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What to do when your registrar (NSI) ignores you?
Frustrated Webmaster writes "For the past two days, I've been trying to make modifications on a domain name I registered through NSI/Verisign. The problem is, they refuse to accept changes through email, and their login system is apparently broken. What are my options? How do I transfer the domain away from NSI if I can't even login to their system?" CD: When I heard that NSI was going to go through yet another interface change, I moved the domains that mattered to me to another registrar. For what it is worth, I can totally reccomend EasyDNS.
I personally think dotster is the best. They have great online management tools and bulk management tools for managing all your dumb novelty domains at once.
They're cheap and the customer support is good too.
I don't work for them, I just like them, disclaimer, etc.
NSI is the worst registrar out there. Here is a list of registrars, any one of which is better than NSI. Personally, I use Bulk Register.
1ALpha7
Live to be Moderated
They've been really responsive when I've suggested features or had a question, typically responding in under an hour business days, and same day even on Sundays.
I don't know if they have an e-mail interface, but after NetSol, I sure as hell don't miss that. The web interface is nice, letting you apply changes to one or all domains at once, view domains sorted by expiry date, and there are no locks on company names like NetSol and all have or had.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
That's typical registrar behavior, especially with NSI/Verisign. Since they have had to deal with competition, they have been doing some pretty nasty things including not doing domain transfers. Their reasoning is that they don't know whether it is actually the owner requesting the domain being transfered, and they don't want to be liable for domain jacking. Well, that should be solved by a phone call and maybe a fax of ID, right? Wrong. They have made it super tough to transfer a domain because to transfer a domain means they are losing business to competition so they are going to hold onto your domain for as long as they can. Call it Reverse Domain Jacking if you will.
directNIC.com is $15 and has nice features like free hosting, paid DNS and paid POP3 email accounts. They also have the best interface I've ever seen for a registrar. They make it really easy to mange lots of domains (even hundreds), which is really nice if you have more than a couple domains. Transfering your domain to them or another registrar is a painless process that doesn't involve the original registrar.
These ones spam:
NSI/Verisign/Register.com
Joker.com
Dotster
You can find out more by asking on news.admin.net-abuse.email. However, here's some that don't spam, haven't given any problems, and are groovy all around.
DomainDiscover
GANDI.net
Stargateinc.com
awregistry.net
netwiz.net
--
# Canmephians for a better Linux Kernel
$Stalag99{"URL"}="http://stalag99.net";
They rock. They're cheap. They do dynamic DNS, a store and forward MX...
I haven't found a better service.
BlackNova Traders
i've been using Joker as my sole registrar for the past 2 years. Super cheap, free dns, easy interface, good service. Only minus would be the sometimes awkward translated website / documents (they are a german registrar)....
--BlueLines "The cost of living hasn't affected it's popularity." -anonymous
I transfered a couple from NSI to Gandi and it was fairly painless. The new registrar you choose should have instructions on how to transfer your domain to them, and as part of the process, NSI should contact you to verify it. I had a bitch of a time getting NSI to do things, but they kept pace on the domain transfer. Check out this site for a review of registrars that includes ratings of their terms of service (privacy and who owns the domain). Gandi is currently ranked first for legal policies. =D
I had a similar problem. We had transfered our company website to another server, and I needed to transfer DNS record information over in NSI.
Unfortunately the MAIN e-mail for their records was going to a non existent e-mail matth@ptd.xxx. Yet, on the contact it listed matth@shell.xxxxx.com. I still dont' totally understand it, they said something about how that e-mail address is hard coded when you setup the account and you can't change it... so I'd either have to send an e-mail from the @shell.xxxx.com address or the @ptd.xxx address.
Our mail system runs on a dynamic DNS system. My e-mail would come from: matth@shell.xxxxxxx.com
but for some reason NSI would read it as our dynamic DNS name which would be: matth@andromeda-xxx.dyndns.org. Needless to say, they said I needed to fax a document over with identification like a phone bill or drivers license ID. I said, umm look here, there aren't any phone bills that come to the business because it's a home business, and my drivers licenes doesn't have the business address, because I don't live here! They were like, ok then just fax it over, and exlpain that. I did.. it came back.. you must include ID. After several days I called them again, and said, that I'd like to know why their e-mail system is reading my dynamic domain instead of the domain I'm sending e-mail from, they said it wasn't their problem. How can you argue with someone who's reading from a script and doesn't understand what you're talking about!??! even when I got someone who understood, somehow they still seemed to find an intellegent way to not answer the question. In the long run I ended up forging an e-mail from the main e-mail address for the account which no longer existed (the main problem in the beginning) matth@ptd.xxx. So I forged the e-mail, and forged a return form, and got the domain trasnfered. *sigh* Why does NSI make me do things illegally in order to transfer my DOMAIN? I even went over this on the phone with the lady.. I said.. look why do I need to fax you all this junk? I could just forge an e-mail from my old address, and have it work. she's like well I'm sorry that's how things are.
OpenSRS resellers have a super-easy set of password-protected web forms for updating all of your info. The cool thing is, if for some reason your reseller goes out of business (imagine that!), you can still do maintenance through opensrs.org.
Two that I like and have used are
Domainmonger
and 000domains
Plus, the price is usually cheap ($13-17 per year).
It's easy to switch from NSI/Verisign to these guys. The instructions are on the sites.
You can end up at a place that used to be okay, and now has gone down the tubes.
I wonder what happens if one of these places goes under?
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Also, Domain Discover makes it incredibly easy to transfer your domain to them. They have a SSL web based interface for making changes.
Note: I don't work for them, but I do have ~15 personal domains registered through them so.. Slightly more expensive them some of the other registrars out there, but I think its worth it to know that my registrar won't steal my domain name if it suits their interests...
One of these days i'm going to find this 'peer' guy and reset HIS connection!
Working as a DNS Admin for a webhosting company often brings forth problems with client domain names. I've had to deal with everything that you can imagine through them. The best way is to call them. If it's something simple, they'll often accept it instantly right there. If it's something more complex they'll often give you a tracking number and you just fax them proof of yourself and that you own the domain name, and within 24 hours most changes go through. At the first sign of trouble through web/email call them.
I've been using EasyDNS.ca for over 6 mos. No problems with the domain. All very "easy". I've never needed to contact them about any issues, or even had any issues in the first place!
:D My ISP was Bell Sympatico, and their PPPoE implementation seemed to ensure many and frequent IP address changes.
;)
I was using the "dynamic" DNS service that they were offering with a DNS client updating my IP address everytime it changed. No problems reported by people trying to connect to my mail or web servers
My biggest issue (ha!) with easydns is updating dynamic IP addresses from Linux. They recommend ez-ipupdate, which is fine if your box is connected directly to the internet. Mine wasn't: it was NATed behind a router. In this situation you have to jump through some hoops to get the IP address updated. Does anybody know of a ddns client for Linux that works straight-off from behind a firewall, *and* works with easydns? Not that it is important anymore as I have a static IP from Istop.com, and better service
Finally, I like easydns.ca as they're just down the road from me in Toronto. That means my money isn't going to some huge ugly US corporation. As I understand it, easydns.com was set up to compete with the US companies, hence they're happy to accept USD$.
for my domain.
Assuming you pay through a credit card, call up your cc company and complain. They tend to be pretty good at satisfying their customers.
Register is the standard $35/year, but they have been responsive to my questions and inquiries. Even through email I got a 2 day response. I'm not saying they are the best or anything, just solid and pretty straight forward.
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
The only bad thing I've seen in the threads so far is that they spam you. I have NEVER found this to be true, and in all the years I've been using them, I've had the BEST service, the LOWEST prices, and the overall best experience with this registrar.
I even have an opensrs reseller account, and I like this better. (costs like $1 more per domain/year, but don't have to buy in bulk).
In the early days of their service, I even got quick replies from their head admin for some issues I was having transfering domains.
Before you do anything like that read the terms of use from your cc. This is not an acceptable form of use. Your card may be suspended. Call their 1-800 and let the charge accumulate untill someone responds.
DRM? No thanks, I'll just get it somewhere else...
Network Solutions is BY FAR the WORST place to register a domain.
Their forms are confusing, even when you know exactly what you're doing. And that assumes you can find the right form in the first place -- even the list of them is confusing! Changing basic things like DNS servers is a nightmare.
Compare to Domain Maniac. It's a snap to change basic info -- you just log in and do it.
So on a purely technical basis, pretty much anything is better than NS.
Oh yeah, then there's the fact that DM charges less than half of what NS charges.
I've been dealing with NSI since 1995. During the middle 90's, they were the only registar company, and when dealing with them for the local ISP I worked for, found them to be un-responsive and totally non-caring.
It took me 6 months to move a personal domain away from them. I tried using their website, and their email forms. Old but still valid email forms from my ISP days. Made some 30 phone calls, and spent over $150 dollars on long distance, because at the time, they did not offer an 800#.
Then, when they did offer an 800#, the call volume got so bad that the only way to reach them was via email, and that was just a large black hole.
In the last 2 years I've migrated every domain I admin to a small registar who offers wonderful website control of my domains, 24 hour tech support (who know what they are doing) vian an 800#, and IF they f8ck up, which happens now and then, they have, EVERY single time, excalated the problem to the right deptartment and it's fixed within a few hours.
NSI is one of the very worst service companies I've ever encounted, and I'm aghast that they are still in business, and screwing with people's domains left and right.
I applied for the .BIZ domain for my company,
.BIZ domain, they told me they aren't administering it, it's neulevel that takes care of it...(that sounded like a ping pong game is about to start).. I asked who to contact at neulevel, neulevel told me NSI would take care of it (ARGH), anyways last time I tried was 2 weeks ago when the .BIZ was supposed to be online, asked them what was wrong, they told me they had a database screwup (good timing guys) and they would get the Neulevel transfer within a week and mail me the new password... that was around november 8th if I recall.... so it's more than a week now and still nothing... god...
I've had nothing but troubles with NSI.
First: The application, they gave me a customer #, a login and a password... few days later, I couldn't log back in the account to see if my application passed, if my domain was accepted or if my company credit card was billed (although I could see it from the receipt generated by the CC company).
Second: Tech support, forget about their email reply, they NEVER reply
Third: I went online with their chatroom stuff, I thought "hey that's a good service" (I hate using the phone), finally they answer your question, it makes sense (I asked why my account wasn't working, they replied they didn't have an account or domain under what I registered, but if I check the neulevel whois database, I'm there (?) , so they told me they would send a password back within a day... of course it never happened).
After a week, I went back to check with them what was happening with the BIZ domain, they told me they didn't have my account and no record of me applying... funny, my credit card does!
I asked what the Fsck was going on, how come I couldn't access my
This brings me to stargate Inc, saw them by a pure coincidence, guess what? 8$/domain when you register at least 2... you get: Email fowarding, static web page, unlimited DNS/NS changing with a nice configuration toolbox, *FAST* service, *FAST* confirmation, heck, Why are companies like NSI still around when you get that kind of royal treatment for a mere 8$??? I was really shocked (and still pissed at NSI). If you can't carry a buisness, let the others do it, we don't have to pay for their incompetence nor the fact that their tech support people don't even know the earth is round yet (so imagine anything having to do with your account).
Anyways, thanks for bringing this up, I almost forgot about it, I'll ask stargate if they can transfer the authorization, and if I'm lucky, maybe I'll be able to actually USE that domain before it expires and I have to renew it...
I don't know about you guys, but they claim software piracy costs BILLIONS per year, but calculare how much is lost in time wasted if we calculate 1-2 hours a week per IT administrator such as myself times the amount of companies that went thru NSI. 35$/yr for a domain might be cheap for corporate usage, but 2 hours/week to fix domain issues and bouncing paperwork around adds to quite a lot, this could almost be worth a class action suit, maybe the management would wake up.
Great website, tools, etc., don't know about service cause I haven't had to bug them yet... have done dozens of registrations and transfers... highly recommended.
Is this truly the only Earth I can live on?
Any of a number of people have suggested transferring your domain away from NSI, and have suggested replacements. There is one big hiccup to beware of, however:
... they wanted $150 for a year. Calls to customer service to get the mess straight proved totally fruitless. We're still unable to register it with another registrar because NSI won't let it go, and NSI won't reregister it for anything like the usual price.
If you try to transfer your domain away from NSI by letting your domain expire and then reregistering it with another registrar, you may find that NSI is holding it hostage.
A customer of mine let one of her domains expire for lack of funds; when the money came in to pay the $30 registration fee, NSI didn't want $30 or $35 or even $70 to re-up it
Also, I moved a domain from NSI to another registrar back in July; in September I started getting bills from NSI for the domains' registration which expires in October, 2005.
Remove the caps and hold to a mirror.
You can transfer to another registrar without initially contacting NSI yourself. Instead, your new registrar will handle everything. If things go as they should, NSI will shortly send you an automated message asking you to approve the change. You merely reply to the message, filling in a couple of fields in the form. I've done it several times now, it only takes about 48 hours.
I highly recommend checking out the DomainNameBuyersGuide to see how various registrars rank among various dimensions (legal, pricing, etc). This is how I found my excellent registrar, DomainDiscover, which has proved to be great.
For the record, I too, am a huge fane of EasyDNS; they provide 4 secondary DNS sites and 2 backup MX for $15 yearly.
When I moved my domain, neverending.org, away from NSI, I didn't have to deal with NSI at all. I just told DomainDiscover that I wanted them to take over control of my domain, and after filling out the proper paperwork, I was homefree. I never had plow through NSI roadblocks.
I remember getting an email from NSI saying "We're so sorry to see you go; could you fill out this form and rank us?" I filled out the form, just to vent the problems I saw with NSI.
This isn't relevant.
While I like, and use DynDNS (note my URL :) they aren't a domain registrar. They supply DNS servers. Not the same thing.
my old sig used to be funny, but then slashcode ate it and now it's not funny anymore
Recently, NSI deactivated one of my client's domains with no notice six months after the yearly renewal fee had been paid. NSI customer service informs me that the domain was shut off because the renewal fee was never paid. When I told the service rep we'd already paid, he told me they had no record of it. Lacking a confirmation number or credit receipt, my client decided to pay them again. Cool beans, right? Not exactly. Three days pass and the domain is still inactive. I call customer service and they tell me that payment is due on the domain. Amazed, I get the go-ahead from my client and we pay for the domain. Again. Cool beans, right? Wrong. Three more days go by, and you can guess what customer support told me when I called them. So after paying them a _third_ time, NSI finally reactivated the domain, much to my client's clients' joy.
This incident has actually inspired my client to get into the registrar business. He figures he should have no shortage of rebounding disgruntled NSI customers available for the taking.
Personally, I recommended that my client fax a copy of his credit receipt to NSI and formally dispute their ripping him off, but the invoices weren't available, and it would have only been more customers and email lost if he had taken the time to get them.
niko
These 'people' (actually I'm not sure if they are people, I've certainly never been able to speak to a human there. I suspect it might be more of an evil artificial intelligence) are the worst. I have been trying to update an out of date email for an admin contact for months. Last time I faxed them official company letterheads, drivers licences, you name it and other than the automated email "we got your request" they maintain a stony silience and the domain info remains the same.
They are more evil than microsoft. I wish someone would declare a Jihad against them.
:wq
After having countless problems transfering domains from NSI/Verisign, Updating DNS or changing emails I decided to consult their 'Ask Jeeves' powered question and answer system...
The answer..
Sorry!
You Asked:
how do I transfer my domain to another registrar?
Thanks for asking your question!
Unfortunately, we couldn't find any answers for this one.
Says it all...
The only way I ever got them to do anything was by listening to their phone system for an hour or two (I'm not joking, and that was at international phone rates, several times over the years) until someone picked up the phone, and tried to do the Dogbert-esque "How may I disconnect you" thing.
With a just a little bit more persistence they would finally react.
I transfered to gandi (which went totally smoothly, and only took about 3 days to happen, and costs about half what NSI charge) and have never had a problem with them. They have a web interface that works, they have a mail system that means that a human gets to see your queries within less than a day, and replies --- In short, they do a proper job.
Why the bloody hell NSI are still allowed to have anything to do with domain administration is totally beyond me. It's about time that someone brought a class action against them for wasting tens of thousands of hours of other peoples time.
Further examples of their uselessness:
Use gandi, use anyone --- just run screaming from NSI and your problems will be solved.
Debian: GNU/Linux done the Linux way
I tell everyone I know not to register with NSI. If there ever was an example of corporate credit card fraud, NSI is it. I prefer to call it e-fraud .
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
hahahaha, call NSI. Good luck getting a human on the phone. Hold times are around 30mins and they have a very small hold queue so if the lines fill up, the automated voice basically says 'fuck you' and hangs up.
Unfortunately, NSI has much worse problems than that. My domain has been expired on their database since Dec 99 and they wont let me transfer it to another registrar because it is "on hold". I called them and asked them how long it would take until it is deleted from their database and told them it has been over a year and they said "Oh, it will be much longer than that".
This has to be a violation some kind of law.
Anyways, all of my new domain business goes to Dotster, as well as my clients'. Too bad I purchased the domain before NSI lost their monopoly.
You should switch registrars as soon as possible, not only because NSI is unethical, but because your first few attempts may fail because NSI is very, very bad.
I work for an small ISP and whenever an NSI-registered domain we host comes up for renewal, we suggest that the domain owner switch registrars. We recommend Gandi, a bunch of French Linux geeks who we've never had a single problem with. They charge 12 euros a year, about $10-11. It helps that they are one of the cheapest, because transfers are often denied by NSI, meaning you lose your 12 euros. Make sure to start this process a while before your registration expires, so you can attempt multiple transfers if need be.
Be very, very careful not to let your domain expire. Occasionally, a customer will call up because their web site isn't working and we look into it and see that their domain name expired (generally because they forgot to pay their bill). In that case, we tell them to pay NSI ASAP or we often pay it ourselves, because of the NSI horrors we've had in the past.
One of our customers forgot to pay their NSI bill and the domain expired. NSI deleted it from their database, but it was still in the master registry. So the registry shows the domain as registered through NSI, but NSI has no records for it. This means that nobody can register the domain until it is expunged from the registry (which, funny enough, is also run by NSI). This takes an undetermined amount of time, meaning that they could do it today or they could do it in six months, but they absolutely will not tell you when they're going to do it.
In the case of our customer, it took about six weeks for NSI the registry to expunge the domain, which generally happens around 6:30 a.m. eastern time. As soon as it was expunged, a domain name hijacker registered the domain and won't relinquish it without getting a wad of cash.
How are you going to dump NSI when you can't even send them authentication in any way?
jeff
ipv6 is my vpn
Dude, I hate to break this to you, but you're worrying about nothing. You don't need to log in/e-mail/whatever to NSI to transfer your domains away. Simply choose your registrar and request a domain transfer from them. All the rest is done for you. End of story. You never have to touch NSI at any time during the process...
*Condense fact from the vapor of nuance*
We are doing everything in our power to eliminate doing any business with network solutions. When I started at ISP A, they were using previous BAP (some sort of business partner agreement) as the basis of doing registrations. Network Solutions proceeded to move towards their new interface, things changed subtley. Things would stop working one day. Managing a NIC Services domain was pretty easy to do as long as you were the proper contact, under the BAP agreements. managing WORLDNIC domains, which were the new interface worked horribly. I spoke with multiple people trying desperately to come to some sort of terms with their new partner agreements, as I was under pressure to maintain our previous level of service. What really bothered me about there new agreement programs was how silly they were. If you are an affiliate partner, network solutions/verisign would only allow you to list two nameservers. We maintain four for redundancy. Every domain that we'd register would have to be corrected afterwards. Verisign said it was technically impossible to change the number of name servers for an affiliate partner. What ended up coming out later, after a couple of conversations was that they wanted to discourage the affiliate program, so that people would become preferred partners. If you were a preferred partner you could list four but not otherwise. I thought this was lame. All of these problems all because there was no way that we were going to take over billing contact for domains.
In the past year, registrar agreements have posed the biggest nightmare in my daily duties.
We have looked to GKG.NET, and they seem reasonable. I would like to explore their affiliate/partner programs more.
Oh, and did I mention I had to submit 12 different Global Updates to update 750+ domains. I submited the first one, called them up as our deadline approached. I was asked for my TRACKING NUMBER. Explained that I did not get a tracking number. Was told to send it again. Wash, rinse, repeat. 12 times. Finally right before our deadline, I get an email stating it has been completed. Shortly afterward I get my Tracking Number. Periodically for the next two months my global update requests would be return rejected. Very bizarre. I guess their is one man behind the curtain responsible for global updates, I was told their was at least a 30 day delay. Man, I don't want to have to do it again, but our domain count will in the near future triple due to migrations coming to fruition....
What a nasty business... I don't know if I ever figured out the process for transferring registrars with network solutions either...
Brian Seppanen
Minister of Information and Propaganda
Area 54 The Secret Government Disco Labs Provo
Powerpipe.com rules.. $8.88. .. They'll even do DNS for no additional charge.. (A and MX records)
Can do multi-domains at once..
very easy to transfer domains as well..
Web based changes..
ChiefArcher
Last year, I decided to move away from NSI. I was in the same boat : broken web site links, no email reply, etc... A total mess. I lost about one month of getting nowhere with NSI. I contacted a company to do the transfer and then took it from here. The name of the company is tigertech.com. They charge a very reasonable fee, and most importantly they offer the best support I've ever seen on the web so far. Writing a mail on Sunday gets me an answer in the following hour.
I don't have any stock in this company, don't even now if they are public, all I know is that they deserve to succeed in this market, compare to some huge sharks who don't give a darn about your problems.
Try them, you won't regret it.
--PPA
-- I feel better now. Thanks for asking.
And then what? Now you have a domain being held by NSI, they're not receiving payment from you for it and you're going to expect them to suddenly comply with your request? If anything, a tatic like that will get your domain stuffed in a hole even further from reach.
You may try GKG.net They've helped me get domains away from the clutches of NSI in the past. Like all of the other registrars mentioned here, they have good customer service, bla bla.
greg
So long as your domain isn't past its expiration date, NSI can do nothing to prevent you from transferring it out of their control. Just go to another registrar and follow their procedure to move a domain to their aegis.
I use Gandi.net, myself (not Ghandi.net; that's a squatter, and costs a lot more). Gandi charges 12 EU (about $10 US) to transfer the domain, and tacks on an additional year of registration. Check them out.
Of couse Network Solutions would not answer any of my email or phone calls, for which they are infamous.
So I had to register the domain name "mindsprinc.com" (with ANOTHER registrar, of course -- I never used Network Solutions after that), and then I simply sent them email from that domain name asking their automated system to fix it.
-Don
Take a look and feel free: http://www.PieMenu.com
How do I transfer the domain away from NSI if I can't even login to their system?
;)
Well, take a peek at the link you've been using, and you'll be one step closer to your goal.
Granted I am a bit biased, since we are a Tucows/OpenSRS reseller. However, I have not found a more reliable and friendly company to work with than Tucows. The development team is awesome and their support staff is more than willing to work with you. We have been registering our domains through them over a year and a half now, and have never once regretted the move from first NSI and then later registrars.com
We currently retail domains at $13.00 per year (which isn't the cheapest price out there) after buying them wholesale from Tucows at $10.00 year.
If you are serious about registering lots of domains I strongly suggest becoming a Tucows reseller.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
www.haidacarver.com
DNS for $30 per domain... for life. And if you decide you want to drop a domain and get a different one? $0. You already paid for 1 domain worth of DNS, and that's what you'll get, regardless of what the domain is called.
Of course you still need a registrar. I've had no problems with godaddy.com with my 3 domains.
Oh, and they're a not-for-profit.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
You really should remember about the whole aol.com fiasco where their domain was hijacked by some crackers with a simple forged email to NSI. You shouldn't use email as the method of change and hopefully NSI has disabled this feature.
The book http://www.realworldlinuxsecurity.com/ should provide more information on this front.
Unfortunately, this does work, even when the charges were perfectly valid. You would not believe how many of our customers (sometimes accidentally, their brother or someone used their CC to purchase a domain or hosting account without them knowing) call their CC company and request a charge back. 99% of the time it goes through and they get their money back. The point is a domain registration is such a small ticket item that most companies just write it off since it is too small to waste the time fighting. If for whatever reason you are being defrauded, then by all means use this method, because it does work. Even if you do make a mistake, usually the merchant or CC company eats it anyway, especially if it is a small ticket item. That is the unfortunate part about it for merchants like ourselves, but I guess it is one of the costs of doing business. Fortunately most people are honest and don't do charge backs unless there really is reason to do so.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
www.haidacarver.com
Did you get the name(s) of the person(people) you talked to on the phone? Did you talk to their supervisors? Did you call the better business bureau? Did you write a letter to upper management? Did you write a letter to the newspaper? Did you write a letter to the TV station? Did you write a letter to the techie journals?
When you were in the process of transferring, did you call them every day and ask why it hadn't been transferred yet? Did you ask them what the exact reasons were? Did you talk to that person's supervisor to get answers? Did you talk to his/her supervisor to get more answers?
What were all the specifics of your "attempt" to transfer?
+1 Insightful, -1 Troll. What can I say, I'm an Insightful Troll.
I am dealing with these jerks right now. They store your credit card without telling you and insta-charge it if you show interest in any domain. They also charge you for a domain even if the registration fails.
Sometimes the cheap choice isn't the best. Actually I must admit that I've never had any big problem with NSI other than the fact that they promised me a t-shirt if I renewed for 2 or more years and never sent it. (and didn't respond to my email asking why they didn't send it)
I had the exact same problem and their admin pages were "broken" for at least 3 weeks. I irc'd their support desk and walked through it with them, only to be told that that portion of the web site was not yet functional. I went to registerfly, where I had one domain already, and transfered it off NSI for $8.99, which included the first year. No fees to change information, no hassels. The transfer took about 3 days! NSI still sent me a bill for the next year, but I just pitched it. What a joke.
THIS SPACE FOR RENT
I still haven't been able to find a registrar other than NSI that allows you to make changes to your registration via PGP-authenticated e-mail. And they're slowing phasing out that feature.
Anyone know of another registrar that allows this?
http://www.stargateinc.com -- I moved to them after Domain Bank started spamming me. I've found Stargate to be very inexpensive ($8.85/domain), and they have a full-blown web-based configuration section where domain owners can make whatever changes they want at any time.
As for the service, Stargate really does make NSI look like the sick joke they've become. When I had some minor trouble assigning two new domain names I'd registered to my own DNS boxes, I simply dropped a note to Stargate's tech support. The problem was promptly fixed in less than 24 hours, and I had a courteous and informative response to show for it.
Whatever registrar you select, let THEM take care of the transfer paperwork for you. SG did an outstanding job here as well.
FWIW: I wouldn't go with Dotster. They support spammers. Avoid register.com as well -- big-time spam support, despite their ToS.
Good hunting.
Bruce Lane, KC7GR,
Blue Feather Technologies
I switched most of my domains over to DirectNIC when I got fed up with NSI about 6 months back. There were many things, but the last straw was that my newer domains were in a different system (some crappy web interface) that wouldn't let me specify more than two DNS servers. I used their support e-mail to ask if it was possible, and after about a week got an (automated) message back saying that their automated help system couldn't answer my question and to fax the information in. Forget that.
Anyway, I just started looking at registrars at random, and ended up at DirectNIC. I've been very happy with them so far. It costs a third as much, and while it uses a web interface, it's a nice one and makes it really easy to manage multiple domains. You can even get SSL certificates through them -- I'm pretty sure it's just a standard Equifax SSL cert -- if you can ignore Verisign's FUD (doesn't bother me one bit, I got a few Equifax certs after balking at Verisign's insane pricing for 128-bit). NSI's "new" interface always just seemed hacked-together to me.
Anyway, ditching NSI made me very happy in itself, and DirectNIC has been pleasing to deal with. I'd gladly encourage anyone to give them a try. The transfer process from NSI is relatively painless; I've heard a lot about them trying to hold on to domains but an email confirmation with a special key to put in a web page was all I needed.
I've got all mine registered through 000domains.com.
They have the best interface I've seen and you can gain access through any opensrs reseller control panel.
Customer support is top notch too. I've used a lot of guys and so far 000domains.com have been the best.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
Am I the first person to click the NSI link? Or did no one else notice the bad link (that still worked).
Hammer of Truth
I feel your pain. A couple of months ago, I had to transfer some domains for a few websites that I was taking over when the last webmaster quit and the host went bankrupt. I've done this before and never had any problems, BUT there were two emails set up to allow changes to the domains, and neither email was active anymore. So I made some phone calls, and I'm pretty sure that verisign has all of their tech support done in call centers in India. I was listening to the BBC a while back and they were talking about how its a big business over there to have call centers for US companies since it's so much cheaper for them rather than having it in the continental US.
Anyway, I appreciate the hard work phone tech support people do, they have a tough job, but I could not understand anyone from their end. I called back every other day for 4 weeks because nothing was done to make changes, and everyone gave me the same story.... "wait for 2 days, the system just takes a little while to get everythign through" Talking to their supervisors did nothing to expedite this either. It took over 1 month to finally change all of the DNS settings, and the sites were down in the meantime which meant lost business (and a lot of explaining on my part). My advice is to make sure you know that email address and it's active, give verisign plenty of time to make any changes, and just hope your host doesnt go out of business, because if you have to call Verisign to make changes, you're in for a big headache.
Hey, cool. I used to work for the guys at GKG a few years back as a web developer when I lived in College Station, TX. Paul and Taylor are really nice guys. Glad to see things are worked out well for ya.
JOhn
Campaign for Liberty
I worked for a hosting company and it was my job to deal with NSI daily. They only way to get anything done is to CALL Verisign and ask to speak to the BAO (Business Affairs Office). They are the ONLY people there that have any power. The customer service reps that you talk to sound like indians for a reason.. Verisign uses a Call Center in India (no lie).
Virginia Office
21355 Ridgetop Circle
Dulles, VA 20166
Main Number: 703-742-0400
Good luck!
Well...
Since one of my domains was also registered directly at Internic (back when it was called that) I got an email that NSI are migrating their domains to a new webbased admin app.
And I recently got an email that the domain in question had been migrated. And that they would be sending out new logins at some point soon...
So I'd guess that's the problem here.
I read once (I forget where) where someone was describing their expierence with network solutions. Their software was choking on their email, it had something to do with not liking how most mail software creates mail headers. This person had to use trial and error to figure out which one, then forge a 'properly' formatted email from himself.*
Another solution would be to get a decent regristrar, but that can cause other problems and can take even longer to sort out. Once you get it sorted out it will probably be very good, but actually making the transfer will make you question why you are doing it.
The easiest solution is likely to figure out what it doesn't like about your email, and forge one it does like.*
*Note to U.S. government. This is merely offered up as a hypothetical solution. I do not advocate the forging of email, nor the impersonation of oneself.
There is a civil war coming in the United States. Remember which side has most of the guns
It occurs to me that the only thing the Better Business Bureau requires is that a company respond to every complaint. Not that they resolve the issue or that they respond favorably, but simply that they respond. Since NSI is infamous for not responding to complaints, perhaps alerting the BBB would be a good idea?
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Registrars react promptly to WIPO UDRP decisions. If your registrar ignores you, the fastest solution is to get a UDRP ruling from WIPO and let the registrar implement it.
DA & I alerted Davey to it yesterday. Wonder when those "Our sites been compromised, change your password" emails will start flying??
BTW? How do you contact google and tell them to stop caching something like this??
LFS. Have you built your system today?
I'm just +1'ing for the above comment. I've always had to end up faxing verisign/nsi to get anything done.
there are 2 kinds of people. those who divide people into 2 kinds, and those who don't.
I have a relevant experience to relate concerning this issue:
/. about how NSI was getting ready to take possession of unrenewed domain names, auctioning them off. I was starting to feel a little paranoid about losing my domain name, so I decided to just do the more expensive thing and renew the name with NSI in order to avoid the transfer process and simplify the issue.
About 6 months ago, I wanted to transfer a domain name from NSI to another registrar. I'll mention here that the domain name is a fun one, and could potentially be used by any flesh peddler out there (although that's not what I'm using it for).
I tried the transfer at least 3 times over a two week period. Failures every time. At the same time, I successfully transferred three unrelated (and less valuable) domain names from NSI to my new registrar using the exact same procedures and information.
I became suspicious, and figured that maybe NSI had some kind of technical problem. I then read an article on
I couldn't renew the domain name through their website either. I got very odd, vague error messages on their website when I tried to pay via credit card.
So I decided to call their 800 number and renew over the phone as a last-ditch effort. First the person on the phone told me she couldn't renew the domain name. When I pressed for details as to why, she claimed that she didn't know. She sounded confused by what she was seeing on her computer, and put me on hold. I was transferred to someone higher up the food chain, who tried the same process, and apparently encountered the same difficulty.
After about an hour on the phone and 4 or 5 long hold sessions, a person in accounting took my credit card info and forced the transaction through.
Funnier still - the computer system wouldn't allow me to renew for only one year, until the issue was manually overridden by someone in accounting. My only option was a two-year renewal according to the people I spoke with before that.
I was very concerned at this point. I waited on the telephone until receiving my renewal confirmation email specifying the new expiration date.
At the end of the phone conversation, I told the latest representative of the problems I had run into on their website paying by credit card, despite successfully doing the same thing with another domain the day before. She sounded surprised, and put me on hold again.
When she came back on the line a few minutes later, her voice had gone very stiff. She said "There is no problem with our website, sir." I expresses a little surprise, and told her that she could check the unanswered technical support emails I had sent a few days before to confirm that I had been having the problem I described.
"There is no problem with our website." she replied, very monotone, all traces of her previous friendliness completely absent.
I transferred the domain name the next day to another registrar. NSI still sends me renewal notices for this domain name.
As an Internet professional, I can resoundingly confirm the negligence, ineptitude, lack of ethics, and failures of Verisign/NetSol.
I can also confirm that Verisign has outsourced the "call center" to locations in India and the Phillipines. I feel badly for the offshore call center reps (they are just trying to make a living), but they simply cannot address issues and are generally untrained. It is almost impossible to reach a US representative of Net Sol. The following telephone number (if it stays connected) may help: 703.742.0400. The toll free telephone numbers on the invoices are wrong -- as of 10.08.2001 -- or directly connect to the offshore call centers.
I ended up filing a formal complaint with the Office of the Attorney General in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Perhaps if more complaints are filed, the AGs in the US will hold Verisign/Net Sol accountable. Filing a complaint is easy and can bring results.
It is easy to bad mouth a company, and I normally refrain from doing so -- being a business owner myself. However, if you want to look at a serious and flagrant example of corporate abuse of customers, Net Sol/Verisign, without exception, gets my first vote (not just of technology companies but of all companies).
I've got a few domains with register.com. (I typically initiate their simple 'transfer registrar' process for a domain whenever I get a renewal notice from NSI! Thanks for the reminders! :)
I've not received any spam from register.com.
More importantly, register.com allows you to give them a billing email/postal address that is separate from the addresses you list in the WHOIS database. This allows me to put completely fake addresses in WHOIS (hint: I do not really live on 123 No Spam Ave, No Spam, California 90210!)
NSI's WHOIS database was the single biggest source of spam and junk postal mail!
"And like that
I've a domain that I've been trying to get changes for almost three months now. Tangled owners, netblocks, uncooperative NSI/third party, and Oh yes, BBNPlanet is in there somewhere. Ha!
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
I totally recommend domain discover, after dealing with NSI - it was like night and day. I moved over 400 domains over there, and am totally satisifed. (as well as my employer who got better service for less cost) Domain discover does not claim the inherent rights to your domain name either. Have you ever read NSI fine print? it is scary - they could pratically take your domain if they liked the name.
WARNING!
DON't DEAL WITH NSI AT ALL! not even to make minor changes before the domain is moved over! Don't even deal with them even if the email cotacts on NSI domains need to be updated first to reach your new address for approval. DONT!
If you can proove to domaindiscover that you have the right to that domain, they will deal with the rest. Just don't deal with NSI at all - switch over and then do with any changes you half to make.
One time I was forced to re-register a domain at NSI because I was afraid it would expire under my nose before the process of transfering to another registar could be completed. I then proceeded to quickly try to continue registration at domaindiscover (which BTW, will honor your NSI registration periond in addition to their initial registration period if you switch over), and was outraged to find out that there was a mandatory 3 month waiting-period between switching registars. - No problem, domaindiscover just kept on it till the waiting period expired and automatically took over the domain with all the updated records. But please, whover you go with - don't deal with NSI.
PS: I don't like verisign either, but that one is up to you.
PSS: I have absolutely no financial interest in domain discover at all other than that I have choosen to register alot of domains there.