Lost money on GoDaddy auction win

I have not personally experienced this scenario -- what payment option were you using that could cause the exchange rate change? Or is that with GoDaddy's auction platform?

OK queried it with the bank and it is actually Visa who has ultimately screwed me over and not GoDaddy.

Does anyone know if bids can be placed in local currency in future so that I don't have this problem again?

bowskie said:

OK queried it with the bank and it is actually Visa who has ultimately screwed me over and not GoDaddy.

Does anyone know if bids can be placed in local currency in future so that I don't have this problem again?

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I would contact GoDaddy concerning this inquiry -- as they could be the only one could give you an official answer. They have an operational 24/7 helpline and support email that gets answered regularly.

As for me, I do not have much experience utilizing their auction services.

bowskie said:

OK queried it with the bank and it is actually Visa who has ultimately screwed me over and not GoDaddy.

Does anyone know if bids can be placed in local currency in future so that I don't have this problem again?

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Dont think so. I can make purchases like hosting and domains in local currency, however, I can only bid on auctions through $

I seem to have the reverse. I wanted to pay GD in dollars, and they only gave me a sterling option.

I prefer to use prepay accounts. That way, they take the money if you win, and leave it alone if you don't.

I experienced this many times. Though not with Godaddy but all kinds of other international payments. No one will reimburse you unless the company does it of its own free volition.

But it can go the other way around. A few years ago I had to send a 50k USD payment to Russia. Something went wrong a long the way and 6 days later it was returned. In those 6 days the exchange rate had gone down. Netting me 1700 USD extra in my local currency. Made close to 2k on a failed payment.

Happened to me half a dozen times already, by the time conversion is done I lose money.

Funny thing..... I have never made money on exchange, even when the Canadian dollar went up.

Bloody banks know how to milk you dry.

I don't know if Godaddy can do anything with regards to currency exchange, because even on their side currency rates apply depending on source of the funds. Sometimes I save when the dollar is down, but I never check the actual saving/lose because it has never been huge amounts.

I like Kuffy's idea of prepay accounts. I do that with my Pheenix account.

Thanks for raising this issue.

Please do find out from Godaddy and let us know their response?

@Joe Styler - would having the account be pre-funded actually prevent this issue? Or any other helpful suggestions for this situation appreciated : smile :

Agree in general, I use pre-funded accounts for as many int'l accounts as I can, then at least I know what I paid at the time of the exchange.

I was having a chat with GoDaddy earlier, however I got cut off before I could finish the conversation with them.
At the time of cut-off they were suggesting that I contact CS when I wanted to bid on a certain domain at auction to see if they could submit a bit their end in my currency.

I would need to go back and clarify again though.

Alternatively GoDaddy needs to stop taking payments before goods are received, as I think that these renewals after auction has taken place happen too often. This would eliminate the problem entirely.

OK so GoDaddy have confirmed that I can contact customer service before bidding on an auction and have the currency changed for that particular auction within my account. Which would then mean I can pay with my local currency.

I do not understand how that works. I thought auction is in USD then converted to requested currency (e.g. your local currency / currency specified in account). In my opinion, you (not using local currency) / Godaddy (if they bid for you using local currency) can still lose/gain depending on exchange rate used. This is interesting especially when it comes to huge amounts.

@Joe Styler please clarify how this works?

Assuming it works as GoDaddy have said, then wouldn't the following happen:
1) I contact GD to tell them that I want to bid on e.g. XXXXX.com (Expired domain), where the bid currency is set as USD
2) GD would then change the settings for that particular auction within my account so that I am actually bidding in GBP (in my case), the conversion taking place using their set exchange rate at the time
3) I win the auction and pay for the domain in GBP
4) Customer renews and I am reimbursed the same amount as originally paid in GBP

I think this is another classic case of poor communication on GoDaddy's end.

I'm a Canadian, but I deliberately keep everything on GD in USD specifically because of potential confusion. (also because now-a-days their $Can prices can be significantly more then the $USD price exchanged into $Can at current rates)

The problem is that I think there are some cases where your regional godaddy website (GoDaddy.ca for Canadians) do indeed charge you in your local currency without converting to USD.

However .. because the auction platform is obviously international, the bids increments obviously need to be fixed to specific increments (in this case starting at $12usd with minimum $5 incremental raises). So Godaddy has no choice but to have everyone using USD .. the problem is actually that they try to be helpful by guesstimating the conversion to your local currency (if you're set to anything other than $USD), which means that the amount you're bidding in your local currency is rounded in their system to the equivalent $USD conversion.

The system is as it should be as there is no other way to do it fairly because of the global nature of the auctions platform. However, as is always the case with GoDaddy .. they most certainly could be clearer that at the end of the day that the non-USD auctions you see are not the actual exact amounts .. which can definitely be confusing because I think the other non-auction parts of regional Godaddy websites do indeed show exact prices in your local currency.

I can see how they might have chosen not to really put this information out there as it most certainly could be confusing to some .. and in most cases it's a question of a few cents (under $1). But yes it indeed can certainly come as a shock when an auction is reversed and you get refunded at your credit card's (or PayPal's) updated exchange rate.

Seems to me I've both won and lost on this sort of thing .. and at first it really frustrated me .. but now I don't really think about it any more. If you lose a few cents then it's really not worth the hassle .. if you lose a very large amount then you could indeed go talk to Godaddy .. the fact they've chosen not to clearly explain how their system works most certainly places a moral responsibility on them if you have your local currency set for their auctions platform ... whether they are legally responsible is another question all together though .. lol.

Just checked ,,, with the closeouts it funny that when you select $Can, the main listings for your "Watched Domains" show up in $Can, but then if you load the page it shows the USD price. So i'm thinking even closeouts (and therefore the entire GD Auction platform) are converted to USD.

Obviously since closeouts are fixed prices the need for everyone to be converted into $USD isn't there. But i'm thinking it's MUCH easier for them to code and have a bug-reduced platform if the entire thing has just a single currency. They do need to be clearer about it however in my opinion.

Maybe for international currencies they should still always show $USD (which they actually do randomly in some places but not other), followed by the approximate conversion.

Ex:
USD$10(~C$13) .. Although I'm not sure how many people actually know that "~" means "approximately"
or
USD$10 (approx C$13)

Unfortunately showing both means valuable on-screen real-estate. So my vote would just be to keep everything in $USD .. it's clearer and easier to code for and makes more room for other important data to be displayed. Then at checkout clearly state that any conversion is done on the credit card's side and could result in potential deviation if a refund is done at a future date.

That being said, the $Can to $USD is fairly easy for me to approximate in my head .. so I'm not sure how many people actually use (and need) their local currencies to be displayed. Probably a case where GD need to go look at the stats and logs and see how many people actually use what.

Hmmmn .. looking into it a bit more it seems that for me even if I switch it to $Can, I still need to bid in $USD. Is this not the case for GD in the UK?

If it's like for GD.ca, then it isn't so bad (can I assume that for the auction in question you bid in $USD?) ... it's just confusing because sometimes things show up in $USD and other times it's in local currency. They should just keep it all consistent across the auctions platform in $USD. Then if there really is demand/need based on traffic/usage stats, have an (Approx ____) appended next to the $USD price if the person selects another default currency other than $USD.

bowskie said:

Alternatively GoDaddy needs to stop taking payments before goods are received, as I think that these renewals after auction has taken place happen too often. This would eliminate the problem entirely.

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This is a HUGE but separate issue .. it's been discussed many times. It certainly is a frustrating problem. There are reasons for it, but I honestly think they could at least make it better and move things around a bit in order to at least reduce the problem.


Check out this thread here:
https://www.namepros.com/threads/wh...oseout-price-reach-to-5.1001036/#post-5995558


There are plenty others I'm sure:
https://www.namepros.com/threads/i-...ly-it-is-canceled.1016003/page-3#post-6133090

happens to me too, just the cost of doing business

Just for your info, Canadian Loonie gained $0.04 in the last week. Whoo Hoo!

Good for buying, not so good for selling !

I hate to oversimply and didn't read the entire line of responses but as mentioned the paypal solution, but with these expired auctions being not being absolute: .

Why don't you keep the money in "Credit" instead on that domain?

Then no refund needed, apply credit on next bidding opportunity. Of course not some huge amount.

offthehandle said:

I hate to oversimply and didn't read the entire line of responses but as mentioned the paypal solution, but with these expired auctions being not being absolute: .

Why don't you keep the money in "Credit" instead on that domain?

Then no refund needed, apply credit on next bidding opportunity. Of course not some huge amount.

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That is also a good idea.

Even though GD will issue a refund (no doubts), domainers that are losing money on such transactions (which may even be the case for non-U.S. issued but USD-denominated credit cards _with_ foreign purchase fees) should - at least in some cases - say "thank you" for this to other domainers, that are actively looking to "cheat the auctions system" by sending emails like "I would like to acquire it and also pay you the renewal fee" to previous owners of each and every expiring auctions domain with bids, using any and all available historical whois records, since GD is hiding whois by placing their contacts on expiring auctions domains, at least on GD-regged ones. I occasionally receive such emails, most notably regarding domains that had my whois at some point of time, were subsequently sold and later not renewed. After making some research I learned that these emails are more frequently /but not always/ originated from India (according to names used, real IPs, "Indian English", and some other criterias) due to reasons unknown, and that they are looking to buy a domain that cheap that in fact a small %%% of transactions actually happens, but the domains are removed from market as previous owners do in fact renew them as the result.
It appears there is no solution, except chaning the system - no renewals should be allowed after the expired domain reached GD auctions.

BTW, the process I mentioned above looks to be well automated, they also send reminders in Uniregistry style ("Any further thoughts on this?") - until auction ends.... : - (

tonyk2000 said:

It appears there is no solution, except chaning the system - no renewals should be allowed after the expired domain reached GD auctions.

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Absolutely and these platforms are losing money on the additional auction revenue. I have posted into several threads about the expired "fake" auction problem, expired auctions on Dynadot, Namesilo and GoDaddy are non compliant with internationally recognized industry standard procedures and best practices of an absolute english auction. Namesilo has explained in a very courteous and nice reply that it is a balancing act between person not renewing and the buyer. I respectfully disagree with this and the auto renew function is automatic by default, so certain domain owners are negligent or gaming the system.