We have severeal domains registered at ENOM.COM.

When one of them was close to expire, we've tried to pay for it
using our card as usually and got this message from ENOM:

Credit card was declined. Authorization Refused. (Declined by Risk Management) - This may be due to a bad credit card verification number or date.

I've tried two different cards and got the same response.
All card's details were provided correctly - this was confirmed by ENOM,
and all cards are working with other online payment gateways and have
required balance. First card was virtual visa, second - real mastercard from
US bank.

Now the domain has expired and we have no way to renew it.
We also have no quality response from ENOM's support team for 3 days.
I've contacted ENOM severeal time by phone but no one would listen
to me carefully. I've also asked to provide me some other way to pay, or push
domain to another account within ENOM to process payment from
different card, but they decline.

Latest response was this:
-----------
Hello Alex,
We've found that the error is coming directly from our merchant processing account services provider. They are blocking the card for some reason outside our control. Either it's been flagged as compromised or stolen etc.
The only work-a-round is to use an alternate card for payment on the account. There is no way for us to get around the block on this card at the merchant processor level.
You will need to use a different card on this account.
-----------

If you contact them by phone, you'll be asked a lot of stupid questions like "check cvv or card number". But the real problem is in their merchant system. I've contacted my credit card service for both cards to check, why transaction failed, and they said, that ENOM even hasn't tried to process my card.

We are in situation, when our payment is not accepted by this registrar, and we have non working site for 4 days. The worst thing, is that we have no way to solve this.

I've started transfer for all of the rest domains from ENOM today. This company simply ignores non-standard questions leaving you alone with their problems.

International users - stay away from ENOM.

What country are you in? Perhaps they suspect fraud because you used a US credit card from a foreign country.

I've tried to use US card from US IP too.

I've contacted my credit card service for both cards to check, why transaction failed, and they said, that ENOM even hasn't tried to process my card.


You already know the reason why:

We've found that the error is coming directly from our merchant processing account services provider. They are blocking the card for some reason outside our control.

That also occurred a few times in my previous registrar life. I was fortunate that all the customers those times had alternative cards that worked.

Sure would be nice if they provided other payment options. But...they're not required to, especially if they deem the risks of doing so as too high to handle.

Sorry to read what happened.

We are in situation, when our payment is not accepted by this registrar, and we have non working site for 4 days. The worst thing, is that we have no way to solve this.

There are multiple ways to solve the issue, any of which could have been done without you taking so long, and therefore allowing the domain to expire.

One of the quickest would have been to ask another user of enom that you trust to renew the domain on your behalf.

Another would have been to press the issue with your bank - they *WILL* be able to see the attempts even if they fail, but most of them dont like having to dig that deep.

Another is to do a funs-transfer, or courier a check, or ....

I agree it doesnt sound like they were particularly helpful after telling you why it failed to go through, but allowing the domain to get into a non-wokring state is your own problem.

othellotech is giving you good advice. Depending on the value of your domain, you could do a wire transfer or PayPal top-up.

othellotech is giving you good advice. Depending on the value of your domain, you could do a wire transfer or PayPal top-up.

Paypal payments and wire transfers are not accepted for retail accounts. Further wire transfers for 1 domain renewal does not make any sense.

I use epassporte virtual card as well as an Etrade Visa card issued in the USA to buy/renew domains on enom and I don't live in the USA.

Most likely the domain under question was a valuable domain, so enom thought it was prudent to not allow its renewal. Now they will earn good money by auctioning the domain.

Customer support of both enom as well as bulkregister.com has gone to dogs ever since they were acquired by Demand Media. Now the only focus of these registrars is to make money by auction of expiring domains. Customers who use the services of these registrars to register domains are not worthy of any kind of customer support. :stickout:

Most likely the domain under question was a valuable domain, so enom thought it was prudent to not allow its renewal. Now they will earn good money by auctioning the domain.

Lol. Are you serious? I can't tell if you are serious or if your post was meant to be humorous.

If it was serious, do you have actual proof to substantiate your slander?

I've used eNom for many years now, and have never heard of this happening. I find it highly unlikely that eNom is now in the business of blatently ripping off their customers.

I think there is a huge potential conflict of interest between Demand Media and eNom customers. Some of eNom's actions are of dubious intent. Like not letting domains expire when they aren't renewed. Like auctioning off only the ones they don't want to keep for themselves. How far they go in this regard isn't clear. But certainly I don't trust Demand Media in not seeing eNom's customers domains as a resource.

As per the registration agreement with *any* registrar, the renewal period is a curtosy. Technically, any registrar can snap up a domain in their system that falls into expired status.

At the "end of the day", I think the lesson here is that if the domain is important then the owner should not allow it to expire.

I absolutely agree, mrzippy. It's only the owner that is a fault if they let their domains expire. Not all registrars include a clause that enables them to take a domain immediately it expires, like eNom does.

I had an unpleasant experience with eNom when they declined to top-up my account because they do not accept CC top-ups from Russia (although my card is OK and issued by a reputable European bank). I solved this by proceeding with PayPal which recently opened their services to Russian customers.

The bottom line is that if your domains are of a value you have to prepare in advance. If I didn't choose to refill my account several weeks earlier then the domain's expiry date I would have lost it.

Well, life sucks but one has to deal with it.