.UK Domain Registration Requirements

The following guidelines are supplied by the domain registry Nominet and apply to all domains that are registered which end in .uk (apart from .LTD.UK , .PLC.UK , .SCH.UK , .GOV.UK and .AC.UK - please refer to notes at bottom of this page). These guidelines have been produced to assist all customers in ensuring any .uk domains that they order through ourselves are correctly registered. This will not only save time in processing a domain order but also reduce the chances of future time and expense spent by a customer on having to resolve a dispute/query over the status of a domain registration.

Registrant Name:-

A registrant is the individual, business or organisation (e.g. limited company, partnership, sole trader etc) that registers a specific domain name. The registrant holds the right to use that domain name for a specified period of time (1-10 years for a domain name ending in .uk). The registrant is the 'legal entity' bound by the terms and conditions of the domain name registration agreement with Nominet (http://www.nominet.org.uk/registrants/aboutdomainnames/legal/terms/)

Because of the legal status of the registrant as per above, it is extremely important to ensure that when registering a .uk domain name that the registrant is correctly specified when placing an order. Failure to do so could result in any number of possible future issues arising which could have an impact on related services to the domain i.e. email and website.

When registering a .uk domain, the registrant should always be the person, business or organisation who will be using that domain.

When registering a .uk domain in the name of a business or organisation then please specify the full name including Ltd if they are a Limited company or Plc if a Public Limited company etc.

Once the domain registration has been processed, retrospective Registrant name changes can be made directly with Nominet who currently charge £10 +vat per change depending on the change in question.

If you are unsure who to select as the registrant then please contact us before proceeding with the order.

Legal Type:-

The legal type confirms the registrants' legal status. A .uk domain cannot be registered until this status has been selected.
Types of status which can be selected are as follows:-

• UK LIMITED COMPANY
• UK PUBLIC LIMITED COMPANY
• UK PARTNERSHIP
• SOLE TRADER
• UK INDUSTRIAL/PROVIDENT REGISTERED COMPANY
• UK SCHOOL
• UK REGISTERED CHARITY
• UK GOVERNMENT BODY
• UK CORPORATION BY ROYAL CHARTER
• UK STATUTORY BODY
• UK ENTITY (OTHER)
• NON-UK INDIVUDUAL (REPRESENTING SELF)
• FOREIGN ORGANISATION
• OTHER FOREIGN ORGANISATIONS

Please ensure that when registering a domain, the legal type matches the registrant name inserted i.e. if the domain is to be registered to a person, their legal type will be INDIVIDUAL or if the domain is to be registered to a Limited company then the Legal type selected should be UK LIMITED COMPANY.

Registration number:-

This field should be completed when the Legal type is set to UK LIMITED COMPANY, UK PUBLIC LIMITED COMPANY, UK SCHOOL, UK REGISTERED CHARITY OR UK CORPORATION BY ROYAL CHARTER.

• For registered companies, the company ID number will be held by Companies House
  http://wck2.companieshouse.gov.uk

• For registered charities, these numbers will be held by The Charity Commision for England & Wales
  http://www.charity-commission.gov.uk/

• For registered schools, these numbers will be held by the Department for Education
  http://www.education.gov.uk/edubase - note that this number should be submitted in the format of LA CODE-ESTABLISHMENT NUMBER i.e. 845-1447

Whois opt out?:-

All domains have an associated registration record which can be searched and viewed on the internet as to whom the domain is registered to. This allows anybody to see what domains are already registered, when they were registered, when they expire and to whom they are registered.
For .uk domains, the whois will show the registrant name, legal type, company ID number (if applicable) and the registrants address. Other contact details such as telephone number and email address ARE NOT SHOWN.

The .uk registry (Nominet) have determined that ONLY domains which are registered to people with legal type set as INDIVIDUAL and where the domain is for personal use (i.e. not using a website to trade under) can opt out from having their address details published in the domains' whois output.
More details on this can be found on the Nominet site http://www.nominet.org.uk/other/whois/optout/ 

PLEASE NOTE that anyone selecting INDIVIDUAL as legal type and opting out of the whois when this selection is incorrect, will run the risk of Nominet suspending or even revoking the domain registration which would then affect any related services such as email and website. This maybe from Nominets own findings or it being reported to them by other people or organisations. To avoid the possibility of this happening, please ensure you meet the whois opt-out requirements.

.LTD.UK , .PLC.UK , .SCH.UK , .GOV.UK and .AC.UK domain registrations:-

Customers who are registering these types of domains should note that these have different registration and eligibility requirements set by their respective registries. 
These domains are manually processed by the domain registry and thus order processing will take some time which the customer will be advised of, once the order has been received and submitted to the registry.

• .LTD.UK & .PLC.UK domains
  http://www.nominet.uk/domains/our-domains/uk-domains/
• .SCH.UK domains
  http://www.nominet.uk/resources/policy/policies-rules/#schoolrules
• .GOV.UK
  https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/naming-and-registering-social-media-channels
• .AC.UK
  http://www.ja.net/services/domain-name-registration/register.ac.uk/eligibility-ac.html