INSIGHT / DOMAINS & EMAIL
Boss Encounters: Episode 1 — “Sir, I Want to Speak to the Boss!”
A business owner storms in: three websites down, the IT guy vanished, and no document proving he owns the domains. A short story about what ownership means.
It’s a regular Wednesday morning. The coffee’s hot. The servers are stable. Life is good.
Then the door swings open.
In walks a man — shirt untucked, eyes fierce. Let’s call him Mike. MD, business owner, and judging by the storm he brings, probably the janitor too.
He marches up to the front desk:
“I want to speak to the BOSS!”
The receptionist (an angel in human form) asks:
“Is there a matter I can help you with?”
“NO. Just the BOSS.”
They call me. I walk in. Mike sees me and suddenly, like magic — he calms down.
We step into my office.
Me: “How can I help you?”
Mike: “My websites are down. All three.”
Me: “Why are they down?”
Mike: “Paul took them down.”
Me: “Paul?”
Mike: “My IT guy. He’s… disappeared.”
Me: “Do you know why?”
Mike: “Not really. We had… a misunderstanding.” (Translation: Paul wasn’t paid.)
Me: “Can you prove you own the domains?”
Out comes a CR12, his National ID, company stamp, and a Certificate of Incorporation that looks like it saw the Mau Mau war.
Me: “Do you have any written agreement or authorization showing Paul was acting on your behalf or he was your employee, etc.?”
Mike: “No. He just used to do everything.”
At this point, I have to say the dreaded words:
“Mike, without formal documentation or control over the domain records, we’ll have to maintain the current status — the sites remain suspended.”
Mike pauses. Looks at me dead in the eye.
“I’ll sue you. You will hear from my lawyer,” then he walks away.
Your turn: how would you handle this?
- If you were in my shoes, how would you have handled Mike?
- What would you advise business owners like Mike to do differently?