ItsYourDomain? Apparently Not!
So here it is: June 28, three days after my domain name renewal period is over. Am I any closer to moving my domain from ItsYourDomain to a more reputable registrar? Absolutely not. In fact, I had no choice but to spend the $14.95 that ItsYourDomain charges for another year with them, or either risk losing my domain or be subjected to extortion well in excess of $100 like they initiated six months ago.
Avoid ItsYourDomain, its parent company InnerWise, and their thousands of affiliates at all costs. Anyone who says that IYD deals fairly is probably on the payroll, a shareholder, or just plain ignorant or stupid. I’d rather be paying the ridiculous $35 that Network Solutions charges than be associated in any way with the charlatans at ItsYourDomain. Their terms of service are deceptive, frustrating, extortionist, and should be illegal. Excerpts:
- “We reserve the right to prospectively change our fees or to institute new fees at any time, for any reason, at our sole discretion and you agree to be bound by any fee increase.” Without notice.
- “You will be notified via email that renewal fees are due at least thirty (30) days prior to the expiration date of a domain name registration.” Having gone through this nightmare six months ago, I carefully watched every email for the past sixty days to see if ItsYourDomain notified me. I DID receive one email on the evening of June 21 that was dated June 20, only four days before impending expiration — a far cry from the seven emails they claimed to have sent last time this happened. Four days does not equal thirty.
- “You will receive additional notifications as the expiration date approaches.” Nope.
- “5 days prior to expiration, your domain will be placed on hold status, in preparation for release. This will result in websites and email not resolving for those 5 days.” ItsYourDomain obviously designed this process so that the email notification sent four days prior to expiration would not arrive if your email address was on the domain for which they are the registrar.
- “There is no grace period and under no circumstances will ItsYourDomain.com be able to renew the domain after the automatic expiration.” They have removed the 30-day grace period given by ICANN, the governing body over all domain registrars.
- “Although you will no longer be able to renew your expired domain name, you can redeem it under the Registrar Redemption program. For a fee of $100.00 (plus the cost of your renewal), ItsYourDomain.com will attempt to restore your domain to its original status. This redemption program is valid for 30 days from the release of your domain.” This 30-day period is the grace period that ICANN provides to all registrars. ItsYourDomain has decided to immorally profit from this, charging for the otherwise free benefit.
- In the event of a credit card chargeback, “your user account will be suspended, rendering all other domains in the account subject to the same terms as the domain charged back.” A $200 reinstatement fee plus a renewal fee then applies to EACH and EVERY domain registered with ItsYourDomain.
- “You understand and agree that ItsYourDomain.com shall deny all initial requests to transfer a domain name registration to another Registrar.” That’s the clincher! This rogue registrar will do anything to extort money from its customers, including what should be an illegal practice of forced retention!
I attempted to transfer the domain five times during the three weeks before expiration. The first two accomplished nothing. Before the third attempt, I sent an email to Brian Toon, telling him that I intended to transfer the domain. It was not until this point that I began to receive emails from ItsYourDomain. The next three attempts were unsuccessful as ItsYourDomain intentionally sent emails acknowledging a response to my request at least two days after each attempt, causing the registrar to which I was attempting to transfer the domain to automatically time out due to lack of action.
Not only that, but since ItsYourDomain only allows transfers up to but not including 10 days before renewal (otherwise the transfer requests are automatically denied) they sent instructions with only 24 hours remaining that required notarization of an agreement that allows the transfer, but completely indemnifies them of every wrongdoing by requiring agreement that no law suits will be filed — ever! That agreement must be faxed along with a copy of your driver license.
Like I need these crooks to have any more information about me! It’s bad enough that they have my credit card number!
UPDATE: I found this interesting tidbit on dnjournal.com:
“ItsYourDomain.com apparently doesn’t believe the message conveyed by their company name. They seem to have decided the domains you register with them are their domains. If you don’t believe it you will when you try to transfer one of ‘your’ domains to another registrar. They will charge you a fee for leaving (that is higher than the fee to renew and remain a hostage there). If that doesn’t discourage you enough they will also demand notarized paperwork, a throwback to the bad old days of Network Solutions. In addition, requests for auth codes (needed to move .org, .info, .biz and .us domains out) are frequently ignored. We believe such tactics should not be tolerated and have to recommend avoiding ItsYourDomain.com and their resellers. A Google search on the company’s name yields multiple complaints against them starting on page 1 (one of their resellers, DomainsNext.com, is also a source of constant consumer complaints). We believe ICANN needs to step in and put an end to this kind of ‘domain kidnapping’ or at least require registrars stooping to this kind of skullduggery to put front page notices on their site telling customers they will be required to pay a ransom if they ever want to leave…”
ItsYourDomain HA… Not if it is registered through ItsYourDomain aka Innerwise. I am sad to say that we were a resellor of ItsYourDoamin. No longer! We cannot and will not support the practices of ItsYourDomain and Innerwise that are effectively equal to hijacking and holding domains for ransom. Their unwillingness to respond via email or voice mail in a timely manner is unacceptable. I have tried for nearly three months to update information in our accout there and it has never been successfull. I have placed multiple emails to support without any replies. The result we could not renew a domain and it expired. We attempted to transfer away another domain 60 days prior to expiration failed “Transfer Request DENIED by Registrar” We ensurred the domain transfer lock had been removed prior to the transfer. When we checked it was once again locked. We again disarmed the transfer lock and innitiated a transfer but it failed again “Transfer Request DENIED by Registrar” We contacted support via email multiple times during the remaining 38 days. NO reply except for automated responces asking for patience. Patience ran out when the domain expired. I attempted to call multiple times. Have yet to recieve a call back from anyone at ItsYouDomain. Further investigation reviels ItsYourDomain shares the same telephone line and office space as Mackenzie & Associates. Apparently according to the receptionist at Mackenzie & Associates Jim MacKenzie is responsible for ItsYourDomain and their related company Innerwise. However he was out of the office for 10 days and I am still waiting for a reply from Mr. MacKenzie. After multiple voice messages to every extention available on 847-895-4301 I finally recieved an email from Brian Toon. Who promptly advised me the domain had expired. Well DUH… it wouldn’t have if you could get a responce in a timely manner. He then goes on to tell me they extended the expiration date and to log into the Acount Manager to renew the domain as it cannot be transfered unless it is renewed with ItsYourDomain first. Well hello ransom request… Ok fine I attempted to renew but it failed outdated cc info. No problem I think to myself I’ll just log in and correct the invalid info. I made the necessarry changes it says they were successful yet when I viewed the account settings they had not changed. I replied to Brian Toon telling him that I was not able to make the correction to our account as the system was not taking the changes…. He replies … (are you ready for this) Just log into the system and make the changes in the Account Manager …. I could not belive it I had to explain to him in 4 reply emails 7 different ways how the system was not allowing me to change the information. I requested he call me so that I could explain to him verbally and hopefully get a resolve. (As I was thinking his reading comprehention was a little off.) He responds back each time with contact your cc company to find out why it failed. I knew why, it was failing because ItsYourDomain Account Manager db has the incorrect information and ItsYourDomain Account Manager won’t accept any of the changes I had attempted to make. I have even provided ItsYourDomain with a toll free number that they could contact be at to get the issue resolved and gain control of the domain again. Still waiting, the dmain will expire again in 4 days. I hold out no hope that the domain will ever be relinquished from the pirate grasp of ItsYourDomain aka Innerwise. I have sent an email to ICANN regarding the whole issue but that will not likely resolve anything within a timely manner. Bottom line check your registrar and their affiliates if any of them remotely mention ItsYourDomain or Innerwise … RUN AWAY AS FAST AS YOU CAN
Since the story continues on other pages, I’m closing out this page for comments. If you have anything to add, finished reading the rest of the saga, and then add your comments at the end. Thanks!