Thank you for your question and I’m sorry to have kept you waiting for a reply due to my recent surgery.

Gene, I’ll be honest with you – this is not something I have done myself as the domain name I registered through my hosting company is not one that I am actively promoting (so it won’t be a big issue if I lose it). However, I’ve done some research on your behalf and you’re welcome to what I’ve found.

The formal process is done via your new registrar, but before you start on that I would contact your hosting company and ask what their procedures are should you wish to transfer your domain name to another registrar. Kelly, who sent in an earlier comment, has clearly come across some hosting companies who charge for a transfer. If there is to be a charge or any other complication from your web hosts, best to find out before you initiate the transfer process.

I ran the question past my own hosting company:

http://www.recommendedbydavid.com/products/webhosting.php

and they DON’T charge, and they seem to make it a straightforward process.

Having cleared the idea with your web hosts, now you can begin the formalities of the transfer.

As the whole point of this exercise is to protect your domain name, do your own due diligence on domain name registrars before you decide which new company to use.

Any company specialising in domain name registration services are likely to have a guide to transfers on their site. The principle seems to be that you apply through them and they will hold your hand through the rest of the process.

I appreciate that my last paragraph is not very “precise” about what happens. During my research for your question, one of the sites I visited was http://www.godaddy.com. They provide a very helpful PDF showing the whole transfer process – I assume that it illustrates THEIR process, but I expect it to be very similar to that of other companies. I certainly learnt from the PDF, so I hope you do too.

Anyway, here’s the link to the PDF:

https://products.secureserver.net/products/domain_transfers/transferinsider.pdf

I hope all this helps you. Do let us know how you get on. I’m sure my other readers will also be interested to read of your experiences.

David

Thanks for your visit and your comment.

The aim of my post was to simplify the process of getting both a domain name and a hosting company. That was my biggest worry when I first started and I think it will be for a lot of my readers who haven’t taken that step yet.

But you are quite right in what you say – once you are set up, you can split the domain from the hosting company if you wish.

David

I kept my own domain name and hosting seperately. No webhost can hijack my domain name.

Have a look at my posts Web Hosting (2) and (3), which give you a lot more info on this topic, including what I pay.

David

Thanks for all the info. I have someone who will build me a website and do all the hosting etc. What is the going rate for hosting per year?

Regards

Maks