this post was submitted on 18 Jul 2024
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Forgot to pay my domain for a year and now I have to spend £2200 ($3000) if I want to get it back (lemmy.zip)
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by sunglocto@lemmy.zip to c/selfhosted@lemmy.world
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I guess this is a cautionary tale.

I was recently having issues with my Gmail account that's tied to my Epik ( a domain registrar ) account, so when I was supposed to renew my domain, I didn't receive any e-mails about it. When I decided to randomly check on my website, it seemed to be down. So I checked Epik and a domain that usually cost £15 a year to renew now cost £400 to renew as it was expired.

As a teenager who does not have £400 to spend on a domain, I decided to just wait until the domain fully expired and buy it for a cheaper price.

After some time, the domain fully expired and GoDaddy decided to buy it as soon as it did, and charged me £2,225 to renew the domain. I don't understand how a price that large is justified, considering that my website gets barely any visitors and I basically only use the domain for hosting stuff. No idea how hiking prices this much is legal

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[–] kitnaht@lemmy.world 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

Sorry, but chalk this up to lesson learned. It's almost always been this way. Domain squatters will do this all the time. In fact, some domain registrars will use you searching their site for an 'available' domain, and if you don't buy it up right away -- will buy it and hike the price and sit on it for years in order to lock it down, knowing you wanted it.

btw, Namecheap says Sunglocto dot com is like $10 - so just register a .com. Not through that Epik piece of shit that you used before. Legit, use Namecheap; they've never done me wrong and have been my registrar for more than a decade now.

[–] hddsx@lemmy.ca 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Time to register that domain before OP gets it…

[–] mal3oon@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Gohddzsx?

[–] hddsx@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago

I prefer to be called daddy. Godaddy

[–] iAmTheTot@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 year ago (5 children)

Have also had good experience using namecheap for years.

[–] sturlabragason@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Thirded for Namecheap.

[–] hddsx@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago

I mean, I use namecheap. I’m thinking about throwing one of my domains onto cloudfare just in case.

If you don’t like namecheap, some people have been suggesting porkbun or something.

[–] jqubed@lemmy.world 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I had this happen with NameCheap. I’m not sure if they bought it or someone else, but it stayed registered with them. Whoever bought it has held it for a couple years, put up a fake website to look like they were using it, but took it down after a year when I didn’t bite on buying it. Current status shows it’s pending deletion finally for abuse or non-payment. I keep checking to see when I can nab it again.

[–] homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world 0 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It happens with anyone. Bots track expirations and snatch them so that they can ransom them back to you for thousands - exactly as in OPs example.

AUTO RENEW. Auto-renew. Auto-renew is the way. The solution to this problem is Auto-renew.

[–] jqubed@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Yes, I just didn’t realize that auto-renew doesn’t work with PayPal on NameCheap and had lazily set it up with PayPal when I got it because I didn’t want to go get my wallet. Lesson learned!

[–] Septimaeus@infosec.pub 1 points 1 year ago

I think you can also register 10 years in advance, or maybe more depending on the registrar, which would cover all other potential snafus like expired card info.

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[–] morriscox@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So search for a lot of domains at random to cost them some money?

[–] kitnaht@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Absolutely. But I think it might be more advanced than that. They might have some sort of analytics that measures how long people stay on the page, etc to inform their purchasing decisions.

[–] LiveLM@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 year ago

Ah, so search a couple of domains and sit on their page for a while making random mouse movements and scrolls then? Got it.

[–] lemmyvore@feddit.nl 1 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Namecheap has extra rules if you want to use an API (minimum money spent with them, minimum of domains managed with them etc.) — GoDaddy style.

Keep that in mind, if you need an API (for DDNS or for obtaining wildcard TLS certificates) you'll have to use a separate service for DNS.

[–] chiisana@lemmy.chiisana.net 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You really should have separate services for registration, DNS and hosting. That way you’re not held hostage by a single provider.

[–] hddsx@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago

Why should I post someone else for DNS records if namecheap is handling it just fine for my use case?

[–] kitnaht@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

DDNS with Namecheap is as simple as hitting a URL with a /GET request from the IP you want it to point to. No limitations. No special requirements.

[–] NateNate60@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have a script running that uses the Namecheap API to automatically get wildcard certs from Let's Encrypt. I didn't pay a dime for this. Did something change?

[–] lemmyvore@feddit.nl 1 points 1 year ago

Maybe you meet the conditions for it? It hasn't been possible to access their API without meeting the conditions for at least a year now.

You don't pay directly for the API, the latest conditions AFAIR are 20+ domains and $50+ on account balance and $50+ spent in the last 2 years.

They also want you to whitelist the IPs that access the DNS which makes it unusable for DynDNS, but at least they have a separate URL for that.

[–] ptz@dubvee.org 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

After some time, the domain fully expired and GoDaddy decided to buy it as soon as it did, and charged me £2,225 to renew the domain. I don't understand how a price that large is justified, considering that my website gets barely any visitors and I basically only use the domain for hosting stuff. No idea how hiking prices this much is legal

GoDaddy is known to do that.

Technically, they're not hiking the price. GoDaddy ~~bought~~ scalped it after it expired and then is re-selling it at an astronomically higher price. It's one of the many, many reasons people hate them.

I'm ashamed to say I still have a couple of domains with GD that I haven't migrated yet. This post might just light a fire under me to get that done.

[–] lazynooblet@lazysoci.al 5 points 1 year ago

I have my dream domain. It was being squatted for a similar amount. I offered £100 and it was declined, I offered £250 and they replied to tell me the domain is easily worth the £2K, well sort after etc. I told them that this is my surname, and I'm not a corporation with unlimited funds and they can take the offer or leave it. 15 minutes later the offer was accepted. I was so happy. Still am chuffed about it.

[–] joeldebruijn@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Got a work related variant, a 3 letter domain we really liked was registered by a person asking a couple of hundred bucks or so. Which really was a good deal and we were more then happy to pay.

Our IT department advised guiding the transfer themselves. Instead our marketing department went ahead anyway and just agreed to "you end your subscription and after that we register it" ... instead of using transfer codes.

In the minutes between, a bulk claimer snatched it away.

[–] AlwaysTheir@lemmy.one 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

OMG. I can't believe the marketing department was that inept. Tragic

[–] seang96@spgrn.com 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Honestly I believe it. I had a VP of sales / marketing overriding requirements making them more difficult from the CEO after getting screamed at by the CEO who wanted the product (probono project) to be quick and easy for initial release.

He also ordered IT garbage for a site once (consumer PCs running Windows not server edition)

And to top it all off went behind supervisors backs in engineering departments asking for daily spreadsheets trackong their time because "if you can go to the bathroom you have time for this.

All leadership was toxic though like the CEO screaming at him lol.

[–] tgxn@lemmy.tgxn.net 2 points 1 year ago

LMAO they really are inept 🤦‍♂️

[–] TedZanzibar@feddit.uk 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Make an offer of $0.01. Assuming the responses aren't automated, every time they reject it, raise the offer by 1c. Keep doing it till you hit the $15 mark and then just stop. It could waste literal years of their time.

[–] hactar42@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Reminds me of a guy I knew who kept getting letters for a $10 parking fine he got while at university. He waited until they spent more in postage than the fine before paying it.

[–] deltapi@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

My last year of uni I was broke. The previous year the parking passes had red letters, that year purple. That was the only difference. The colour. I traced over all the letters of my previous parking pass with a blue sharpie and parked for free all year.

[–] Blackmist@feddit.uk 1 points 1 year ago

Automated numberplate recognition systems have spoilt so much fun.

[–] mosiacmango@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago

Nice hacking mate.

[–] bartolomeo@suppo.fi 2 points 1 year ago

Aaahh capitalism. This is what business school graduates call "innovation" and "smart".

But seriously, I'm sorry that happened to you. It's predatory, abusive, and wrong.

[–] scrchngwsl@feddit.uk 2 points 1 year ago

Sounds like you're in the UK, if so I'd recommend legit companies run by old nerds like Mythic Beasts: https://www.mythic-beasts.com/domains

[–] VonReposti@feddit.dk 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I simply don't get why domain squatting is legal. On my ccTLD it is absolutely illegal meaning you have to forfeit the domain if you don't use it anymore.

[–] kitnaht@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Just because you don't have a website up at [XYZ].com doesn't mean you're not using it. You could have a domain controller on the back end doing file services, or you could be using it for network auth, etc. Not all .coms exist for the purpose of putting up a website.

[–] VonReposti@feddit.dk 1 points 1 year ago

Neither do .dk domains, but in order to determine use the courts will have to be involved. I haven't heard about a lot of those cases, but I'd guess you can prove use against the person who wants to take the domain. If I have a domain called firstnamelastname.dk it'd be pretty easy to show that I got a mail address at contact@firstnamelastname.dk that's in use.

[–] wesker@lemmy.sdf.org 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I own 8 domains. Only one has HTTP/S ports open. The rest are for email and other services.

[–] towerful@programming.dev 1 points 1 year ago

Other services will be reflected by active DNS records.

If the only DNS record points to a "Buy this domain" webpage, I think it's fair to argue that is misuse.
Doubley so if it turns out many unrelated domains are owned by and point to the same webpage, and it's just doing a js hostname thing to make it seem relevant to the current address

[–] gencha@lemm.ee 2 points 1 year ago

Buy a different domain. Let them pay for this one until the end of time.

[–] dukatos@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago

I knew GoDaddy is somehow involved as soon as I saw the title.

[–] atocci@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

This was the plot to an episode of iCarly

[–] fellowmortal@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Don't pay this! You just reinforce their predatory practices. How renewals at much higher prices are allowed - no clue!

Something similar happened to a company I know - it expired and was immediately bought by domain squatters, when they found them they were told that it couldn't be sold back because the squatter had paid $XXXX for and had big plans (I assume it was BS, just a premise to get paid - no site was ever put on the domain)

Solution: they bought the .org version and bought the .com back a year later.

edit:grammar

[–] miau@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 1 year ago

I am sorry that happened to you

Thanks for sharing your story, though. I have a few domains, two of them being very important for me (one I use for all my emails, and the other one for all my self hosted stuff). So I'll be paying close attention to their renewal

I hope you can find another domain that you like and that you can transfer your stuff to it.

[–] Cornpop@lemmy.world 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

That’s a horrible domain name anyways. .xyz is trash, the name itself is long, hard to pronounce and sounds like gibberish. Time for an upgrade.

[–] LunarLoony@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's the second time I've seen someone cast xyz in a negative light. What's wrong with it? (Genuine question, in case it needs saying)

[–] NateNate60@lemmy.world 0 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It's just a hallmark of "I bought the cheapest domain name TLD available".

That's not necessarily bad if all you need is something to get the job done, but there is a stereotype associated with it.

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