Chuck Gomes wrote >Don't take my comments below to mean that I don't think the idea has merit. >I am just trying to flush it out further. Approach the idea of a $1 non-refundable registration fee as a business decision. Generally, I identify three kinds of registrations: A) standard -- no follow-up necessary B) invoicing follow up necessary C) trademark challenge follow-up required A) Baseline would be what is the actual cost per registration (this includes pro-rata share of infrastructure and staff to support the activity) of a domain name registration that is paid within 30 days, is activated with legitimate information. In terms of NSI's expensies as a registrar, these registrations are the least costly to administer. B) Compare that with registrations that need billing follow up to collect the registration fee -- invoicing once or twice. Invoicing different contacts. This includes the pool of registrations that must be handled yet again to place them on hold for non-payment of renewal or to return them to the available pool. C) Registrations which are challenged by a trademark owner require that someone at NSI checks to assure that the challenge has met certain criteria; that the date of the domain name registration fits into the policy requirement; contacting the registrant with the 30-day notice; and finally, taking some action after 30 days depending up the domain registrants response. Clearly these are the most time intensive, thus the most costly (to NSI) domains. Now what portion of (C) challenges are to names held by speculators? If the most costly domain names to process (C) are the ones held by the people who pay the least (because often they don't pay anything) then those who pay at the outset and require the least processing are actually carrying the weight of the speculators and trademark challengers. This, of course, is unfair. Thus, NSI cannot justify its current glut of bogus registrations and speculators free-for-all from a practical business approach, much less a public relations one. Let us ask, what are the pitfalls to a $1 application fee? Who would squawk? How would that be implemented? If NSI can't see a way to require pre-payment, nother approach might be to ADD $1 to the cost, but those who pay at time of registration would have the applicaiton fee waived. The mere inconvenience of having to mail or otherwise issue two checks to NSI ($1 plus, later $70), might encourage more of your customers to pay at time of registration, thus saving the company internal processing costs. Those who can't find a way to pay $1 when they want to grab a name probably won't pay $70 either. Ellen Rony Co-author The Domain Name Handbook http://www.domainhandbook.com ================================ // =================================== ISBN 0879305150 *=" ____ / +1 (415) 435-5010 [EMAIL PROTECTED] \ ) Tiburon, CA // \\ "Carpe canine" __________________________________________________ To receive the digest version instead, send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To SUBSCRIBE forward this message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNSUBSCRIBE, forward this message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Problems/suggestions regarding this list? Email [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___END____________________________________________
