With features offered at domain name registrars like Auto-Renew many people put a lot of trust in a system like this. Why? What happens if the credit card on file expired and you forgot to update it? Maybe email notifications from your domain name registrar are spam blocked?
Most people figure out their domain name expired due to the site going down because of a DNS change at the time of expiration date being reach but really… does that need to happen in the first place? No, it doesn’t!
Ask Foursquare.com what it is like to have your domain name expire only for a couple hours. It still likely takes down your site and throws in an inconvenience to the site users, tech people and sometimes simply causes a big headache that clearly could have been prevented.
The fact is, Auto-Renew is not 100% fully trusted because credit cards on file often become expired after a couple of years. Some registrars like Network Solutions, you have to turn it on as it is not a default on setting! Renewal notification emails do not always reach the correct location because of spam filters, old email addresses on file and I’m sure many other reasons…. like putting it off happen a lot!
Domain names can be registered for up to 10 years at a time so I really so no reason for a popular site not to keep renewal fees paid up at least 2 years in advance no matter what. We all know the price will likely keep increasing on domain registrations so why not just renew the domain for 10 years now at the current rates!
Sites do that already? No, they do not. Some do but many do not and often only renew for the 1 year minimum! Some 50,000 – 100,000 domain name expire everyday and many of these are unwanted!
If you are unsure of your expiration date, the best and most accurate location to see it is at the registry of your domain name! For .com, .net, .edu, .cc, .name, .jobs and .tv domain names, the registry is Verisign. Use the whois look-up if you own that kind of domain to find out the expiration date of your domain name and if you still want the domain or it is important to you, renew it for at least 2 years out, if not the full 10 years allowed.
FailBlog.org, popular site… domain expire date is only about 1 month away currently
BillShrink.com, popular site… domain expires 5/3/2010
Not big enough companies / sites?
ABC.com expire date is 5/23/2010.. a little over a month away. I mean really, a company the size of ABC even risking any downtime or putting trust in auto-renew is simply crazy to me! For about $100, you can be 10 years in the clear by renewing the domain name out to the max years allowed!
ESPN.com is currently under a year away from the expiration date.
Flickr.com is under a year away from the expiration date.
AOL.com is under a year away form the expiration date
Since domain names mainly are renewed annually, it can be easy to forget about it, so it is always best to renew your domain name out for as long as you can or afford. Never fully put trust in an Auto-Renew system and be sure to keep your email address up to date at your registrar.
John
A former client just had their domain expire… I noticed it when I got the DomainTools alert. They were slow to renew it, but they finally did after my call and fax. Noticed the other day that they renewed it for 10 years. Was debating if I should email them and tell them good job… but I bet it expires in 10 years! It’s fine they wanted to work on their own site from now on, but I think they regret taking over the hosting and domain ownership, too.
Nion
Maybe registrar need to have feature of Paypal subscription….. So they will charge to Paypal automatically…. Customer only need to keep their credit card detail up-to-date on single place, Paypal….. No need update to all registrars…… NB: Paypal only for example, other provider may suit too
Keith Goonez
Once I originally commented I clicked the -Notify me when new feedback are added- checkbox and now each time a remark is added I get four emails with the same comment. Is there any means you’ll be able to remove me from that service? Thanks!
Jamie Zoch
Hi Keith. That is a bit odd that you get 4 emails as you shouldn’t, but in the email you get.. scroll to the bottom and click the unsubscribe. You will be brought to a web page, put a check mark next to the subscribed boxes and remove it. Hope that helps.