Redemption fee $ 269

[Robo]

Really did it this time and shot myself in the foot, not to speak of other weak parts. Our domain name expired on August 10, went into redemption on August 26, and I found out and contacted active-domain (hope this is not against forum rules) on 27. No dice, pay $ 269 for renewal or chance it and wait until it becomes free again. The latter was their advice, hoping to get some more money that way through auctions?

Is this $269 a normal fee now, or just plain extortion, any ICANN rules that can help or am I up the creek here.

In my defense I can say that there were a cascade of mitigating circumstances and events, several of them outside our control (I know, it still is my stupid mistake).

[lucy24]

Is this $269 a normal fee now, or just plain extortion

They're not really mutually exclusive are they? :(

If you watch too much courtroom TV, the scenario is instantly familiar. It's like having to pay more to get your car out of impound than the car is worth-- but if you don't pay it, the price may go still higher before they give up. And where are you going to find another $269 car?

[thirteen]

Nothing you can do about. There's no regulatory price control on penalties and fees. Charge what the market is willing to pay.

Some Registrars make millions in revenue on their domain auctioning business. If you are with GoDaddy, transfer your domain to another domain Registar that doesn't have a domain auctioning business, so there will be no conflict of interest.

On the bright side, it's not just you. It has happen to other people too.

[edited by: thirteen at 9:51 pm (utc) on Aug 30, 2011]

[edited by: Webwork at 12:23 am (utc) on Sep 1, 2011]
[edit reason] Website not responding at link. Besides we're not big fans of gripe site links. :-/ [/edit]

[bhartzer]

transfer your domain to another domain Registar that doesn't have a domain auctioning business

That is not going to be very likely--just about every domain name registrar is now auctioning off their domain names when they expire, or have an agreement with other services to do it on their behalf.

Whether or not you pay the $269 or not may depend on the domain--if it's a domain that is not likely to be picked up by someone else (a very uncommon word/phrase and it doesn't have much SEO value), then you may let it drop fully. You might want to add some backorders on the domain, just in case. There are several services out there, I would backorder it on them all (you only pay if they get the domain for you).

[HuskyPup]

Don't you use a registrar who tells you at 2 months/1 month/3 weeks/2 weeks/1 week/do it now?

FWIW my registrar is not an auction house nor does it work with anyone else, they just give the required first class service expected of them.

[dhaliwal]

With resellerclub, its $59 (including the registration cost), which means that actual charges should be around $30-50.

[wheel]

Pay the $269 charge and move on. Consider it a tax on stupidity :) :). Learn your lesson and don't let it happen again.

You let it go to the after market and I pick it up, am I going to sell it to you for $269? Well, not me personally, but there are some real lowlife's in the domain marketplace who make a living on other people's sites/efforts. I don't suggest you put yourself in a position of having to work with them.

[Robo]

I was out of reach for internet for a few days, hence the late reply on my own thread.

If all would have failed, I would have been ready to accept the $269 as a fee for my stupidity. And yes, they warned me several times, but I had them in my scedule when to pay and that somehow got messed up. Like I said, my stupidity combined with some events outside our control.

Wathever, I emailed that registrar and told that as non-profit, we did not have those amounts laying around, etc etc. Not a sob story but admitting we were wrong but unforseen events played a role as well.

To make a long story short, they lowered the fee to $ 130, including renewal, which we tried to pay immidiately. Then three credit cards of my US non-profit colleagues were blocked by their banks "because the secure payment page belongs to a foreign company". That this is a major player does not matter; as part of their anti-fraud efforts, those banks block all online payments to foreign accounts.

I finally managed from my side with a Czech credit card, and the payment was accepted by the domain registrar friday night. Now we am waiting that the site goes back up in the air. For once, a happy end and a lucky escape from what could have been wordse.

Thanks for all comments

[wheel]

Wow, rough go. Glad it's been cleared up.

We all make mistakes. I've picked up a few drops where I got contacted by the original owners asking for it back - it happens, people mess up.

I have my wife handle my domain registrations. Then I can't forget :).