Transferring Domain to WP
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Hi, I am updating (or preferably completely designing a new site) for a friend as theirs hasn’t been updated for some time. They want to keep their existing setup as much as possible such as keeping their website name and keeping all the payment direct debits the same where possible. One problem is they have no way of contacting the people that set up the site originally and no usernames or passwords. If we use the WP transfer a domain option and make a new website on WP will the billing remain the same or will you take the domain name and we set up a payment through WP? Thanks in advance.
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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Hi there,
What is the URL of the existing site?
Transferring a domain to us will transfer ONLY the domain. Not the site or any of the content on it. You would need access to the account at the registrar where the domain is currently registered to initiate a domain transfer.
If you don’t have admin access to the site, I’m not sure how you would be able to transfer any existing content or functionality from that site to us – admin access is required to export content from a site.
Current payments for the site would also be going to whatever hosting provider the site is with. If you moved the site to us, you would need to buy a paid plan from us depending on what features you need, and if you transferred the domain to us, future renewals of the domain will also have to be made with us, not to the current provider.
Cancelling current payment would require access to the hosting account at the site’s current hosting provider as well, so as a first step I recommend you contact them. Once you have access to the hosting account, you should also be able to gain access to the admin accounts on the site itself.
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Hi, it’s only the domain we want to continue to use. We want to keep the website name but make a completely new site using wordpress. Hope this makes more sense thanks.
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Okay, in that case you’ll have to upgrade the WordPress.com site to a paid plan, and then you can follow these steps to transfer the domain to us:
http://en.support.wordpress.com/move-domain/incoming-domain-transfer/
If you’re using any plugins on the existing site, you’ll need to upgrade to our Business Plan to continue using those:
http://en.support.wordpress.com/business-plan/
Let me know if you have any other questions.
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It will be a completely new site so I will start from new so I will add the plugins as I go. The old website can be deleted. With regards to payment will my friend have to continue to pay for their existing domain provider and existing server costs as well as paying for a premium WP service account? If this is the case would it be cheaper for them to just start a new website with a new domain registered at WP. Thanks for your responses.
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If you transfer the domain to us, going forward the domain renewal fee will be payable to us.
And if you’re not continuing with the old site, you can cancel your hosting account at the current provider, so you will not have to continue paying that hosting provider. Just make sure you download a full backup of the existing site before you do that, as once you cancel the hosting account the current site will go offline and the hosting provider will delete it from their servers, so a full site backup would be the only way to recover any content from the old site later.
In general I’d recommend at least keeping the old site online until the new one is finished.
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One last question (hopefully), when I click to transfer the domain will the old website be killed immediately or are we able to keep that one running while we build the new one? Sorry for all the questions. Thanks very much.
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When you transfer a domain to us, we still maintain the domain’s current DNS, so it will continue showing the existing site.
The existing site will only go offline once you either switch the domain’s DNS to point to us, or if you cancel the other site’s hosting account, or otherwise disconnect the domain on that end.
You can also hold off completely on transferring the domain.
All sites on WordPress.com get a free WordPress.com or .blog subdomain when the site is created, that functions just like any regular subdomain, and your site is fully online and accessible at that subdomain (provided you set it to public).
So you can experiment and build your site at that free address, even upgrade the site while still using the free address, and only transfer the domain to us once you’re ready.
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