Netregistry pulls plug on .au.com, leaving users in the cold

The Australian registrar Netregistry has been running an alternative extension .au.com since 1997 but has now pulled the plug on this. Since the official domain name extension for Australia (.com.au) has very strict local presence rules, the .au.com extension was an often used alternative for companies from outside of Australia who still wanted to focus on attracting Australian clients.Netregistry suddenly stopped accepting new registration requests and updates for .au.com without any prior notice late July. On August 8’th they eventually sent out a notice to current holders of a .au.com domain name with more information on what is going on. The e-mail informed holders of such a domain name, that their name would stop working February 1s’t 2015. Any registration period after that time already paid to Netregistry isn’t refunded, but can only be used as credit for other products of Netregistry.

Some recent .au.com registrations were even instantly de-activated because of an error with the transition. Those clients, who had just paid for their new registration, will actually not receive any refund (not even as a credit) automatically. If you are in such a situation, it is best to contact Netregistry, but as far as we can tell, they won’t refund your money, only give credits for other products.

The domain name “au.com” seems to already have been sold to a Japenese company, probably for much more than what reselling subdomains under it was generating.

Netregistry, part of Online Growth Solutions ltd, recently took over its biggest competitor: TPP Internet, forming one of the largest Austrlian internet companies. They however have recently also been receiving more and more of disgruntled comments on forums and social media about their lack of support and client friendliness.