I have a website and part of the contract with the web-developing company were 2 domain names for $xx per year.
are those domain names belong to me or the developer can do what ever he wants with them or take them back?!

Do a whois and see whose name they are registered to.

Do you have access to control the domain and the name servers?

Many times when you get into a deal like this you get screwed.

Thanks for your response,
I have checked it on whois and it says it belong to some domains company
my name is not there, but it says that it is registered and active website(mine).
ICAN registrar though is different from the registrant...is it possible that i'm actually paying a reseller?!

after searching the web I also noticed that this domain is being offered for sale!!
can they do that??

Originally Posted by slash74

after searching the web I also noticed that this domain is being offered for sale!!
can they do that??

The legally registered owner of a domain can sell or give it away when they want to do so.

Always buy your domains, never take a freebie from a hosting company or anyone else. Buy from an accredited registrar; never from a third level reseller.

Tough lesson to learn the hard way and I hope it works out for you.

it's not a freebie I'm paying for it about $50 a year(2 domains).
I can probably sign a contract with the owner for few years right?! would that secure my domain name?
would it matter if I will buy the same name with .net extension?

also, legal question, my domain owner is the web developing company
on the web developing contract it also mentioned that the company(web developers) will provide the domain names, isn't it make me the owner of the domain?
if in the contract the web developer refers to my company as (mydomain).com isn't it also committing them to give me first rights on the domains?

Unless YOUR name is on the registration as the "owner" you have no rights at all to the hostname.

They said they'll provide the domains but did the contract say they'll let you keep the domains? You got to be always careful about sneaky contracts.

Originally Posted by ariya

They said they'll provide the domains but did the contract say they'll let you keep the domains? You got to be always careful about sneaky contracts.

The problem is in the company which in the such way would like to stick the customer to them.
That is disappointing because once scammed the customer will never thrust any other honest company.

I am so mad at myself for not giving more attention to those things when we signed the contract but I just didn't know much about these internet stuff,
in the contract it doesn't say I will be able to keep the domain, it only says that they will be responsible to provide the domain.
anyway I got mydomain.net and mydomain.org as backup.