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This
website is created and maintained by The Profit Clinic as a free public service
to
small business owners who want their domain names to remain exclusively theirs.
How
to have your listing removed
Our purpose
in creating this website is threefold:
- 1. To alert
your clients and/or prospective clients to the documented fact that you have
registered the reporting client’s domain name at their expense and have subsequently
refused, neglected or otherwise failed to transfer ownership of that domain name
to them, without adequately informing them of your intention prior to accepting payment
and/or acting upon their instructions, so that they can make more informed choices
than the reporting client could due to inadequate prior notice from you.
2. To encourage web hosts and web designers who adopt this practice to disclose it
fully BEFORE accepting registration fees and/or requests from clients or prospective
clients to register their domain names for them.
3. To demonstrate to web hosts and designers who neglect or refuse or otherwise fail
to provide adequate prior disclosure of intention to clients and prospective
clients that direct and far-reaching consequences attach to such actions.
Inclusion
of clients’ domain name registrations in terms and conditions as ‘tools of trade’,
‘by-products’ (or similar) of web hosting or website design is NOT regarded as adequate
prior disclosure of intent.
To prevent
listing or have your listing removed you need to comply with the following within
10 business days:
- 1. Disclose
your policy/practice in regard to retention of domain name ownership by you prominently
and unmistakably in your terms and conditions of service. (Copy of terms and
conditions required.)
2. Disclose to any client or prospective client who requests or expresses interest
in domain name registration the details of your policy/practice in regard to domain
name ownership before they apply for and/or pay any monies for domain name
registration by you in their behalf.
3. Resolve any outstanding disputes. Ownership should be relinquished to the client
as a gesture of good faith.
We
do not regard domain name registration as a "tool of trade" or "by-product"
of either web hosting or website design.
4. Have
the reporting client or former client consent to your removal. Their consent may
not be unreasonably witheld.
The most
obvious, sensible course of action is to abandon this damaging practice. Any temporary
commercial gain is rapidly negated by adverse publicity. This self-defeating practice
WILL cost you business. It’s a case of “Win the battle but lose the war!”
What if
we’re not satisfied that our criteria have been met?
Simple. The listing remains until they are met.
If you fail to provide clients or prospective clients with information that could
adversely effect their choices and their businesses, then we have a duty of care
to alert them to that fact. One
way or another, your clients WILL be advised.
What
can you do about it?
Not a lot, other than comply with our requirements. This site is owned by The Profit
Clinic Pty Ltd, a private company incorporated in the State of Victoria, Australia
and not subject to foreign laws. Any action initiated by you would need to be under
the laws of the Commonwealth of Australia.
Under applicable Australian laws and domain name regulations, you could not retain
ownership of your clients’ domain name ownership in this way. You would be automatically
stripped of ownership, probably be sued for damages by your clients and become liable
to prosecution under our strict trade practices laws. In other words, you would
lose. (Expensively.)
Our suggestion is to do the right thing by your clients and protect the integrity
and future viability of your own business.
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