ALPNAMES.COM - WARNING! WILL DELETE YOUR DOMAINS & HIKE PRICES WITHOUT NOTICE.

[tomcarl]

As someone who has experience with almost every major registrar out there, I am very unhappy with my AlpNames.com experience. Here's why:

1. They raised their .COM renewal fees from $8.75 to $15.00 with NO warning, NO email, NO reminder or alert. A few days prior I renewed a few domains at $8.75, a couple days later I add expired domains to my cart to renew, they're all set at $15.00 each. Dozens of them.

2. They will DELETE DOMAINS from your account OR CHARGE YOU a $60 Recovery fee, a DAY BEFORE the deadline date they specified in their emails when the domain expired! For example: "You must renew domain before the 3rd or it may be unable to recover!" , Ok fine, then on the 2nd, not the 3rd, they're all deleted or a 60 recovery fee is slapped on them. And I checked time-zones, that had nothing to do with it, they were clear in all time-zones!

3. Slow responses for support. I've contacted their support regarding the price hike, then about the domains being deleted before their due time, going on 4 days still waiting for response on time-sensitive/urgent issue.

4. Lastly, Visa doesn't seem to like this company as they're always blocking payment to them. I had to call my bank several times.

I was introduced to AlpNames because of the transfer promo a couple years ago, without issues which is why I didn't transfer out, $8.75 was reasonable so I paid back the savings to them AND THEM some, renewed my domains (HUNDREDS) for 2+ years with them AFTER promo and was going to again, NOT NOW.

If you have names with AlpNames, again, they hiked .com renewals up from $8.75 to $15.00, so if you have dozens or hundreds of domains to renew and you're not looking for an unpleasant surprise during renewal time, here's your fair warning which they won't give. And they lock your domains so you can't transfer out after expiry date and they may just delete your domains or put them in grace period early. Enjoy.

 

[Rob Monster]

An Epik customer is reporting challenges with accessing AlpNames.

In the meantime, I am at ICANN in Kobe and will try to track down someone from Alpnames. Apparently Robert Posnett from Alpnames is here.

I did also put a question to the ICANN Registrar Stakeholder Group just now.

If anyone is still having issues with Alpnames, you can email me at [email protected] and will try to coordinate with Alpnames.

Thanks.
Rob

 

[Rob Monster]

Officially lights out for Alpnames:

https://onlinedomain.com/2019/03/15/domain-name-news/icann-terminates-alpnames-registrar/

We'll see how quickly ICANN appoints a new registrar here.

 

[Rob Monster]

The AlpNames website completely shut down.

I understand that sometimes there are problems but they must always inform the clients. Right now I do not know if they are going to return or we lost everything.

Thanks to Rob Monster from Epik we have an opportunity.

Apparently Alpnames is in receivership for the last many months.

I am still working to find an active contact from AlpNames. From what I have gathered, @AlpNames been on life support since mid-2018 when Famous Four Media went into restructuring.

The former head of sales there, Robert Posnett, left in January. I managed to connect with him earlier today so got some insight there. The site is currently completely offline so that is not looking good.

I have reached out to ICANN officials and will try to fast-track something on Tuesday in Japan during the ICANN meetings. @Sufyan Alani is also here with me.

 

[Rob Monster]

I thought so too at first.. because of the screen that pops over the options/code.. but all you gotta do is click cancel or later at that point.. and your back to picking options.. including clicking the secret code link

Jurgen was right.. its upto -36 days to get your code and transfer out

so the problem isn't really there with alpnames.

the problem is more (1) when alpnames goes from 9$ to 15$ for renewal without notice.
and (2) when its now been down couple days... without notice

as I said before no one here would probably even know about alpnames had it not been for their $5 promo 1-2 years back.

I did just use the alt link someone gave above to login and get the 25 codes for all names I own there.. of which I probably will keep maybe 15... so I think I'll go ahead and end my biz with them here... not because I believe they shut down without notice for good.. but because I don't like the two things I mentioned above. I guess even if they do shutdown (hyphotiteically speaking) we can still transfer out names if we have code and its unlocked in whois.

though honestly I've no cluie what happens to names at a registrar.. if one shuts down... or if there is some icann rules protecting names.. so people can at least transfer out... for say X days or months after shutdown... maybe @Rob Monster knows this... I would imagine the people who registered those names are somehow protected for their "property". or I hope... never happened to me before so I do not know.

The Alpnames site is still down and it appears nobody works there now. As such, it looks like lights out there. Andee Hill at ICANN is investigating the matter. I confirmed that this is in her scope.

For anyone who can access their domains via the Logicboxes URL, we welcome you at Epik with domains at cost, e.g. $8.49 for all-inclusive .COM.

I have no word on de-accreditation so for now every registrant has to find their own path. If ICANN intervenes, they have the option of moving all domains to another registrar in bulk.

Hopefully ICANN provides some clarity soon. From what I know, the vast majority of the domains there at Alpnames are governed by ICANN agreements.

@Andee Hill

 

[Bob Hawkes]

OK I am an optimist most of the time, but this does not seem to be a really good day.

On the positive side, thank you so much for people like @Rob Monster, @Kate, @Jurgen Wolf and others who have the experience and are so willing to share and help us at stressful times. I truly thank you.

NPs also seems to be exploding in flames in a couple of other threads. All of us who are not moderators should be thankful we are not, and we also should thank the moderators.

To paraphrase from a famous book, most of what you need to know to be a good domainer you learn in elementary school: be kind, be truthful, work hard, have fun, help others, be happy, be creative, be responsible, play well with others, don't fight, don't break things, follow the rules, share the toys, respect that others are different, make a difference.

Bob

 

[Bob Hawkes]

I wanted to stress that I am not defending (other than stating my personal experience) or promoting Alpnames or any other registrar (I use 10 different registrars personally). It is just headings like this bother me. I think it is important to let people know about price increases and services down, but the OP title is very sensationalistic.

We should be concerned when registrars are down, for any reason, and I am glad that the ever helpful @Rob Monster has kindly offered to see if he can contact the CEO of Alp at the ICANN meeting. But we should not jump to conclusions.

Re price increase on renewal, I was somewhat surprised when I checked just now to note that 23 out of 43 registrars covered by TLD-LIst now show .com renewal at $15 or more, including some names we know and use a lot. I am not sure if renewals have edged up, or if that was always the situation. Anyway just stating that a $15 renewal while higher than in past at that registrar seems in about the middle of the pack.

I also agree with the person who posted that it is always best to decide and renew well in advance.

But my main point is throughout NPs to urge us to be less sensationalistic in thread titles and statements. Just my mission....

Thanks for reading,

Bob

 

[Rob Monster]

You may also try to call/email... to recheck if somebody replies there...

ICANN listed contact
Damon Barnard
Phone: +44.2031379682
Email: [email protected]

Already talked to him. He no longer works there. He interviewed with Incite.

He sent me this:

####
Hi Rob,

I've been trying to tell Kevin Murphy what I can today which, unfortunately, is not all that much.

I haven't worked with AlpNames since November and, in truth, my role for the 12 months prior to that was basically limited to local mind and management in Gibraltar, the shareholders having decided to move all day-to-day operations to London in November 2017. The majority shareholder decided to terminate my appointment as a director to save costs for AlpNames and, also, due to the fact that he wished to be more "hands on" with the day-to-day of AlpNames and that he wanted to properly relocate the business to the UK - how far those plans were progressed, if at all, are unknown to me, as I've had no correspondence with him.

I am an AlpNames customer myself, and currently don't have access to critical domain names, .. . (Section removed due to personal info)

That's about the extent of my knowledge. I'm really very saddened by what is happening, as I spent years of my life building AlpNames as a brand.

Hope all's well with Epik!

All the best,

Damon.

###

Seems sincere.

 

[Damon Barnard]

Already talked to him. He no longer works there. He interviewed with Incite.

He sent me this:

####
Hi Rob,

I've been trying to tell Kevin Murphy what I can today which, unfortunately, is not all that much.

I haven't worked with AlpNames since November and, in truth, my role for the 12 months prior to that was basically limited to local mind and management in Gibraltar, the shareholders having decided to move all day-to-day operations to London in November 2017. The majority shareholder decided to terminate my appointment as a director to save costs for AlpNames and, also, due to the fact that he wished to be more "hands on" with the day-to-day of AlpNames and that he wanted to properly relocate the business to the UK - how far those plans were progressed, if at all, are unknown to me, as I've had no correspondence with him.

I am an AlpNames customer myself, and currently don't have access to critical domain names, .. . (Section removed due to personal info)

That's about the extent of my knowledge. I'm really very saddened by what is happening, as I spent years of my life building AlpNames as a brand.

Hope all's well with Epik!

All the best,

Damon.

###

Seems sincere.

Hi all, I would just like to clarify that I didn't "interview" with Domain Incite - Kevin approached me to ask if I was still working with AlpNames and I provided him with the same info that I provided to Rob, which is that my involvement ceased in November. It was not anything nearly as official as an interview.

As you can tell from Rob's copy/paste of my message to him, I am in the same boat as an AlpNames customer, and hope to see the situation resolved ASAP.

This is a great community and the support you are providing each other is outstanding - use the non-branded OrderBox link already shared in this thread to access your accounts. I am not sure if you will be able to complete any actions that involve sending funds to AlpNames, as the payment gateways seem to have been disabled, but you should be able to unlock and transfer out domain names.

 

[Rob Monster]

obviously not ,rob monster said the big shots ,or should I say big snakes were out of all places icann conference ,hopefully someone poisons the bastards

Ben - As clarified privately just now, Alpnames personnel were not in attendance at ICANN. If you look at the comments from the former CEO, Damon Barnard, posted earlier, it is clear that there is plenty of humility, regret, and even contrition on the part of the leadership there who likely worked their tails off.

One thing I will say is that smaller registrars struggle to keep up with the big guys, e.g. Godaddy that not only has a huge scale advantage, but has also an endless ability to borrow funds plus can access equity markets pretty much as needed through private placements that have institutional buyers.

I suspect with Alpnames there was a bit of collateral damage from the very large bet by Famous Four on new TLDs which did not work out vis-a-vis dependence on the registrar channel. And then Alp adopted a blitzscaling model which is great if you can access capital markets but can be a fiasco when you can't!

To chase the Godaddy model without the capital structure is very gutsy. In some ways, NameSilo might be trying to do exactly that with a highly levered balance sheet and a dependence on Verisign unit rebates that are tied to year-over-year growth metrics. Suffice it to say that the stakes are high.

By contrast, Epik has a dual pricing model where retail customers pay a high margin for a full service product while professional domain investors get domains at cost. For being global and a fast innovator, we have a relatively lean overhead model and we have raised only a modest amount of value-added capital.

Hopefully it all works out before folks lose domains. ICANN has been warned and can hopefully speak with Alpnames stakeholders this week to find a workaround that does the least damage to the fewest people regardless of whether Alpnames equity holders see a penny from their investment as that ship has sailed.

 

[HotKey]

Really really big thx to @jorgeug for the link, can confirm works perfect, full access to domains (as customer login). Have unlocked, and in process of transferring remaining names out. With only a handful left, don't care to see the aftermath of all this.

@Bob Hawkes just fyi, your link to this thread from the article on your site is broke..

 

[Rob Monster]

For anyone who missed it, this URL apparently works for all all Alpnames users:

https://apal516804.myorderbox.com/

Good luck.

@Andee Hill - FYI!

 

[Rob Monster]

I wonder what the delays are usually.

so if I understand things correctly, icann will apoint one singular gaining registrar for all names and registrants? or multiple gaining registrars?

I think we better act quick to transfer out our names where we want.. while we can.. cause what if situation arises where icann forces gaining registrar to be somehting where transfer .com or other tld rates are much higher than averages? such registrars do exist.

i better get to work on my 25 names asap. man what a mess it can be dealing with little known registrars in some exotic places...

Considering that there was an ICANN meeting going on, and that the site went offline just 3 days ago, I think ICANN did a reasonable job here. They have a fiduciary requirement to reach out to the registrar admin contact which of course took time since nobody was reachable. They are aware that there are many expired domains involved and I imagine @Andee Hill will fast-track some kind of transition plan. Epik has offered to take action and migrate through the weekend if selected.

 

[Kate]

They have a bad reputation for other stuff so you're really taking chances with those shady registrars.
All those 'promos' are gonna cost you.

 

[Bob Hawkes]

Thanks for the update, @Rob Monster but wow that is indeed concerning.

Sorry to bother you while at meetings, but has a registrar ever gone out of business, and if so do ICANN have provisions for people moving out domain names that were held there? Not saying we are at that point, but with thousands of registrars it must have happened.

Bob

Edit: I found a bit at this link
https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/bulk-transfers-2017-10-06-en

 

[Kate]

has a registrar ever gone out of business, and if so do ICANN have provisions for people moving out domain names that were held there?

Yes.
Registerfly is the most famous example. Following that debacle Icann designed a procedure (bulk transfer). Since then a few other registrars have been terminated (including some little registrars owned by domainers). Estdomains was terminated due to a criminal conviction of its owner.
Registrars disappear from time to time. For example shell registrars that only exist for dropcatching. Phenix dropped a lot of them because the costs must have been unsustainable.

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

AlpNames website is just frontend.
Backend - LogicBoxes... so you may safely log in using the mentioned address above.
+ API is available as well (for resellers).

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

Transfer lock (so-called "Theft protection") with LogicBoxes registrars can be disabled in a bulk even for expires.

Yes, just unlocked my expires and other domains via Bulk request:
https://apal516804.myorderbox.com/servlet/ListAllOrdersServlet

 

[Rob Monster]

Andee Hill at ICANN confirmed that the buck stops with her on this case. For anyone not able to use the logicboxes workaround, you can send specific issues to the following:

[email protected]


@Andee Hill

 

[Internet.bs]

If they don't come back online, as an accredited registrar ICANN will put out a tender process to all ICANN registrars and select a provider to take over the domains. Might be worth transferring names you want to keep before then if you can as you won't have control over where they go.

 

[jorgeug]

I was wondering if anyone can tell me this...

1. Do we expect that the myorderbox way to control will stay working in long term?
2. If I transfer a domain out, after unlocking and getting auth code, from there does it require an approval from Alpnames, or after 5 days my new registrar will be able to complete the transfer without any response from Alpnames?
3. Does the 60 day transfer out restriction still apply? I have one name that I hope to protect that is less old than that at Alpnames.
4. I guess none of us know if there is a possibility of Alpnames coming back? I know sometimes even for companies in some form of financial problems they restructure or are bought out and come back.

Thanks for answers on any of the above.

Bob

On Wednesday 6 I realized that I was not allowed to renew and did not answer my calls or messages.

I requested the transfer on: 2019-03-11 and it was completed on 2019-03-11 ".party .download" the and ".com" a day later

I had left four domains then I ordered transfer on 2019-03-11 and I do not think I have a problem.

We must choose the registrars well Epik is a good option, because we can contact the CEO, other companies do not even know who the owner is and we can not contact.

 

[jorgeug]

Dear Iain Roache: Please be advised that as of 15 March 2019, Alpnames Limited’s (“Alpnames”) 2013 Registrar Accreditation Agreement with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (“ICANN”) dated 13 August 2014 (“RAA”) is terminated pursuant to Section 5.5.8 (vi) of the RAA. The termination shall become effective immediately, on 15 March 2019. The termination is due to Alpnames’ discontinuance of its operations. Based on the information available to ICANN, including multiple third party complaints, Alpnames is no longer providing Registrar Services in violation of Section 3.1 of the RAA, including not providing registrants the ability to renew or transfer domain name registrations. Alpnames’ website also recently became unavailable and its contact information in both ICANN’s RADAR system and the Registrar Information Specification is out of date and fails to reach any registrar representative. Alpnames has also failed to respond to ICANN Contractual Compliance’s notices regarding this matter. Please see the chronology below for additional details.Alpnames is further advised that the logo license granted in the Logo License Specification to the RAA is revoked as of 15 March 2019. Please remove all ICANN trademarks, name and logo from Alpnames’ website and business materials that have been licensed to Alpnames under the terms of that Specification by 15 March 2019. Domain Name Transition Process To protect domain name registrants, ICANN will commence the domain name transition process and will solicit bids for a qualified ICANN-accredited registrar to manage the domain names currently managed by Alpnames. ICANN will follow the De-Accredited Registrar Transition Procedure (“Procedure”). | 2 ICANN reserves all its rights under the RAA. Please note the rights and obligations required to have effect after the expiration of the RAA, including but not limited to Sections 3.4 Retention of Registered Name Holder and Registration Data, 3.9 Accreditation Fees, 5.8 Resolution of Disputes Under this Agreement, and 5.9 Limitations on Monetary Remedies for Violations of this Agreement. Alpnames has current and past due accreditation fees. These fees are required to be paid to ICANN by Section 3.9 of the RAA. Please immediately submit payment to ICANN Accounting.

 

[Mario Venturini]

Do not panic: email received from PDR read two things as follows...

---------

(A) Only for domains that are registered with Public Domain Registry as the Registrar:

● Once your domain name is moved under the new account, you will be able to renew and manage your domain names and attached services through... (cp resellerclub customer)

● For help documents related to renewing and managing your orders, you can refer... (cp resellerclub kb)

● You will be provided support for these domain names and services by creating a ticket through... (support resellerclub helpdesk)

(B) For domains that are registered with Alpnames as the Registrar:

● You can choose to transfer the domain name to a Registrar of your choice

● Alternatively if your domain and other associated services are active, you can wait for ICANN action to appoint a registrar

We will be sending another email once the move is complete so you can log in to manage your orders.
---------

That's all, bynow.
(Mario)

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

UPD
https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/bulk-transfers-2017-10-06-en
Looks that all pure AlpNames domains will be moved to Moniker/KS.

 

[KS-Marketing]

As you may be aware ICANN has made the decision to de-accredit Alpnames as a registrar and today announced that it has awarded the names to the CentralNIC Registrar Group, with the domains to be split between three of its ICANN accredited Registrars – Key-Systems GmBH, Key-Systems LLC and Moniker Online Services, LLC.

ICANN announced us as the gaining registrars here: https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/bulk-transfers-2017-10-06-en and ICANN's transfer procedures are described here: https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/dartp-11jul13-en.pdf

We were informed of this decision earlier today and are now in the process of creating accounts at www.moniker.com for all Alpnames customers. The process will be completed as soon as possible.

Part of the process is arranging the transfer of the names into our management. Please be assured that we are working closely with the relevant domain registries to restore access to the domains as quickly as possible. We ask customers for their patience as we complete this process, we will only be creating the customer accounts once the domains have been transferred. Customers that own ccTLDs with Alpnames and require assistance in accessing and transferring these names please get in contact.

We will email customers asap with information on how to access their account at www.moniker.com, where all domains previously managed via Alpnames will be migrated.

A dedicated email address, [email protected] has been set up, where our support team can assist customers. Our team will also be present on forums and blogs to answer questions.

Thanks!

Key-Systems and Moniker