Domain Name Rip Off - Don"t Get Scammed!
One thing that really ticks me off, is when a company or business preys on you because you may not have the knowledge or time to research what they are trying to sell you, or be aware of the value of the product or service they sell and to work out whether the cost they charge is reasonable, so here is a warning to all business owners not just real estate operators.
I'm going to let you in on a situation that I walked into this morning during one of my office audits, I'm going to hide the names of the real estate business for obvious reasons and I can't name the company involved, but I'm going to do my best to make sure you don't get ripped off by these sharks by writing this post.
So here's what happened, During the course of my audit, I check what domain names the agency has registered, and in the discussion today, the agent handed me correspondence from a domain name registration company in Melbourne advising him that his company name and location domain name was available for sale and that by filling in the attached credit card form he could secure that domain name from them.
Now here is the sting, the price was $295 + GST.
The domain name offered for sale is a .
com domain name, so I then checked the domain name availability on GoDaddy.
com, and found it was unregistered and still available and the price for that domain name was US$14.
Now, how can you sell something you don't own, and at $295+GST, that's not a mark up, that's a complete rip off.
My advice to the office this morning was to buy the domain name from GoDaddy at US$14 and tell the company in Melbourne to go jump, and so should you, if you get these sharks trying to rip you off.
If you do get one of these letters, first thing to do is check out the domain name availability, and you can use GoDaddy.
com if it is a .
com domain, or Crazydomains.
com.
au if it is a .
com.
au domain and check the price.
The business owner said to me this morning, that his first action was to pay the company because it looked like an invoice for payment and he had no idea what a domain should cost.
So now you have been warned, if in doubt and you want advice, then email me from this blog, I'll be more than happy to help you shaft them.
I'm going to let you in on a situation that I walked into this morning during one of my office audits, I'm going to hide the names of the real estate business for obvious reasons and I can't name the company involved, but I'm going to do my best to make sure you don't get ripped off by these sharks by writing this post.
So here's what happened, During the course of my audit, I check what domain names the agency has registered, and in the discussion today, the agent handed me correspondence from a domain name registration company in Melbourne advising him that his company name and location domain name was available for sale and that by filling in the attached credit card form he could secure that domain name from them.
Now here is the sting, the price was $295 + GST.
The domain name offered for sale is a .
com domain name, so I then checked the domain name availability on GoDaddy.
com, and found it was unregistered and still available and the price for that domain name was US$14.
Now, how can you sell something you don't own, and at $295+GST, that's not a mark up, that's a complete rip off.
My advice to the office this morning was to buy the domain name from GoDaddy at US$14 and tell the company in Melbourne to go jump, and so should you, if you get these sharks trying to rip you off.
If you do get one of these letters, first thing to do is check out the domain name availability, and you can use GoDaddy.
com if it is a .
com domain, or Crazydomains.
com.
au if it is a .
com.
au domain and check the price.
The business owner said to me this morning, that his first action was to pay the company because it looked like an invoice for payment and he had no idea what a domain should cost.
So now you have been warned, if in doubt and you want advice, then email me from this blog, I'll be more than happy to help you shaft them.
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