Tell HN: I can no longer support Protonmail
I often say you can tell how good a service is by judging how easy they make it to part ways. By that measure, Protonmail is a terrible service. Allow me to explain since those are harsh words for a privacy-focused email provider.
After being with them on a paid supporter (privacy first) plan for years, I finally decided to take the plunge and try their business account.
This was a big, big mistake.
From purely a business services standpoint, they are not up to par. For starters, they lack basic forwarding. I don't understand how you cannot do basic forwarding even if you do end-to-end encryption. Fastmail does it, why can't Proton? Anyway, after discovering all the shortcomings of the business plan, i finally threw the towel and decided to discontinue the service. I then decided to import my proton file into fastmail. Move my domains. Hard work, all done.
Here is the part where Protonmail's reputation went down the toilet.
After removing domains and users from protonmail, the subscription was telling me I could NOT downgrade because I was over the 1GB limit. This was because, all those freebie GBs you accumulated during promos, are now gone!
Yes, stupid customer! For trying to support us, and upgrade from the basic personal service. We now penalize you and take what you had rightfully earned! All those years of personal paid plans mean nothing. Gone!
Anyway, I am a determined customer to downgrade, so I start deleting personal pictures to hit < 1GB quota.
But Proton hasn't had its last laugh. "Your storage in use is above the 1GB quota for premium accounts". I can't downgrade, again! What?
So I write to customer service. Something about being sorry. NO downgrade happens. Nothing really happens.
I finally get fed up with the service enough that I swap CCs and call it a day.
Now, this is where the store would normally end. However, I now realize I cant access the proton free account without paying a $7 bill. And I need access because I forgot to redirect 1 critical 2FA away from proton free userID. So my 2FA is held in ransom of my CC, because I can't self downgrade.
Protonmail - You had a huge advocate here. You have lost me forever and I will never recommend Proton to anyone.
Learning: Never upgrade to a paid service using a free account you have been using for years. Commingling free use with paid use puts your free use in jeopardy. The moment you decide to stop paying, you will lose everything.