Like many people, I "own" a few personal domains for my blogs and a few old business ideas that never got off the ground. And, like many people, they have been parked at Yahoo Small Business, partially because I already had a Yahoo account when I registered them a few years ago, and partially because I was lured by the $1.99/year offers for new domains that they had running at the time. The rate increased to $9.95 after the first year, but I was OK with that. I was able to reserve the domains and set up redirects to my blogs, and have the option of building real sites if I ever get too frustrated with Google's Blogger service.
Now I find out in an email from Yahoo that the annual domain "renewal price" has increased by 30%, to $12.95 year.
Mind you, this isn't for new domains. It's only for existing ones, owned by loyal customers like me. If you look on the Yahoo Small Business site, there isn't any mention of the price being jacked up by 30%, and why should this be listed? That would only scare people away!
There was no explanation for the increase in the email I received or on the company website, so let's examine some possible reasons.
It's certainly not because it takes more work to renew the domains or send out the email notifications. Like eBay and other large Internet companies, Yahoo automates many of its services, and keeps customer service staff to a bare minimum
What are some other potential reasons? Consider the effective date of the price increase: March 11, 2008. As you may recall, this was when the company was in a tight spot. It was just one month after Yahoo announced a "lavish" employee retention and severance program in the wake of Microsoft's bid for the company, and about six weeks before it attempted to justify various salary increases and bonuses for senior executives, including President Sue Decker's $1.1 million bonus for 2007.
But I don't think these added costs are the direct reasons for the domain price increase. A primary source of Yahoo's profit is advertising, and while revenue increased in the first quarter, the company said it experienced weakness in sectors such as finance, travel and retail. If this weakness persists throughout the year -- a possible scenario, considering all of the negative economic news we've been hearing, and the rapid increase in online advertising inventory from social networks and other sites -- Yahoo will have to depend more on non-advertising income. I don't know if the new pricing scheme will really boost Yahoo's bottom line, but pissing off its domain customers is a small price to pay to help offset any dip in advertising.
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Comments
Oh, this is nothing just wait. I received an e-mail from Yahoo last night before leaving the office which informed me that the new renewal prices for 2008 will be $34.95 per year. I called to discuss this as this is the second price increase this year. I was told by a very friendly support staff (Brain) that an e-mail had just been sent to the floor notifying the staff of the price increase. It's nice that Yahoo has allowed "just" enough time for us to transfer our domains out before the new renewal pricing is billed.
Is this Yahoo's way of getting into the domain industry? By pushing around the smaller people and buying property at that time.
Any suggestions out there?
Sincerely,
Will
I'm just totally perplexed by it, and fail to understand how any sane company can justify increasing its prices from 12.95 to 34.95 -- Thats a 200% increase!!!
stupid, idiotic, short sighted, greedy, and (given many people are on auto renew and will not notice) just plain immoral is what it is.
I wrote to complain but the response I got from Billing shows they seem to have little idea of whats going on
I guess the only answer is to pull out. Transfers here I come
G.
I also just received notification that the increase will go up to $34.95, per year. I had a gazillion domains that was just sitting there. When the increase went to $12.95, I got rid of a lot of them. Now, that it has gone to $34.95/yr, I will get rid of the ones I really don't need, keep the ones that are up and running as websites (3) and transfer the rest. They have totally lost my business. I was a good customer. What I can't understand is, they are doing this to their existing customers, who they know are someone stuck, in that they already have websites that utilize these domains. I think they are counting on people just biting the bullet and paying the fees. I think it is such a low blow. I hope they DO go down the tubes.
I received the notice also. I'm moving all my 30+ domains from Yahoo as of this coming Monday. There is no way I'm paying $34.95 a year for my Yahoo domains. This is pure greed and bad business. Yahoo was really stupid to do this at this time in our economy. Everyone is taking advantage of the fact that people can't do anything about gas prices or anything else. So in other words, why not milk the cow some more. Transfer your domains to a cheaper register, there are several out there. Do your research and get away from Yahoo, fast!
Michael
Corporate Exec.
Its just gone from $12 to $34 - See Here
I'm really astounded by this, and I'm looking at starting a class action, but I really can't even begin to find the issues, as the pricing and terms are so intentionally confusing. It looks like they lull you in with very low prices (a couple of dollars), renew at $9.95, then $12.95 and then just hoist it up to $34.95. The problem is, you can't even turn off the autorenew without losing the domain from what I can see. Is this right?
Glyn
Yahoo! go to hell!
MOVE ON FROM YOHOO. Hi im CULERO (if you know what this mean). Yes i noted there was something wrong with yahoo when my domain was about to expire last May 1 Amount $12.95. I knew it something wrong was going on. I started paying $2.95 and my next payment must be as advertised $9.95. I was unable to TRANSFER my domain because my credit card expired also my renew date in yahoo domains expired so when i solved my cc problems i had to paid late $12.95 problem solved in May 15. Now after reading this I know there is SCAM GOING ON IN YAHOO now it says $34.95 next payment renew. My idea was comeback 1 or 2 months before expire next May 1, 2009 but after reading this i think it must be ASAP . No way i am gonna pay once more $12.95 less will do $34.95 so what i think today there is someone an administrator, websmaster, etc on the site making the scam before they must quit when MICROSOFT purchase YAHOO INC. I think someone wants to go out retired young with a little (or do i need to say thounsands) extra bucks from the company… LOL LOL LOL. This is yahoo customer response when i confronted by email:
Hello,
Thank you for writing to Yahoo! Domains.
I understand you are concerned regarding amount charged as a renewal of
domain name “culeros.com”.
I would request you to contact our billing department as it is a billing
related concern.
To better serve you, we now provide care for billing-related concerns
exclusively over the phone.
Please call us at 800-318-0870, Monday through Friday from 6 a.m. to 6
p.m. PST, and a Yahoo! Customer Care representative will be happy to
assist you.
Please do not hesitate to reply if you need further assistance.
Have a nice day!
Regards,
Gerry
Yahoo! Customer Care
For assistance with all Yahoo! services please visit:
http://help.yahoo.com/
Original Message Follows:
————————-
I registered a domain name referred by melbourneit.com.au on yahoo
domains i was wondering why
i paid this year so much for renewing my domain CULEROS.COM (not my real domain name of course)
$12.95 USD yahoo is supposed to charge every year $9.95 USD only.
This is because i was referred by your company Melbourne IT or its Yahoo
Inc???
check this out, I received the email on July 24 about the July 1 new policy change. But the worst part is the renewal date was July 23.
I'm doing a charge back if the have the audacy of charging my credit card.
Enough for me with yahoo.
Hi.
I thought I was clever to do a transfer quickly. But I missed the confirmation email as it landed in the Spam folder. My credit card was charged the full $34.95. The expiry date is 4 days ago. Can someone advise whether I could still do a transfer to another registrar now and get the credit co. to stop payment? Thank you.
Totally disgusted and frustrated.
Alice Phua
Apologies for not revealing my identity. But I think your readers should hear my story.
Not the bait & swith tactic but they also use very very dirty tactics to gouge you. It seems their corporate mission is to make clients hate them. like Lamont, I didn't mind the 9.95 when I created 2 domains at the 1.99 offer. But 34.95 is insane.
I was a bit slow transferring my domain out but I initiated the process before their autobilling date ie about 2 weeks before expiry. Having paid the new registrar, I went over to Yahoo Small Business (YSB) to say that they were history.
First I tried cancelling the plan, and this was before the autobilling date, to try to stop the autobilling. Here's the first shocker, you go thru a few screens and finally it flashes a warning to not cancel the plan until the transfer is completed because you'll lose all access to your control panel. I read it as a threat ... they might not co-operate in processing your transfer once you cancel. And this is with some two weeks before the expiry of what you paid for the current year!
I didn't cancel thru their systems fearing my transfer will be jeopardised. So I look for a way to write to them. I look thru yahoo.com and find a "contact us" page . And damn, it's an unending loop thru this and that help page with no contactable email address.
Desperate, I manage to find a contact us form where I could type in a message and I think that went to some technical dept. In all honesty, these freaks are not interested in dealing with you as a human being!
A few days later, someone writes to me asking me for info to verify my identity. And that was sent to an email address they found on my account! For god's sake, I'm in a different country and I've always communicated with them thru email. WTF do they need to ask me verification questions? All delaying tactics - shows their true colors!
I reply and tell them I am moving out because 34.95 does not make any freaking sense. Ciao! I tell them not to auto-bill me. I also tell them I want to cancel but fear that's going to jeopardise my transfer - what should I do??
Instead of telling me how to go about the cancellation, they ignore me and do not reply till after the autobilling!
Oh, did I say that I tried to remove my credit card details from their system? Well, I found out there is no way you can do that! I asked them how and they simply ignored the question. Seriously, do they have any right to hang on to your credit card details indefinitely?
I hope the whole world will know the truth about these frankensteins!
Rip off!
ps: I found out that ICANN allows you 5 days' grace period to renew your domain. And Yahoo says that their T&C gives them the right to renew it on your behalf up to 30 days before expiry. Ok, granted that's precautionary. But if someone like me and I'm sure a whole load of others who feel repulsed by the 34.95 and wants out, be nice. The way Yahoo Small Business and its agents are going about it simply re-affirms my guess about their corporate mission - they want you to hate them!
Beware! Yahoo charges $34.95 for your domains EVEN AFTER you transfer your domains away from YAHOO! It is their standard policy to continue charging unless AFTER you transfer your domains to a new registrar you also know to log into your Yahoo account and CANCEL YOUR SERVICE, yes, it’s there hidden in the fine print. Otherwise, they charge your card $34.95 on the domain expiration date even though they are no longer the registrar! They charged my Visa $34.95 5 times for 5 domains I had previously moved to GoDaddy.com. I am filing a complaint on this practice with the FTC Federal Trade Commission, since Yahoo is essentiallycharging you for providing no service whatsoever. I tried to complain, but it is stated in their fine print that they will continue charging for service unless you cancel the account, which by the way, you cannot do at the same time you are transferring the domains. You must wait until after they transfer, then remember to back and cancel the account. Unbelievable, but very true. I am canceling every service for all my clients with Yahoo now as a result and moving them to GoDaddy.com, I am a web designer (http://www.AtlantaWebDesignGA.com) but I insist my clients not do business with Yahoo anymore due to their sneaky business tactics.
If anyone who was charged $34.95 is interested in filing suit, please shoot me a email... This is a complete scam that must be stopped...
Thanks
Patrick AT pfbull.com
I just got the $34.95 charge on my credit card bill- and that's quite a shocker. I just cancelled my account with Yahoo. They'll never see another dime from me, that's for sure.
This SAME scenario happened to me down to the "threatening" cancel page.
My domain was to expire on November 8, 2009 but yet they wanted to bill me on October 24, 2009, and they sent me a notice of this on October 21, 2009. I thought I would have until November 8, 2009 to take care of my transfer, but that wasn't so. I initiated the transfer to GoDaddy about an hour or so after receiving the notice from Yahoo (on October 21st). I jumped through every hoop and finally the transfer authorization rested with Yahoo! (on October 21st). GoDaddy was waiting on Final Authorization from Yahoo.
Well, Yahoo didn't approve the transfer until today (after calling them) October 26, 2009 and of course they billed me on October 25th 4 DAYS AFTER I STARTED THE TRANSFER PROCESS TO GODADDY!
I got a call from someone in the billing department from Yahoo who told me that she "didn't have a supervisor" and that if I wanted to dispute the charges I would have call my credit card company. I don't know what they are pulling but it is wrong and I fully intend to dispute the charges through my credit card company.
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