Nominet's current Terms and Conditions were introduced in September 2001 (with some minor changes in February 2003).  Since September 2001, Nominet has made considerable changes in its operations, for example by the introduction of positive renewals, online reply forms, and withdrawing paper certificates.  Including the operational detail of these changes in the Terms and Conditions would make the standard contract much more difficult for the reader to understand.  As a result we have made a determined effort with this new draft to set out the policy issues but not include the operational detail of each process.

In addition, the text has been completely rewritten in plain English, in a further attempt to make the contract more accessible and user-friendly.

The draft terms and conditions were approved subject to changes by Nominet's Policy Advisory Board and we then sought the views of the wider stakeholder group.  The consultation period ran from 4 May to 4 August 2004 and the consultation paper is published here. 

The main areas on which we consulted were:-

a) Whether the contract between Nominet and the registrant should terminate if the registrant dies or a company is dissolved (with some exceptions)

b) Rules for the identification of registrants: it is proposed that they should give a name that properly allows them to be identified and contacted, and which is not deceptive

c) Proposals to allow Nominet to set up a system for the issuing and cancellation of passwords and other online security checks in order to ease the move away from paper processes

d) Formalising the situations in which Nominet gives registrants refunds

e) What criteria Nominet should follow when responding to requests for personal data.