> How can you be sure they are lying? Isn't it possible that for whatever > reason, they may have not received their notices?
It does not really matter if they received them or not. The responsibility is that of the domain name owner to keep his domain records up to date. No one wants to lose a renewal fee by a client failing to renew the domain, but it is the client responsibility to renew on time. Since snail mail was also used and not returned, the client is probably lying, at least about the snail mail notice. We see this 2-3 times a month, when we receive email or telephone calls from clients who claim they did not receive notification of domain expiration and threaten to sue if their domain name is not returned. We use OpenSRS notification plus we sent out a 14 day notice and a notice on day of deactivation ourselves. We do not use snail mail nor do we telephone them to ask them to renew. We make it clear on our web site that renewals and all correspondence concerning domain names are handled by email and request they keep their records up to date. When we receive these complaints we explain the number of emails sent to notify them of the renewal, their responsibilities to keep their email address current and refer them to the registration agreement and dispute policy notice on our site. We point out to them that the registration agreement clearly states it is their responsibility and they are in violation of the agreement if they provide false email address or do not keep their records up to date. If they continue to threaten we tell them to have their attorney contact our attorney. Haven't been sued yet. As I stated, no one wants to lose a renewal fee but there are limits to how much you can do at these price levels.
