Web Designers taking over Domain

[allstarit]

Does anyone else experience this:

Customer rings up and says having issues receiving emails. You do some investigating and discover their DNS names have suddenly changed and now have a mail.<domainname>.com instead of what ever MX records they had like Office 365.

I have had 2 new clients this week report this issue. One Web Guy was the clients friends son in high school and the other im not sure. Surely if your job is in web design you understand DNS records. Too many times i see these issues occuring.

Some web guys are great they ask you to make the DNS changes or whatever neeeded but these cowboy designers need to get a drivers license in DNS Management and stop touching stuff they dont know about

 

[LordIntruder]

Webdesign has absolutely _nothing_ to do with DNS. Fullstop.

 

[allstarit]

i wouldn't say webdesign has absolutely nothing to do with DNS- A website doesn't exist without DNS records, Websites require A records or CNAME records ect - Its not uncommon for web hosts/designers to managed DNS and Domain renewals ect but point of this post is there is alot of website designers to instantly decided to just delegate the name servers to their host and dont care what previous records were there- So the clients then experience downtime with their emails and causes issues with their business.

 

[LordIntruder]

DNS is the job of the guy named in zone-c. The webdesigner is the guy who breathes live into the place, where a setted domain name targets. There are for sure a lot of people out there trying to do a full service. And the serious ones know that "webdesign" is their second job, not their first one. For that, my first statement is true.

 

[ComputerRepairTech]

A web designer should never gain access to domain management thats just a liability they really shouldn't want. A web designer may change DNS settings via cpanel at the host level though i've seen web designers do that before.

Edit: I know it does happen often but I think its silly for a web designer to want the liability of having that login for domain management.

 

[allstarit]

dont know about in other countries but in Australia i find most Web Designers do a package deal and purchase domain name/handle renewals, design website and host website. Then do SEO/Digital Marketing.

But with my clients i always try to advise them to not put all their eggs in one basket because if that company closes for what ever reason everything goes down.
Where possible i like to have the Domain renewal and registrant details in their name so they are in control of it. I host their emails and DNS and then the web designer can host website. I occasionally will do all but only with new startups. But when i do it ill check what records they have first and document everything and provide client with a handover of everything they need.
ill never just login to domain registar and simply change the nameservers and lets see what stuff breaks- its just a horrible way to manage a client.

 

[TAPtech]

Yep, run into this all the time. My way of dealing with it is to charge by the hour for DNS changes, and that includes all of the head scratching while you try to figure out exactly what happened- as usually there is no indication from the web designer. After that I pitch hosting the website and managing DNS for them. I have a small VPS where I put my clients sites onto and manage their DNS. Makes a small amount of money and makes management a ton easier.

 

[allstarit]

Yep, run into this all the time. My way of dealing with it is to charge by the hour for DNS changes, and that includes all of the head scratching while you try to figure out exactly what happened- as usually there is no indication from the web designer. After that I pitch hosting the website and managing DNS for them. I have a small VPS where I put my clients sites onto and manage their DNS. Makes a small amount of money and makes management a ton easier.

Basically what i do too. I add this as one of my add-ons for my Managed Service Plans so the clients gets the Complete Package or one point of call for any IT issues.

 

[TAPtech]

Yup, same here. I find the web designers actually like this. I think most of them have had a few disasters dealing with DNS and it really isn't in their skill set.

 

[LordIntruder]

At this point anyone should differ between web _designer_ and web _hoster_. For me a webdesigner is the person (or business) creating my website in its look and feel and - maybe - fill it with content. The designer is not the person (or business) that is hosting my webspace/vps/drs/whatever and is really not the person (or business) managing all around DNS. Sure, you can get an all in one solution if there is a company having specialists for every part of this aio-solution. But no "normal" webdesigner is able to have a real deep and good knowledge for all the things around dns, hosting, designing, content management. Especially DNS managing is not a job someone can do along the way.

 

[allstarit]

Yes they are completely different jobs but if you ring any web designer in your area they aren't going to tell you to go find a web hosts as im only a web designer or go find someone else to manage your DNS.
Although they are very clearly different fields they are all related and most web designers will have their own web server - whether it be their own in-house server or a re-seller account with a web host. They arent the web hoster but would resell packages as their own services.
Generally they are CPANEL or Plesk and you would install the website on the server and manage the site themselves. Within CPANEL is DNS records which they would also manage.

For me as a Managed Service Provider- I want my clients to have 1 point of call for their IT Services - Server issues, workstation issues, internet issues, printer issues, Software/Vendor issues, web hosting, domain renewals, Antivirus, web design, digital marketing, voip, backups, emails, virtual servers - the list goes on.
The whole point of being a managed service provider is to manage all the clients services for them - My clients have one person to call for all IT issues and dont have to lookup what phone number is for which supplier or who looks after my DNS ect
However just because i manage all the services doesnt mean im in control of all the services. So if the client for what ever reason changes IT provider all of these services i look after are in their names with the suppliers/vendors because putting all your eggs in one basket is never a good idea.

 

[trevm999]

In my experience, most businesses get web design + hosting from one company, and that company also wants the DNS records on their nameservers, but I've only dealt with one company that knew what they were doing when I asked for records changed/added.

 

[LordIntruder]

but I've only dealt with one company that knew what they were doing when I asked for records changed/added.

Signed. That's the fact. The customer's liability is to give every work to the right hands. If the customer let a butcher paint his house he shouldn't moan if the house's colour is pulled pork alike after that action.