Do you know who owns your domain name? You may think you do but are you sure?
Every few months we start a project with a new client and one of the first things we ask them is if they have access to their domain name. You’d be surprised at how many people have no idea. Your domain name is one of the most important assets your company has. Make sure you know who owns it and have access to control it at all times.
Not sure who owns your domain name? Do a WHOIS on your domain to find out all the information regarding the registrar and registrant.
The Registrant
The registrant is the person who owns the domain name. If you’re not showing up as the registrant and you should be, you need to get that fixed immediately (BTW, we can help you do that). The registrant of your domain should always be the individual person who owns it, business owner, or the highest level officer of your company. It should not be your web developer, an employee or your sister’s husband’s cousin’s nephew.
The Registrar
This is the company you registered your domain name with. You should hopefully have a login to manage your domain on their website. If you don’t, this will tell you who you should start contacting to get the information you need.
Dates
Take a look at the expiration date of your domain. If for some reason you don’t have ownership or control over your domain, you should make sure that happens before it expires and you lose it to someone else.
Additional Contacts
Administrative and Technical Contacts are those people that you want to put in control of managing your domain for you. These can be employees and your web developer.
If everything looks good in your WHOIS listing, then you’re good to go. If there is a red flag, you should address it immediately. Each situation is different but here are some steps you may need to take transfer the domain:
- Contact the person whose name it’s registered in
- Contact the registrar and show proof of ownership
- Transfer to a new registrar
- Contact the registrar to get your login
- Contact Idaho Web Solutions to help you out
Here are just a few of the horror stories we’ve ran into over the years:
No job referral here
A company we worked with had a shady IT consultant buy their domain name and build their website. He charged them a ludicrous amount of money each month to maintain and host the site. When we were brought in to redesign the website the guy refused to give up the domain name stating that it was “his” and at some point down the road he might sell it to them when it was necessary but he didn’t see that it was that time yet.
TIP: If you request that a person act as your agent and buy your domain name for you, it is yours and not theirs. If he had bought it on his own prior to the relationship he would of had a case, but he had not. We finally got him to release the domain name after several months of back and forth communications and threat of legal action.
Missing in action
We started work with a non-profit client and offered to host their website for free. Unfortunately the domain name was in a person’s name who they had been out of contact with and the email address associated with the domain registration was no longer active so a transfer was not possible. After several months they were able to track down the guy and he was able to contact his old employer to activate the email address. We were able to finally transfer the domain name to the non-profit.
On a related note, the organization had been paying for web hosting for several years to a company, only to find out that the website wasn’t actually pointing to their server but to another hosting company. The hosting company refused to refund them any money.
Domain hostage
A client of mine had his IT guy help source a web designer for his professional web site. The company he found purchased his domain name on his behalf and then proceeded to build the site. They charged him over $3000 and delivered a 5 page site built in Frontpage. The client was shocked and horrified by the site. Now being behind on launching he came to us to rebuild the site. The previous company was kind enough to point the domain to the new site but refused to give up the domain name until they were compensated for the entire $3000. I’m not sure who did the ripping off, but it was not worth that amount of money. After 2 years, we are still trying to get the domain name transferred into the clients name. The registrant has agreed to the tranfer, now just trying to make it happen.
So again, make sure you register your domain name yourself or trust the person acting on your behalf to put it into your name. Too often developers will put it in their name and then use it as leverage if something goes wrong later. This may be business smart on their end, but isn’t very moral when they are acting as your agent.
Tags: Domain Names, horror stories, whois, Your Business
