Once upon a time, several years ago, Nominet used to send out physical letters to confirm your domain registrations. They’d send out a confirmation letter to the registrant address for each and every registration. With thousands of domains being registered every month their postage bills must have been quite impressive! They also used to send out physical receipts for registrant transfers.
I’m not sure when they stopped sending out the letters, though I suspect it must have been nearly 10 years ago. If anyone knows please let me know via the comments!
While tidying out some old junk I came across several of the letters I got about 10 years ago for some of my co.uk domain registrations.
These days most country code domain registries don’t send out physical mail to registrants, though there are exceptions, including the Danish ccTLD .dk.
Nominet stopped these paper certificates for all domains registered/renewed from 1 August 2003.. so 13.5 years ago..
Here is the non-announce email sent out on 12 August 2003:
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As you may be aware, paper certificates for domain name registrations or
renewals made after 1 August 2003 are being replaced by an online system
that enables registrants to confirm their details directly with Nominet UK
and download and print off a registration certificate. In providing this
system, we are not extending the range of services we offer but simply
enabling registrants to update their contact details quickly and
efficiently online at any point during their two-year registration period.
Instead of a paper certificate and reply form, the registrant will be sent
a letter that confirms their domain name and includes a unique security
code and a link to the ‘Registrants Online’ system, which they can access
to check that we hold the correct details for the registration. The
screens will initially display the information that we currently hold and
the registrant will be able to confirm whether this is correct, change any
incorrect details or add any information that is missing.
We will advise the tag holder of any changes that are made to registrant
details for domain names on their tag.
Registrants cannot use the system to change the registrant name (they will
still need to complete the transfer process), and if they request changes
to any sensitive fields (see our FAQ for a list of these) we will need to
investigate further before agreeing to the request.
When the registrant has agreed to Nominet’s terms and conditions and
submitted the information to us, they can download and print off a
registration certificate.
For more information about Registrants Online, please refer to the FAQ at
http://www.nominet.org.uk/RegistrantsOnlineFaq.html or email
nominet@nominet.org.uk with the subject line ‘Registrants Online’.
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Denesh
Yes, but this is one of the letters from 2007 – not an actual certificate. So I’m not sure when they discontinued these as well.
Thanks for the extra information anyway – it’s interesting 🙂
Michele