When your agency stops answering, who owns your website?
Your provider has gone quiet and the domain isn’t in your name. How to find out who owns your site, and what to ask for in your next contract.
November 11, 2026Last updated November 11, 2026
Relationships with an agency end like the other kind. Rarely with a fight. Usually the replies just take longer, then stop, and one Tuesday you discover your business’s domain is staying with the other party, like the dog in a divorce.
Nobody planned it. Five years ago someone registered the domain “to save you the trouble” under their own name and email, and nobody thought about the day it would matter.
The domain belongs to whoever is on the record
For a .mx domain the rule is simple. Registry .MX, which runs those domains, says so on its support page: the holder is whoever is listed as the registrant. Even if you paid every renewal.
You can check it today in two minutes. Go to whois.mx, type your domain and look for the registrant’s name. If it’s your business, breathe. If it’s your old agency, a freelancer you stopped talking to in 2021 or your ex-brother-in-law, you know what comes next.
If it isn’t in your name
The first step is the most boring one and the one that works most often: ask for it in writing, calmly, and offer to cover the paperwork. Sometimes the other person had forgotten it was in their name at all.
If that doesn’t work, the registrar that manages the domain (whois tells you which one) has a process for disputing ownership. Each one asks for its own documents, so ask them directly before you start gathering paperwork.
Meanwhile, list everything else that might be in the same situation. Hosting, the website platform account, your Google Business Profile, Google Analytics, the Facebook page. Each has its own way to recover access, and most are easier once you have the domain back.
The prenup
The best recovery is the one you never need. Before you sign with any provider, us included, ask for the agreement to say in writing:
- The domain is registered in your business’s name.
- Accounts are opened with a company email, and the provider is added as a guest.
- You own the Google Business Profile and the social accounts.
- When the work ends, the provider hands over access and backups and removes themselves from the accounts.
You’d do the same with the keys to your shop. A serious provider has no problem with any of this, and if one pushes back, that answer is useful too.
If you’re stuck on one of these steps and want to sort out what to recover first, book a free 30-minute call.
