Our Chocolate Hosting plan is not allowed to perform outgoing connections to remote servers and this is the reason for the troubles noticed.
Only our paid hosting plans do not have this limitation so you can benefit from functions as the specified one. You can upgrade your web hosting plan from the "Change plan" section on your control panel, you will find the link on the left "Upgrades" menu.
Upgrading to a paid hosting plan would also allow you to send e-mails via your account with us - the SMTP will be activated for you and you will be allowed to upload files bigger than 500KB. The Watercircle plan is only $2.95/month and has no such restriction. In addition disk space, monthly traffic and other features will be increased significantly. You will be able to check a comparison of our payed hosting plans features here:
http://freehostia.com/compare-hosting-plans.htmlIf you have any further questions or problems, please do not hesitate to contact us!