What happens to your clients if a meteor strikes?

[LeMarque]

<Or similar>

So you have a successful business reselling domain names and you and your team are kidnapped by aliens. You hosting account gets suspended for non payment, phone disconnected and your landlord auctions off your stuff.

What steps do your (ex)clients need to take to gain control of their domain registrations?

[Remitur]

I was abducted by aliens so, I guess, I don't care about this: I have much more serious matters to worry about... 😉

[LeMarque]

It could be a serious matter tho.  And although my post is tongue-in-cheek, the question remains:

What/how do clients recover management of their domains should the 'registrar' (re-seller) go belly up?

[sahostking]

This is hilarious.

 

But seriously customers domains are in their own names and hence they can transfer it anywhere to any planet they choose to.

[steven99]

4 hours ago, sahostking said:

But seriously customers domains are in their own names and hence they can transfer it anywhere to any planet they choose to.

My alien overlords have ordered me to ask for clarification on this?  If your site, your whmcs install is down, how can clients get EPP codes and unlock registrar locks to do transfers?    Most likely the client would need to contact the upstream domain registrar (enom, tucows, etc) and get control that way.  But what if that wasn't possible?   Then they would have to do a domain dispute and go down that rabbit hole. 

This is where the "hit by a bus" policy is activated and whatever that entails ensures the business continues in one form or other and clients aren't left holding the alien's eggs. 

[LeMarque]

4 hours ago, steven99 said:

This is where the "hit by a bus" policy is activated and whatever that entails ensures the business continues in one form or other and clients aren't left holding the alien's eggs. 

If you have a "hit by a bus" solution I'd be interested in learning more.

[Remitur]

8 hours ago, steven99 said:

My alien overlords have ordered me to ask for clarification on this?  If your site, your whmcs install is down, how can clients get EPP codes and unlock registrar locks to do transfers?    Most likely the client would need to contact the upstream domain registrar (enom, tucows, etc) and get control that way.  But what if that wasn't possible?   

It's ALWAYS somehow possible. Registrars are forced to provide support to registrants when necessary...

[steven99]

41 minutes ago, Remitur said:

It's ALWAYS somehow possible. Registrars are forced to provide support to registrants when necessary...

As I said, and you did not quote, a domain dispute would be needed and that would be the "always" part of your statement.   Before that though, talking to the upstream registrar might lead success in getting the domain and may not -- i have seen both ways.  If a domain is at a personal account, like godaddy, it makes it even harder and a domain dispute is likely required -- especially nowadays with them getting socially engineered.  

4 hours ago, LeMarque said:

If you have a "hit by a bus" solution I'd be interested in learning more.

Can be as simple as an agreement with someone, preferably in the industry already, that will take over the business after your disappearance.   The one part that will vary is passing keys to the castle off and many ways to do that from having lawyers keep passwords of password databases and copies of them perhaps to simple as giving a key to the deposit box at a bank with a flash drive of the password database.

[LeMarque]

1 hour ago, steven99 said:

Can be as simple as an agreement with someone, preferably in the industry already, that will take over the business after your disappearance.   The one part that will vary is passing keys to the castle off and many ways to do that from having lawyers keep passwords of password databases and copies of them perhaps to simple as giving a key to the deposit box at a bank with a flash drive of the password database.

Thanks for doing my thinking for me. Perhaps someday I'll describe what a female alien... ah, never mind

[Walther]

9 hours ago, steven99 said:

As I said, and you did not quote, a domain dispute would be needed and that would be the "always" part of your statement.  

Nope, a dispute is not necessary.

Registrant just needs to prove his identity to Registrar, and the Registrar is required to give him some way to manage his domain.

Every TLD and every Registry have his own rules, but check i.e. ICANN rules about common gTLD: ruled obligations are between registrar and registrant, the reseller may stay in the middle, but if he disappears registrar and registrant have direct intercourse.

I.e. about Publicdomainregistry (Directi): registrant just need to go to this page:

https://publicdomainregistry.com/compliance/

and compile the form to get in touch with Registrar and get the control of his domain.

And EVERY Registrar on this planet have some kind of procedure like this.