Disable Auto-Renew on payment for specific clients

[urbee]

Hello,

 

i was wondering (actually also looking for one) if there's a module or addon that would allow us to disable the autorenew/autoregister the domains on payment.

 

We have the autorenew feature (i am talking about renewing at the registry, not sending invoices before due date) ON for most clients but there are some that would prefer to have the domains renewed prior to payment. If we do that with an unpaid invoice ofcourse we get double renewals after we add the payments to WHMCS.

 

Is there a way to achieve this? If something like this doesnt exist would anyone care to do it for us?

[brian!]

I was wondering (actually also looking for one) if there's a module or addon that would allow us to disable the autorenew/autoregister the domains on payment.

for renewals, take a look in Setup -> General Settings -> Domains - http://docs.whmcs.com/Domains_Tab#Auto_Renew_on_Payment

 

Enabling will renew domains automatically at the registrar (eNom, ResellerClub etc) when the renewal invoice is paid.

so to avoid that occurring, disable this option (untick the box).

 

for new registrations, change the "Auto Registration" dropdown value to "None" in Domain Pricing for each TLD you want this to apply to.

 

We have the autorenew feature (i am talking about renewing at the registry, not sending invoices before due date) ON for most clients but there are some that would prefer to have the domains renewed prior to payment. If we do that with an unpaid invoice ofcourse we get double renewals after we add the payments to WHMCS.

 

Is there a way to achieve this? If something like this doesnt exist would anyone care to do it for us?

I think WHMCS have always suggested that the auto-renew option (at the registry level) be turned OFF to avoid situations such as this.

 

however, if such a situation occurs, the Domains Management documentation does explain what to do...

 

Manually Registering/Renewing a Domain

 

For some trusted customers, or indeed for your own domains, you may wish to register or renew a domain without payment. To do this:

 

1. Navigate to the domains tab in the client's profile for the desired domain
   
2. Click the Renew button in the Registrar Commands row of buttons to immediately send a renewal request to the domain registrar
   
3. If successful, the expiry date will update. You should also increment the next due date if you are manually handling payment as below.
   

Now if the domain is already invoiced, and automatic renewal on payment is enabled, when that invoice is paid under normal circumstances, another domain renewal request would get sent to the registrar. That is unless you stop it. So to do that you need to also perform these steps:

 

1. Locate the invoice for the domain (click the View Invoices link on the domain page to jump straight to a list of invoices for just that domain)
   
2. Copy the line item and amount for the domain from the existing line to a new invoice line item and save
   
3. Then delete the original line item from the invoice and by doing that you are removing the actual link to the domain when paid so no further renewal will occur
   

to be honest, i've never had to do the above step as we've always had auto-renew turned off at the registry, so I can't confirm whether it works or not.

[urbee]

Manually Registering/Renewing a Domain

 

For some trusted customers, or indeed for your own domains, you may wish to register or renew a domain without payment. To do this:

 

Navigate to the domains tab in the client's profile for the desired domain

Click the Renew button in the Registrar Commands row of buttons to immediately send a renewal request to the domain registrar

If successful, the expiry date will update. You should also increment the next due date if you are manually handling payment as below.

 

Now if the domain is already invoiced, and automatic renewal on payment is enabled, when that invoice is paid under normal circumstances, another domain renewal request would get sent to the registrar. That is unless you stop it. So to do that you need to also perform these steps:

 

Locate the invoice for the domain (click the View Invoices link on the domain page to jump straight to a list of invoices for just that domain)

Copy the line item and amount for the domain from the existing line to a new invoice line item and save

Then delete the original line item from the invoice and by doing that you are removing the actual link to the domain when paid so no further renewal will occur

 

I am talking about this - renewing domain prior to payments and avoiding double renewals. However i am surprised by these instructions as they look more like a quick (dirty) fix to an issue than a procedure I would expect something like a button "Autorenew on payment ON / OFF" per specific client in their summary, like the buttons "Send late fees" and similar are. Do you think something like that could be done?

 

Or am i the only one that needs something like that? Since i've heard about the issue many times...

[brian!]

I am talking about this - renewing domain prior to payments and avoiding double renewals. However i am surprised by these instructions as they look more like a quick (dirty) fix to an issue than a procedure

get used to quick dirty fixes with WHMCS - this won't be the only one.

 

I would expect something like a button "Autorenew on payment ON / OFF" per specific client in their summary, like the buttons "Send late fees" and similar are. Do you think something like that could be done?

most things are possible with WHMCS if you want to put the work in to do it.

 

my first link in the above post disables the auto-renew on payment for everyone - so with that disabled, when an invoice is marked as paid, it won't get renewed at the registry, I think it just adds a note reminder to your todo list in WHMCS to renew manually... now if it's automatically renewed by the registrar because of your registrar settings, then you can delete the todo item and change the next due date on the domain setting in the client profile... job done - invoice paid, domain renewed, NDD set.

 

Or am i the only one that needs something like that? Since i've heard about the issue many times...

I doubt you're alone in this, but then again, why use a billing software with automated domain renewal, if you're going to potentially bypass it by renewing some of them yourself in the background? that's why the advice from WHMCS is to disable it at the registrar level and let the billing software take care of it.

 

however, if you want another dirty fix, what you can do on a per domain basis, is effectively disable auto renewal on payment..

 

choose a domain that is set to autorenew at the registry that you don't want WHMCS to attempt to renew... in the admin area, choose the client this domain belongs to, click on the "Domains" and select the domain from the dropdown list of the client's domains.

 

in the "Registar" dropdown will be a list of available registrars... if you choose "None" and save the changes, then renewal invoicing will still work as normal, but when payment is marked as paid, WHMCS won't know which registrar to send the renew notice to - so it will make a todo note which tells you to renew it manually... and as before, it's it's auto-renewed by the registrar, you just delete the todo note and change the NDD... or I suppose use the domain sync option.

 

the thing to watch out for with this would be that it could prevent the client from doing any registrar specific activity, e.g they couldn't update their whois record, enable registrar lock etc - but it shouldn't have any effect on any related hosting of the domain.