I was trying to register a new domain tonight (2005-03-15) with ev1servers.net and their domains registration service is 'down for maintenance'.

When I emailed support, the message I got back was:

"We are no longer accepting new registrations from clients that do not have
servers through us.

We appologize for any inconvenience this may cause you."

Not that their customer service has ever been that good, but this takes the cake. Not warning or notifying customers of a major policy change and then asking me to buy more from them?

Give me a break!

wow, is this true?

Perhaps the loss leader approach is not yielding the results they expected.

I imagine they are probably not losing money on the actual registrations with opensrs, but maybe on the customer service investment when managing some of the people who register the domains.

I used to work for an opensrs reseller, for three years, and I am quite familiar with the whole system. One of the strategies that certain people at opensrs encouraged was to sell domains at cost and encourage hosting.

And I understand this: godaddy.com is killing other domain resellers. And if you have lousy customer service (as per ev1servers), then it must be twice as hard.

With someone like ev1servers out of the way, godaddy.com, as far as I know, really doesn't have anymore competition.

Originally posted by fang27

With someone like ev1servers out of the way, godaddy.com, as far as I know, really doesn't have anymore competition.

doubtful, ev1 was never a large competitor to begin with from a domain perspective. Although godaddy is growing fast they still have many formidable competitors to deal with now and in the future.

Originally posted by fang27
I imagine they are probably not losing money on the actual registrations with opensrs, but maybe on the customer service investment when managing some of the people who register the domains.


exactly.

i see this coming since long time ago.

Originally posted by fang27
"We are no longer accepting new registrations from clients that do not have servers through us ... "
If that is true, then I would need to start using my own Tucows/OpenSRS reseller account, which costs me more!

how about getting one of their dirt cheap servers ;)

what about renewing existing names???

Then I guess is time to get all my eggs into eNom basket :(

Im sure they'll let you renew - dont worry :)

Bashar,

Nice idea, but I doubt that they will allow to register unlimited number of domain names if you only order one cheap server. I think they will limit it somehow.

Okay, just had an EV1 support chat with Mike C, here are the facts, which he got directly from his supervisor, full transcript available below:

1. Domain reg/transfers actually ARE down for genuine maintenance reasons.

2. The service WILL definitely be returning but no timeline on that is currently available.

3. Renewals are still working in the usual way.

4. EV1 will be issuing a formal statement later today.

5. There's no question of the service being restricted to server customers, the full service will be available to everyone.


So, let's stop all the rumours; EV1 aren't stupid, they know that an unannounced move like this would torpedo their reputation.

I'll be posting this at the EV1 forum too, feel free to copy this info to whatever hosting forums you frequent.


Here's the full transcript:

COMPANY: EV1Servers
Department: Sales
Name: Mike C
Email: sales@ev1servers.net
Day: Wed 03/16/05 06:40 am
"What\'s up with domain sales, there\'s a nasty rumour going round."
Login: Guest User** You are now speaking with Mike C, Sales. **

[06:32:32] Mike C : Hello Donnacha. Welcome to EV1 Servers. If we
get disconnected, please come to our IRC chat room at irc.ev1.net
#ev1servers. You can also reach us at sales@ev1servers.net or
customercare@ev1servers.net.
[06:32:41] Mike C : what do you mean?
[06:33:15] Donnacha : Your domain page says domains are temporarily
unavailable, maintenance but...
[06:33:42] Donnacha : some people on the forums are sayign that ev1
support have told them that domains sales are being discontinued
[06:34:23] Mike C : hold on, let me find out, i just got here
[06:35:53] Mike C : Okay my sup says that they are down for
maintance, but that you can still renew them and also that they will
be coming back
[06:36:34] Donnacha : Ok, so, can I report that on the forums: that
sales/transfers will be coming back and available to everyone?
[06:36:59] Mike C : let me get permission
[06:37:14] Donnacha : any timeline for their return?
[06:37:39] Mike C : they said that no timeline, and that the
higherups will be putting out a response
[06:37:59] Donnacha : ok, any timeline on the response... and...
[06:38:00] Mike C : they say that they don't want to cause
confusion, so they are going to issue statement later
[06:38:20] Donnacha : fair enough, I take that to mean sometime
today on the statement...
[06:38:31] Donnacha : but just want to make sure I have this
right...
[06:38:41] Mike C : yeah
[06:38:50] Donnacha : they ARE actually, really down for maintenance

[06:38:55] Mike C : Yep
[06:39:01] Donnacha : and WILL be coming bac
[06:39:09] Mike C : i guess a warning would be nicer in the future
huh
[06:39:34] Mike C : Yes it will be coming back down the road
[06:39:44] Donnacha : no warning for maintenance is fine, but
withdrawal of service whould be differnet
[06:39:50] Donnacha : thanks Mike
[06:39:51] Mike C : you WILL be able to register in the future
[06:40:06] Mike C : no prob, and again soz about all this
[06:40:06] Donnacha : that's great
[06:40:21] Donnacha : no worries, keep up the good work.

Yes, their maintenance is probably genuine. But recently, there have been more than a handful of such maintenance windows (last for hours) in the past couple of months.

My guess is that they will no longer waste time on manually serving domain registrations for e.g. people outside the U.S. who are having trouble getting through that stricter credit card billing address verification, unless you are also a server client.

Originally posted by silhouette
what about renewing existing names???
Renewals have always been okay, EVEN when they kind of take down the new registration interface. Yes, only kind of. ;)

Originally posted by nameslave
Yes, their maintenance is probably genuine.
Yeah, that was my initial guess too, it simply wouldn't make sense to go to the trouble of fading out the domain option on the main page rather than removing them entirely if it wasn't just a temporary problem. And, in any case, it just isn't the way EV1 do things; they would definitely give some sort of warning.

Originally posted by nameslave
... But recently, there have been more than a handful of such maintenance windows (last for hours) in the past couple of months.
That's doesn't really bother me, I guess it's to be expected from time to time, I have endless patience for technical problems, it's insane management/marketing decisions that drive me nuts. In this case, I've been reassured that I won't have to undergo the nightmare of having my portfolio of domains split between different registrars, that would have been truly unforgivable.


Originally posted by nameslave
My guess is that they will no longer waste time on manually serving domain registrations for e.g. people outside the U.S. who are having trouble getting through that stricter credit card billing address verification, unless you are also a server client. That's an interesting thought although I wonder how much adminstrative hassle domain registrations actually cause them? If you look at the Domains section of the EV1 forum, the vast majority of posts were created back in Aug '03 when we all piled in on the service's initial teething problems. Since then it seems to be, yes, the occasional credit card problem but I presume that mainly affects people in black-listed countries and, from an administrative point of view, they can simply say "sorry, you'll need to take this up with your card provider".

Originally posted by nameslave
My guess is that they will no longer waste time on manually serving domain registrations for e.g. people outside the U.S. who are having trouble getting through that stricter credit card billing address verification, unless you are also a server client.

That would make sense to me. They are looking to protect themselves from further losses.

Originally posted by dmaven
That would make sense to me. They are looking to protect themselves from further losses.
Important to remember, though, that such a change in how they handle troublesome manual transactions would not require them to temporarily withdraw the service as a whole. Obviously, the current maintenance issues are entirely unrelated to any such policy change.

Ok, I received a second email from their domain people this morning - when their system comes back online, unless you have a server with them, they will not allow new domain registrations.

In addition, in regards to renewals, they said that all renewals will be done by them manually, by request. A little vague, but it sounds like you would have to fax them or email support somehow to get the renewals done.

I agree with a previous post, domain registrations and renewals do not take a tremendous amount of support, but ev1 isn't particularly organized and their support in general, in my experience, has been fairly bad. When you have bad support, problems inside an organization snowball quickly.

Personally, I think this is incredibly stupid of them and poorly thought out (planned). I started a servint vps about 6 weeks ago. If I knew this was going to happen with them, I would have had to give them more serious consideration for such a thing. Now I won't; I'll just transfer my domains, a few each month, to h

Ok, I received a second email from their domain people this morning - when their system comes back online, unless you have a server with them, they will not allow new domain registrations.

In addition, in regards to renewals, they said that all renewals will be done by them manually, by request. A little vague, but it sounds like you would have to fax them or email support somehow to get the renewals done.

I agree with a previous post, domain registrations and renewals do not take a tremendous amount of support, but ev1 isn't particularly organized. Their support in general, in my experience, has been fairly bad. When you have bad support, problems inside an organization snowball quickly.

Personally, I think this is incredibly stupid of them and poorly thought out (planned). I started a servint vps about 6 weeks ago. If I knew this was going to happen with them, I would have had to give them more serious consideration for such a thing. Now I won't; I'll just transfer my domains, a few each month, to godaddy.com or some other place I find when I do the research this week.

Personally, I would consider becoming a tucows reseller; I know the system and I know the people. If I must pay a lot more for my own domains.....why not?

Well, renewals are currently working. Starting to do them by hand, apart from annoying the Hell out of their customers, would defeat the purpose of trying to reduce their support burden.

Fang, could you post those support emails here? I got my info straight from a named support, backed by his supervisor. If what you say is true, they would have been outright lying.

If anyone else wants to question them, go to http://www.ev1servers.net/english/support/index.asp and follow the "Chat" link.

It would be useful if, when you finish your conversation, you could choose the option to have the transcript emailed to you, then post your conversation here. The more people who show their concern, the better.

It's important that we clarify this situation quickly because, sometimes, companies lunge in a particular direction without really thinking about the consequences: EV1's dalliance with SCO is one really good example.

Despite the assurances I received from EV1 this morning, I have a bad feeling about this. I can only too easily imagine some PHB in EV1 deciding that, because they don't make any profit from domain sales, they're not obliged to give their customers any warning of cessation. They quite possibly don't realize the long-term and widespread animousity this will create against EV1 as a whole.

Well, here is my most recent email from them:

< Email Copy Starts>

Hello,

You can fill out the attached form to renew whatever domains you need to
renew.

Please contact us if you are in need of further assistance.

Thank You,
Michael J.
EV1Servers Domain Services

----- Original Message -----
To: "Domains" <domains@ev1servers.net>
Sent: Wednesday, March 16, 2005 9:04 AM
Subject: Re: Domain Registrations?


>
> By 'manual renewal', do you mean I would need to call, fax, or email some
> sort of request to renew with my credit card information?
>
> When will this renewal change start?
>


< Email Copy Ends >

It would be typical of their past behaviour to have more than one story coming out of support, though. I cropped a few things out, like my each emails sig file.

EV1Servers.net Community Forum (http://forums.ev1servers.net/newreply.php?s=&action=newreply&postid=338955)

Originally posted by isabel
Our domain registration system is TEMPORARILY offline for two reasons.

1. We are performing tests in preparation for our ICANN accreditation

2. We are implementing a very cool new payment verification system

We are very sorry that we are TEMPORARILY unable to accept new domain registrations and domain transfers. Our apologies to all of our customers and visitors for this inconvenience. Owners of existing domains will still be able to manage and renew registrations.

We will keep you updated on our progress. In the meantime, thanks for your patience - and your business!

Thanks Mario, that clears everything up, the fundamentals of the service are remaining the same, just a new payment system.

Can you give us some indication of when we can start registering domains again?

Thanks, Donnacha

My question is some kind out of topic, but well ............ If you consider ev1 is at lost by selling $6.49 per domain. How come netfirms can offer $5.30 per domain as reseller for Tucows/OpenSRS ?

I have tested netfirms by registering two domain names and the control panel is exactly the same with EV1.

I would say ev1 is trying to get a better deal with Tucows/OpenSRS than getting out of it.


Thanks,

Originally posted by dreamnexus
My question is some kind out of topic, but well ............ If you consider ev1 is at lost by selling $6.49 per domain. How come netfirms can offer $5.30 per domain as reseller for Tucows/OpenSRS ?

I have tested netfirms by registering two domain names and the control panel is exactly the same with EV1.

I would say ev1 is trying to get a better deal with Tucows/OpenSRS than getting out of it.


Thanks,

Right at the beginning, EV1 struck some sort of deal with OpenSRS and, as such, are probably making some sort of profit on each domain but their main motivation is the attention it draws, far more cost-effective at drawing in potential hosting customers than, say, google adwords.

Watch your arse with Netfirms. True, they use the OpenSRS interface but have crippled it to make it more difficult to move your domains elsewhere. When you email their support, you have to submit change requests for each domain individually and they take their sweet time in getting stuff done. I needed to have 300 domains downgraded to the non-hosting option, it took them three weeks.

BTW, it's essential that, if you've bought the $5 domains, you MUST ask them to downgrade all of them to the non-hosting option or, after two months, your credit card will automatically be charged $100 per domain and there is NOTHING you can do about it, it's all in the small print you signed up to.

On top of that, Netfirms renewal costs is $10. And, worst of all, you have to manage each of your $5 domains through it's own user account, no bulk management.

Netfirms, a very shoddy operation, best avoided.

I went to internic and see that "The Planet" is setup now as a registrar. I have servers at EV1 and TP, I spoke with them about five minutes ago and appears that they are just about ready to go, although they couldn't tell me the price.

Is ev1 setting themselves up as a registrar?

Yeah, I just gave them a call and the guy wasn't able to give an exact date but suggested within the next week.

I asked for prices, couldn't give them me so I asked if, roughly, they would be competitive with EV1, the guy kinda laughed knowingly and said they were going to be competitive with everyone.

Sounds good. Although SM/TP are far, far cheaper for servers, I wouldn't expect there domains to be much cheaper than EV1, there simply isn't that much more you can pare from the price but they tend to be good generally, for instance they didn't hit everyone with the Texas sales tax the way EV1 did for a while, even though they're Texas-based too. Never understood why EV1 allowed that situation to run on for so long, I guess they were getting some pretty bad legal advice - probably the same lawyer who suggested they fund SCO's campaign against Linux :)

If they come in at the same price as EV1 and if the current EV1 outage lasts more than a few days, SM/TP could be onto a winner.

I agree. I've been slowly migrating everything to TP/SM anyway. I just hope the billing is intergrated with the server billing. Nice to have everything on one statement instead of a complete new purchase everytime like EV1 currently.

Well, FWIW, I'll be very interested to see how their new system will perform considering I have 25 domains registered w/ EV1. ;)

Just my two cents.

Regards,
Kory

I don't believe "Mario" from EV1. If I was to believe what he is saying, then all five customer service and support reps I've talked to in the last 24 hours are wrong?

Then again......this is ev1.

Either way, what it ends up doing is breaking my confidence in ev1. I have 128 domains with them and don't need the lasting unreliability of their services. I am switching away - better safe than sorry.

Originally posted by fang27
I don't believe "Mario" from EV1. If I was to believe what he is saying, then all five customer service and support reps I've talked to in the last 24 hours are wrong?

Then again......this is ev1.

Either way, what it ends up doing is breaking my confidence in ev1. I have 128 domains with them and don't need the lasting unreliability of their services. I am switching away - better safe than sorry.

There may have been some confusion I am not sure what you were told, care to share? Email me.

While we truly regret you having to move 'away' if there is anything we can do to prevent that please do let us know.

The reasons provided will be very evident in the near future, what goes on behind the scenes.......well that is why they call it 'behind the scenes', if you stick around you will not regret it.

Your choice......but like I said if there is anything I or we can do let us know.

Thank you for your understanding,

I appreciate your response, BUT:

1) If you read the thread, particularly the post I started this with, you will understand.

2) Having worked in "the industry" until recently (I just design and host web sites now), I know that pretty much whatever change you are making, it can be done in a test bed somewhere and introduced smoothly. There is no need to put your customers out.

3) Like I've mentioned in the thread, I think this is just the "straw that broke the camel's back" for me with EV1.

it may be that if you need a domain regged or renewed while the regular service is offline, they will do it manually. ....just a hunch :homer:

Originally posted by CD Burnt
it may be that if you need a domain regged or renewed while the regular service is offline, they will do it manually. ....just a hunch :homer:

That is correct....but I think fang27 was trying to register a new domain.

I bet if he shoots an email to domains@ev1servers.net he will get the answer (http://forum.ev1servers.net/showthread.php?s=&threadid=54022) he needs and is looking for.

A little information.....I have been with EV1 for over 6 years.....I would not say something if I did not know what I was talking about regarding processes here.

My email address is found below if you need further assistance fang27.

look at this link

http://www.dnsstuff.com/tools/dnstime.ch?name=loser-revolution.com&type=A

thats the dnsstuff.com page on dns name timing for loser-revolution.com a domain name registered at ev1servers which means if there master name servers are down

That domain is on registrar-hold and it would not have any name records.

EV1's nameservers are just fine.

Originally posted by donnacha
it's essential that, if you've bought the $5 domains, you MUST ask them to downgrade all of them to the non-hosting option or, after two months, your credit card will automatically be charged $100 per domain and there is NOTHING you can do about it, it's all in the small print you signed up to.



?????? with who?

I just want to make it absolutely clear that EV1 had not done any deal with Tucows which allowed them to make a profit on domains at those prices.
The reason I can be so sure is that Tucows Pays VerisignGRS $6.25 for every domain and Verisign are not going to negotiate on that price. Therefore anyone who sells at under $6.50 or so is making a loss in order to run a promotion.

Originally posted by LaurenStephens.com
?????? with who?
Netfirms.

Is that not clear from my post which is all about Netfirms in response to Dreamnexus's off-topic question about Netfirms?

Again, I stress, avoid Netfirms and their $5 offer like the plague unless you have a lot of time to waste. EV1 are angels compared to cowboys like that.

Originally posted by GordonH
I just want to make it absolutely clear that EV1 had not done any deal with Tucows which allowed them to make a profit on domains at those prices.
The reason I can be so sure is that Tucows Pays VerisignGRS $6.25 for every domain and Verisign are not going to negotiate on that price. Therefore anyone who sells at under $6.50 or so is making a loss in order to run a promotion.

considering process fee and other office/data lines etc.. i think anyone selling below 7 is making loss

Originally posted by Bashar
considering process fee and other office/data lines etc.. i think anyone selling below 7 is making loss

Correct, plus you have to factor in chargeback fees and frauds.

I got a reply from EV1 about temporary service shutdown. Sadly, I need domain at the moment, and EV1 domains are offline... Still, domain renewals and other modifications of already registered domains work just the same. Interesting - EV1 will be ICANN accredited... Can't wait to see their domain control panel, if they are going to use something new far from OpenSRS... :)

many opensrs resellers went for accreditation like 000domains.com

I understand the need of independence, but I love OpenSRS domain control system... ;) Well, if EV1 will have some panel that rocks, I'll choose them for my future domains. I now have only two :)
I used to have kelmas.com with eNOM, but after successful transfer I enjoy EV1. It is much better for me :)

EV1 just closes the f**kin' doors on the domain names without warning, you call and no one knows s**t. On the EV1 forum they say it could be days! WTF!! Now they've locked the thread on the subject!

You know EV1 your not the cheapest any more and your support ain't what it use to be either! I'll be goin' elsewhere.

for $0.50 extra you can get real domain at domainsite.com or little extra for better other trusted places

Wondered why they would close it? Obviously they were not making money from it so if it is up or down they get nothing out of it I am sure.