1&1 Warning - Move your .UK names away from them NOW!

[devolution]

I've had trouble with these people.
BIG trouble.

I mentioned earlier in the year they messed me around with some fake attempt to try and get money out of me for some domain I didn't even renew.

Now they have detagged a number of my .uk names, which means that even though they are registered until next year, they are in a limbo.

I will have to pay £15+vat for each domain in this state to get them working again (to Nominet).

Suffice to say, this is thanks to 1&1 - dba Schlund, United Internet etc. Crooked bas*ards.

My advice is to move all your .UK names away ASAP.
Who knows what will happen to yours?

[mole]

Why did this happen? Did you not pay them for something they thought you had to like hosting etc?

[devolution]

Well...
Initially I had a problem with a domain several years ago that was registered, and didn't renew myself.
They renewed it themselves and attempted to force me to pay for it.

Previously, I ordered (in a separate account) a number of .uk names, which were fully paid up for 2 years by Credit Card.

They sent me a letter last year saying that they were 'cancelling this account', without reason or justification.
I contacted them and have mentioned previously on this board what kind of response I got - very little to be precise.
The only thing I managed to get out of them was 'to open up another account' and they would 'transfer the domains into that account'.
The catch was you cannot set up an account with them unless you order something first - which I certainly did NOT want to do. Would you pay money to crooks to get your car back? I think not.

Suffice to say, they recently detagged these domains, and since Nominet is stuck in the past, I have to get them to manually change the tag at a cost of £15+vat for EACH domain. Thats going to cost me HUNDREDS of POUNDS.

I will be taking this matter up with our Office of Fair Trading - these cowboy domain firms think they can get away with anything. And Nominet thinks it can charge what it likes, even when it's not your fault.

[hotirish]

I may be wrong, but I think UK are renewed every 2 years unless cancelled, but it may depend on the company.

For example ENOM's t&c say that uk domains will expire one day before the proper expiry date because of this (Enom don't wish to auto renew them I premsume).

With UKreg you get an email saying they will try and auto renew them unless you click a link to opt out of the auto renewal process.

With Easyspace they don't try to auto renew them, but you start getting invoices from Nominet after the expiry date.

[mole]

Originally posted by hotirish
(Enom don't wish to auto renew them I premsume).

ENom does not auto-renew .co.uk? Hmm... how sure are you of this?

[apples4u]

Yeah you gotta read the Terms of 1and1 with their new low priced domian names... seems like they are trying to make an extra dollar on their clients

[hotirish]

Here's ENOM's additional registration terms for uk domains,
it sounds to me like they don't autorenew, but I'll no first hand experience of it.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
In addition to the general terms and conditions of agreement with eNom listed in Sections 1 through 21, you agree to the following terms and conditions for registrations in .UK WITH THE FOLLOWING IMPORTANT MODIFICATION: You also agree that .UK domains which are not renewed will be deleted one day before the scheduled expiration date. For example: You register a .UK domain on April 9, 2003, for two years. Then, on April 7, 2005, you renew the domain for an additional two years. Your domain will then be scheduled to expire on April 9, 2007. If, however, you do not renew your domain on April 7, 2005, it will be deleted on April 8, 2005. The reason for this is that Nominet uses a non-real-time email-based system to make status changes in the .UK registry. The combination of this email-based system and Nominet's policy on renewals means that we will be charged for a renewal unless the name is deleted (via instructions in an email) prior to the end of the registration period which is then in effect. As a consequence, if we do not receive your renewal instructions prior to one-day before the end of the registration period, we will send the delete instruction one-day before the end of the registration period then in effect. Also, all .UK registrations are bound to a different Dispute Policy than the one outlined in section 4 above. Section 4 will still apply when registering any .UK domain however Nominet's Dispute Policy shall be applied instead of the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy.
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

[devolution]

No no no...

The .UK system doesn't work like this.
Domains cannot be 'deleted' by a Registrar directly.
They become whats known as 'detagged', similar to a REDEMPTIONPERIOD - you have to pay £15+vat for the domain to be recovered. The domains then go in to a 'suspended' state which is similar to PENDINGDELETE. You can still recover them though even in this state.
Suspension lasts between a few weeks and a few months. Detagged lasts between a few months and several years! (Though they are trying to stop this from happening anymore).

[generics]

I totally agree with anyone slagging them off! They are the most useless, frauds i have ever come across. And next time they charge my c/card without authority they will be receiving a lawsuit through their glass or is that ass doors!!!