It's a whole different world.
A registration agent Has the right to take over/renew the registration anytime - Exercising deletion/full Control at around minus42 days - (the normal registration expiration) But will be happy to demonstrate their control and penalise you with for an inhouse recovery charge much earlier. Most of the conflicts exist due to the inhouse reselling/auctioning systems.
I'm happy to PM a couple of good examples of my own (whatevers-current) dual-status domains for those that want to get their head around it. ie the registration agent has already renewed the domain + 1 year(national database) However local and original effective registration DB expiration date reflects my non-renewal
(You have to understand it's a responsibility for: assigned system )
I'm sure I could draw a simple flow-chart for anyone that's not familiar with the the dog eat dog world that exists at the Gtld level. - It can be fun - as long as you know how each registration service works
The plus point - the management /analysis/renewal services are just out-of-this-world. I can pick the phone-up 247 and have instant contact with my renewal/ dedicated manager - And yes I probably do know what he had for breakfast.
This evening I paid a couple of .com $20 penalties - eye off the ball stuff - but, I equally know these domains were listed pending deletion ( No different from domainlore - except with this particular registration services global audience)
The bottom line is this is not Nominet-world. Deletation/recovery/transfer/access etc etc - think Chicago and enjoy the ride