Webupon

1. Don’t look at price only. If you pick the lowest price, you might end up without a website six months from now.

2. Make sure they provide 24/7 support. Contact them on a Sunday, see how long they take to reply

3. Do a Ping test to see how fast their servers react. You can do this for free at http://www.centralops.net

4. Use the same URL as above to check how long they have been in existence. Beware of fly-by-nights.

5. Ask them how many servers they have. Don’t go for the very big ones – for them you are only a number. Don’t go for the very small ones – they might disappear overnight.

6. Make sure they provide all the services you will need for the foreseeable future. For example PHP, MySQL databases, web stats, webmail, a control panel to set up your own email accounts.

7. Do a Google search on their company name. See what people write about them on the hosting forums.

8. If they claim to offer “unlimited space” or “unlimited bandwidth” accounts, stay away! No such thing exists in the real world. They are overselling, and if you really need high bandwidth or space, they will find an excuse in the fine print to throw you off the server.

9. Check the fine print to see how much they charge for excess disk space and bandwidth. Don’t end up with a nasty surprise!

10. Make sure they offer a secure server for payments. Never enter your credit card details on a unsecured page. Look out for the yellow security lock at the bottom of your browser indicating you are at a secure page.