BEFORE YOU SUBSCRIBE TO ZOHO CRM: BEWARE OF ZOHO CORP'S UNETHICAL UPGRADE PRACTICES

BEFORE YOU SUBSCRIBE TO ZOHO CRM: BEWARE OF ZOHO CORP'S UNETHICAL UPGRADE PRACTICES

I am the Principal Advisor for a Business Consulting firm that specializes in helping start-up and small businesses achieve better returns through business process automation.  During these past 7 years, my associates and I have always recommended Zoho CRM to HUNDREDS of business and have worked on customizing at least 15 Zoho CRM packages for our clients.  We also have been using Zoho CRM ourselves since 2007, so we are expertly proficient with Zoho CRM and are VERY familiar with the life cycle development of the software as it's been changed over the years.

When Zoho first launched in 2005, it touted itself as the "free" full featured CRM and included most of the core CRM functionality available at the time in it's free offering.  Zoho touted it's CRM package as the free alternative to Salesforce.com, and literally boasted about how inexpensive (FREE) and complete the Zoho CRM was.

However over the past 5 years (particularly when Zoho changed it's name to Zoho CORP in 2009), we've watched Zoho parse out core system functionalities into differing "Levels" of subscriptions in their attempt to create a compelling upgrade path that would lead to revenue.  Since all of the major changes to their pricing and subscription model had been announced and documented appropriately in the past, we were never HAPPY about being pigeon-holed into subscription "upgrades" (who would be?), but every business needs to work towards profitability and with changes being communicated appropriately, we've always said "Fair Enough"... Until Today.

We had a recent start-up company join us as a client, and like many others, they had a need for a CRM.  After checking the latest ZOHO CRM release notes, sales documents, and basic help pages online, we didn't notice anything that would change our standard recommendation.  The client accepted our proposal and commissioned us to launch and customize the ZOHO CRM package for them, like we have done for tens of other companies in the past.

We exercised the Zoho CRM 15 day Trial period for the client (which now is set to the "Professional" level apparently and began importing data for the client.  We also began setting up custom fields for the client as needed.  Today, as the trial period had expired, we advised this same client to pick up 2 user licenses at the "Standard" level prepaid for $288/year.  The client notified us that the licenses were purchased and we were clear to wrap up their customization.  We fired up the ZOHO CRM interface this morning to finish the final custom field setup, and to our horror, we encountered an unexpected system alert when trying to create a custom field saying "Sorry, you cannot create more custom fields in your edition".  


Now, usually when this happens, it's because ZOHO Corp had once again systematically reconfigured their subscription level offerings to compel people to convert to a higher paid subscription levels, and after a little digging, we would find the supporting documentation affirming their nickle-and dime tactics.  However this time, there was NO documentation of any limitations on the number of Custom Fields you can have at ANY level.  In fact, quite the contrary. 

As you can see in the following screenshot taken from the PDF download located at Here: Compare Zoho CRM Editions page, you will see that there is simply a check box next to the STANDARD, PROFESSIONAL, ENTERPRISE, and CRM PLUS subscriptions (Not FREE edition - although Custom Fields used to be free).


We, like any other reasonable consumer expected that, If Custom Fields are included in a subscription, there would be no limits on them.  After contacting a Zoho Customer Support Chat Agent named Pranesh Gopalakrishnan, we learned that, not only is there a limit of Custom Fields, but there are differing quantities of Custom Fields that Zoho Corp will allow you to have in the current CRM offering PER EDITION and PER MODULE?!?  

Yes, apparently now, you only get 10 custom fields/module in the STANDARD edition, 150 custom fields/module in the PROFESSIONAL edition, and 300 custom fields/module in the ENTERPRISE edition.  So now, after spending 25+ hours importing our Client data into Zoho CRM, customizing the package for them, and having them pay the quoted price of $288, we cannot deliver the customized CRM package that we promised.  

While chatting, explained the situation to Mr. Gopalakrishnan our Client's situation.  Pranesh explained that the only way to expand custom fields was for our Client to purchase another 2 user licenses at the PROFESSIONAL edition level for $480 MORE?!?

At this point, we had two choices; 1. Explain the oversight to our client and ask for, or cover the additional $480 for the two user licenses or 2. Revoke our long standing ZOHO CRM recommendation we have provided our clients for the past 5 years, researching another CRM package to replace ZOHO CRM, and then spend countless hours learning the new system, customizing it for our client's needs and exporting, and entering all of the data again that we had in this Client's Standard ZOHO CRM edition. 

.....OR maybe a 3rd option. Hope that Zoho CORP was willing to exercise some responsibility and good faith to cover their oversight and enable additional custom fields for this client at their current STANDARD subscription level.  

I asked Pranesh to chat with a Supervisor.  After waiting a few minutes, a lady named "Robin" took over the chat and once again explained the situation over text.  I let Robin know that, prior to signing this client up, we reviewed the sales / help documents here:   https://www.zoho.com/crm/comparison.html, and here:   https://www.zoho.com/crm/help/customization/field-level-customization.html, with NO MENTION of limits on custom fields.  After some awkward silence, Robin produces ONE link to an obscure help file buried in their help system that would elude even the most diligent seekers in a sales cycle:  https://www.zoho.com/crm/help/erutaef321.html 

I explained to Supervisor Robin that we feel trapped into upgrading our Client to a higher, significantly more expensive subscription level that they otherwise would not need if they had access to custom fields AS ADVERTISED.  I also explained that IMHO, most people would find it VERY misleading to have ANY limits on Custom Fields without advertising the change in advance on ZOHO CRM's online sales literature.  I concluded that, after all of the business that we had sent to ZOHO CRM over the years, we would expect them to at least comp an upgrade for our client from STANDARD to PROFESSIONAL, and correct their misleading sales documentation in order to prevent trapping more people into upgrades with unethical advertising and questionable free trial practices. 

In essence, I explained that in this case, we're not willing to pay any more for what we should already have (according to the online Zoho CRM Edition comparison), and have had in the past.  Supervisor Robin, said that she would arrange for a quick callback from the respective Account Manager.  I waited HOURS and NO CALL.  

Hours later, I finally receive and email from Ricky Thakrar, Regional Sales Manager | North and South America.  I'm thinking, "Now we're getting somewhere".  In his email to me, Mr. Thakrar says "You are correct it does not say on the main pricing page the specific number of custom fields per edition as it is a feature comparison page. It only says this information in the detailed technical comparison page on our user guide which shows features and limits."  Mr. Thakrar then goes on to say (without apology or missing a beat), "In order to get 150 custom fields, you will need to upgrade to the Professional edition".  WHAT!!??  Our Client really only needs 5 more!

Upset at wasting the whole day trying to resolve this, and pursing the situation now just on a matter of principal, I tracked down the phone number to  Mr. Thakrar's office   (877-834-4428, Option #1) and asked to speak to Mr. Thakrar regarding an email I just received from him.  After being on hold for approx.4 minutes, the gentleman who initially answered comes back on the phone, and nervously (lying??) explains that it appears Mr. Thakrar is on another scheduled call with another client and is unable to take my call.  The gent goes on to ask if I would be willing to talk to a Regional Account Manager.  I asked if that person had the authority to override / upgrade a subscription level to accommodate my Client's custom fields issue, and the gentleman says "Yes".   I agree to be forwarded to Cliffton Kent, Regional Account Manager.

I once again explain the situation to Mr. Kent, who tells me that he recognizes that their central comparison chart is misleading to the consumers, and that should be corrected.  He also understands what an inconvenience it would be to find out about the Custom Field limitations after the fact of entering data for 2 weeks in a Free Trial set to the PROFESSIONAL Edition, and later paying for a lesser subscription without knowledge of the limitation.  Mr. Kent said that he does not, nor does ANYBODY else at Zoho Corp have the ability to comp a free upgrade to our Client so that they can have access to the advertised functionality.  Mr. Kent does say that he will take the matter up with "management" and "go to bat" for my client.  Mr. Kent then emails me a bit later saying "We did discuss your concern with our management. Unfortunately, it is not possible for us to upgrade the Zoho CRM account from Standard to Professional (for free). Sorry to disappoint you."

As a now former team of Zoho CRM Evangelists for the past 7 years, words cannot express our disappointment in this decision   If we accomplish nothing else, we hope that you will help spread the word as far and as wide about this latent limitation, or as we see it, Zoho CRM upgrade trap that has been crafted and honed by the ZOHO CORP.  As it stands, we are going to work overtime into the night and through tomorrow to try to find an ethically sold and supported product.  Unless ZOHO reverses their present course, WE CANNOT AND WILL NOT CONTINUE TO SUPPORT ZOHO CORP'S FALSE ADVERTISING AN UNETHICAL PRACTICES IN PIGEON-HOLING NEW CUSTOMERS INTO OVERPRICED ZOHO CRM PACKAGES. We would rather suffer through this situation, than be further subjected to ZOHO's legal extortion tactics.  

So, now you know ;-)  Hopefully, Zoho will understand that space is cheap, and that unlimited Custom Fields IS a core CRM function (as it was in past ZOHO CRM versions).  Maybe someone at  will see the error of their ways and will work to include unlimited Custom Fields as part of a STANDARD subscription license.  Until then,  I will try to follow-up with a post detailing the new CRM we will be recommending in the future.

Rick B.

    • Recent Topics

    • How can I change spell check language?

      I cannot find the way to change spell check language. My "display language" is English, and I want to have the same one for Spell Check, but it is Russian!!! How can I change it? In one of your explanations you mentioned that I have to choose it from

    • Mail is so slow - doesn't even work!

      Mail has been getting slower and slower - and today it's not even pulling up emails in either Inbox or Unread. This is beyond frustrating since email is a big part of business. Sent a request through the useless help portal - no response. Called the useless

    • User marked as SPAMMER. Mail Fetch has also been disabled for any active POP accounts.

      I am the administrator for joelles.com One of our accounts has been blocked saying this: User marked as SPAMMER. Mail Fetch has also been disabled for any active POP accounts. I cannot change the disabled account in the control panel as it says that it

    • My domain did not activate

      Hi, my domain (apsaindustrial.com.ar) did not activate, and the phone verification message never arrived. Please would you solve this problem? Thanks.

    • ME SALE ESTE ERROR: No fue posible enviar el mensaje;Motivo:554 5.1.8 Email Outgoing Blocked

      Ayuda!! Me sale este error al intentar enviar mensajes desde mi correo electronico de Zoho! Tampoco recibo correos pues cuando me envia rebotan. Ayuda, Me urge enviar unos correo importantes!! Quedo atenta MAGDA HERNANDEZ +5731120888408

    • Is there a way to sync Tags between CRM and Campaigns/Marketing Hub?

      I wonder if there is a way to synch the tags between CRM and Marketing-Hub / Campaigns?

    • how to see if a specific contact opened an email in zoho campaign?

      how to see if a specific contact opened an email in zoho campaign?

    • Revenue Management: #8 Revenue Recognition in Educational & Training Institutions

      Educational Institutions and training centres typically collect course fees at the time of enrolment, sometimes for a one-day workshop and sometimes for a year-long certification course. You might also charge separately for course materials or evaluation.

    • How to Customize Task Creation to Send a Custom Alert Using JavaScript in Zoho CRM?

      Hello Zoho CRM Community, I’m looking to customize Zoho CRM to send a custom alert whenever a task is created. I understand that Zoho CRM supports client scripts using JavaScript, and I would like to leverage this feature to implement the alert functionality.

    • Using files from Zoho CRM in Gemini/ChatGPT/Claude

      Hi all, I’ve got subscriptions to Gemini and a few other AI tools which I use for tasks like data enrichment, email composition, etc. In our workflow, we often receive various documents from clients — such as process workflows, BRDs/requirement documents

    • Maximum file limit in zoho people LMS

      Dear Team, I am having approximately 4.9 GB of material, including PPTs and videos for uploading in zoho people LMS course. May I know what is the maximum limit limit for the course files Thanking you, With regards, Logeswar V Executive _ Operations

    • Dynamically prefill ticket fields

      Hello, I am using Zoho Desk to collect tickets of our clients about orders they placed on our website. I would like to be able to prefill two tickets fields dynamically, in this case a readonly field for the order id, and a hidden field for the seller

    • Optimize your Knowledge Base for better visibility by allowing search engine crawling and indexing

      All you need to know about no-follow and no-index in KB. What are article crawlability and indexability? Crawlability and indexability are vital for making an article visible and accessible to search engines. When a search engine crawls an article, it

    • Has anyone created a public ASAP Guide that I can check out?

      I am thinking of adding an ASAP guide to my web application, but I have noticed that the ASAP widget itself can be really slow to load sometimes. Has anyone created a public ASAP Guide that I can check to see how performant it is? I don't want to spend

    • Zoho Desk Partners with Microsoft's M365 Copilot for seamless customer service experiences

      Hello Zoho Desk users, We are happy to announce that Zoho Desk has partnered with Microsoft's M365 to empower customer service teams with enhanced capabilities and seamless experiences for agents. Microsoft announced their partnership during their keynote

    • What’s New in Zoho Analytics – September 2025

      Hello Users!! In this month’s update, we’re raising the bar across multiple touchpoints, from how you bring in data, plan and track projects to how you design and brand your dashboards. We’ve added the all-new Gantt chart for project visualization, expanded

    • Zoho MCP has no tools for Creator or 3rd Party Apps?

      I don't see a Zoho MCP community forum so putting this here. Two big problems I see: 1) Although Zoho advertises "over 950 3rd party apps" as available through their MCP, when I go to "Add Tools" there are ZERO 3rd party apps available to choose from.

    • Zoho Forms - Zoho Drive connection - Shared Drives not supported

      Hello i am stuck with Google Drive Connection There is no supported shared drives Connection is not support shared drives boolean Query Parameters - supportsAllDrives=true&supportsTeamDrives=true to activate fetch files from the shared drives. Ahat need

    • Can't create package until Bill created?

      I can't understand why we cannot create a package until a Bill is created? We are having to created draft Bills to create a package when the item is received, but we may not have received a Bill from the supplier. Also, Bill # is required, but we normally

    • Whats the Time out Limit for API Calls from Deluge?

      Hi Creator Devs, We are making API calls to third party server via Deluge. Getting this error message: Error at line : 24, The task has been terminated since the API call is taking too long to respond. Please try again after sometime. Whats the default

    • How to get the authorization code for domain transfer from Zoho?

      I have transferred my domain from zoho to godaddy, and that needs a authorization code. I haven't got any mail containing that. How to get the authorization code from domain transfer? Thanks, Arun

    • I have error AS101 when I try to add paypal@mydomain.com to Zoho

      Please help me with this. I tried to call the help line 4 times but don't get any response.

    • Tip #3: How to change your booking page language

      Displaying your booking page in your target audience's language can greatly increase customer satisfaction. By speaking their language, you will help customers feel more comfortable scheduling with you and create a stronger connection with them. Let's

    • How can I optimize a Zoho Site page for SEO when embedding external menu or restaurant links?

      Hi everyone, I’m experimenting with building small content hubs on Zoho Sites and want to make sure I’m doing it in an SEO-friendly way. For example, I tried creating a page that highlights restaurant menu items and linked out to a resource like this:

    • Diff signature for compose new email and replies

      Hi,   How do i have different signature for replies and new emails. its inconvenient to have one large signature for replies. Usually on Outlook we have the option to keep separate signatures for new emails and for replies.

    • Zoho Website Site Speed Up & Setting

      We are experiencing slow loading speeds on our Zoho website and would like assistance in optimizing its performance. Kindly review the site and suggest or implement necessary improvements to enhance speed, especially related to: > Caching mechanisms >

    • Clickjacking: Zoho Vault's Response

      Issue: Password manager browser extensions are found to be vulnerable to clickjacking security vulnerabilities that could allow attackers to steal account credentials, TFA codes, and card details under certain conditions. Reported by: Marek Toth, Independent

    • Refund

      Hi There, Please refund me asap possible, because of no support given. Thank you

    • No option for pick up in Zoho Books / Inventory but yes on commerce

      Is it planned to release soon on books/inventory?

    • Accessing Zoho form enteries via API

      Hi As a user I can view enteries to a form at: https://forms.zoho.com/<myOrganisation>/report/<myReportName>/records/web How do I access these entries via API? I don't have any problem with scope and getting tokens. But I have no idea what the API call

    • Blueprint Issue - Being able to set a subform field as mandatory

      I'm creating a blueprint. My record involves a subform which is only shown once field is set but the field gets set in step two of the process. My problem - I can't save the record as the subform field is set to mandatory - If I unset the mandatory field,

    • Blueprint - Mandatory file upload field

      Hi, File upload (as we as image upload) field cannot be set as mandatory during a blueprint transition. Is there a workaround? Setting attachments as mandatory doesn't solve this need as we have no control over which attachments are added, nor can we

    • Zoho Books - Include Quote Status in Workflow Field Triggers

      Hi Zoho Books team, I recently tried to create a Workflow rule based on when a Quote is Accepted by the customer. This is something which I thought would be very easy to do, however I discovered that Status is not listed as a field which can be monitored

    • Zoho Books - Show Related Sales Orders on Quotes

      Hi Books team, I've noticed that the Quotes don't show show the related Sales Order. My feature request is to also show related Sales Orders above the Quote so it's easy to follow the thread of records in the sales and fulfilment process. Below screenshot

    • Add VAT/Tax line to bank adjustments

      When categorising transactions and matching bank feeds with transactions such as customer payments, we use the "Add Adjustment" to add things like fees/bank fees. It would be useful to choose a VAT/Tax rate here. Whilst there is a bank charges option when adding a payment, this goes into the default bank charges account. We use the adjustments so that we can choose the account and separate our fees. We use different card providers and Worldpay charges VAT so we are stuck. We cannot integrate with

    • New Menu Layout Feedback

      I'd really like to see the banking item back on the top of the menu. I'm sure part of it is just because that's what I'm accustomed to. However, for a bookkeeping program, I think there's a logic to having banking be on top. Not a giant issue, but something

    • How to use Rollup Summary in a Formula Field?

      I created a Rollup Summary (Decimal) field in my module, and it shows values correctly. When I try to reference it in a Formula Field (e.g. ${Deals.Partners_Requested} - ${Deals.Partners_Paid}), I get the error that the field can’t be found. Is it possible

    • Form Accessibility

      Hi, is there an update on the accessibility standard of Zoho forms? Are the forms WCAG 2.1 AA compliant? 

    • Cannot schedule report delivery

      The only 'send option' available when exporting reports is 'immediately' The option to schedule the report is missing.

    • adding attachment in sendmail script where attachment is in a CRM field

      Hi all, I have a custom field of type 'File Upload' in one of my modules in my CRM. I want to include the file in that field as an attachment to an email - which is done from a button on  the 'Results' module. I have created a script and a button to initiate an email from that module. The Deluge scripting window has allowed me to add arguments for all the fields I need to use except for the one file upload type field. My script currently looks like the below (content of the email omitted). As you

    • Next Page