At 14:08 2/10/00 +1000, you wrote:
>Justin is saying that where a terminate and re-apply IS performed there's a
>risk during the short time between the terminate and the re-apply.  This can
>be avoided if the old owner "Fred Smith" transfers the business name to the
>new company  "Fred Smith Antiques Pty Ltd" in the way I've described above.
>
>The problem with that is that the new company has to keep the business name
>for ever paying a renewal fee every three years.  Just to safeguard its
>domain name.

Yes, that's the theory, and what we usually advise people to do at this 
stage, if they ask.

However, part of the reason for raising the original question is that we 
did have a client recently whose accountant had already scrapped the 
business name that "owned" (in INA's opinion) the domain name. When they 
went to re-apply for the business name they were told they would end up 
with a different business registration number, which presumably is part of 
what INA uses to determine if it is the same business and so would not have 
been much help.

The next best option is perhaps to "do nothing" and just leave things as 
they are. But since the business name (license holder) no longer exists I 
don't think is an ideal situation to be in. But the client suggested (and 
I'm inclined to agree) that this may be better than signing something that 
says you wish to cancel the domain name and there's no guarantee you'll 
keep it -- particularly as in a case like this were the domain name in 
question is really quite a good one and may well be snapped up if someone 
happened to notice or just get the timing right by chance.

I assume the manual "terminate and re-apply" process does work in practice, 
but I've yet to find many takers once they read the "no promises" disclaimer.

JS