A client terminated my design services 18 months ago because she was out of money. She was current with her bill. She said she would call me to work on her stuff again when she had money, which happened a fortnight ago. Sometime in the interim she apparently lost her marbles.
Me: I would love to upload the design for you, but it looks as though your domain expired 15 months ago.
Client: Why would it do that?
Me: That usually happens because you cancel renewal or don’t pay the fees to the registrar.
Client: Well, fix it.
Me: I can’t fix it. You’ll have to get in touch with your host yourself and sort it out.
Client: I can’t do that.
Me: Why not?
Client: Because I don’t like to talk to them.
Me: You want your website to function, yes?
Client: Well, duh.
Me: Well, then, you’ll need to get in touch with them. I’ve worked with [host] before they’re super nice people. You don’t necessarily have to talk to them on the phone just email support@[host] and someone will get right in touch with you and get everything sorted.
Client: NO! They stole my domain! I can’t believe they would do that.
Me: I’m sure they didn’t steal your domain. Perhaps there was a mix-up. Did you not get emails from them that the domain was about to expire?
Client: Well, yes.
Me: Then why didn’t you renew?
Client: It should just do that by itself shouldn’t it?
Me: Was it set to auto-renew? Did your credit card change or something?
Client: You didn’t update my credit card. This is your fault.
Me: What?
Client: You should have updated my credit card information when it expired.
Me: When it expired?
Client: Last year.
Me: When I wasn’t working for you?
Client: YES!
