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Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

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Uncle_Tupelo
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Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

Back in June 2007, Plusnet suffered a webmail security breach which resulted in a massive increase in spam. As a gesture, they offered every customer a free .uk domain and agreed to host and renew for free for as long as the customer's account remained live. I registered my domain in August 2007 and true to their word, Plus renewed the registration for free in 2009, 2011, 2013 and 2015.

 

However, I received a ticket a couple of days ago, asking for payment details for the £52 charge for renewing my domain. I challenged this, reminding Plus of the agreement, but they have responded saying they have no record of the agreement and have asked me for evidence stating they have no tickets referring to it - of course they don't as they appear to delete old tickets after a number of years. I do'nt know about anyone else, but my email records from 10 years (and probably 5 computers) ago are pretty sketchy and I cannot find anything, other than the original email from Nominet confirming that Force 9 (one of Plus's legacy brands) had registered the domain on my behalf - and I did find this archive thread discussing the offer at the time. https://community.plus.net/t5/Community-Support-Archive-Forum/Free-domain-name-because-of-Webmail-de... I did find a few emails referring to Plusnet problem tickets from that time, but as I said, Plusnet seem to have deleted old tickets from the system.

 

I'm sure I cannot be Plusnet's oldest customer (joined in 2005), so is anyone else having this issue? Does anyone have any evidence of the offer? I'm going to suggest that they look at their accounting records and explain why they have been paying the fee every 2 years up to 2015. Any other suggestions? Can anyone help? Seems a shoddy way to treat a very longstanding customer.

 

(btw, I wonder if me switching from regular broadband to fibre this year might have screwed up my account records?)

30 REPLIES 30
Oldjim
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

I have one as well and I have an email advising that it was set up dated Sept 2007

LifeonMars
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

Can not help you with the date, only that I got asked for the same thing at the beginning of this month.  I queried it through chat, who created the ticket and they got back to me saying that they would renew for another two years free of charge  I have been with plusnet since 2005.   I have also switched from ADSL to FTTP within the last year. Sorry can not help anymore.

Uncle_Tupelo
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

After searching the archive section of the forum, I found the terms and conditions of the offer. I've posted it below in case anyone needs it. I've highlighted terms 4 & 5 which seem the pertinent ones in this instance.

 

Claim your FREE .co.uk, .org.uk or .me.uk domain!

As part of the series of improvements we are making for customers which were announced on the Community Site, we'd like to offer you a free domain name. It's yours to keep and whilst you stay a broadband or subscription dial-up customer we'll automatically renew it every 2 years - for free!

We're offering this in response to customer requests and as a solution to preventing further spam coming to your usual address. If you'd like a free .co.uk, .org.uk or .me.uk domain, click the button below.


Terms for free domain name offer

1. This is an optional offer to claim a free domain. You do not have to accept this and no changes will be made to any existing PlusNet domains which you may have.

2. Only 1 free .co.uk, .org.uk or .me.uk domain name is available per PlusNet customer account.

3. The free domain is not available to PlusNet customers who have free accounts.

4. The domain will remain free of charge to you as long as you remain a PlusNet broadband or subscription dial-up customer.

5. After you have registered for a free domain we will automatically renew this for you every 2 years at no charge.

6. In order to prevent abuse of the offer, a charge of £5.99 will be applied if you wish to transfer the free domain to another supplier within 12 months of initial registration. This price represents the wholesale cost of the domain and will only apply if the domain is transferred away from PlusNet. It will not be applied if you cancel your account or the domain name at a later date.

7. Out of courtesy, please only register the free domain if you intend to use it.

Oldjim
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

well dug out

Uncle_Tupelo
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

And here's the link to the thread. The T&Cs are in message 10:

 

https://community.plus.net/t5/Community-Support-Archive-Forum/Details-of-Free-Domain/m-p/37384#M8117

MisterW
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

For info, I've just checked mine, and it was renewed in May automatically, without any request for payment.

Superusers are not staff, but they do have a direct line of communication into the business in order to raise issues, concerns and feedback from the community.

Oldjim
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

and mine renewed automatically as it is now due to expire on 2019-06-23

Uncle_Tupelo
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

Interesting. LifeonMars and I both had problems and both switched to fibre this year. I wonder if that is the issue?

 

MisterW
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

That shouldn't be related, I switched to Fibre late last year.

Superusers are not staff, but they do have a direct line of communication into the business in order to raise issues, concerns and feedback from the community.

Oldjim
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

it didn't affect me when I changed to FTTC a couple of years ago but I could see changing to FTTP causing a hiccough

bobpullen
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

Fix

@Uncle_Tupelo, not sure how this has come about because your domain is still clearly flagged as free in our CRM systems. I've escalated your support ticket to our Hostmaster and asked for the domain to be renewed at zero cost as it should be.

Bob Pullen
Plusnet Product Team
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Uncle_Tupelo
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

Thanks Bob!

Uncle_Tupelo
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

In fairness to the CS team, rereading my ticket, they were asking for details of the dates this was agreed so they could attempt to unarchive the relevant tickets, rather than for documentary evidence as I first thought. So whilst still disappointed that the issue has arisen, apologies for portraying the CS team as being less helpful than they actually are and thanks to Bob for his help and support.

Uncle_Tupelo
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Re: Help needed - anyone remember the free domain hosting offer of 2007?

All sorted as of 9.35 this morning. Domain has been renewed until Aug 2019 and I've been assured that it will be renewed again FOC for as long as I am a PN customer. Many thanks to Bob for getting this fixed (and to everyone else who contributed to the thread).