Record domain custody before the agency handoff

Start with the domain, not the website login

Write the exact domain the business needs to keep operating and locate the corresponding account record in files the business already holds or in an account an authorized person can open. Record the registrar or domain service named there and the date of the evidence. An agency's name on a website project document is a lead to investigate; it is not a substitute for identifying the actual domain account.

Keep domain custody separate from the WordPress administrator, hosting contact and payment account contact. Those roles may be held by the same person, but the handoff should establish that relationship for this domain instead of inferring it from a working store. Someone's ability to edit a page does not answer who can act on the registrar account.

Record custody, authority and renewal as separate roles

For this worksheet, the account custodian is the person or organization documented as managing the registrar account. The authorized merchant contact is the business representative who may coordinate the handoff. The renewal owner is the person or team that has accepted responsibility for the renewal task. Naming one role does not establish the other two.

Use existing account records, the agency agreement, renewal correspondence and written responsibility confirmations to fill those roles. Record where the supporting evidence is held internally. A past renewal receipt establishes a past event; it does not, by itself, show who agreed to handle the next one. A project contact who forwards a request is not necessarily the person with account authority.

Where records conflict, preserve the conflict. If the agreement names the merchant but the available account record names an agency contact, write both with their evidence dates. Do not resolve the discrepancy by changing the account, assigning ownership to the payer or declaring the agency's rights from this worksheet.

Confirm the handoff route before marking it complete

Ask the identified custodian to confirm the domain they manage, the authorized merchant contact they recognize and the agreed route for renewal questions after the agency relationship ends. Keep the response with the handoff record. A contact address in an old proposal establishes a listed route; an actual reply about this domain is stronger evidence that the intended person can be reached.

Classify the handoff by what you have established. If the roles are documented and the custodian has acknowledged the contact route, the custody record is usable. If the custodian is named but has not replied, reachability remains unconfirmed. If nobody can identify the actual account, the account-custody dependency remains unresolved. None of those statuses requires guessing who legally owns the domain.

Carry any real renewal date or agency departure date into the unresolved item, preserving its source. Assign a person to obtain the missing confirmation and a merchant-chosen follow-up date. That follow-up is a work assignment, not a promise about registrar processing times. This page supplies no registrar-specific transfer, recovery or access procedure.

Make the unresolved dependency part of project acceptance

Keep the domain row open in the agency handoff until the missing evidence is supplied or the merchant explicitly records how the dependency will be handled. A delivered website and a documented domain contact are different acceptance items. The practical outcome here is a named person to reach, a defined responsibility and a clear next action for anything still unknown.

Prism's preparation guidance asks merchants to distinguish available records from unanswered questions. A scoped checkout consultation can start with the public site and an explanation of how the unresolved domain dependency affects the planned work. Requested assistance, pages, responsibilities, fees and terms must be confirmed before work; the merchant chooses changes. The inquiry form is for the website, products and question, with follow-up by email. It does not book an appointment, buy a service or submit a processing application.

Domain custody handoff

Complete one record for each actual domain involved in the handoff. Enter a non-sensitive evidence reference and its date beside each role. Treat a missing custodian, unconfirmed authority or unanswered contact as an open dependency rather than evidence of legal ownership.

Worksheet entries are not submitted by Prism’s worksheet and are not saved by the site. Use record types, availability, anonymized observations, or match/mismatch results. Do not enter government identifiers, customer names or addresses, customer messages, receipt-access links, card or bank details, passwords, or keys. Send sensitive documents only through the provider’s verified secure channel.

These are temporary notes. Leaving or reloading this page may clear them. Worksheet entries are not sent automatically. If you copy notes into the consultation message and submit the form, Prism receives them as part of your request.