The Domain Registered in a Former Employee's Name

Whose name is on it

The domain is on the vans, the cards and every email address the business uses. It was registered years ago, in an evening, by whoever knew how.

Sometimes that was the office manager, sometimes the web designer, sometimes a relative who built the first site as a favour. They registered it in their own name, to their own email address, with whatever card was to hand.

The business has paid the renewals ever since, so it assumes it owns the address.

The registrar sees it differently. It deals with whoever is named on the registration, and that may be somebody who left in 2012.

How it happens

• The keen employee who set up the first site on a slow afternoon.
• The web designer who registered it in their own account to save time.
• A relative who helped with the first site and paid with their card.
• A marketing company that bundled the domain into a package.
• The owner personally, before the business was incorporated.

The second is the most common and the least suspected. It was quicker at the time, the renewal appears as a line on the designer's invoice, and nothing looks wrong until the relationship ends.

Registrant and account are different things

Two separate questions decide who controls a domain, and they often have different answers.

The registrant is the person or organisation named as the domain's holder. It is the registrant who approves a transfer, changes the details, or lets the name go.

The account is the login at the registrar where the domain is managed and renewed. Whoever holds it can change where the site and email point, or simply fail to renew.

A domain can be registered to the business inside a designer's account, or to a former employee inside the business's own account. Both answers need to be the business.

Checking what you have

A public lookup will name the registrar. For most domains it now hides the registrant, so the real check is made from inside the account.

Log in if you can, or ask whoever manages it, and read three things: the registrant's name, the email address on the registration, and whose account the domain sits in.

For a .ca address, the registration also records what kind of holder it is, such as an individual or a corporation. A .ca recorded as held by an individual belongs to that person, whichever business uses it.

Why it matters before it is urgent

Renewal reminders, transfer approvals and security notices all go to the email on the registration. If that address belongs to somebody who left, nobody at the business sees them.

When the card on file expires, the renewal simply does not happen. Most registrars allow a short grace period after expiry, then a recovery period at a higher fee, and after that the name can be released to anybody.

The same gap appears when you change email provider, move hosting, or sell the business. Each is a bad day to learn the holder is somebody you have not spoken to in years.

A worked example

A family-owned print shop with eleven staff had its domain registered in 2006 by its graphic designer, in her name, to her personal email address at an internet provider.

She left on good terms in 2013. The renewals kept going through, charged to a company card she had saved in her account.

Last autumn the bank replaced that card. The renewal failed, the reminders went to an address she no longer used, and one Monday morning the website and every company email address stopped working.

Renewing during the grace period needed her account. The shop found her through a former colleague, and she logged in from her new job that evening and paid.

That week she changed the registrant to the company and moved the domain into an account in the company's name. The shop had gone two days without email.

Asking for it back

Most people are glad to hand a domain over. Holding a business's address is a small worry for them too, and the request takes a few minutes.

Ask in writing, while you are on good terms, and say exactly what you need: the registrant changed to the business's legal name, and the domain moved into an account the business controls. Offer to cover any fee.

Doing the transfer properly

Before anything moves, write down where the domain's settings point: which host serves the website, which service receives the email. A transfer done without that list is how email goes missing.

For .com and the other generic endings, a change of registrant asks the old and new holders to confirm, and can lock the domain against moving to another registrar for sixty days.

So agree the order with whoever handles it. Changing registrant and moving registrar are separate steps, and the wrong order can leave the job half finished for two months.

For a .ca address, the business has to meet CIRA's Canadian presence requirements, which a Canadian company does. The change is made through the registrar, with the current holder's consent.

When the person cannot be found

Keep the domain renewed in the meantime. A lapsed name is far harder to recover than one registered to the wrong person.

Then ask the registrar how the business can show it is entitled to the domain. Expect paperwork, such as incorporation records and invoices showing who paid, and expect delay.

The counter-case

Not every domain held by somebody else is a problem.

A domain your web company manages in its own account, under a maintenance agreement, is a reasonable arrangement, provided the business is the registrant and the agreement says it moves on request.

A sole proprietor's own name on the registration is, in effect, the business's. A domain registered by the owner before incorporating is low risk while the owner runs things, though worth changing before any sale.

Anywhere else, put the business's own name on the registration, in an account the business controls.

This month

1. Find the registrar and log in.
2. Read the registrant name and email.
3. Note whose account holds the domain.
4. Ask the person while you are on good terms.
5. Record where the site and email point.
6. Change the registrant to the business.
7. Move it into an account the business owns.

Step four is the one with a clock on it. Numbers change, people move away and goodwill fades, so a request that takes minutes this month can take weeks in five years.

Telling a genuine renewal from an offer to move your domain is covered in the renewal notice that is not from your registrar.

Frequently asked questions

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.