This Article follows on  up one of our previous articles about Domain Name Registration and why you should register your own domain name.

Sadly, again this month we have had a new client come to us, requesting we create a website for them but we have struggled to get the domain names transferred and the registrar’s tags altered so that we could use the client’s original domain name.

So if another web design company has your name and they are refusing to give it back and you need to get it back then this is article will tell you what to do.

About Nominet

Nominet is the Internet registry for .uk domain names – this covers any email or web address that ends in .uk (or .co.uk, etc).

Nominet was established in 1996 as a private, not-for-profit company, limited by guarantee. It was formed as a replacement for the original Voluntary Domain Management Group; then known as the ‘Naming Committee’.

This replacement was a necessary step as in the 1990’s the commercial selling and demand for TLD (Top Level Domains) grew and it became obvious that the small Voluntary Management group could not cope with the increase in volume.

Give me my name Back ! …..  please

Please be aware, this is for .co.uk names only and for this simple process to work you need to have originally registered and paid for the name yourself. If your web design company registered the name then it can get tricky, but the most important thing is have evidence you paid for the name to be registered.

Step 1*.  Find the original Invoice (and any renewal one) to prove that the domain is yours.
Step 2. Go to http://www.nominet.org.uk and click on the ‘login’ button in the top right corner.
Step 3. Click on the in text link ‘access your account’ in the first sentence.
Step 4. Clink on the in text link ‘re-establish your identity’
Step 5. Agree to the terms and click next
Step 6. You have a few details to fill in now, just follow the wizard.
Step 7. Make a Payment if necessary
Step 8. Nominet, now have it all in hand and they will contact you, ask for your proof (we faxed ours over) and job is done!

We also asked them to change the tags back to the original Clients account, I think they charged us £10 one off fee for this.

So £12.00 to re-establish your identity and £10 to change the tags £22.00 cost to the client and they have their name back – totally cutting out the rouge web designer.

*Of course ‘Step 1 is ask the person who has the name to return it to you. Try phoning them and emailing them first. Once this has failed and some dofus thinks they can hold your feet to the fire then follow our instructions.