Beware of the Domainnames.com

[Goran]

Hi everyone.

I just want to share what happened to me last night.

I have registered last night domain name via Domainnames.com

At least I thought I did. After registration and billing, i have received confirmation email, but from other company Web.com

I have received welcome email, and login details. Also, in my back statement, it said that company that billed me was Web.com(i have never heard of them before)
I signed in to my account, but there, it said my domain name is not registered with them or expired. Than, i checked WHOIS, and it is really not registered.

I registered domain via yahoo few hours later, and opened a ticket for explanation and refund. And than, 4 tickets after they said they billed me for hosting on Web.com, not domain, even if I never ever heard of them, nor visited their website. I gave my info to DOmainnames.com, and I was redirected to web.com after I paid.

I am sanding entire conversation with web.com below if anyone cares

---------- Post added at 09:57 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:56 AM ----------

Me:

10/28/2013 7:48:43 PM - Online Customer:
Hi
I have registered domain with DomainNames.com but I have received confirmation email from your company.
I can login to my account for domain I registered, but I cant control domain name as it says that domain is expired or not registered with your company. Also, I cant change nameservers or do anything else.
I have checked and domain appears to be free, not registered(but my credit card is billed)

Do you have any idea what is going on?

web.com

Thank you for contacting us today. We appreciate your patience and your continued business. The domain in question is registered to your name through Yahoo. We hope to continue helping you move your business forward. Have a wonderful day.

me:

Yes I know domain registered with Yahoo. I did it last night AFTER I sow that you didnt register domain for me, even if you billed my credit card. I have registered domain name with DOMAINNAMES.COM, but I havent received confirmation mail from them, but from your company(web.com). Also, in my bank statement it says that web.com billed my credit card. But when I entered your user area, it said that domain is expired or not registered with you.
So, what did you take money for? Do you plan to refund?

web.com

Solution History On Ticket:
10/29/2013 1:16:36 PM - Matt F.:
Dear Goron,

Thank you for contacting us today regarding the website hosting for mojcv.org. We are sorry to hear that you would like to cancel your account. Unfortunately, we cannot process this request via e-mail or online ticketing. This is to ensure that the security of your account is not compromised. We would also like to be sure that you are fully aware of any potential impact closing your account may have. Please contact our Life Cycle Management team at 1-800-932-4678, Monday - Friday, 8:00 a.m. - 8:00 p.m., EST, for assistance. If calling the toll free number does not work for you, you can call 001-904-680-6600, and request Life Cycle Management or LCM. Once your account is verified, one of our representatives will be happy to assist you. We appreciate your business and regret any inconvenience this may cause you. We look forward to speaking with you soon! Offline Team Life Cycle Management Web.com 1-800-545-9076

me:

Hi Thank you for your answer. However, I live in Serbia, and phone call would be a lot more expensive then few dollars you took for nothing. If refunding is not your policy,OK, I lost 3$, life goes on. But you are mentioning my account, and canceling...Can you tell me what exectly to cancel, because I am confused. Can you give me simple and straight answer:
1) Do you accept the fact that you billed me?
2) If you do, what is the service you billed me for?
3) Did I get what I payed for? Thank you Thank you

web.com

appreciate your patience and your continued business. You requested from us and we billed you for hosting services. We have not billed you for any domain name registration and you yourself stated our system told you that was the case as well. If you no longer wish to have the hosting only account you opened with our company, then you would have to call the international number I supplied. We hope to continue helping you move your business forward. Have a wonderful day. Matthew F. Web.com

So that is it, I have bought hosting from company whose website I have never visited

 

[techgal128]

What? I don't even understand their answer to your last question. lol I can't tell if this is a ridiculously bad company or they are scammers. Either way, I'll stay away from them. Thanks for the report!

 

[Kate]

I think you ditched a poor registrar for another registrar that is possibly as bad.

Next time, get yourself a decent registrar, and don't be lured by the coupons. Sooner or later, they leave a sour taste in your mouth :imho:

 

[Goran]

I think you ditched a poor registrar for another registrar that is possibly as bad.

Next time, get yourself a decent registrar, and don't be lured by the coupons. Sooner or later, they leave a sour taste in your mouth :imho:

I agree.
I always register domains via InternetBs, because I like their stable prices (8.5$ for com + privacy) better than GoDaddys 2-15$ COMs.
But this was a domain for experiment website, so I thought it would be nice to have domain+privacy cheap.
I have learned a lesson, but I couldn't believe that someone could do anything like that for so small amount of money

 

[techgal128]

I was looking up Web.com and they seem to be pretty hated overall. Maybe they registered domainnames.com to look like a new business so all the bad reviews for their main site wouldn't show up. Shoddy contracting businesses do this all the time.

 

[Goran]

Probably, because when I try to open ticket on domainnames.com, web.com user panel opens.

 

[Kate]

web.com is the holding company of netsol and register.com => a registrar that is especially difficult to deal with. I would stay far away from these companies.

Saying that, I don't think they conspired to scam you. Probably a buggy script or a delayed registration that went wrong. Many registrars have bugs.

 

[alien51]

I have registered last night domain name via Domainnames.com

At least I thought I did. After registration and billing, i have received confirmation email, but from other company Web.com

I have never heard of Domainnames.com myself. After checking out their website, it says their domain promo rate for the first year is just 75 cents. I won't be surprised you took the bait (renewal price is $37).

I tried to register a random domain. After finding that it is available, a second page shows up which is interesting:

You have an OPTION to choose either (1) just register a domain; or (2) Create a website with a free domain.

I am not sure if you clicked OPTION 2 (intentionally or by mistake), which is why you got billed for a hosting account.

You narrated that you told the tech support that you lost $3 (which i think is closer to the price of a webhosting account, than the 75 cents for the domain). You didn't argue about the price, so i think you are consciously aware $3 can never be the price of 75 cents for the domain.

I believe what could have happened, is that Domainnames.com took so long a time to run the software to register your name. That is why you got the confirmation email first, even before your domain even got registered. Checking your whois and finding out it was not registered, you decided to reg it instead to YAHOO.

By the time Yahoo registered your domain, the software at Domainnames.com began executing the registration of the same domain. However, YAHOO already has beaten it. So the software seeing the domain is already taken, it did not register your domain anymore. But you got billed for hosting anyway. If you clicked "Create website", then your domain would have been free of charge anyway for the price of $4.95.

Also, there is an asterisk on the domain pricing. After clicking the asterisk, a webpage shows up and it says:

"The following promotional terms and conditions govern those particular Web.com promotions and offers for certain Web.com products and services:"

I think this clearly spells out that Domainnames.com and Web.com, are one and the same entity (or perhaps, one is the reseller of the other).

 

[mrfike]

I had a similar experience, ordered a 50¢ or 75¢ dn through DomainNames dot com, and received 2 confirmations from Web d com, nothing at all from "Domainnamesdotcom". After I read both of the confirms twice (honestly!), I figured out that I had to expressly decline the hosting, and go through a couple of other steps to change nameservers. DomainNames d com is simply a landing and processing site for Web.com to attempt to sell us other products, hosting, designing, all-in-one etc. Be Careful!.
I've found when dealing with registrars other than GD and Namecheap etc, that it's very important to go slowly, and look at every input option, every checkbox, radiobox, and dropdown on order forms, and in domain control areas. Most of these registrars, and we all know who they are, are simply trying to get you to unknowingly buy something that continues until you cancel it, and additionally, make it difficult to cancel. Also, watch out for auto-renewals, and "free" trials with these sorts of registrars. Kind of a hassle, but I was out of 99¢ codes at GD.

 

[HeyNow]

I was looking up Web.com and they seem to be pretty hated overall. Maybe they registered domainnames.com to look like a new business so all the bad reviews for their main site wouldn't show up. Shoddy contracting businesses do this all the time.

I'd be interested knowing if the owner (individual) who owns web.com is one of the regular attractions at the roving, gypsy-like domain conventions which typically hold in high esteem some individuals who we would prefer to use as shark bait. I'd really like to know.

---------- Post added at 07:25 AM ---------- Previous post was at 05:28 AM ----------

... I don't think they conspired to scam you. Probably a buggy script or a delayed registration that went wrong. Many registrars have bugs.

Well, it's mighty convenient for a company to take a small amount of money from an unsuspecting victim, then put that victim through a by-design email goose-chase system meant to deter the victim from pursuing a refund for a mere $3. Then others give the company the benefit of the doubt and blame a "buggy script" or some other nonsense in the naive belief that the company is too large to really commit fraud for a paltry $3, right?

Don't believe for one minute that the apparently non-caring company doesn't know exactly what it is doing.

 

[Kate]

A lot of registrars have bugs. How many times people 'bought' from nodaddy domains that were not available.

 

[HeyNow]

A lot of registrars have bugs. How many times people 'bought' from nodaddy domains that were not available.

Lots, but they were able to get their money back quickly. Godaddy didn't keep the money. I've had past issues with Godaddy and refunds are forthcoming quickly, and the only obstacle to speaking with a real Godaddy employee is variable "hold time."

 

[techgal128]

I don't think they are outright scammers since they do provide an actual service. I think that they are a company that uses questionable and misleading business tactics to make their revenue.

 

[HeyNow]

I don't think they are outright scammers since they do provide an actual service. I think that they are a company that uses questionable and misleading business tactics to make their revenue.

How can a company use "misleading business tactics to make their revenue" and not be an "outright scammer?"

If you use misleading tactics to extract money from people, guess what? That would make you a scammer!

 

[techgal128]

How can a company use "misleading business tactics to make their revenue" and not be an "outright scammer?"

If you use misleading tactics to extract money from people, guess what? That would make you a scammer!

Eh... they do provide a real service and they have everything in the fine print. I guess I feel like scammers are people that take your money for nothing in return or blatantly lie about their product to get you to buy it. This is just a poorly managed and shady business. That's just my opinion though. I'm sure people have different criteria in what's considered a scammer.

 

[HeyNow]

Eh... they do provide a real service and they have everything in the fine print. I guess I feel like scammers are people that take your money for nothing in return or blatantly lie about their product to get you to buy it. This is just a poorly managed and shady business. That's just my opinion though. I'm sure people have different criteria in what's considered a scammer.

What you state is not synonymous with "misleading," which is the characterization I was responding to. Some companies provide the "service" of separating people from their money in a slimey fashion. How's that for service?

 

[techgal128]

What you state is not synonymous with "misleading," which is the characterization I was responding to. Some companies provide the "service" of separating people from their money in a slimey fashion. How's that for service?

Well, I've never dealt with them so I was just saying that based on what others have said. If they are truly misleading people as in the complaints that I read online, then sure, they're scammers. However, some of the reviews I'm reading seem to miss key points such as they forgot to read the fine print or signed up for something because they misunderstood what it was.

 

[HeyNow]

Well, I've never dealt with them so I was just saying that based on what others have said. If they are truly misleading people as in the complaints that I read online, then sure, they're scammers. However, some of the reviews I'm reading seem to miss key points such as they forgot to read the fine print or signed up for something because they misunderstood what it was.

Point taken. I've never dealt with them either, but based on the email exchange provided above, I don't think I'll be giving them any of my money anytime soon. How about you?

 

[techgal128]

Point taken. I've never dealt with them either, but based on the email exchange provided above, I don't think I'll be giving them any of my money anytime soon. How about you?

If I did, it wouldn't be on purpose that's for sure. Lol

 

[mrfike]

I think a case could be made for deceptive and/or unethical business practices very easily against web.com, who seems to be everywhere the past 2 years or so. That said, if they run another 50¢ or 75¢ .com/net/org sale, I'll be there, with my reading glasses and magnifying glass, to reg another name or two.