[selowitch]

Network Solutions wants to charge me $34.99 to renew each of my three domains I have registered with them. This seems outrageous to me. Is that rate competitive? If I do move to another registrar like Dotster or GoDaddy, do I lose any added value? It's not like NS's customer service is all that fabulous.

[peeb]

Switch. It should not cost that much. I'm with Godaddy - I've heard people bitch about them, but never had any problems - I'm happy with them.

[justin_md]

Originally Posted by selowitch 

Network Solutions wants to charge me $34.99 to renew each of my three domains I have registered with them. This seems outrageous to me. Is that rate competitive? If I do move to another registrar like Dotster or GoDaddy, do I lose any added value? It's not like NS's customer service is all that fabulous.

Hey selo, I'm an inside sales rep with MyDomain.com (we're affiliated with Dotster). I just received a Google Alert about your post. I wouldn't say you're getting fleeced necessarily, but there's no question that you could be paying less for your domain registrations.

When you transfer your domain to MyDomain, you pay $7.99 for your first year registration, and then pay our standard registration rate of $8.25/year after that. If you have 6 or more domains registered with us, you qualify for discounted registrations rates as low as $6.60/year. Feel free to shoot me an email or give us a call if you'd like to discuss your options. We have account representatives dedicated to helping customers transfer their domains away from other registrars, and we provide free domain tools with every domain name registered with us (email forwarding, URL forwarding and DNS management).

Justin | jmills *at* mydomain.com
sales: 800.399.4312

[Person Man]

Originally Posted by justin_md 

Hey selo, I'm an inside sales rep with MyDomain.com (we're affiliated with Dotster). I just received a Google Alert about your post. I wouldn't say you're getting fleeced necessarily, but there's no question that you could be paying less for your domain registrations.

NOT a good way to get customers. People registering JUST to advertise their service is viewed here as spam.

Reported as such.

[peeb]

Yeah, but the OP did ask about other hosting. It's not entirely unsolicited. Borderline, I know, but I think this is pretty ok.

[justin_md]

Certainly didn't mean to break the rules or offend. We don't spam, and actually don't even make a habit of monitoring forums. I just saw the alert and thought I'd answer selo's question.

[ghporter]

As Person Man says, we have a dim view of ANY commercial postings. Please tread lightly in this; if you are truly interested in helping our members out, pointers and tips are always welcome, but much more than that is over the edge.

[Thinine]

Yeah, $34.99 is far too much for domain registration or renewal unless there are other services involved that you didn't mention (or perhaps don't know about). $10/yr. is about as much as I'd pay for it.

[jersey]

Thats way too much. I use Omnis.com to register my 5 sites, and it runs me $40 per year for all of them, or $8 each.

I like Omnis, as they let you manipulate the dns, and allow forwarding.

[MacosNerd]

Just visit Godaddy to see if its competitive and you'll see that infact its not and you are getting fleeced by network solutions.

[selowitch]

Originally Posted by MacosNerd 

Just visit Godaddy to see if its competitive and you'll see that infact its not and you are getting fleeced by network solutions.

Gee, thanks. Don't know what I'd do without that stellar advice, and I would never have thought to do that on my own.

I spoke to Network Solutions and they offered several thoughts as to why the extra cost might be worth it, including 24/7 phone support (I got someone on the line at 11:04pm EST after about a 40-second wait. Not bad.) and the fact that they are the registrar that's been in business the longest and they aren't going anywhere. It's food for thought. Still not convinced it's worth five times the amount, though.

I called Omnis, and their customer support center is closed. Considering that I do this work for sites that are my bread-and-butter livelihood, I think I might be willing to pay a little more for some peace-of-mind. I don't like not being able to reach a live person.

Dotster also limits phone support to 14 hours during the day, altho they also offer 24-hour live chat, which I often prefer to the phone because I don't usually have to repeat myself or spell my name umpteen times.

GoDaddy does offer 24-hour support, but they are a little more expensive than Omnis. I think I may go with them.

[GeeYouEye]

Yep, you're getting fleeced. Domain names themselves have little to no upkeep once you've got them pointing at the right site. You should be getting in the range of $7-8 per domain for a .com or .net, $10-12 for a .org or .biz.

[selowitch]

Originally Posted by GeeYouEye 

Yep, you're getting fleeced. Domain names themselves have little to no upkeep once you've got them pointing at the right site. You should be getting in the range of $7-8 per domain for a .com or .net, $10-12 for a .org or .biz.

That's what I've basically concluded. I assume that since my current registrar will keep pointing to my server until the new one takes its place, there will probably be no downtime during propagation --- is that correct?

[greenG4]

Originally Posted by selowitch 

That's what I've basically concluded. I assume that since my current registrar will keep pointing to my server until the new one takes its place, there will probably be no downtime during propagation --- is that correct?

There will be about a one day period where you may be "at risk" of having some downtime, but when I switched registrars it was pretty seemsless.

[Angus_D]

Shouldn't be any downtime at all, if your nameservers aren't changing.