EPP domain questions

[Swa]

I have a couple of questions about the new domain system. I see several registrars advertising domains for prices like R99. Domains.co.za advertises them from R62 on their reseller platform. That's almost double. Are these registrars just taking chances or am I missing something? What's the real price for a .co.za domain or is it different for each registrar?

Secondly, on the EPP system can I have all the domains expire at the same time or pay in advance? I would much rather not deal with payments on a monthly basis but still register them whenever I can instead of waiting for the same date.

Thirdly, I see some offer privacy protection on their domains. Normally they seem to register your details on a domain as this is still visible on the whois but don't if you pay them not to. If I go with domains.co.za can I control all of this myself?

Domains.co.za also lists only .co.za domains as well as the new crap .joburg etc domains. What about the new .net.za, .org.za and .web.za domains?

 

[Domains.co.za (Wayne)]

I have a couple of questions about the new domain system. I see several registrars advertising domains for prices like R99. Domains.co.za advertises them from R62 on their reseller platform. That's almost double. Are these registrars just taking chances or am I missing something? What's the real price for a .co.za domain or is it different for each registrar?

Domains.co.za was the first .co.za Registrar in South Africa, we have a white labelebed Reseller platform and the price that you quoted ifs on this platform, you are not missing anything.

Secondly, on the EPP system can I have all the domains expire at the same time or pay in advance? I would much rather not deal with payments on a monthly basis but still register them whenever I can instead of waiting for the same date.

Unfortunately the registration date of the domain will always be the anniversary date / renewal date of the domain and cannot be changed

Thirdly, I see some offer privacy protection on their domains. Normally they seem to register your details on a domain as this is still visible on the whois but don't if you pay them not to. If I go with domains.co.za can I control all of this myself?

ZACR (The .za Registry) does not allow Privacy Protection on .za domains, what you see offered is International domains like .com etc

Domains.co.za also lists only .co.za domains as well as the new crap .joburg etc domains. What about the new .net.za, .org.za and .web.za domains?

You can register all .za domains (co.za, net.za, org.za & web.za) domains on both our front-end website and our Reseller platform

Please PM me if you require further information

 

[semaphore]

Domains.co.za also lists only .co.za domains as well as the new crap .joburg etc domains. What about the new .net.za, .org.za and .web.za domains?

They're right there?:

https://www.domains.co.za/domain-registration

net.za 1 R75.00 R0.00 R75.00
web.za 1 R75.00 R0.00 R75.00

 

[qwertydudeza]

I have a couple of questions about the new domain system. I see several registrars advertising domains for prices like R99. Domains.co.za advertises them from R62 on their reseller platform. That's almost double. Are these registrars just taking chances or am I missing something? What's the real price for a .co.za domain or is it different for each registrar?

Secondly, on the EPP system can I have all the domains expire at the same time or pay in advance? I would much rather not deal with payments on a monthly basis but still register them whenever I can instead of waiting for the same date.

Thirdly, I see some offer privacy protection on their domains. Normally they seem to register your details on a domain as this is still visible on the whois but don't if you pay them not to. If I go with domains.co.za can I control all of this myself?

Domains.co.za also lists only .co.za domains as well as the new crap .joburg etc domains. What about the new .net.za, .org.za and .web.za domains?

1. EPP providers had to build a platform to interface with the ZA Registrar. That came at a cost. Bulk dealings and therefore bulk discounts apply to resellers, the idea they going to have many domains. Also easier to deal with a single reseller than 100 clients etc from a support point (Even provisioning support systems/staff). Therefore a cost saving which is passed onto the reseller. The days of making 10% profit or R10 on a domain is ridicolous. It is time we make a fair living as resellers. Ayway, not sure how you get double with a 38% discount. guess maths wasn't your strong point.
2. All providers work date of aniversary, it also helps even out cash flow. ZA don't offer privacy, only on international.
3. ZA Domains were consolidated into a single registrat. .net.za and .org.za are as old as .co.za, nothing new about them.

We use ZADomains as our domain management of choice and GoDaddy for international domains. ZADomains have also been around as long as the first guys, domains dot coza may have launched first, but they were days/weeks within them.

 

[NullHypothesis]

ZA Domains.net reseller charge is R59.00. And unlike Domains.co.za they don't use interns to reply to support queries. Why you hear more about Domains.co.za is that ZA Domains is more B2B focused so consumers get confused. They don't have the traditional registrar portal. People search for ZA Domains and they get this page and they don't know what is happening.

 

[Domains.co.za (Wayne)]

And unlike Domains.co.za they don't use interns to reply to support queries.

With regard to the “interns” part, we and other large SA hosting companies work very closely with various internet bodies in trying to make a meaningful contribution to the development of the internet in South Africa.

Domains.co.za works closely with the ZACR, CoZa Cares and the Foundation for Internet Development. These great initiatives rely on companies like ourselves and other ISP’s to assist them with in training young talent with programs like their “Intern Programs” amongst other great programs. The industry needs new people / talent in it if it is to grow or in years to come there will be a massive skills shortage.

There is a conundrum here in that the industry requires experience in order to get a job, but you need a job in order to get experience. In essence these are junior people that are being trained but on occasions they do make mistakes (we all do) and you are obviously pointing out that you had a bad experience in the past with an intern and once again my sincere apologies for this. On numerous occasions we offered you a full refund and yet you have never come back to us to take us up on the offer. You are also taking a once off incident and basing this on an entire company.

I do not want to hijack or derail this thread, but felt I should add some clarity regarding this.

 

[Swa]

Thanks Wayne, that was helpful. Only thing I'm still not clear on is how long in advance I can pay and whether or not I can renew for multiple years.

They're right there?:

https://www.domains.co.za/domain-registration

net.za 1 R75.00 R0.00 R75.00
web.za 1 R75.00 R0.00 R75.00

Yeah but that's under domain registration. I was referring to domain reseller.

1. EPP providers had to build a platform to interface with the ZA Registrar. That came at a cost. Bulk dealings and therefore bulk discounts apply to resellers, the idea they going to have many domains. Also easier to deal with a single reseller than 100 clients etc from a support point (Even provisioning support systems/staff). Therefore a cost saving which is passed onto the reseller. The days of making 10% profit or R10 on a domain is ridicolous. It is time we make a fair living as resellers. Ayway, not sure how you get double with a 38% discount. guess maths wasn't your strong point.

Yeah but even their normal registrations are R75 over some others charging R99. I understand about making a fair living but if someone can charge 25% less than you do there's some serious markup occurring. This is a cutthroat business and if your competitors are settling on a 10% profit margin, which is the norm with computer resellers, and you aren't you better get out of it. Also no reason to nitpick on my maths as it was just a rough observation of it almost being double.

2. All providers work date of aniversary, it also helps even out cash flow. ZA don't offer privacy, only on international.

Not really what I asked. Customers having their domains expire on the same date would also not have an impact on cash flow unless they only had one or two. This is a limitation of the system.

 

[Swa]

So what does zadomains offer over domains.co.za? Can I register international domains as well?

 

[NullHypothesis]

Yeah but even their normal registrations are R75 over some others charging R99. I understand about making a fair living but if someone can charge 25% less than you do there's some serious markup occurring. This is a cutthroat business and if your competitors are settling on a 10% profit margin, which is the norm with computer resellers, and you aren't you better get out of it. Also no reason to nitpick on my maths as it was just a rough observation of it almost being double.

You are overthinking things. Its just business strategy. Some want to get you onto their platform to either upsell you in future or with the thinking that you already there you will use their other services in future. So if they are paying the registry R51.30 per domain (this is the amount I heard last time - R45 ex. VAT) and they put a few rands on there to reel you in so they think you will use their hosting in future etc.

And why are you worried so much about when the expiry dates fall? They simply expire a year from registration. Simple.

So what does zadomains offer over domains.co.za? Can I register international domains as well?

They both do the same thing. Yes.

 

[Domains.co.za (Wayne)]

Thanks Wayne, that was helpful. Only thing I'm still not clear on is how long in advance I can pay and whether or not I can renew for multiple years.

ZACR only allow for 1 year registration / renewal at a time for .co.za, org.za, net.za & web.za, international / TLD's allow for multi year registration / renewal

Yeah but that's under domain registration. I was referring to domain reseller.

You can do all .za domains in the Reseller panel

Not really what I asked. Customers having their domains expire on the same date would also not have an impact on cash flow unless they only had one or two. This is a limitation of the system.

Domains renew on the registration date, they cannot be aligned to renew on 1 specific date

So what does zadomains offer over domains.co.za? Can I register international domains as well?

domains.co.za is the only operational ICANN accredited Registrar in SA (https://www.domains.co.za/accreditations/accreditation-overview)

.

 

[qwertydudeza]

Yeah but even their normal registrations are R75 over some others charging R99. I understand about making a fair living but if someone can charge 25% less than you do there's some serious markup occurring. This is a cutthroat business and if your competitors are settling on a 10% profit margin, which is the norm with computer resellers, and you aren't you better get out of it. Also no reason to nitpick on my maths as it was just a rough observation of it almost being double.

I don't want to get into a debate about markups of computer resellers. What I do know, very few last years in the business for 10% and offer great service and not minimum wage earners.

But 10% on R50 is only R5, doesn't cover the bank fees and admin.
10% on R50k server is R5k, which is another story.
So we have a sliding scale rule. the less the amount, the more the markup, the higher the amount, less the markup.
Also depends on the client and their spend.
As someone else mentioned, the idea is upselling, for the clients to take more and spend more. R10 profit on a domain and R20 on web hosting is not money, that is just effort for nothing.

 

[Swa]

You are overthinking things. Its just business strategy. Some want to get you onto their platform to either upsell you in future or with the thinking that you already there you will use their other services in future. So if they are paying the registry R51.30 per domain (this is the amount I heard last time - R45 ex. VAT) and they put a few rands on there to reel you in so they think you will use their hosting in future etc.

You miss the point. If the price per domain is R51.30 then some are adding a 93% markup. It has nothing to do with upselling. This is not like with Takealot for instance where they buy in bulk to sell it to me for less than what I can get it at the supplier. The economies of scale thing doesn't apply here, presumably. But in any case for something like 10 domains I won't go for R99 per domain when I can get them for R62.

And why are you worried so much about when the expiry dates fall? They simply expire a year from registration. Simple.

As I explained it's much easier to pay them on the same date every year than a few this month and a few that month and so forth.

ZACR only allow for 1 year registration / renewal at a time for .co.za, org.za, net.za & web.za, international / TLD's allow for multi year registration / renewal

Ok but how long before expiry? If one domain expires in March another in June and one in November can I renew them all now?

You can do all .za domains in the Reseller panel


Domains renew on the registration date, they cannot be aligned to renew on 1 specific date


domains.co.za is the only operational ICANN accredited Registrar in SA (https://www.domains.co.za/accreditations/accreditation-overview)

.

Thanks.

 

[Swa]

https://wiki.gandi.net/en/domains/faq/renew

So is it our registry that can't add individual months to a registration or our registrars?

 

[NullHypothesis]

You miss the point. If the price per domain is R51.30 then some are adding a 93% markup. It has nothing to do with upselling. This is not like with Takealot for instance where they buy in bulk to sell it to me for less than what I can get it at the supplier. The economies of scale thing doesn't apply here, presumably. But in any case for something like 10 domains I won't go for R99 per domain when I can get them for R62.

Yes, but anyone can pay a R5000 fee to be an accredited registry and purchase a WHMCS license and are now in business. People go with who they trust (even if it costs a bit more). What if (like Thor187 like to say) there are guys running a domain registrar and hosting company out of their garage in Oudtshoorn and they charge R75 per domain but reputable company charge R99 per domain. There is a reason Hetzner is still in business despite not being the cheapest. The lucky thing is the margin on domains can be small as its not labour intensive to sell, support or manage.

 

[Swa]

Yes, but anyone can pay a R5000 fee to be an accredited registry and purchase a WHMCS license and are now in business. People go with who they trust (even if it costs a bit more). What if (like Thor187 like to say) there are guys running a domain registrar and hosting company out of their garage in Oudtshoorn and they charge R75 per domain but reputable company charge R99 per domain. There is a reason Hetzner is still in business despite not being the cheapest. The lucky thing is the margin on domains can be small as its not labour intensive to sell, support or manage.

You're still not really getting the point. For a 93% markup your support should then be excellent and immediate with no flaws at all. I don't know of any other examples where you pay that much more for better support.

 

[NullHypothesis]

As I explained it's much easier to pay them on the same date every year than a few this month and a few that month and so forth.

OK, seeing that you are so in love with this idea do this: During 2016 register your domains. Lets say you registered a total of 10 domains during the year and domains cost R75 each. 1st Jan 2017 load R750 into your registrar account while setting all your domains to auto-renew. You can now sit around with your dick hanging out and all your domains will be automatically renewed. While only one charge of R750 came off your bank account. Just make sure there will be no price increases during the year. Same thing for 2018, tally domains, tally renewal fee. And remove auto-renew from domains you don't want to be renewed and just load credit if you registered new domains.

 

[NullHypothesis]

You're still not really getting the point. For a 93% markup your support should then be excellent and immediate with no flaws at all. I don't know of any other examples where you pay that much more for better support.

We are talking a markup of double-digit rands here not thousands. You know these companies employ people who have families to feed and office space to pay and electricity etc. etc.

 

[Swa]

We are talking a markup of double-digit rands here not thousands. You know these companies employ people who have families to feed and office space to pay and electricity etc. etc.

So do the person at the corner pc shop. He can't afford to add a 93% markup when he already pays 50% more than Matrix does. I presumed this doesn't apply to registrars and they all pay R51.30 per domain apparently. So there's no real technical reason for them to be 32% more expensive on normal pricing. I don't want a debate as to whether they are worth it as there are plenty of places selling stuff cheaply with good support and service.

 

[Thor]

You miss the point. If the price per domain is R51.30 then some are adding a 93% markup. It has nothing to do with upselling. This is not like with Takealot for instance where they buy in bulk to sell it to me for less than what I can get it at the supplier. The economies of scale thing doesn't apply here, presumably. But in any case for something like 10 domains I won't go for R99 per domain when I can get them for R62.


As I explained it's much easier to pay them on the same date every year than a few this month and a few that month and so forth.


Ok but how long before expiry? If one domain expires in March another in June and one in November can I renew them all now?


Thanks.

Takealot doesn't buy anything.

Anyone can sell on takealot they take 10% per successful sale and some monthly fee for storage etc.

 

[qwertydudeza]

You're still not really getting the point. For a 93% markup your support should then be excellent and immediate with no flaws at all. I don't know of any other examples where you pay that much more for better support.

The registrar is just that, most providers offer added services like DNS. 93% on R50 is still nothing for the admin and the costs needed to run it.

Once had a client who went with a cheapie to realise the guy was running it off a desktop (which fell over often) from this room at varsity running off the universatiy network. Problem was when he went on holiday for school break and server fell over. Client had no email or web site for nearly 3 weeks. needless to say, they learnt there lesson.