Every business will have noticed over the past 2-3 years how its domain name is increasingly a component of its 'life blood', so it's time to get it completely under control.  No business knowingly allows others to control the most important tools of that business yet almost all have allowed their domain to 'drift' outside their control BUT now it's too valuable to let that situation continue.  

The problem is that most businesses originally registered one or more domains through its IT consultant, ISP, friend or colleague.  This meant domains were registered all over the world and often for the cheapest price possible.  This 'randomness' has lead to considerable confusion, even lost domains, and no business can allow this to happen into the future.  What's beginning to occur more and more often is that e-mails just stop and a website goes 'off the air'.  The reason is very simple and that's that your domain has not been renewed and the Registrar has simply 'turned you off'. 

If the domain is renewed within a few hours then it'll almost always come up again quickly and away you go BUT if your domain remains un-renewed for too long, say, in the case of a domain name you want to use but have yet to do so, then that domain runs a big risk of being lost forever.  Even more so now domain names can be 'reserved' by others which means another can put their name down for your domain and if you slip up they can get it. 

Why might your domain not be renewed on time?  When it was registered a number of records are created and one of these is a contact e-mail.  Renewal notices will be sent to this address for up to 90 days before the domain expires.  The obvious problem is that this e-mail address no longer exists in any form and these renewal e-mails never get to you or your representative such a AcctWeb or PlannerWeb, so 'out of the blue' you're suddenly thrown into considerable confusion and concern you can do without.

In most cases, fixing the problem is simple if you do the following, but some will find their domain was registered with a cheap and/or overseas registrar and finding the necessary detail from these can be very hard indeed.  Also if you don't do the following then you'll have the same problem again in 2-3 years time.  

The following is the process you need to put in place as soon as possible.  

1.  Obtain your domain's Registry Key if you're domain's registered with Melbourne IT, or the Username and Password for all others.  This will allow you to access your record periodically, say once a year, to make sure it's up-to-date. 

2.  Obtain the name and website address of the Registrar where your domain is registered.  Melbourne IT, Enetica and NetRegistry are examples of domain registrars.

3.  Record this information in such a way that it's easily retrieved.

4.  Diarise an annual review.  A good job for the member of staff who's in charge of your website based solution.

5.  Go to your Registrar's website, log onto your domain and up-date the records accordingly.

Regards,

AcctWeb / PlannerWeb