My Experience With NamePal (And How To Get Them Banned)

[Shailendra Mishra]

There are three purpose of this thread:

1. To alert fellow name Pros who have no prior experience with NamePal, about this scammy registrar NamePal with my 2 stories.

2. Invite suggestion on practical (doable) ways to get namepal strongly warned or if possible get their license revoked and run them out of business.

3. Gather fellow name Pros who were cheated by namepal at the some time, and take action. Together!

PART 1: My Experience​

I tried namepal in March 2018 because I liked their clouseouts/auctions. I bid on a few and won 2 auctions. Total cost 2x ($5+$9.59). Nothing much. In few days I got the domains (and emails) in my account like normal.

The domains are:
400817.com
VisaManual.com
These are the only domains I ever had with them.

Now, I corrected and updated my Whois again and again, never purchased or activated privacy (and checked that again and again) but even after several days, none of my domain show correct whois record.

Finally, I wrote a support ticket :

Even after couple of weeks of registering the domain, the whois information of following domains is not updated: https://www.namepal.com/domains/who-is
Domain VISAMANUAL : Result : Whois information is not found
Domain 400817.COM Result : Whois information is wrong (does not belong to me even though I have not applied privacy).

Their Reply :

Hi,
this domain is managed by our partner, in order to activate instant NS and full whois update option, please renew this domain.
Once domain was renewed, we will be able to move it to NamePal directly and show your whois information.
Let me know if there is anything else we can do for you!
Liza
P.s.: After you renew the domain it might take couple of days to move the domain.

Then I asked :

Didnt I already renewed my domain?

Response :

Hi,
yes, domain was renewed with our partner, expire date is
Domain Name VISAMANUAL.COM View history Owner Shailendra Mishra <admi*****eb.com> Create Date 02/20/2017 Expire Date 02/20/2019 Renew Price $ 12.99 View Invoices
If you add an extra year, we will be able to update your whois.
We will include 2 year renewal to our auction platform to handle this issue
Let me know if you need help with the renewal.
Liza

I warned them :

This is not fair. I am complaining about this to ICANN as it is clear violation of whois guidelines.

But :

Hi,
please request the auth code and proceed with the domain transfer.
We will forward you any email you receive regarding the domain transfer to help you finish the transfer.
Liza

I know lots of fellow name Pros do not even get support replies, I got replies, Cool. But, look at their arrogance! They have hijacked my domain even though I paid full price. It is cheating. And violation.

And now I can not control the Nameserver (of visamanual.com), I changed it in dashboard but it has not updated in whois.

Whois record of other domain (400817.com) shows blank whois since then. I can not verify my identity, If want to sell it.

PART 2: Possible action?​

How to complaint about such bad businesses, apart from writing bad reviews? I know that there is an icann grievance redressal mechanism. But, does it work good? Any other suggestions. There must be a way which we can easily follow and take action.

PART 3: Lets take action?​

I read dozens of namepal horror stories, people missed opportunities, lost sales, lost money because of their poor platform and even poorer support. But they (victims) did was to write bad reviews.

Lets go a step beyond. Lets decide on a collective action to take. Make them run out of business and thus save lots of others in our community from falling in their trap and create a lesson for other registrars to improve on their service while there is still some time left.

ATTACHMENTS:​

 

[anantj]

I've had the exact same experience as you including near verbatim response from support. Yes, you should transfer your domains out and yes, you should try to take action against them. I'll join in whatever capacity I can. They have really poor platform and support!

Ps. They were a namescon sponsor a couple of years ago and were even endorsed by Elliot Silver. Poor choice imo but then I'd say hindsight is always crytal clear!

 

[Paul Nicks]

It sounds like you bought an expired domain from their system that is kept at a partner registrar. I'm not an expert at namepal, but am a bit of an expert in the expiry field so I can say that here's what's likely happening:

• name expires at partner registrar (likely smaller/boutique)
• namepal auctions it off during auto-renew grace period
• winning bidder pays auction fee and the 1 yr renewal to keep the domain from dropping
• name stays registered at partner registrar with limited access to bidder since the bidder is obscured to partner via the namepal integration
• bidder does not have full access to domain via namepal unless another year registration is added because the name isn't actually at namepal, so it'd need to be xferred into namepal for them to have full access to give to bidder, thus costing 1 yr reg.

I know we've discussed internally about how to handle partner expired domains and we decided that all names would be xferred to GoDaddy after being won so that the buyer would have full access. Not every registrar is onboard with willingly letting domains xfer out after being sold, though.

Again, not an expert on any other registrars' practices but I've got a pretty solid background on expiry in general. The good news here is that you bought some decent names at prices that you must have been comfortable with, so all you need to do now is move them to whatever registrar you feel comfortable with to hold your portfolio. It'll cost another year registration upfront, but I would hope any domain you spent money at auction on would warrant at least a 2 year life in your portfolio.

-Paul

 

[Shailendra Mishra]

...
...

• name expires at partner registrar (likely smaller/boutique)
• namepal auctions it off during auto-renew grace period
• winning bidder pays auction fee and the 1 yr renewal to keep the domain from dropping
• name stays registered at partner registrar with limited access to bidder since the bidder is obscured to partner via the namepal integration
• bidder does not have full access to domain via namepal unless another year registration is added because the name isn't actually at namepal, so it'd need to be xferred into namepal for them to have full access to give to bidder, thus costing 1 yr reg.

...
...
-Paul

Seems like my case looking at the symptoms. But I paid for the domain and "I CAN NOT USE IT". The domain is not opening in browser. and Whois record shows null record (kinda).

If they can not provide at least this much control, they should stop selling this feature of buying expired domains.

Am I wrong?

 

[Paul Nicks]

Seems like my case looking at the symptoms. But I paid for the domain and "I CAN NOT USE IT". The domain is not opening in browser. and Whois record shows null record (kinda).

If they can not provide at least this much control, they should stop selling this feature of buying expired domains.

Am I wrong?

Well considering I run a competing service I really can't comment on right or wrong.

The whois issue may be GDPR related and not related to this service at all, many registrars are blocking whois now for all registrants regardless of country.

As far as the control goes, I think you should at least be able to change the DNS settings, if you can't then I agree that's a problem. Can you be more explicit with their tech support and explain that you are unable to use the domain at all and see if they require a xfer to even have that functionality? Another tactic may be to ask the rep what registrar the domain currently sits in and whether they can COA it to you within that registrar rather than fully xferring to a new one. COAs should be free for intra-registrar moves.

 

[Shailendra Mishra]

Well considering I run a competing service I really can't comment on right or wrong.

The whois issue may be GDPR related and not related to this service at all, many registrars are blocking whois now for all registrants regardless of country.

As far as the control goes, I think you should at least be able to change the DNS settings, if you can't then I agree that's a problem. Can you be more explicit with their tech support and explain that you are unable to use the domain at all and see if they require a xfer to even have that functionality? Another tactic may be to ask the rep what registrar the domain currently sits in and whether they can COA it to you within that registrar rather than fully xferring to a new one. COAs should be free for intra-registrar moves.

No it is not GDPR related. It existed before GDPR and it happened exactly the same to other name Pros.

I was about to write a support ticket about NameServer control, but now (after 3 days) finally my NameServer change comes into effect. Still worst service.

Any suggestions for complaint of registrars?