Today, the domain “Above.au” is dropping and, technically, it’s supposed to be available for the public and any Australian business to buy, but, it’s not.
A concerned domain investor sent me this image this morning of the one-word generic domain name “Above.au” being locked out from being purchased on the one and only drop auction platform that can catch it.
When he searched for the keyword “above” on the platform, it returned ZERO results;
We contacted another domain investor who had informed us they had bid on the domain when it was on the Drop.com.au list for a short time. We then contacted them again this morning to notify them that the domain had been removed from this list, which prompted great concern.
We can confirm the domain Above.au is still confirmed to be dropping today according to the official expired domain name name list, Backorder.com.au and DropCatcher.com.au, just NOT on the only drop auction platform that has the auDA Registrar accreditation and connection to the Registry to catch it.
As previously explained on this website, although the domain is listed on backorder.com.au and dropcatcher.com.au(,) these two websites can’t compete to catch the domain name as they are not accredited auDA Registrars with Registry connections.
The only Australian domain drop catching auction platform IN THE WORLD that publicly offers expired and deleted Australian domain name drop catching services (that is an auDA accredited Registrar with a Registry connection) is Drop.com.au, who also own around 6 other auDA accredited Registrars as well.
Effectively, by not allowing the public to bid for the generic domain “Above.au“, Drop.com.au have ensured no one else can get it, except for them. Technically, they are allowed to do this because auDA allows them to do so and has not approved a Registrar competitor since 2016.
This means, literally HUNDREDS of Australian Businesses who should have been entitled to have an option to bid to own this domain name, have no way to do so.
Just look at SOME of the Australian businesses who would have surely loved to have been able to fairly and competitively purchase this domain name (there are hundreds, this is only a small sample)…
There are around 3 hours from the time I am writing this comment, until the expired domain names, including Above.au, are released by the Registry.
Registrant: CAMTEC ELECTRONICS BALCATTA
Registrant ID: ABN 45108771697
Eligibility Type: Registered Business
This was the previous owner.
As written above, they successfully caught it, uncontested.
Trellian Pty Ltd have just won the domain Above.au
They have pointed the nameservers to “ns1.drop.com.au”
Trellian have the same owners as Above.com and Drop.com.au
Hundreds of businesses in Australia with the generic word “above” in their name had zero chance of being able to purchase this domain name. Zero.
Here is the screenshot of them advertising the above.au domain the day before it dropped. Probably their automation. They removed it from the auction after a few people bid on it. It’s now obvious they removed it so they could catch it for themselves uncontested. I can see they now own it for themselves.
AUDAs own Registrar agreement states- *The Registrar must: (a) act in good faith in its dealings with auDA, the Registry Operator, other registrars and each Registrant.* – How is this good faith?
This extremely single-sided unopposed behind closed doors operation as such would not be legally tolerated by any other organisations such as organic real estate etc. Failing complete disclosure can permit insider trading and cheats to dwell and fester. Someone is always accountable when so much failure to the public via a public service or those cheating via that public service is rife.