information Afternic Update

[Joe Styler]

There are several threads ongoing about Afternic so it was easier to start a new one here with the big picture of what is going on. A few weeks ago we had a major release which did away with the escrow process on Afternic and started a new service called Transaction Assurance. There are several main reasons why we did it, two of the big ones being:
1. Compliance - We are not an escrow company and using this new flow allows us to be compliant to all laws in the areas we operate which is very important for everyone.
2. Ease of use - Much of what we have done over the past 2 years around the Aftermarket is being done to reduce overall friction for the buyer and seller to allow domains to move to buyers easier and make managing your domains for sale easier.

There are other reasons for doing this which tie into a bigger picture of other projects we have in line for the coming year or so which also allow for better sales for our sellers such as faster payment times and more International payment options as well as better/easier domain management and some bigger improvements that have been asked for by customers for a while.

The project was not rushed or left untested. In fact we put in over 8 man years of labor on it and did extensive testing. Part of the project involved us integrating with two 3rd party providers to help with International payments and communications. These are big name companies with a track record of success and utilizing their tools behind the scenes will help everyone in the long run to be able to sell more domains easier.

Obviously things have not gone as well as we would have liked, but we are actively working on resolving the issues around communication and payments. We have had meetings at the highest levels to take care of this as a very high priority. As of today we believe most email communication issue are resolved.

We are not only meeting about things we are actively deploying new code and changes and other teams are working to manually jump in and help out so we can get answers for our customers and make sure they are being paid. I personally saw many people working late nights and over the weekends doing what they could to keep improving the processes because our customers are very important to us. We have a good team who have all pulled together to try and help it is not just me on the forum answering questions I couldn't do it without the help of our Aftermarket teams.

I think we are very close to having a smoothly operating process again with a better ultimate process for the future which will allow you to grow with us and continue to sell domains at a better rate of return. Thank you for your patience and for being a customer.

If you are waiting for payment the #1 thing I have seen resolve this the fastest is to login to your Afternic account and go to your payment settings. Make sure that you have a payment set up as a default option and that is correct. We migrated all the old payment information into the new system. If you are in doubt or cannot find a way to select a default payment option it is faster to create a new payment method (even using the same info you already have) and select that new payment method as your default. Doing this will tell the system to try and pay you for any outstanding balance you are owed.

 

[SuperDudePro]

I had a domain sell through fast transfer around the 21st of April and the site said it would pay out on the 28th. On the 28th I checked and realized that either I hadn't put in my payment info or it got lost in the migration. I added the payment info again and got an email from Paypal today, followed by an email from AfterNic this evening. I'm assuming that it's starting to clear up.

 

[Premiums]

I had default payment in place, going on 8 days now, no payment

same here

 

[Premiums]

still no payment

May 1, 2017
Est. Payout Date

 

[Premiums]

My default payment method has been updated as well.

 

[Apprich]

It would be great if you would support payoneer payments.. Most other companies do support payoneer why dont you? Same question applies to Godaddy as well..

 

[platey]

Trademark check service would actually hurt sales, and confuse buyers. Lots of misconceptions about trademarks, and different uses, so I would stay away from that avenue. Lots of free tools online to check already.

Why would godaddy work a deal with paypal, when they have a sales channel that already covers your issue, if you use their service then you don't have to worry about this. Yes, it comes at a cost, but that is business.

If a trademark service was available it would only impact sales by putting people off buying domains because the domain a person may want to buy would infringe a trademark which is how it should be not a it's not our problem if a person buys a trademark infringed domain as long as we make a sale etc etc

The equivalent to this would be like swimming in the sea and forgetting that's where sharks live

Or investing in the stockmarket and ignoring the fact that recessions which are inevitable diminish your investment portfolio

 

[wwwweb]

still no payment

May 1, 2017
Est. Payout Date

Hey I'm on the May 1st payout schedule too, let's see who gets paid first, or maybe at the same time, still no payment here either.

I would say they were running on April 27/28th payments, but I saw someone say they were due for a May 4th payout, who got paid yesterday.

So no idea how payouts work in regards to timeline.

 

[wwwweb]

I quess I special then. Support replayed within 6 hours also. I used the contact TA agent thing.

But another transaction closing in few days, will see if that goes also smooth.

Just getting a response from support is like amazing enough! I don't know what you guys were owed, but I am owed mid 4 figures.

It is also interesting to see that some people's payout schedules are being adjusted, and some are not. Lots of things in play I would guess.

Anyone get paid today? Has the money started trickling yet?

 

[Ted.T]

If a trademark service was available it would only impact sales by putting people off buying domains because the domain a person may want to buy would infringe a trademark which is how it should be not a it's not our problem if a person buys a trademark infringed domain as long as we make a sale etc etc

The equivalent to this would be like swimming in the sea and forgetting that's where sharks live

Or investing in the stockmarket and ignoring the fact that recessions which are inevitable diminish your investment portfolio

I think we have already discussed about this... Godaddy, as a service provider, in it's case a domain registrar, offers you the possibility to register a domain. Godaddy doesn't have to be a policeman and check for you which domain you register, it's your right to register any domain you want.

 

[wwwweb]

If a trademark service was available it would only impact sales by putting people off buying domains because the domain a person may want to buy would infringe a trademark which is how it should be not a it's not our problem if a person buys a trademark infringed domain as long as we make a sale etc etc

The equivalent to this would be like swimming in the sea and forgetting that's where sharks live

Or investing in the stockmarket and ignoring the fact that recessions which are inevitable diminish your investment portfolio

The same mark can be used in different lines of business.

For instance ABC can be a entertainment company, ABC can also be a company that makes can openers, also ABC can be a chain of markets etc... You are just confusing things, do you want a big red X to come on the screen when someone tries to register ABC.HORSE?

 

[bmugford]

I sold 2 domains recently @ Afternic recently. One of these domains was listed and priced, the other was an unlisted domain that an Afternic broker contacted me about and an agreement was reached.

In the past with Afternic's system you could choose disbursement on a per transaction basis. This was convenient to me as I would use different disbursement methods depending on the transaction for accounting reasons.

The new system seems to be a poorly implemented version of GoDaddy's payee system.
With GoDaddy you can have many different payee accounts you can use.

With Afternic it appears you can only have (1) of each type. I added both an ACH and Paypal payee account, but apparently it still can only disburse to the default payment method.

I was trying to have one disbursed to each payee, but was informed that was not possible. Then somehow ACH became the default when I would have preferred Paypal. When I asked them to change it to Paypal it was told it was not possible as payout has already been scheduled.

My account showed ACH as the disbursement method, but then I was actually paid via Paypal.

In summary I ended up getting paid, but it was an extremely confusing process that required multiple customer service contacts.

Brad

 

[Joe Styler]

I have a transaction at GD which has transfered the domain to the buyer successfully since April 21st but I haven't received the funds yet (via my Paypal account).

I have asked GD for sometimes but I don't know when I can have this funds yet because they don't give me a deadline.

For Afternic.com, I can't access it from Vietnam, maybe they ban users from Vietnam @Joe Styler

We do not block people from Vietnam from seeing our site. You can email [email protected] with your IP address and they can check into it for you. Also let them know your domain name you sold so you can be paid.

 

[Joe Styler]

I'm not sure if these 2 issues are related, but I also have problems with Godaddy payments. Still waiting for some of them, that should have been paid long ago. What's interesting, until recently, there were no problems...

@Joe Styler, is Godaddy using the same third party payment processor?

Yes Godaddy is using the same processor for Non US payments.

 

[Joe Styler]

This is why I asked, because in the past everything was working fine...

New for Afternic not for GoDaddy.

 

[Joe Styler]

I know the primary issues were around payments but does the Afternic team have any focus on the UX and features around the core product itself? Like portfolio management, bulk editing, parking reports and even a simple feature like domain filtering?

Yes we do have plans to release changes but it will not be until late this year or early next.

 

[Joe Styler]

still no payments:

Show attachment 57140

Send me the domain and I will take a look.

 

[Joe Styler]

I sold 2 domains recently @ Afternic recently. One of these domains was listed and priced, the other was an unlisted domain that an Afternic broker contacted me about and an agreement was reached.

In the past with Afternic's system you could choose disbursement on a per transaction basis. This was convenient to me as I would use different disbursement methods depending on the transaction for accounting reasons.

The new system seems to be a poorly implemented version of GoDaddy's payee system.
With GoDaddy you can have many different payee accounts you can use.

With Afternic it appears you can only have (1) of each type. I added both an ACH and Paypal payee account, but apparently it still can only disburse to the default payment method.

I was trying to have one disbursed to each payee, but was informed that was not possible. Then somehow ACH became the default when I would have preferred Paypal. When I asked them to change it to Paypal it was told it was not possible as payout has already been scheduled.

My account showed ACH as the disbursement method, but then I was actually paid via Paypal.

In summary I ended up getting paid, but it was an extremely confusing process that required multiple customer service contacts.

Brad

It was your contacting me that made us manually update the payment to PayPal instead of ACH, which is why it is reflected incorrectly in the account information, because we had to manually adjust it in the back end.

We also brought up the need for multiple payment choices as need for the developers to work on fixing.

 

[bmugford]

I am also not sure in Afternic emails are going out properly, as I received no notification email on my last priced sale.

The only thing that clued me in was an email from GoDaddy saying the domain has been removed from my account. I had to contact my GD account rep to see what was going on, then I was notified it was sold on Afternic.

Brad

 

[bmugford]

It was your contacting me that made us manually update the payment to PayPal instead of ACH, which is why it is reflected incorrectly in the account information, because we had to manually adjust it in the back end.

I appreciate you updating that. I was just not sure what was going on until payment arrived via Paypal, as it still said ACH in my account.

I will say that Joe and others @ Afternic have been extremely responsive and helpful with questions I have had. I just hope the system evolves into something more streamlined.

Brad

 

[pokainc]

Brad .. same thing happened to me. Apparently when the domain is sold on Godaddy "as an affiliate link", Godaddy secures the payment and ONLY then contacts Afternic to tell them to send the seller an email that it's sold (that's what I was told anyway)... needless to say the issues this can cause if you have an offer in the meanwhile on the same name.

 

[Joe Styler]

Thanks everyone for the feedback and your patience. It seems like we are starting to make some decent progress resolving things and will have a better solution than the previous one once all the bugs are resolved. I appreciate all the feedback and will continue to help as I can.

 

[Joe Styler]

I appreciate you updating that. I was just not sure what was going on until payment arrived via Paypal, as it still said ACH in my account.

I will say that Joe and others @ Afternic have been extremely responsive and helpful with questions I have had. I just hope the system evolves into something more streamlined.

Brad

It will and I apologize for the extra work everyone has had to do. We will get it right and make it better in the long run for everyone.

 

[Premiums]

Does NameFind invest in new gtlds?

 

[Hypersot]

Today I noticed that, all domains under the -much dreaded- 'review' show only this when visited:

In the past -for domains that were under review- there was a field in the landing page which provided the interested buyer the option to insert their details and Afternic would contact them.

Moreover, the above indirectly implies that domain MIGHT NOT be for sale with Afternic and that the representatives from Afternic need to make sure that it's even for sale! ... all that over the phone.

Knowing that most domains are usually 'under review' for years, the above is really bad for our sales.

@Joe Styler
can you please check with the tech guys and verify if that's intended or is it something temporary?

thanks

 

[Joe Styler]

Today I noticed that, all domains under the -much dreaded- 'review' show only this when visited:

Show attachment 57185

In the past -for domains that were under review- there was a field in the landing page which provided the interested buyer the option to insert their details and Afternic would contact them.

Moreover, the above indirectly implies that domain MIGHT NOT be for sale with Afternic and that the representatives from Afternic need to make sure that it's even for sale! ... all that over the phone.

Knowing that most domains are usually 'under review' for years, the above is really bad for our sales.

@Joe Styler
can you please check with the tech guys and verify if that's intended or is it something temporary?

thanks

For us to know you need to give us a domain or two as an example. You can pm me them.