Can anyone help with this nightmare?

Website may shut down !

[phantombookman]

Hi
I run several sites but purchased them through a reseller (bought my 1st one and carried on in good faith)
One is now coming up for renewal and I cannot contact him. The hosting company says they cannot do anything unless the current administrator gets in touch with them. I want to pay for the renewal etc myself but cannot.
One site has just closed down but thankfully the person I built it for no longer wanted it - but the next one is important.

Can anyone give me any suggestions as I obviously do not want to lose all the Google positioning and see the site disappear for a period.

Any help greatly appreciated
Regards
Rod

[Philosopher]

Quick question...are you saying the domain name itself is up for renewal or that the hosting account is up for renewal?

[phantombookman]

Hi Philosopher
both domain and hosting due on same day.
My client has the domain registered in his name but the admin' for the hosting etc is in this other guys name.

[PatrickDeese]

Find out who the domain registrar is and ask them what their procedure is for manually changing the admin contacts etc.

Usually you have to fax an affidavit and a copy of a photo ID.

[Philosopher]

Yep...just as Patrick said. If your client is listed as the Registrant, then they can get the admin contact changed. Get it changed and then you are set.

[MatthewHSE]

This brings up a lesson I fortunately learned without getting into such a sticky situation: always register and maintain domains yourself through a reliable company. I've had experience with several hosts and each wanted to register my domain names. I refused each time, and have often been grateful for the extra convenience it provides when changes need to be made.

[phantombookman]

Hi Guys
thanks for that, much appreciated. That looks the way for the domain but that still leaves me with the hosting problem.
Readyhosting will not allow me to renew, they say they will let me re-register but only 30 days after the site is shut down!

Does this mean I have to rehost and what potential problems do I face there?

Regards and thanks
Rod

[tbear]

I my experience (done this twice only) if you load your site onto another host and allow a few days (as much time as possible) for the name to resolve to the new host you should see no effects regarding search engines.

[kwngian]

Seems like you will have to rehost, and worst still if you do not have a backup of your site.

We have encountered the same problem with one of my client's site. We have to write to the registrar, look for another host, upload the old version of their site to the new host, update the changes (lost a number of pages, because we do not have the source code), change the DNS servers and settings.

And all these while, the original designer and hosting company refuses to reply the client's emails just because the client refuses to renew their yearly maintenance contract.

[phantombookman]

HI Guys
thanks again for all the tips, I've been out and bought a fax machine to start the process.

I understand the security implications but I am amazed at the intransigence of the hosting company, I even asked if I could just pay them myself without altering the registration details - refused.

Could anyone recommend a hosting company, one which uses ASP etc (is it windows? - excuse my ignorance)

Tried Westhost recently but my ASP search facility (embedded into loads of pages)does not work with them.

Thanks again for all the help
Regards
Rod