domainmonster backorders now with just 1 year

[Pred]

tight gets
whack the price up and only give 1 year reg now
talk about how to lose customers
I'll only use them for occassional backorders now

 

[Alien]

Disgusted!

I had this issue yesterday with a caught domain from them.

They charged me £41.98 for a catch, plus 1 year reg. Couldn't believe it.

I complained, they answered within minutes with this (which suggests I was not the first to complain!).

Daylight ROBBERY!

Thanks for contacting Domainmonster.com Customer Support.

I've taken a look into this and the order is actually for the Back Order of the domain XXXXXXXXXXXX. The Back Order fee is £29.99 + VAT, on top of the standard 1 year registration fee for the .org.uk domain of £4.99 + VAT.

At the top of the Back Orders page at http://www.domainmonster.com/backorder/ we do state that there is an "additional fee to the regular registration price when we succeed." On the same page, the £29.99 fee is very clearly listed beside each TLD. Also, when you attempt to place the Back Order you are then shown the message "Only when our intelligent systems snap your Domain name and register it on your behalf, is our Back Order fee payable of just £29.99 + registration fees."

I'd also like to point out that a lot of Back Order services from other companies require fees up front when you place the Back Order. For example, you might have to pay £15.00 just to place the Back Order, which you don't get back even if you don't get the domain name (and if you do get it then you have to pay the full Back Order fee on top of that).

Some companies also charge the full Back Order fee up front, which again you do not get back regardless of whether or not they manage to snap the domain for you.

Other services still will let you place a Back Order, but will also allow other users to place a Back Order for that domain. If they snap the domain, you are then entered into an auction whereby you offer as much as you are willing but still might not end up with the domain (and in this case you still often have to pay admin/auction fees).

Out Back Order system, however, does not charge you at all if we don't get the domain for you. We do not charge any up front admin fees, or up front Back Order fees, or auction fees if we do snap the domain. We only allow one Back Order per customer, so if we snap the domain you get it for the agreed £29.99, as opposed to having to bid £100's or even £1000's to try to secure the snapped domain in an auction.

I hope this helps clarify your query, please let me know if you have any further questions.

 

[Pred]

I see the webfusion effect is taking place
how to alienate customers

It didn't take long for 123 to ruin the monster

 

[Ashton]

That's a crap reply anyway.

Loads of other companies DON'T charge up front - In fact the majority of catchers do not (in my experience) at least in the UK space.

I think there's only 1 catching group in the UK that runs an auction system like that.

That last bit about 'snapping it up for thousands' is totally without merit, its their business choice to offer a drop catching service and has nothing to do with 1 year registration fee's.

I feel they just overlooked your main point and gave you a cookie cutter answer to all drop catching price queries.


EDIT: Also DM, I see you're reading this thread. Your presence on these forums is a good thing. However, with recent actions you are doing little to assure us you aren't becoming another 123 reg / fasthosts with the take over.

 

[Pred]

one I backordered in april had the 2 years
a may catch now has 1 year

 

[retired_member21]

too expensive I feel

 

[doodlebug]

This 1 year thing is becoming a joke, it would be alright if it was half the price of 2 years.

You should be able to set your backorders and renewals to the maximum of 10 years if you wanted to, I thought a company couldn't charge you more than is neccessary as in if you want 2 years to save money then that is your choice.

 

[cm1975]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but are Domain Monster not charging the same catching fee, but automatically regging for 1 year and charging for that 1 year?

If so, then surely the problem is actually that they don't have a system in place to ask how many years you would like to reg for?

I'm not trying to defend them, as I believe they should be retaining the status quo of 2 years, before they have a system in place to deal with the different lengths of registration that are now available.

 

[bensd]

Old prices still showing here: http://www.domainmonster.com/backorder/

 

[cm1975]

Old prices still showing here: http://www.domainmonster.com/backorder/

Good spot. That is a bit naughty!

 

[Pred]

Old prices still showing here: http://www.domainmonster.com/backorder/

good spot
and
¹Price shown is per year. Minimum 2 year registration required.

banged to rights and legally liable to add an extra year for the difference imo

get those tickets sent
I have a screenshot if you need one

 

[Monster_Sam]

Hi Everyone

Our system for back orders will always default to the lowest registration term. I completely understand the frustration with the single year pricing policy. However, with a surcharge being applied by Nominet, it is inevitable that the cost will be passed on to the customer.

@mattyr45 - That's correct Matty. We have implemented the change that allows you to set the auto-renewal term for the domains that are currently in your account, but this has not been applied to Back Orders. Back ordering is a different system altogether that will require substantial developer work to amend. I have forwarded this issue on to the product team after reading this thread and asked them to examine the issue.

@pred - Pred this issue has nothing to do with the Host Europe Group takeover. This was implemented along with the Multi Year Registration update from Nominet. This meant that all the systems that we had in place, from back orders to auto renewals, which were defaulted to the minimum term started using a 1 year registration as oppose to a 2 year registration. This is the way the systems were designed, we have not actively done this in the interest of profits, as we have not made any additional profit from these transactions. It is simply the way the systems are designed. We are still operating independently from Host Europe Group and will be for the foreseeable future. The service that we have always provided is not going to change! However we do now have a massive potential moving forward in partnership with Host Europe and we are very excited for our future prospects!

@Ashton - Thank you for being positive about our involvement in this community. You, our customers, are extremely important to us! We like hearing your feedback. Sorry to hear you thought that was a poor response to the query. I believe the issue may have been misread here and I will follow up the issue with support this evening.

@bensd - Apologies for not updating this page Ben! We have someone looking into this now to bring this up to date.

@Alien - Sorry Alien there certainly seems to have been an error processing that order. The total cost for your back order would have been £41.97 inclusive of VAT. There would be no additional cost. The one year registration you refer to appears to have been charged in error. Please PM me and I will get this year refunded for you.

Currently there is not a way for us to change the default renewal term for a back order. As I have said, after seeing this thread I promptly raised the issue with the development team to see what can be done.

I will keep you all up to date with any progress there.

I'll keep an eye out for your tickets. If you have sent in a ticket regarding this matter and would like me to chase that up please feel free to send me a PM and I will look into this for you.

We are proud to have a presence here at Acorn Domains and are always happy to help the members of this forum however we can.

Thanks again for your support and as always PM me if you have any other issues.

Thanks everyone
Sam

 

[Rich]

you have defaulted all the .co.uk renewals to 1 year and charging £5.99 compared to £6.70 for 2 years, bit naughty that

 

[Monster_Sam]

@Rich - as I have tried to explain previously all of our systems are defaulted to the minimum registration term. We have added the functionality for users to change the default auto renewal term for domains they own. We have not intentionally enforced 1 year renewals it is simply the way our systems work. I'm sure you can appreciate that this is the first time in our industry experience that the minumum term of renewal has not been the best value and as such we are having to adapt our systems to accommodate this change.

 

[dav111]

which company do you recommend that offers backorders at a more reasonable price

 

[Rich]

@Rich - as I have tried to explain previously all of our systems are defaulted to the minimum registration term. We have added the functionality for users to change the default auto renewal term for domains they own. We have not intentionally enforced 1 year renewals it is simply the way our systems work. I'm sure you can appreciate that this is the first time in our industry experience that the minumum term of renewal has not been the best value and as such we are having to adapt our systems to accommodate this change.

Thats not the issue though the issue is you have decided to charge way more than normal for 1 year registrations.

You charge £2.79+VAT per year compared to Nominet's fees of £2.50+VAT on 2 year+ registrations.

Nominet fees for 1 year registrations are £3.00+VAT so why are you charging £4.99+VAT instead of £3.29+VAT

Including VAT you are now charging

£5.99 for 1 year registrations
£6.70 for 2 years registrations

In other words you are milking the fact your system defaults to 1 year registrations.