Increased Enhanced quota

robmueller · 16 Oct 2007, 08:32 PM

As noted by others, there's been an increase to the Enhanced quota. The email quota is now 6G and the file quota is now 2G. I had planned to announce this as it was happening, but got bogged down debugging some unrelated issues.

Unfortunately there will be an increased cost with this. We are planning to increase the cost of Enhanced accounts from $40/y to $50/y. However we will be keeping the cost of accounts to $40/y (really $40 first year + $30/y for subsequent years if a multi-year renewal) at least until the end of November so anyone who upgrades or renews during this time will get the old price for up to a 5 year renewal. Of course I'll announce the details on the blog soon and in a newsletter.

For Full users, we've increased the file storage to 100M from 30M, which is a bit more useable than it was. We are not however planning on changing the cost or email storage available to Full accounts. From our analysis and feedback, we believe that the Full account currently sits at an good price point with regard to features and storage for the majority of email users.

Rob

purzel · 16 Oct 2007, 09:20 PM

Still a very reasonable price, considering all the usefull features the web interface offers. This morning I bought something priced in Dollar with PayPal and got 1.38543 Dollar for a Euro. I will surely renew.

Actually the enhanced plan ahould be called "full" because you get full access to all features with it. Enhancements are the extra features (bandwidth etc.) one can buy. Full should be called "extended" or something like that.

sflorack · 16 Oct 2007, 09:51 PM

Woot! Was going to buy another GB yesterday, glad I waited.

FM has been superb lately, excellent job!

nighthawk700 · 16 Oct 2007, 10:02 PM

Hmmm, you are really twisting my arm on the Enhanced level of service (I'm still at Full). I've been trying to figure out if I want it or not. I own a few domain names, although I'm still also fine with my @fastmail address. And I've been able to keep my e-mail at about 40-50% of storage space. But I really could use a few more personalities. Now with the price increase on the way... You guys are cruel!

**ReuvenNY** · 16 Oct 2007, 10:25 PM

I am not very enthusiastic about all those changes. A 25% increase in price is very substantial. Sure, more space is always welcome, but for many people like me, who never got close to the limits of bandwidth and storage it's a pure price increase.
I would rather see a new tier, called "Super Enhanced" for $50 a year, and have FM leave in place the Enhanced at $40 a year. If the vast majority will choose to remain at "Enhanced", that will be a proof that this "improvement" is a simple price increase.
If however the majority will switch to "Super Enhanced", then Fastmail will accomplish what they intended to do and everyone will be happy. The name of the game is choice!

NJSS · 16 Oct 2007, 10:39 PM

As an Enhanced User I was pleased to see the email quota increase to 6Gb, but disappointed that the file quota has only increased to 2G.

Up until now Enhanced Users had a file quota of 50% of the e-mail quota - could this relationship please be restored, or has previously been suggested could users manage the partitioning of the storage between file and email quota themselves, or better still simply have a single pool of combined file and email storage?

David · 16 Oct 2007, 11:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ReuvenNY

I am not very enthusiastic about all those changes. A 25% increase in price is very substantial. Sure, more space is always welcome, but for many people like me, who never got close to the limits of bandwidth and storage it's a pure price increase.

I agree with your synopsis ReuvenNY. Looking back a year or two, one can see Fastmail's long term planning regarding this. When they removed the ability of full account holders to host their own domain names likely they had this in mind. If they had left this ability in place many Enhanced users would have been able to drop down to full and avoid it.

FMRocks · 17 Oct 2007, 01:16 AM

For me, the change is a welcome one, even though I don't end up using a whole lot of disk space. But now that the quota has gone up to 6GB and the price to $50, I think what I will be doing is go to a Gmail model and never really delete my emails. I also will be using the FM file storage a lot more. File storage mobility is important to me, and this increase helps. Recently I have also been using the web interface mostly - as much as I love Thunderbird, it seemed to be a waste of hard disk space given the massive amounts of web storage.

Rueven, your concerns are valid, but I wonder if the price increase is not at least partially influenced by the weakening US dollar against major world currencies, and the FM guys having to make a living outside of the US...

Rob, I know that you said that you will be keeping the price to $40 a year. My question is this: my current subscription does not expire until August of 2008. If I extend my subscription now, for say, a year or 2, would I be getting the current pricing (i.e. $40 first year and $30 the second year of extension)?

sflorack · 17 Oct 2007, 01:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FMRocks

If I extend my subscription now, for say, a year or 2, would I be getting the current pricing?

Quote:

Originally Posted by robmueller

so anyone who upgrades or renews during this time will get the old price for up to a 5 year renewal

..................

FMRocks · 17 Oct 2007, 02:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sflorack

..................

Oh, right. I should have... umm... read. :-)

Ken7 · 17 Oct 2007, 03:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ReuvenNY

I am not very enthusiastic about all those changes. A 25% increase in price is very substantial. Sure, more space is always welcome, but for many people like me, who never got close to the limits of bandwidth and storage it's a pure price increase.
I would rather see a new tier, called "Super Enhanced" for $50 a year, and have FM leave in place the Enhanced at $40 a year. If the vast majority will choose to remain at "Enhanced", that will be a proof that this "improvement" is a simple price increase.
If however the majority will switch to "Super Enhanced", then Fastmail will accomplish what they intended to do and everyone will be happy. The name of the game is choice!

I strongly feel the same way!!!

beq · 17 Oct 2007, 04:49 AM

Very nice, now I have a 12GB email quota (and several gigs bandwidth)

My mailbox content is only at 1.4GB though, due to my using a pre-Outlook 2007 IMAP PST file that's limited to 2GB (I've had to keep archiving old mail locally so Outlook won't stop downloading new mail).

Can't wait to re-synchronize my FM IMAP account into a new Unicode PST file without the 2GB limit. I've just been too lazy to reconfigure all my MAPILab/Sperry Outlook add-ins again.

Though I'd just as soon ditch Outlook for emailing if I can get a better HTML compose in the FM webmail (which is otherwise amazing).

ewal · 17 Oct 2007, 07:33 AM

Good move Fastmail, Thanks! That should certainly get the competition and media looking at Fastmail afresh.

Not that I will be needing such an enormous amount of email space soon, but welcome nevertheless. Also thanks for the tip that the price increase not being implemented until November some time. I will be extending my subscription.

However I do wonder how all this will fit into the new Small Business / Home Office project you will be launching shortly. I will probably be one that will jump on that once you launch, however how will the Enhanced pricing on soloist accounts work with regard to the multi-account plan? Will there be some sort of trade off or incentive for enhanced users?

Ed

ChinaLamb · 17 Oct 2007, 10:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ReuvenNY

A 25% increase in price is very substantial.

Two ways to look at this. Fastmail is a foreign company and losing out with the value of the dollar.

My personal 2c. I would pay 49.95; however, I suspect Fastmail will probably lose customers over a 25% increase.

Fastmail is losing out on the exchange rate. If they begin pricing in Australia dollars, or Euros, they could weather the fluctuations in the USD better (although there is reason to believe the USD will rebound a little in 2008 - if you disagree - I will NOT get into an economic discussion - this is about Fastmail...)

The down side is that US customers do not like paying for things in other currencies and probably think of Fastmail as a US company. Both of these reasons may lead them to lose US customers...

Another option that may be "psycologically easier" on the customers is to raise it 12% now, to $45 and then another 12% at the end of 2008.

Then again, Fastmail needs to evaluate how many customers would leave, and what they would gain by the price increase. Fastmail customers seem to be fairly loyal.

/cl

**ReuvenNY** · 17 Oct 2007, 10:59 AM

While they are an Australian company and have payroll etc. in AU dollars, most of their infrastructure is in the USA, and is being paid in US dollars... I believe that that is the majority of their costs. lets not forget that.

16 Oct 2007, 08:32 PM	#1
robmueller Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: Melbourne, Australia Posts: 6,102 Representative of: Fastmail.FM	Increased Enhanced quota As noted by others, there's been an increase to the Enhanced quota. The email quota is now 6G and the file quota is now 2G. I had planned to announce this as it was happening, but got bogged down debugging some unrelated issues. Unfortunately there will be an increased cost with this. We are planning to increase the cost of Enhanced accounts from $40/y to $50/y. However we will be keeping the cost of accounts to $40/y (really $40 first year + $30/y for subsequent years if a multi-year renewal) at least until the end of November so anyone who upgrades or renews during this time will get the old price for up to a 5 year renewal. Of course I'll announce the details on the blog soon and in a newsletter. For Full users, we've increased the file storage to 100M from 30M, which is a bit more useable than it was. We are not however planning on changing the cost or email storage available to Full accounts. From our analysis and feedback, we believe that the Full account currently sits at an good price point with regard to features and storage for the majority of email users. Rob

16 Oct 2007, 10:39 PM	#6
NJSS Master of the @ Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Hampshire, UK Posts: 1,238	More File Storage - please As an Enhanced User I was pleased to see the email quota increase to 6Gb, but disappointed that the file quota has only increased to 2G. Up until now Enhanced Users had a file quota of 50% of the e-mail quota - could this relationship please be restored, or has previously been suggested could users manage the partitioning of the storage between file and email quota themselves, or better still simply have a single pool of combined file and email storage?

17 Oct 2007, 10:59 AM	#15
ReuvenNY Moderator Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: New York Posts: 4,259	While they are an Australian company and have payroll etc. in AU dollars, most of their infrastructure is in the USA, and is being paid in US dollars... I believe that that is the majority of their costs. lets not forget that. Last edited by ReuvenNY : 17 Oct 2007 at 12:47 PM.

16 Oct 2007, 09:20 PM	#2
purzel Senior Member Join Date: Mar 2007 Posts: 127	Still a very reasonable price, considering all the usefull features the web interface offers. This morning I bought something priced in Dollar with PayPal and got 1.38543 Dollar for a Euro. I will surely renew. Actually the enhanced plan ahould be called "full" because you get full access to all features with it. Enhancements are the extra features (bandwidth etc.) one can buy. Full should be called "extended" or something like that.

16 Oct 2007, 09:51 PM	#3
sflorack The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Feb 2002 Posts: 2,937	Woot! Was going to buy another GB yesterday, glad I waited. FM has been superb lately, excellent job!

16 Oct 2007, 10:02 PM	#4
nighthawk700 Essential Contributor Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: Baltimore, MD Suburbs (US) Posts: 237	Hmmm, you are really twisting my arm on the Enhanced level of service (I'm still at Full). I've been trying to figure out if I want it or not. I own a few domain names, although I'm still also fine with my @fastmail address. And I've been able to keep my e-mail at about 40-50% of storage space. But I really could use a few more personalities. Now with the price increase on the way... You guys are cruel!

16 Oct 2007, 10:25 PM	#5
ReuvenNY Moderator Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: New York Posts: 4,259	I am not very enthusiastic about all those changes. A 25% increase in price is very substantial. Sure, more space is always welcome, but for many people like me, who never got close to the limits of bandwidth and storage it's a pure price increase. I would rather see a new tier, called "Super Enhanced" for $50 a year, and have FM leave in place the Enhanced at $40 a year. If the vast majority will choose to remain at "Enhanced", that will be a proof that this "improvement" is a simple price increase. If however the majority will switch to "Super Enhanced", then Fastmail will accomplish what they intended to do and everyone will be happy. The name of the game is choice!

17 Oct 2007, 01:16 AM	#8
FMRocks The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: FM does NOT refer to Fastmail (anymore). Posts: 4,034	For me, the change is a welcome one, even though I don't end up using a whole lot of disk space. But now that the quota has gone up to 6GB and the price to $50, I think what I will be doing is go to a Gmail model and never really delete my emails. I also will be using the FM file storage a lot more. File storage mobility is important to me, and this increase helps. Recently I have also been using the web interface mostly - as much as I love Thunderbird, it seemed to be a waste of hard disk space given the massive amounts of web storage. Rueven, your concerns are valid, but I wonder if the price increase is not at least partially influenced by the weakening US dollar against major world currencies, and the FM guys having to make a living outside of the US... Rob, I know that you said that you will be keeping the price to $40 a year. My question is this: my current subscription does not expire until August of 2008. If I extend my subscription now, for say, a year or 2, would I be getting the current pricing (i.e. $40 first year and $30 the second year of extension)?

17 Oct 2007, 04:49 AM	#12
beq Cornerstone of the Community Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: USA Posts: 895	Very nice, now I have a 12GB email quota (and several gigs bandwidth) My mailbox content is only at 1.4GB though, due to my using a pre-Outlook 2007 IMAP PST file that's limited to 2GB (I've had to keep archiving old mail locally so Outlook won't stop downloading new mail). Can't wait to re-synchronize my FM IMAP account into a new Unicode PST file without the 2GB limit. I've just been too lazy to reconfigure all my MAPILab/Sperry Outlook add-ins again. Though I'd just as soon ditch Outlook for emailing if I can get a better HTML compose in the FM webmail (which is otherwise amazing).

17 Oct 2007, 07:33 AM	#13
ewal Master of the @ Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: West Sussex, UK Posts: 1,334	Good move Fastmail, Thanks! That should certainly get the competition and media looking at Fastmail afresh. Not that I will be needing such an enormous amount of email space soon, but welcome nevertheless. Also thanks for the tip that the price increase not being implemented until November some time. I will be extending my subscription. However I do wonder how all this will fit into the new Small Business / Home Office project you will be launching shortly. I will probably be one that will jump on that once you launch, however how will the Enhanced pricing on soloist accounts work with regard to the multi-account plan? Will there be some sort of trade off or incentive for enhanced users? Ed