Domain sync issues and overall messiness

[theviewer1985]

Hey guys,

My domains are in a mess and it only gets worse the more I register. I am sure i am partly to blame - but I am hoping on some clarity so i can get myself out of it. The problems I face i think are predominantly because the next due date / expiry dates are not syncing properly.  I can't quite put my mess into words as there are so many different types of issues I face, all hinging around the dates - forcing me to have to manually check domains all the time as very often, a domain will be let to expire behind my back whether it been paid for or not - leading to angry customers.

I do quite frequently change my next due dates which i think overrides the sync forever, so that could be the source of my woes.

It's important to note that my business model is to give a free domain for the life of the product. This is simple when somebody registers a domain from the get-go because everything is tied together... but when someone transfers a domain, the dates dont match and i think the dates have to match for the invoices to be tied together so WHMCS can make it free as long as the product is renewed... which means i have to change the date to force it to match.

I guess i can formulate some kind of questions to help...

1. How do other people set up their WHMCS system if they give free domain / free renewals tied to a product? And what do you do for people who transfer domains in when the dates mismatch the product date.

2. If you change the expiry date, it overrides the whois sync correct? So where does the next due date get its date from - and does it change automatically when the cron runs to always tie in with the expiry date?

3. If you do change the expiry date, but you want it to start syncing with whois again, is there a way to undo the override?

I think those questions will help kick start off the discussion and hopefully end in me finding my way out of this mess.

[Kian]

On 5/19/2019 at 12:30 PM, theviewer1985 said:

1. How do other people set up their WHMCS system if they give free domain / free renewals tied to a product? And what do you do for people who transfer domains in when the dates mismatch the product date.

Here is how you offer free domain with hosting package. As for transferred domains I think that you'll need to manually (or automatically with a custom action hook) sync the Next Due Date of the domain in question and its related hosting package this way they will be tied together.

On 5/19/2019 at 12:30 PM, theviewer1985 said:

2. If you change the expiry date, it overrides the whois sync correct? So where does the next due date get its date from - and does it change automatically when the cron runs to always tie in with the expiry date? 

When customers transfer their domain to you, the remaining time they have with their current Registrars plays a role in the Expiry Date. Let's suppose that the transferred domain expires in 6 months from now.

For generic TLDs the renewal period (1 year) is added to the current expiry date. In other words the domain will expire in 12 + 6 months from now. Technically a customer could transfer a domain that expires in 2025 😀 It happens when you change Registrar frequently. That's why in WHMCS Next Due Date and Expiry Date don't match.

That said, what you see in Expiry Date is irrelevant. Even though the domain expires in 2025 your customer must pay you on a yearly basis. In other words Next Due Date is the only thing that you have to care about. You could consider Expiry Date as a "courtesy" date for you and your customers.

When it comes to country-code extensions, rules could be different. A lot of TLDs don't give a damn about the remaining time. When the domain is transferred Expiry Date simply is current date + 12 months.

Editing Expiry Date makes no sense if you are using Auto-Sync since it will override your changes.