microsoft no longer provides any security updates for the extensions, FrontPage extensions potentially could pose a security threat to the servers. Therefore we are announcing that FrontPage extensions on our Network have reached the end of their life as of 17/12/2008. Most hosting providers have already ceased supporting and providing FrontPage extensions, and we are one of the last to still provide them. The servers will continue to support FrontPage extensions for the time being, but Frontpage extensions could be withdrawn at any time in the future without further announcement, and we will no longer be offering any technical support for FrontPage extensions if you are having trouble with them. If you do use Microsoft FrontPage, you can instead upload your website without FrontPage extensions by using FTP, which will continue to be supported.
Do your Control Panels have phpmyadmin?
Yes they do. This allows you to manage your databases with ease, and can be accessed from within the hosting Control Panel.
Do your email accounts have SMTP?
Most hosting includes both POP, IMAP and SMTP.
Some of our New Zealand based hosting only uses POP and doesn't have SMTP, so you will need to use your ISPs SMTP settings for sending email.
Please note that some ISP's are now blocking third party SMTP connections, due to spam, so you may be forced to use your ISP's SMTP server to send all your email.
How come your website hosting prices are so cheap?
Our website hosting prices are cheaper than our competitors for a number of reasons:
As we are a small New Zealand company, we have managed to keep our overheads down, which we have passed onto our customers by offering excellent feature rich website hosting at the cheapest price possible.
In addition to our free online knowledge base we have an excellent technical email helpdesk, thus eliminating the need for a call centre.
When we setup this company, we saw a gap in the New Zealand market for providing web hosting plans, with large amounts of diskspace and a control panel, at an affordable price. Since setting up the company, we have added many other features to our hosting plans, making them some of the most ‘feature rich’ web hosting plans available in New Zealand.
How easy is it to switch my Website Host over to you?
In most cases, switching your website over to us is relatively simple.
Please read what is involved with switching your website, by clicking here.
How long does it all take to switch my Existing Website over to you?
The time varies depending on your domain name extension. If you are switching a .NZ address, switching will usually take less than a day. Switching a .COM address can take a couple of days to switch over.
The delay is due to registry delays in updating databases, and propagation, which are beyond our control and is the same for all ISPs and website hosts.
How long does it take for you to setup my account?
Your account will normally be setup within just a few hours within normal business hours, depending on our workload. For security we setup all hosting account manually, to minimise the risk of scammers or spammers using our hosting. You'll then be emailed your hosting account details, and what you are required to pay. Upon receiving this email, you will be able to access your hosting account, and upload your website straightaway.
Note: If you are also registering a domain name, we won't be able to process your registration until we have received confirmation of payment, however you will still be able to access your hosting account. If you are signing up to our Corporate or Business Class Web Plans, we won't be able to setup your hosting account until we have received payment.
How many websites can I have with my hosting plan?
This depends on the hosting plan you are on. We normally allow one website per hosting plan. You can however have multiple domain names pointing or redirecting towards your websites diskspace. You can also have domain names attaching to your hosting plan. (additional fees may apply depending on your hosting plan).
If you are wanting to host multiple websites with us, please contact us.
Any attempt to host more than one website per hosting plan, by using code or any other method to bypass the servers website quota system, may see your hosting account terminated without notice or refund.
How much bandwidth is 10 GB, approx 10,000MB?
As a rough guideline, 10GB data transfer is approximately equal to 80,000 - 100,000 visitors/month. This of course varies depending on the amount of pages each of your visitors views, and if they are downloading files or images through your website.
How much hosting space is 1000 MB?
As a rough guideline, 1000MB disk space is approximately equal to 10,000 website pages. This of course varies depending on the amount of information on your pages, and the size of your images.
How reliable are your servers?
Over the last 20 years of providing web hosting services, our upstream providers servers have proven to be very reliable. We take the reliability of our servers very seriously, and take great care to ensure that we choose upstream providers with high reliability and support for us. If hardware, software, or network issues occur, the data centre technicians will make sure that the servers are back up and running as soon as possible.
I have found cheaper hosting services elsewhere, will you match their price?
There are always companies who will undercut on price, and often cheaper hosting is far lower spec, and can be unreliable and overloaded, with minimal or no backups, and poor quality support. So hosting should never be chosen on pricing alone, as all hosting is different, and you maybe comparing the pricing of a A-Grade host with a D-grade one. Our Premium hosting plans are considered to be business grade premium quality hosting, and comparing our hosting services with other cheap providers in the market, our hosting is far superior. As with everything, you do get what you pay for. So if you pay peanuts, you tend to get monkeys.
The following features come as standard on all premium plans. These are features most cheap hosts don’t offer.
On our Premium CPanel plans we offer the following features as standard:
- Daily, weekly and monthly backups to local backup storage (Premium CPanel servers).
- Remote disaster recovery backups. These are incremental backups that occur every 4 hours. This would prevent for any type of disaster at the webserver, such as complete wipeout of a site, and it's backups. This would be useful in case a hacker was ever able to take down all data on a server.
- Host an unlimited number of websites in your hosting account.
- 100% NZ owned and 100% NZ based support from a company who has been operating for over 12 years
Our Business and Corporate Hosting Plans are hosted in a server cluster where different services are split between different servers. Therefore should one service go down, such as an email server, other services such as your website will continue to operate whist the email service is being worked on. We are only one of a few providers in NZ who provide this sort of cluster hosting, and it is a lot more expensive for us to provide.
It is often false economy to use cheap hosting if your website suffers from a lot of downtime, slow loading due to the servers being overloaded, or you have emails that go missing, as the loss of business and time would far exceed any savings a company may make using a cheaper grade of hosting. Also the quality of support from many of the cheap hosts is very poor, and many of the businesses who switch to using our services, have switched from a cheap hosting provider who either has very poor service, or lots of website and email downtime. Therefore we don’t try to compete with the lowest price providers, because either support or server reliability will suffer if costs were cut, and we don’t want unhappy clients who are constantly contacting us to complain about performance problems with their website or email. Thus we have invested in a reliable premium network and NZ based staff with many years of experience. Many of the cheap hosts use staff who just follow flow charts, and have little technical knowledge themselves, which ends up being very frustrating for the customer if they can’t get the problem initially identified, and then resolved quickly.
As we have been operating since 2001, our business model and pricing has proven to be sustainable over the long term, and NZ companies use us, because we offer superior reliability and support that many other companies simply don’t provide. Many of the low cost companies only tend to last a few years before they disappear, or they have to put up their pricing.
We do also have a full network status page which discusses any issues or upcoming maintenance at www.status.loungenetwork.co.nz/ . Many cheap hosts don’t have any form of status page so you don’t know when they are having problems or when their scheduled maintenance is. Many have so many problems that they don't want you to know of all the outages they have, so outages don't get reported on a status page. We believe in being upfront and honest about all network issues.
If you aren't already convinced about the quality of our Premium hosting plans, more information about why our Premium Hosting is 'better' can be found at www.loungenetwork.co.nz/why-our-premium-web-hosting-plans-are-better/
If I join a hosting plan, do I have to register a domain through you too?
You will need a domain name to use your hosting plan, however you are free to choose any company to register your domain name through. The advantages of using us, is that we have very good prices for domain registration, and you will be dealing with a single point of contact for billing and administration for both your domain name and web site hosting. Also if there are issues with your hosting, it can be easier and quicker to see what the issue is, especially if the issue is related to your domain name and it's settings.
Is email included in my accounts diskspace quota?
For hosting plans that use the CPanel control panel, the email for your account is included in your accounts overall diskspace quota.
For our Corporate and Business Class Web Plans, there is also a quota, but this is separate from the web hosting quota. There is a 8MB maximum attachment size, that can be accepted by the email server.
Our providers do reserve the right to delete any email that is 30 days or older, from the server, therefore clients must regularly download their email from the server to their own computer.
For other hosting plans that don't have a control panel, each mailbox will have 100MB of diskspace, and our providers do reserve the right to delete any email that is 30 days or older, from the server, therefore clients must regularly download their email from the server to their own computer.
My computer is Windows or I own an Apple Mac, can I use Linux hosting?
Absolutely. People often get confused over this. You can interact with Linux servers using any computer operating system, including Apple Macs. All you need is a recent copy of Internet explorer, or similar web browser. You can also upload your website and check your email etc with the appropriate software, no matter what computer operating system you use.
What are the addresses of your Primary and Secondary Name Servers?
You are able to view these details by going to our TECHNICAL DETAILS SECTION.
What happens if I exceed my allocated bandwidth?
Our CPanel hosting plans have bandwidth quotas that will suspend the account when the monthly bandwidth quota is exceeded. This is done automatically by the server if it sees that you have exceeded your bandwidth quota. Bandwidth usage is checked once a day by the server.
You will then have the choice to upgrade your hosting plan to the next size up. We recommend that you keep an eye on your bandwidth use to make sure that it doesn't run out. If you are getting close to exceeding your bandwidth allocation, please contact us to upgrade your hosting plan.
Please note that CPanel only measures http,ftp and pop traffic . If you are doing traffic on other ports it will not appear in CPanel.
For clients on our Corporate and Business class hosting plans, they will be charged for any usage over the allocated quota.
What happens if I need to cancel my hosting?
To cancel your hosting account, you must fill in our Hosting Account Cancellation Form, which can be found by clicking here.
Failure to cancel your hosting form by filling in this form, will mean that your hosting account will remain active, and you will continue to be billed for your web site hosting.
What hosting plans do you offer?
We have a wide range of different hosting plan options, on both Linux and Windows servers. Please view the homepage of our hosting website, for a list of our hosting plans. Or please email us for your web hosting requirements.
What is a Sub Domain?
A subdomain is a website address that resides under your top-level domain name, but behaves like an independent domain.
eg. www.matt.mysite.com or www.sally.mysite.com, are both subdomains of www.mysite.com.
Setting up subdomains are like having multiple domain names, without the additional cost of registering additional domain names.
Currently only clients using the CPanel Hosting Control Panel are able to setup subdomains, and these can be setup from within CPanel.
What is a Web Host?
Web Hosts store websites on specially customised computers called Web Servers, that are permanently connected to the Internet via a ultra high-speed connection.
Using a Website Host with a reliable Web server has proven to be more cost effective, and provides more security and protection for most small to medium organisations, than running your own web server. It can also provide the technical expertise that many businesses need. This is why many businesses choose a professional Web Hosting Provider such as us, to look after their Website hosting requirements.
Outsourcing web hosting makes sense for the same reason as outsourcing any other service, it reduces hassle. It allows you to concentrate on your core business rather than re-train or upskill on technical issues associated with web hosting.
If you were to run a web-server yourself, you would need a Fast Computer, High-speed Internet Access, Technical Knowledge of Server Software and Operating Systems, Regular Maintenance, Performance Monitoring and Security Protection from hackers.
Outsourcing your web hosting reduces your risk and is ‘scalable’ – meaning you can buy more web hosting capacity as needed, as your company grows.
As New Zealanders, we are among the world leaders in being Internet ready, with 2 million New Zealanders who are regular Internet users. More than 50% of all households in New Zealand also have internet access. This means your current and future customers could be looking for your website right now!.
Website hosting means you can:
- Be open for business 24 hours a day, seven days a week to reach and serve customers in New Zealand and around the world
- Beat the competition
- Grow... New Zealand businesses with websites grew 100% in 2000
- Serve your local customers so they don’t look overseas. In 2000 65% of New Zealand online sales were to overseas companies
- Provide information such as a company overview; product specifications or photos; a map showing your shop locations and parking; sound or video clips on your people, company or your products; and industry news
- Sell online - New Zealanders purchased $324 million over the Internet in 2000.
Whatever your business, you can use a website to provide a better service and so grow your customer base.
What is considered excessive usage on our NZ based shared hosting plans?
What happened to unmetered?
There are always a very small number of shared hosting customers (less than 1%) whose resource use would be considered 'excessive' for the shared plan that they are on. To ensure that your website is never affected by the 1% we have moved away from unmetered and implemented shared hosting quotas.
If you are one of the 99%
The new quotas were set at limits that will affect less than 1% of existing customers, so if you are one of the 99% - you won't be affected in the slightest, that's our guarantee. Quotas will only affect the 1% of customers who fall outside of what's considered fair use.
If you feel that your use falls outside of the shared hosting quotas, then shared hosting probably isn't for you. Contact us today for an effective hosting solution better suited to your needs.
What are examples of excessive usage on the shared hosting platform?
Examples of excessive usage include, but are not limited to...
- Using your web site storage space to back-up large quantities of files, often unrelated to your website.
- Using large amounts of bandwidth due to streaming large amounts of video / audio, hosting files for other sites.
- Setup one web site, then setup dozens of email accounts for other domains.
- You start using large amounts of bandwidth hosting files for other websites.
We have an ongoing commitment to investing in the NZ hosting network.
At the Lounge Network, we make an ongoing commitment to investing in resource and technology that ensures our servers run at optimal performance & availability – and most importantly – keeps your website or app running smoothly. Recently this has included;
- a complete overhaul of the shared hosting architecture at the Vocus Datacentre in Auckland, including upgrading all front-end servers and SATA drives to HP hardware,
- the implementation of MySQL Governor to regulate usage and prevent a site from affecting others when it requires additional resource,
- over $70,000 and 1000 hours of development/engineering time into upgrading mail systems and storage, providing you with a significantly more robust service.
What is the difference between Linux(UNIX) and Windows Web hosting?
For all intents and purposes they both accomplish the same task .. that of serving your web pages to the world.
We are able to host Linux websites on all of our webhosting plans. We can also host Windows websites, with our Corporate and Business Class Web Hosting Plans.
What is your policy on SPAM?
We will in no shape or form tolerate spamming of any kind. Click here to read our Full Spam And Unsolicited Email Policy.
What restrictions are there on hosting my website with you?
We have very few restrictions on our hosting services.
We will not host any illegal, adult content or warez websites. If your website is found to breach our terms and conditions, we will ask you to remedy the problem, otherwise your web hosting account will be terminated.
Also we ask that all the files that you upload onto our servers, are linked to a webpage, or can be proven to be directly associated with your website. This prevents software that could potentially harm our servers, from being uploaded.
For full terms and conditions for hosting your website with us, please click here.
What sort of functions and features do you offer?
All hosting plans come with a huge range of features.
Our cPanel Hosting plans also come with Fantastico, which offers a wide range of open source software that you can use on your website. This software includes Forums, Shopping Cart, photo galleries, etc.
A full list of features for each hosting plan can be viewed by selecting the hosting plan on the homepage of our hosting website.
What support do you offer?
Our servers are monitored 24 / 7, 365 days a year, by professional technicians at the datacentre.
All hosting plans have comprehensive documentation that can be accessed from within your hosting control panel. We also offer video tutorials for CPanel hosting plans . Online Support is given for server and server related issues only, and not for web design of website script issues, which are the responsibility of the websites developer.
We also have comprehensive instructions, with illustrated 'Step by Step' instructions in our Knowledge Base, showing you how to use your web hosting plan and setup your email software.
If you need additional help, you can email us via the support form in your hosting control panel. Emails are answered during normal business hours Monday to Fridays, and there is also limited after hours support in the weekends and after hours. Often emails will be answered within a few hours during normal business hours, however during high demand this maybe longer. All support is best effort and there is no guaranteed response time.You can contact us by using the support form in your hosting control panel, or going to our support site here. Please note that being a 100% online company, we do not provide technical support via the telephone and never have.
What's the difference between 'Premium' & 'Standard' Hosting Plans?
Although on the surface there doesn't appear to be much difference between 'Premium' Hosting Plans and 'Standard' Hosting Plans, the difference is in the backend. We recommend our Premium Hosting plans for business users, and our Standard Hosting plans for personal use.
Premium hosting plans have higher quality upstream providers, and potentially better redundancy, which is needed for business. For example our Premium CPanel plans have monthly backups, weekly backups and daily backups, as well as offsite backups, which is a lot of backing up and requires a lot of additional diskspace. However our standard hosting plans will only have either 'weekly' backups, or daily backups, depending on the server you are on. Usually it will be weekly backups. However any backups are always the responsibility of the client, so any backups we do should not be relied upon, and we don't take any responsibility of backups and loss of data
Where are your web servers located?
Both our Corporate and Business Class Hosting Plans, are housed in datacentres in Australasia.
All web hosting plans that use the cPanel branded control panel, are housed in datacentres in the USA.
Most other hosting plans are housed in the Orcon datacentre in New Zealand.
Please also refer to the hosting website that you are on, or email us if you are unsure or need further clarification.
Why choose us to be your Hosting Provider?
We have been hosting NZ websites for over 20 years, with a huge amount of experience. We have a wide range of very simple and affordable hosting plans for you to choose from, or we can customise a plan to suit your web hosting requirements. Our hosting network uses servers located in datacentres in Australasia and the United States of America.
With Lounge Network, you also get personalised service. To us you aren't just a number, you are a real person!
Lounge Network is 100% New Zealand owned and operated, and has been providing hosting services since 1998.
Our pricing plans are some of the best in the New Zealand webhosting market, and we believe that we offer one of the best value hosting options in New Zealand. Infact if you find a New Zealand Website Hosting Company, offering hosting for less, with the same features, than what we are offering it for, we will try our best to match or better the deal.
Lounge Network utilises the latest proven software technology and the most advanced purpose-built hardware, all resulting in extremely fast website servers for hosting your websites on. We also provide the highest level of support to our clients, and assure that our services are always of the highest standard.
Why pay to host your website, when I can get hosting for free?
When you have a website, your website host is one of your most important Internet partners after your ISP.
Here are a few reasons why we are the host for you:
(1) Australasia based web server network - Our Corporate and Business Class Hosting Plans use servers based in Australasia, for fast website and email loading. All cPanel plans are hosted in the USA on high performance web servers.
(2) Better connectivity - this means your website will load very quickly.
(3) Professionalism - Hosting with us means that you don't have to have any pop up windows or on-site advertisements. Your web space is 100% YOURS when you host with us.
(4) Enhanced security - our servers are protected by powerful firewalls for the security of your data.
(5) Sophisticated hosting options - our services include a wide variety of features, and are enormously flexible.
(6) Superior customer service - we're here to answer any questions that you may have about your hosting account.
(7) 100% New Zealand owned - Hosting with a NZ web hosting company, means that you will be communicating with people in your timezone, and you are contributing to the New Zealand economy.
Will I have access to my website statistics?
All of our hosting packages have access to detailed web statistics. These can be accessed from the Hosting Control Panel, or via the link you have been provided with.
Please note that if you are using the CPanel Control Panel, and you go over your diskspace or bandwidth quota, the statistics software will have nowhere to write to, so they will stop recording until your statistics. If this occurs, you will either need to reduce your diskspace usage, or upgrade your hosting plan.
Will people need to type ‘www’ in the domain to access my site?
No, they won't have to. If your site is hosted with us, typing in either 'yourwebsite.co.nz' or 'www.yourwebsite.co.nz' can be used to access your site.
There are many hosting providers (mainly ISP's who also provide hosting) that don't provide this feature, which means unless visitors type in www in front of the domain name, the website won't display!
Therefore this is very important when looking for a website host, as many people don't bother typing www in front of the URL these days.