Domain Names & Privacy – The Purple Spade

Domain Names

This policy is presented by The Purple Spade, a USA-based web design and hosting provider.

Your registered domain name(s)

The Purple Spade will on your behalf register any domain name and its extension at your request. When a domain name is registered, we will always register the domain name showing your personal name, or business name, as the legal registrant. This page explains your rights and the procedures that we can apply if certain conditions are not met.

The domain name

The domain name will always be registered to show you as the legal registrant. This will either show your personal name or your registered business name. Your address (home or business) will also be included in the Whois Records (unless you specify otherwise).

Renewing the domain name

Once the domain name has been registered on your behalf, we will automatically offer to renew the domain name as and when the expiry date is due up. Generally, all domains are renewed every 1 year. If you would like to extend the renewal period of any domain names, please contact our Support Department. At least 28 days prior to the domain name expiry date, we will invite you to renew and make payment at the prescribed renewal rates.

Reminders are normally sent out 28 days, 14 days, and 7 days prior to the actual renewal date.

If you wish to renew the domain name

If you wish to renew the domain name, then please let us know by replying to your reminder email. The Purple Spade team will have sent you a reminder email, and all you have to do is reply, and let us know whether or not, you would like us to renew the domain name for you.

Once you have confirmed your decision to proceed with the domain name(s) renewal, our team will send out an invoice (usually 30 days prior to the renewal date) for payment. Renewal payments MUST BE MADE prior to the actual domain expiry date to ensure no disruption to your services.

If you decide not to renew a domain name

If you make the decision NOT to renew any domain name(s), and you have told us about this by a confirmation email or instructed us by telephone or letter, then The Purple Spades at their sole discretion, may decide to renew the domain name at our own expense.

If this happens, then we will consider ourselves legally entitled to offer it for sale at any price we may decide upon through one of our own websites or website parking providers.

PLEASE NOTE – If the domain renewal is NOT paid by yourself, but instead paid solely by The Purple Spade, then we will have no legal obligation whatsoever to you or your business, to reimburse you in any way whatsoever. Any monies received by us for selling a domain name that you have NOT paid us for, will not be recoverable by yourselves.

The renewal fee that you pay for the domain name registration is an annual, bi-annual or depending on how many years you may have opted to pay for in between renewals. In other words you “own” the domain name only as long as you keep paying for it. In this sense, the actual “ownership” of any domain name is not like the ownership of a physical object, for example a motor vehicle that you may buy outright, where once you have paid for it, you own it permanently. Instead, domain name renewals are more similar to a rental fee, where as long as you pay the renewal fee (or “rent”), then you can continue to decide what happens with the domain name.

If domain names are not paid for before the renewal date

If domain names are not paid for before the renewal date then The Purple Spade fully reserves the rights to either:

1. At our own discretion we may choose to automatically renew domain names and issue an invoice to you for these services. Until paid in full the domain name(s) although registered to you are still liable for payment if the domain has been renewed by us at our own expense, if we believe that we are acting in *good faith on your behalf;

1.2 “Good Faith” for the avoidance of any doubt is defined as acting in the best interest of the client. The domain name and/or services that the client has paid for in the past, or frequency of contact in emails, phone calls or letters, may indicate to us that their lack of response for a renewal request was down to circumstances beyond their control at that time. As a responsible business offering these services, we would like to think of ourselves as being caring enough to deal with each specific renewal on a case by case basis. If your domain name and/or services have been renewed automatically by The Purple Spade, then we have taken this course of action to protect YOUR INTERESTS and therefore we would deem you legally liable to reimburse the charges you have been invoiced for.

2. Allow the domain name registration to lapse, in which case any services, websites, or associated email services relating to that domain name, will cease to function;

3. Take “ownership” of the unpaid domain name by paying for it ourselves, and at our sole discretion, use the domain name as we may see fit, sell or leave it lying dormant.

Any associated websites, email accounts, or databases connected to the domain name(s) that have NOT been paid for by yourself, will cease to function on, or just after the expiry date of the domain name renewal date. We are NOT obliged to make any website backup(s) unless you may have instructed us otherwise. Please remember to remove any email accounts from your email software program to prevent error messages.

What happens when your domain expires

When a domain registration expires, your options for renewal vary based on when your domain expired. On Aug. 31, 2013, ICANN adopted the Expired Registration Recovery Policy (ERRP), which requires registrars to disclose important information to Registrants and prospective customers about expiration notices, fees, and redemption procedures. As an aid to Registrants, this article contains links to all required elements in the new policy.

Each domain name extension and its registry rules can affect the renewal process once a domain has expired. Some domains, such as ccTLDs, may have special requirements for renewals.

We’ll send multiple emails to notify you of expiration within the 30 days prior and 30 days after the expiration date of your domains.

If you would like us to try to sell the domain name on your behalf

If you have renewed and paid for the domain name renewal itself, but do not need or use a website in connection with that domain name, then you might like to consider asking us to put the domain name up for sale on your behalf. Our site Domains For Sale allows us to display and offer your domain name for sale. For more details and brokerage fees relating to selling a domain name on your behalf, please email domains@thepurplespade.com.

Whois Protect

Safeguarding your identity using whois protect

WHOIS Protect Service. The following terms and conditions will apply if you subscribe to the WHOIS Protect Service. This policy is governed by our supplier and therefore is legally binding upon us, as well as yourself.

1. Subscribers to the WHOIS Privacy Service have elected to include the following information in the publicly available WHOIS Registry:-

1.1. Whois-Protect.info shall appear as the Registrant and Contacts name(s);

1.2. Our supplier’s postal address and an assigned email address from our supplier, and telephone number shall appear on behalf of the Registrant and the Contact(s);

1.3. The primary and secondary nameservers shall be those designated by the Registrant;

1.4. The original date of registration and the expiration of each domain name;

1.5. Our supplier will/may be identified as the registrar of record.

2. You understand and agree that the Domain Contact Information that you have provided will be kept on file. You further agree and warrant that you will ensure that the Domain Contact Information is true, accurate, and up to date.

3. You will retain complete control over the domain name and its registration records and may suspend and reinstate the WHOIS Protect Service at your discretion.

4. The WHOIS Protect Service may be used with both new and existing domain names that have been registered through ourselves or our supplier. You may use the WHOIS Protect Service with respect to a domain name that has been transferred to us but it will only commence after the transfer has been completed. If you wish to transfer the domain name to a different registrar, the WHOIS Protect Service MUST be disabled in order to initiate the transfer.

5. Communications Forwarding. Communications received with respect to a particular domain name registration will be handled as follows:-

5.1. Email correspondence will be forwarded to the Domain Contact at the digression of ourselves or our supplier.

5.2. We or our supplier will forward communications where our details have appeared in the WHOIS to your Domain Contact.

5.3. Postal mail will be discarded or returned to the sender at the digression of ourselves or our supplier.

6. Right to Suspend and Disable. We, or our supplier, reserve the right, at our sole discretion and without liability to you or any of your Contacts, to suspend or cancel your domain name and to reveal our Account Holder and Domain Contact Information in certain circumstances, including but not limited to the following:-

6.1. When required by law;

6.2. In the good faith belief that disclosure is necessary to further determination of an alleged breach of a law;

6.3. To comply with a legal process served upon ourselves or our supplier;

6.4. To resolve any and all third-party claims including but not limited to ICANN’s or a Registry’s dispute resolution policy;

6.5. To avoid financial loss or legal liability;

6.6. If we believe that you or one of your Contacts is using the WHOIS Protect Service to conceal involvement with illegal, illicit, objectionable, or harmful activities;

6.7. To transmit SPAM, viruses, worms, or other harmful computer programs.

7. You understand and agree that, in the event that we or our supplier receive a formal complaint, a notice of claim, or UDRP, we or our supplier will have the right to disable the WHOIS Protect Service pending final disposition of the matter.

8. You agree that we or our supplier have the right to suspend, cancel or terminate your WHOIS Protect Service and/or terminate this Agreement at any time. In the event of this, your details will be made available in the WHOIS Database.

How do I hide my personal information in the domain name WHOIS details?

The Purple Spade customers can protect their personal information with our service called Domain Privacy.

The Domain Privacy feature protects your personal details from being publicly available in the Whois database and makes the contact information related to your domain name private.

In other words, you would be able to hide your name and organization, address, phone, email address, etc, which will be otherwise accessible through public domain Whois queries.

Note that after the European Data Protection Regulation (applicable as of May 25th, 2018) was enforced, the Domain Privacy is available free of charge for all The Purple Spade’s customers owning a .IT domain registered or transferred with/to us.

In case the domain is owned by an individual, all owner’s data will be hidden in case of withheld consent to the publication. Therefore the only information shown will be the Registrar and the registration/expiration date.

On the other hand, in case the domain is owned by a legal entity (e.g company, etc) all information, such as a physical address, e-mail address, phone number, etc., will be publicly visible.

Domain Privacy

What is Domain Privacy? Do I need it?

The Domain Privacy feature protects your personal details from being publicly available in the Whois database and hides the contact information such as your name and organization, address, phone, email address, etc. related to your domain name. It is strongly recommended to activate the service in order to avoid identity theft and spam.

Review Of This Policy

The Purple Spade reserve the right to add, delete, or modify any provision of this Term or Policy at any time without notice. Failure to receive notification of a change does not make those changes invalid.

We keep this Policy under regular review. This Policy was last updated in July 2022.

This policy represents your web design agreement with The Purple Spade, in addition to all emails exchanged between us and yourselves. Please retain your emails for future reference in the unlikely event of any dispute.

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From time to time, we may have to revise the policies on our terms and conditions. Any changes or updates to these policies are normally minor and do not affect the overall agreement between both parties. However, please always make sure you do check back on this page regularly for updates.