Free but…. needs a pro extension

  • remakewarsaw

    (@remakewarsaw)


    5 days, 14 hours ago

    Update: The issue has been resolved.

    After my initial review, the support team at ServMask reached out and handled the situation professionally. They reviewed my case, clarified the licensing terms, and offered a fair resolution.

    My original license has been reinstated for personal use, and they provided a trial of their Pro version for client work going forward.

    I still think there is room for improvement in terms of license transparency and management (especially for long-time users), but I appreciate that they took the time to review the case and find a reasonable solution.

    Updating my rating to reflect the outcome.

    —————-

    You need their license to restore backups.

    The free version limits uploads to a very small size (around 100MB), which means in real-world scenarios you’ll need a paid extension just to restore a full site backup.

    I purchased the FTP Extension years ago when it was sold as a lifetime license with lifetime updates and use on unlimited websites. That’s why I relied on this plugin across development, staging, and client projects.

    Recently, my license was suddenly deactivated for an alleged EULA violation. At the same time, I lost access to my account and can no longer retrieve my purchase or receipt.

    There has never been a proper license management system (no way to deactivate old sites or review usage), so it’s unclear how users are supposed to stay compliant — especially developers working across multiple environments.

    This creates a risky situation where you may depend on this plugin for backups, but later lose access to restore them unless you pay again.

    I recommend carefully considering this before relying on it for critical backups, especially for client work.

    • This topic was modified 5 days, 14 hours ago by remakewarsaw.
    • This topic was modified 4 days, 23 hours ago by remakewarsaw. Reason: Updating my rating to reflect the outcome
Viewing 5 replies - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)
  • Plugin Author Yani

    (@yaniiliev)

    5 days, 9 hours ago

    Hi @remakewarsaw,

    Thank you for taking the time to share your experience. We genuinely appreciate that you found All-in-One WP Migration useful enough to rely on it across development, staging, and client projects for what sounds like many years. That speaks to the value the plugin delivered for you and your clients.

    We do want to clarify a few things for the benefit of anyone reading this.

    Our FTP Extension (now part of All-in-One WP Migration Pro) was offered under two plans: a Personal plan (lifetime license) for use on your own websites, and a Business plan (monthly or yearly subscription) for use on client websites. These terms were clearly presented at the time of purchase. Using a Personal license across client projects is a violation of the license terms, and that distinction exists for a reason.

    We understand that after years of use, having a license revoked is frustrating. But consider the other side: if the plugin was purchased around 2019, that comes out to less than $10 per year. If your hourly rate is even $20, the plugin only needed to save you an hour or two each year to pay for itself many times over. The value you received over those years is real, and it was delivered in full.

    To be clear, we are not revoking lifetime licenses as a policy. A small number of licenses have been cancelled where our system identified a pattern consistent with misuse. Our detection uses multiple data points, including download frequency, geographic distribution, and the number of distinct sites a license has been activated on. When these signals, taken together, point to systematic abuse, we act on it.

    You are right that the Personal license does not include a dashboard to track individual site activations. That is a feature of the Business plan, which includes the tooling to manage use across client sites, precisely because it is designed for that use case.

    We take every case seriously. Our support team reviews each situation individually, including the license terms that were in effect at the time of purchase, the usage data, and any context the license holder provides. If you believe your case was handled in error, we encourage you to reach out to our support team directly so we can review it together.

    Thank you again for your years of using the plugin. We hope we can resolve this.

    • This reply was modified 5 days, 9 hours ago by Yani. Reason: add link to contact customer support
    Thread Starter remakewarsaw

    (@remakewarsaw)

    5 days, 5 hours ago

    Hi Yani,

    Thank you for the detailed reply.

    I’d like to clarify one key point, because this is where the confusion comes from.

    At the time of my purchase, the FTP Extension was marketed as a lifetime license with lifetime updates and use on any number of websites. There was no clear distinction presented (at least not prominently) that limited usage strictly to “websites you own,” nor was there any practical mechanism provided to enforce or manage such a limitation.

    Like many developers, I used the plugin in good faith across development, staging, and client projects — which is a very typical workflow in WordPress.

    The core issue is not the existence of different license tiers today, but that:

    • there was no license management system available to users of older licenses
    • there was no way to review or deactivate past usage
    • enforcement appears to happen retroactively, based on internal criteria that users cannot see or control

    This creates a situation where long-time users may unknowingly fall out of compliance, with no tools to prevent it.

    I fully understand the need to protect against abuse. However, there should be a clear and transparent path for legitimate users to regularize their usage (for example, a reset, migration path, or visibility into activations), rather than immediate deactivation and loss of access.

    I’ve already contacted support and am happy to cooperate in resolving this.

    Thank you.

    Thread Starter remakewarsaw

    (@remakewarsaw)

    5 days, 5 hours ago

    Hi Yani,

    Thank you again for your response.

    To better understand the situation, I went back to the original product page from around the time of my purchase using web archives.

    The publicly available version (for example via archive.org) describes the license as “lifetime” and “use on any number of websites,” but does not clearly mention a restriction limiting usage to only websites owned by the purchaser.

    This is where the confusion comes from on my side — I relied on the wording that was presented at the time, and used the plugin accordingly in a typical development workflow.

    If there were separate license tiers with different usage rights, it would be helpful to see exactly how those distinctions were communicated at the time of purchase.

    I’m not disputing your current licensing model, but rather trying to reconcile it with what was advertised when I originally bought the extension.

    I’m happy to continue this via support as well, but I think this clarification is important for transparency for other users reading this thread.

    Thank you.

    Plugin Author Yani

    (@yaniiliev)

    5 days, 5 hours ago

    Thank you for the follow-up. We appreciate the effort to look into this, but we need to correct the record here.

    The Wayback Machine link you shared is from 2016. However, our records show your purchase was made in 2021. These are not the same product page.

    The 2016 page you linked lists a price of $79 and says “Use on any number of websites.” The product page at the time of your actual purchase in 2021 was priced at $99 and clearly states “Use on any number of websites that you own.” The distinction was explicitly communicated at the point of sale.

    We understand that licensing terms can feel like fine print, but “websites that you own” versus client websites is a meaningful and clearly worded distinction. It is the same distinction that separated the Personal plan from the Business plan.

    We are not questioning whether you found the plugin useful. Clearly you did, and we are glad it served your work well for years. But presenting a product page from five years before your purchase to suggest the terms were unclear is not an accurate representation of what happened.

    Our offer still stands. If you believe your situation was handled unfairly, our support team is ready to review your case individually. They will look at the actual license terms from your purchase date, the usage data, and any context you provide.

    Thank you.

    Thread Starter remakewarsaw

    (@remakewarsaw)

    5 days, 3 hours ago

    Hi Yani,

    Thank you for clarifying the timeline and the wording used at the time of purchase.

    I understand the distinction you’re making regarding “websites that you own.” However, this is where the situation becomes unclear in practice.

    In a typical WordPress workflow, developers often:

    • build and host sites on their own infrastructure
    • manage them over long periods
    • maintain ongoing access even after client handover

    From that perspective, the concept of “ownership” is not always strictly defined, and can reasonably be interpreted more broadly than just legal ownership of the domain. (that i own and renew myself under my account)

    More importantly, there has never been any tooling provided to:

    • review where a license is used
    • deactivate past installations
    • or ensure compliance over time

    Without that visibility or control, it becomes very difficult for users to understand or stay within the intended limits, especially after years of usage.

    I fully respect your need to enforce licensing terms. My concern is that enforcement appears to rely on internal criteria that users cannot see or manage, which can lead to situations like this.

    I’ve reached out to support and am happy to work toward a resolution there.

    Thank you.

Viewing 5 replies - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)

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