I have a client that did not renew their domain or hosting. i keep all of my clients on auto renew for domains. i emailed them a month in advance telling him about the renewals. i emailed them 2 weeks out and 1 week out and finally 3 days out. the domain auto renewed which i paid for, and they paid for neither. they have had complete access to the back end of the site and the cpanel/hosting. so they could back up EVERYTHING at any time. where is my responsibility? i know i can shut down the site. i put a lot of time in building the site and would hate to see it go down as i know there are a lot of people that use the free part of the site. but obviously they shouldnt benefit from it. can i, if ever, resume control of the site? i thought about shutting it down for a few days and re-launching but dont want any issues and want to cover myself. thanks
A few ideas... Who owns the domain? As in, do you have control over it? If you do and you're happy enough running the site, keep it going. Replace any ads on the site with your own. Change any login passwords and only change them back if you get paid. I forgot to add that as they have paid for the site it is theirs and imo, you cannot simply take it over on a permanent basis. Running admin duties until you get paid is one thing but taking the site is another.
this is true. i have both the domain and the hosting. seems like there are 2 different animals here. the domain and the site. they paid for both, but did not choose to renew either. if i think about them as objects. object a) is built and paid for - website object b) is only leased - domain i cant build a) and then go take it if they dont use it. but b) they choose to let expire and i paid to renew it (it would have been snagged up by someone for resale for a high price if let go) like taking over a lease so i can build something new on this how im seeing it as of now
Doesn't mean you can't clone the site of course, and run the similar site on the domain, assuming there are no legal restrictions to you doing so, such as Trademarks, 'passing off,' etc.
Temporarily park the domain until it runs out again, meanwhile, if the guy comes back to grab it, charge him some kind of fee - $25, $50, $100 or whatever you feel reasonable.
I would feel a lot more comfortable about your position if you had waited for the domain to expire and then purchased it anew. At that point it would be much harder to challenge your ownership interest. The fact that you merely renewed their ownership interest for them, and that you had a business relationship with them, makes your propery interest fuzzy at best.
thanks and yeah, i agree. but im sure it would have been a battle for the domain. it would be snatched up if not already in a waiting list. i in no way shape or form however renewed it FOR THEM. i renewed it for me. they didnt choose to renew it and i wanted to keep it. no way i was going to let someone else take it. we're not to far away from each other in OH
it's your domain now. build a new site on it and benefit from the old traffic, no matter who it belonged to before. I would suggest building a similar site. Good luck with it mate
Is their website active? Are they making changes to the site, responding to questions etc? Do you have their phone number and billing info? Did you try and call them? Send a notification via snail mail? If their hosting account is past due I would lock the account and take the site down until the past due payments were made including the renewal fees. They may have lost interest in the site/project or maybe something happened to the person whose email address is used for hosting/domain renewals/payments. Taking the site down will probably answer your question one way or another. In terms of renewing the domain for them it does not make it yours regardless of what your intentions were. As was mentioned earlier in this thread if it had dropped and you caught it then that's one thing but by renewing it they still have ownership of the domain name. Your paying for it was in fact a gift. You can still charge them for the renewal however if you take ownership of it they have recourse. Whether or not they would take any action is a different story. GL
Honestly, I don't know if any of these answers are correct and I'll explain why. I haven't seen your agreement with your client. All your rights and remedies should be in that agreement. If the client owns the domain and is the registered owner, in the absence of anything else to the contrary, all you have a right to do is sue for money damages. It's like paying a mortgage payment for someone else's apartment. You can't just own it because they didn't pay. If you had a security interest in the real estate or if you had title, that's a different story. My thought - look at the agreement first.
You should be able to obtain the domain name after it expires, unless it's parked. It's not like on MySpace, where they can use a previously deleted link for their unique link.
ive decided to back up their site and their db's, email it to them. let them know that i let their domain expire for 24 hours and then renewed it on my own accord for future usage rather than have a stranger pick it up for resell at a premium.
That's what I was about to say, and that's if there's even one to begin with. Otherwise, as some said especially Jaffe, it's fuzzy. On the registrar's side, they consider the listed registrant as the legal owner regardless of who paid for it. Neither do they want to get involved in the registrant's dispute/s with whoever.
Therein lies your problem as already pointed out. You had no right to renew that domain name, that right is exclusive to the owner of the domain. Their rights extend for many days beyond the expiration date itself. You only had the right to purchase it upon expiration as everyone else did. What you did, despite your protestation otherwise, is renew it on the domain owner's behalf. You should be asking for advice on how to get paid for what you are rightfully owed and not these contortions you seem to be engaging in.
lol. even more gray area. i guess i could rightfully charge anything i want since there was no agreement upfront
If one of my clients don´t pay his hosting or domains, i wait 3 days and shut them down without any words. Especially if i emailed them before. Backup his files and delete his whole account. If he asks for his files, charge him at least $50.00 before sending them + $100 for the time you wasted here for support. Since your client don´t want to pay, it seems that he has no interest in keeping his site anymore. It´s your biz, why struggling with people who can´t even pay their bills. If you give him his domain and files back for free, he will do the same again and again.
No you cant. We have established that you renewed the domain for the owner. Therefore the owner has the right to retain the domain name on payment to you of the amount you paid plus any late fees as declaired in your TOS. To charge anything more would come under extortion and raketeering. You definatly do not want to go there.
i have no TOS as it was already established. and i didnt renew it for the owner, i renewed it for me after it had expired and they didnt reply to MULTIPLE emailed over a month to multiple email addresses.
Maybe if you say it in all caps and bold it will become true. Since you never waited for the real owner of the domain to exhaust his own options for renewal and just usurped his right by renewing the domain - how exactly did it become yours in that process? Neat trick. I am curious how you explain the process of renewing a domain owned by someone else where it magically becomes yours? Dude, you are trying to steal the domain. This thread is evidence of it. I suggest you conduct yourself accordingly.
I love people who can't keep their story straight in one damn thread. You started by telling us that your company policy was to keep all domains on auto-renew for your clients. You go on to tell us that the domain auto-renewed. Then you lie and tell us you didn't renew it for them, even though you already told us it was on auto-renew for your clients. Then you lie and tell us you got it after it expired, but again you had already started by telling us that it auto-renewed and not expired. Jesus man, keep digging you are giving yourself quite a reputation as someone people will be eager to do business with in the future.