Legality of massive price hikes for services

TomB_

Hello,

Sorry if this is in the wrong place but hopefully someone can point me in the right direction!

I own several two letter domain names under the TLD .tc so (xx.tc for example).I registered them originally in March 2007.

When I registered them, and at the time the pricing was $59.00USD per year.

However, they have just announced that from now (without even a notice period by the sounds of it!) renewals will cost £3000+VAT. This is a price hike of well over 1000%!

Now this wouldn't be a problem but for the past five years my primary email address, the one I use for pretty much everything has been on that two letter .tc domain because it's quick to type as well as the one ALL my contacts have.

The domain will need to be renewed in march next year at a cost of £3600. Obviously I cannot afford that, let alone every year!

They are a UK company: adamsnames.com

There must be some legal footing for this. I'm going to talk to the Office of fair trading but I wanted some informal opinions here first!

Please help! This seems incredibly unfair and sounds like it should be something legally wrong! I can see how they would be allowed to start charging new registrations at any price they want... but renewal of existing ones? That can't be right, surely?!

I don't mind paying more, but to go from under £50 a year to £3600 is just plain wrong.

I think what would happen if British Gas or someone raised prices by that much, there is the argument "well you don't have to go with that supplier" but I still can't see them being allowed!

Is there anything I can do? I'm hoping that because they're based in the UK there is some kind of legal basis for me to challenge their price hike.

Thanks!

somethingcorporate

What does your original contract say about renewals? If you are basically agreeing a new contract by renewing they can charge whatever price they want. I think this is likely to be the case.

If this is the case there is nothing in law stopping them adding another zero onto the renewal cost.

British Gas could up it's rate to whatever it wants to (as long as it is implemented in alignment with it's existing contracts). M&S could put all clothes up to £1,000 tomorrow etc.

There are no laws outlining what a shop can advertise a good or service for. It does not have to have any relation to the cost of providing that service or good.

wealdroam

I think you will find they can charge what they like.

Clearly it would be commercial suicide to charge more than the market can stand, but I am not sure there is anything to stop them.

You mention something different should apply to renewals versus new subscribers.

At renewal time, are they bound to offer renewal terms at all?
Consult your T&Cs.

Perhaps they have decided they no longer want your business, or maybe they have had 'substantial' offers for your domain names.

prowla

Can you buy those domain names elsewhere?

TomB_

That's frustrating! No it's the company that resells .tc domains. They have complete control over the costs of them. For instance ICANN handle the base .com/.net/.org pricing and nominet handle .co.uk,.org.uk etc. So you're saying if nominet started charging £3000 for a .co.uk renewal they'd be perfectly within their rights? Hmm, doesn't seem right to me!

prowla

I would move to another domain then - £3k+ for a domain is usury.

TomB_

Yes it is ridiculous. Moving domain is likely my only option but it is a bit of an upheaval, luckily it's only email I'm running on it but what if I was a business with a brand, website, search engine listings, signs, business cards and whatever else? It does seem incredibly unfair that they can just raise the price so drastically!

zenmaster

prowla wrote: »

Can you buy those domain names elsewhere?

No. adamsnames are the sole administrator for those TLDs, other providers go through them.

I have to say I'd never heard of .tc (Turks and Caicos Islands) but I Googled it.

And they have raised the price of certain domains to £3k pa (£6k in some cases :eek:).

The adamsnames website have the following "Announcement"

New registrations of .TC domains are freezed (sic) currently

However renewals are going ahead at the above price, though they have a grace period in respect of the new charges.

OP, they can charge what they like for a new contract (which this is), it's up to you whether you wish to accept it. Given their actions the price rise has come as much of a shock to them as it has to you. Hopefully, it's just a misunderstanding and will be resolved soon. Otherwise I can't see them getting much custom in future.

zenmaster

TomB_ wrote: »

Yes it is ridiculous. Moving domain is likely my only option but it is a bit of an upheaval, luckily it's only email I'm running on it but what if I was a business with a brand, website, search engine listings, signs, business cards and whatever else? It does seem incredibly unfair that they can just raise the price so drastically!

Posts overlapped here.

I don't think they have unilaterally upped the price by that amount. They would pay a sum to the provider + a cut. My guess is the supplier has either got very greedy or made a mistake. Have you spoken to them about it?

Changing your email address is quite traumatic but not the end of the world. My advice is to get a cheap generic .com or .co uk and have all emails forwarded to that address. I have several domains and all emails arrive in my virgin.net inbox.

molerat

Probably find a lot of these "offshored" web addresses are owned for either dodgy or vanity reasons so they can milk them for as much as they can stand.

paddyrg

All those tiny countries which sold their TLD's to independent NICs are starting to wise up/get greedy - or possibly that NIC has decided 5 yrs is long enough for you to not want to let it go and to bust your balls. Either way, it is untenable, and you're without options, so move. They will then doubtless put up an affiliate links page on your domain and benefit from your goodwill traffic. You're kinda hosed.

How long before your renewal comes up? Set up xxtc.com or xxtc.co.uk or whatever NOW and start drumming it into your users to use that instead??