Domains, Owners death and Wills

digitalquill · Feb 17, 2010

In the 'The long term future of domains' thread there was a side discussion about securing your future, wills etc. I noted that I have started documenting all my online activity and domain names etc to be included in a Will.

My question is what would the position be for domain names in the event of their owners death?

1. for domains registered in that persons name
2. for domains registered in that persons company name

Would it be allowable to provide access to the nominet and registrar accounts to a partner to enable them to take over ownership?

Can anyone see any problems or things that would need to be considered for this?

Maybe a slightly morbid subject but an important one I think. Many people here have some considerable wealth tied-up in domain names that they have registered, and as such, passing on that wealth to ones family would be a good thing.

julian · Feb 17, 2010

good point - I don't expect many people heres friends and family probably know the exact extent of their involvement and value of their domains.

I think your contact with nominet ends if you die?

But I know one thing if you die without making a will the government will pretty much make one for you!

digitalquill said:
In the 'The long term future of domains' thread there was a side discussion about securing your future, wills etc. I noted that I have started documenting all my online activity and domain names etc to be included in a Will.

My question is what would the position be for domain names in the event of their owners death?

1. for domains registered in that persons name
2. for domains registered in that persons company name

Would it be allowable to provide access to the nominet and registrar accounts to a partner to enable them to take over ownership?

Can anyone see any problems or things that would need to be considered for this?

Maybe a slightly morbid subject but an important one I think. Many people here have some considerable wealth tied-up in domain names that they have registered, and as such, passing on that wealth to ones family would be a good thing.

Skinner · Feb 17, 2010

I'd imagine much like bank accounts and any other asset it would pass to your next of kin, but you would have to likely prove the death and prove your benefactor and then change the details.

The Ferryman · Feb 17, 2010

On death, the executors of the estate of the deceased person should contact Nominet, who will transfer the domains to whoever is entitled to them under the terms of the will.

They don't need to be specifically mentioned, the usual general terms will include them, eg my entire estate, or everything else i leave to, or all my worldly goods, etc.

Regards

Bruce

accelerator · Feb 17, 2010

I don't know whether this is true, but I imagine that if you are holding your domains in a company name it makes domain inheritance a lot easier. The company would be an abstraction of the domain ownership, so you can just assign someone to inherit company assets, or perhaps make them a director of the company. If domain names are individually held, then I guess that technically on the owner's death, the ownership would have to be changed via the Nominet transfer process to grant ownership to the will beneficiary.

As I say I am not an expert here, just my thoughts.

Rgds

digitalquill · Feb 17, 2010

That is great, I am going to contact Nominet and see what they say? Anyone any advice who to contact? I will post any response here.

Also do we think that it would have to be a limited company or would a sole trader with a trade name suffice to be the abstraction?

digitalquill · Feb 17, 2010

Some on is doing somethign right with the forum, jsut googled 'domain names in the even of owners death' this post came up #1 in the results just a few hours after it was posted!

digitalquill · Feb 18, 2010

Hi all

Just to share this, I got a response from Nominet which is fairly clear:

"You are welcome to leave any login details for your control panel and access to our online services to a person of your choice in the event of your death, or at any stage you wish too.

Within our Terms and Conditions and how we manage the event of a registrants death anyway is fairly similar. As all .uk domain names should be registered to a legal identifiable entity if a registrant does become deceased the executor of the estate will be able to transfer the registrant of the domain name and gain general control of the registration. "

Matt