CLIENT HOLD Status on a domain

What does it mean?

[Roel]

I found an interesting domain name that was about to expire soon. Using one of the "grab expired domain name" services I placed a "backorder" for that domain. The domain had more interested buyers and now the domain is in auction (after the expire time I think)

The interesting thing is that the domain status is now showing as "CLIENT HOLD, CLIENT TRANSFER PROHIBITED" with the ORIGINAL creation date. The expiry date has gone up one year.

How can this be (the original creation date)?

Who owns the domain at this point? Surely not the original owner? Likely the registar or the 'expired domain name grab' service.

The WHOIS shows the registrar as owning it.

I am wondering how the registrar or the 'expired domain name grab' service (who obviously work together) can keep a domain 'in suspense' like this?

When I called the 'expired domain name grab' service they said; it's not owned by anyone - it's in auction. Duh! Surely it's locked now and I cannot use a normal registrar to go and register it, so I would say it's owned by the registrar or the 'expired domain name grab' service at this point.

Is this legal?

If I get this right - is it allowed for registrars to pay for the renewal fee (which would be a fee to themselves) and then auction of the domain via an affiliate service (likely themselves just under another name) while placing the domain in some sort of locked state (CLIENT HOLD) with the original creation date?

[Roel]

Does anyone have some input on this? Thanks...

[bwnbwn]

Expire soon as to the date showing on the whois information means the owner of that domain has I think between 30-60 days to pay for the domain name at the regester of the domain.

It can not be just snatched up as soon as it expires. You may as well have been the 3rd to 4th one to backorder the domain so your in the hunt with the rest of the pack waiting for the domain to fully expire and I assume will be auctioned off to the highest bidder.

If this auction is only with the ones signed up I don't have a clue but it could have been backordered by a domain auction company as well they pretty sharp on these things.

[Roel]

I ended up winning one of these expired domain name auctions/backorders and the domain - although transferred to me - has kept the original creation date (2005) - is this normal / allowed ?

[bwnbwn]

yes creation date of the domain is always shown

[Roel]

I am still confused. So if an expired domain is sold by a registar it is legal for that registar to keep the original creation date, not the 'new' creation date (i.e. a date AFTER the domain was sold)?

[Receptional Andy]

Creation date is when the domain was first registered - it doesn't reflect changes in registrar or ownership.

[Roel]

Creation date is when the domain was first registered - it doesn't reflect changes in registrar or ownership.

Thanks for that. That is an interesting comment. The people at ICANN said something similar I think.

Yet I believe that when a domain completely 100% expires it will get a new creation date if it is re-registered. Correct?

If so, then things do not seem correct (i.e. how can a domain keep it's original creation date if it supposed to be 100% expired?)

[Roel]

I just spoke with someone today at a registrar and it seems that what is being done is that these expired domains are held in some deletion account and are then moved to the new owner - again - is this legal?