Welcome to the LCNews

Dear %%FNAME%%.

Welcome to June. For all you sports love's out there which ball will you be keeping your eye on? The football or the tennis ball? Will you be causing employers grief by becoming MISSING IN ACTION? Don’t get spotted on the terraces on TV. It you’re an employer don’t miss the game by spending all your time scanning the audience for missing employees - read our tips for ways to avoid staff skipping work. We would like to issue a warning to all customers regarding fake renewal notices that are being issued. To find out how to tell whether a notice is fake or not read the EU REGISTRY SCAM article. Are you missing out not being online? Computing firms are leading the way in the e-race while more traditional trading companies including transport firms and textile businesses are letting their competitors get the edge on them. A stitch online could save time!! Finally we have added a new function to our Admin section on the LCN website. You can now change your password. To find out what you can do via the admin section read PUTTING YOU IN CONTROL section of the website.

I hope you enjoy reading the newsletter and if you have any comments or suggestions please email feedback@lcn.com.

Many thanks

LCN's Editor

IN THIS ISSUE...

EU registry scam

We would like to warn all customers of domain name renewal notice fraud in operation.

Letters are currently being distributed making false claims to encourage uses to reply submitting payment details for bogus renewals. The letters are being distributed by The Domain Registry of America, Domain Registry of Europe and EU Registry Services The letters are headed "DOMAIN EXPIRATION NOTICE" claiming that your domain name/s are at risk if they are not renewed immediately.

These letters are actually offers to transfer your domain name to another registrar. If you take up the offer you will be changing your contract, may lose any free services currently provided and may face higher renewal fees.

If you receive one of these letters or have any questions regarding your renewal dates please investigate before making any payment.

To investigate the renewal date/s of your domain name simply visit http://www.lcn.com and type the domain name into the search area. You will then be able to see the name is taken and if you click on "view owner information" details of the current owner and expiration date will be displayed.

LCN issue renewal notices by email and/or text message only.

Click here for example

This company has already been barred from carrying out this practice in the USA by the Federal Trade Commission. They are currently operating in the UK and Europe under the name Domain Registry of Europe.

EU Registry Services

This company operates out of St Neots, Cambridgeshire, and seems to only send letters to registrants in the UK.

Putting you in control

We have added another function to the admin section of our website to put you in further control of your domain name. You can now change your password to the admin section. The option appears in the drop down menu like other options such as "Set-up forwarding".

To access the admin section of the website visit
http://www.lcn.com/admin.asp
You will be greeted by the following message:-
Welcome back (customer name)

Here you can manage your domains individually, select an option in the drop down list next to the relevant domain and click go.

We will ask you if your current email address is correct and give you the option to change it.

Your e-mail address is fred@bloggs.co.uk. If this is incorrect please change it now using the Update Profile link.

In addition to being able to update your profile you can also perform the following tasks for each domain name:-

Set up email forwarding

The e-mail forwarding service allows you to forward e-mails sent to 'someone@yourdomain.com' onto an existing e-mail account. so that you may collect them. For example you may have a Hotmail account e.g. 'your_name@hotmail.com'. Any email messages that are sent to 'someone@yourdomain.com' can be automatically redirected to your existing Hotmail address.

There are two types of e-mail forwarder that are explained below:

Alias E-mail Forwarder

An Alias E-mail Forwarder allows you to forward a specific email addresses at your domain name e.g. 'info@yourdomain.com' to the destination email address specified.

info@yourdomain.com -----> you@existing email.com

Catchall E-mail Forwarder

A Catchall E-mail Forwarder will forward all the e-mails sent to your domain, that do not match one of the other 'Alias E-mail Forwarders' to the destination email address specified. By default we set the Catchall E-mail Forwarder as the e-mail address in your account profile.

sales@yourdomain.com
support@yourdomain.com -----> you@existingemail.com
anything@yourdomain.com

Add hosting to your domain

Web hosting is an allocated amount of disk space for your domain name on a computer that serves the information stored on it to the internet. It is where all the files that make up your web site can be found. Hosting removes the need of you having to provide and maintain expensive and complicated servers.

Having your website hosted offers many benefits over free space offered by Internet Service Providers:

- It gives you disk space on our servers which you can use to upload your site to
- Support for more advanced features such as CGI,ASP,Perl etc.
- You can use your domain name as your web address instead of the long and often hard to remember ISP/free space one.
- You can use your domain to send & receive emails.
- You are not sharing the servers resources with 1000's of other users.
- Eliminates the need for redirection altogether.

Unix hosting plans offer access to:

MySql database, PHP, Perl, CGI, Chillisoft ASP, FTP access, Microsoft Frontpage 2000 extensions

NT hosting plans offer access to:

FTP access, Microsoft Access database, ASP, CGI

Take a look at our hosting plans to decide which plan is most suited to your needs.

View invoices

LCN provide VAT invoices for all purchases. You can view/print invoices for your orders online via the admin area using the drop down menu.

Modify nameservers/release domain name

LCN do not charge to transfer domain names to other ISPs or Hosts.

All domains can be transferred/re-delegated free of charge using the admin section. You will find step by step instructions for modifying nameservers and releasing to a different IPS tag (.UK only).

The altered nameserver or IPS Tag details for .UK domains will appear in the WhoIs database once it re-loads (approx. 24hrs). The .COM, .NET, .ORG, .INFO, .BIZ nameservers updates will also appear in the WhoIs after 24hrs but may take up to 48hrs to resolve fully.

If you wish to fully transfer generic Top Level Domains (gTLD - .COM, .NET, .ORG, .INFO, .BIZ) to a different registrar, you need to post or fax to LCN (+44 (0)870 7440824) on your headed paper requesting the registrar change. You must include the domain name(s) you wish to transfer, the receiving registrar, your name, your LCN account username/password, your signature and your contact details.

Five days after receipt of this letter/fax we will open a time window of 10 days within which the receiving registrar may submit their transfer request. Requests outside of this time window will fail.

Please note: domain names must have been registered for at least 60 days before they can be transferred. Domain names that have expired will not be transferred until the renewal fee has been paid.

Generate a gift certificate

Currently none of the domain name registries send out a paper based certificate providing confirmation of registration. If you are registering a domain name as a gift for someone you may want to give them something tangible such as a certificate which confirms the registration and the registrant.

For this reason LCN has created a printable PDF Domain Name Registration Gift Certificate. To view/print the certificate you will need Adobe Acrobat Reader. If you do not have a copy of Adobe Acrobat Reader please click the 'Get Acrobat Reader' logo. This will allow you to download it from the Adobe website.

Further Questions

If you have any further questions regarding your domain name, hosting, or any of LCN’s other services please visit our FAQ (Frequently Asked Question) section at http://www.lcn.com/help/faq.asp

This section features the 10 most asked FAQs regarding domain names and web hosting. If you cannot find the information you require below, please use the search facility to query the full FAQs database. If your initial search fails to produce any relevant results, please try rephrasing your search term.

The race to get online

Wholesalers, transport firms, clothing and textile businesses are bringing up the rear in the race to get online

Just 38.4% of clothing and textile businesses have their own website, making them the e-commerce losers of the small and medium sized business sector.

Compared to 83.2% of computing companies conducting their business selling and advertising online. These were followed by recruitment firms and telecoms businesses, with 82.5% and 77.9% online respectively.

Have you realised the competitive advantage of being online and acted upon it yet?

It starts with simple purchase of a domain name, then comes the commissioning of a web designer and before long you will have a fully operational website. You can then advertise your services and products online, happy in the knowledge that you are not missing out on potential customers!

If you would like advice on buying a domain name please visit the LCN site http://www.lcn.com or ring the design team for further assistance on 0870 7440823 and selection option 2 for design.

Missing in action?

Staff absenteeism is a growing problem - how are you going to deal with it during Euro 2004. Do you remember the employee that called in sick last summer only to be spotted in the crowd by a colleague watching Test Match cricket!

With Wimbledon and the football to compete with in June plus the promise of hotter weather on the way some companies may see the number of absentees rise in tune in line with the temperature.

According to the CBI, the average number of days absent per employee, each year, is 7.1 and the cost to UK employers is £11.6 billion - or £476 per head.

Once a company has taken drastic action and has cancelled employee sick pay for the first three days of absence. It remains to be seen whether the removal of 'sick pay' will reduce the financial burden of absence or create a corporate headache, with low staff morale and high employee turnover?

Advantages of an absenteeism policy

In today's working environment, employers are continually looking for ways to stay 'lean and mean' but still remain effective. Creating and implementing an absenteeism policy may not reduce or remove the problem. However, what it will certainly do is demonstrate awareness of the problem at management and staff levels, encouraging both to face up to, and deal with, the underlying causes.

If this happens, you may succeed in reducing unplanned absence and that, in turn, will minimise workplace disruption, unnecessary pressure on those who do turn up for work and also remove managerial subjectivity, by clearly specifying unacceptable levels of absence and procedures to deal with them.

However, the best way to deal with it maybe to introduce a TV into the work place and let staff watch the games and then make up the time. It worked during the world cup!

Sporting Month Of June!

Normally when June arrives the Nation's thoughts turn to tennis. Tennis-lovers get very excited because it's time for the Wimbledon tennis championships, one of the most important tennis tournaments in the world. Who are the big tennis stars this year? There’s the American, Pete Sampras - he has won the men’s singles game at Wimbledon seven times. Then there are the top women players - the American, Lindsay Davenport is the number one player in the world. There’s the popular Jennifer Capriati - another American. But many people are putting their money on the African American sisters, Venus and Serena Williams, aged 21 and 20. Last year Venus won the women’s singles game and the two sisters won the women’s doubles. So the big question is - can they do it again?

The tennis-lover's dream is to get a seat for the centre court, where the most important games take place. Most have to make use of their arm chair and view the matches via the screen. Film stars and royalty will be amongst the guests in the centre court seats. Maybe an ideal place for Trinny and Susanna as it’s a great place to see what the best-dressed people are wearing! . Wimbledon wouldn’t be complete although without Wimbledon's famous (and very expensive) strawberries and cream!

This year however, the sporting nation maybe swooping their strawberries and cream for pizza, beer and bbq’s as they settle down for the start of Euro 2004. The 13th June is the first England game (ignoring the friendly).

There is bound to be a huge power surge around the UK as man/boy and many women tune in to watch the first England game. It may all be over for the team in 90 minutes but many of the football fans will watch the competition to the end.

Who will be in the final line up for the 13th June? Undoubtedly Beckham.

Will Eriksson choose Gerrard to back up golden balls? He’s already publicly backed Paul Scholes who he’s been quoted saying “He's a brilliant football player."

Will their be a but over Butt?

Key June Dates

5th June - Constitution Day

13th June - First England game - France v England

17th June - National Day, Iceland

20th June - Father’s Day

21st June - Wimbledon 2004 - Men's and Women's 1st round

23rd June – National Day, Luxembourg

June past

6th June 1944: D-Day marks start of Europe invasion. Thousands of Allied troops have begun landing on the beaches of Normandy in northern France at the start of a major offensive against the Germans.

2nd June 1953: Millions cheer as Queen is crowned. Queen Elizabeth II has been crowned at a coronation ceremony in Westminster Abbey in London.

9th June 1958: Queen opens revamped Gatwick. The Queen has opened London's new and extended airport at Gatwick on the Surrey-Sussex border 25 miles (40km) south of the capital.

9th June 1975: First live broadcast of Parliament. The first live transmission from the House of Commons has been broadcast by BBC Radio and commercial stations.

7th June 1977: Queen celebrates Silver Jubilee. More than one million people have lined the streets of London to watch the Royal Family on their way to St Paul's at the start of the Queen's Silver Jubilee celebrations.

9th June 1983: Thatcher wins landslide victory. Margaret Thatcher's Conservative Party has won a landslide second term election victory, taking 397 seats to Labour's 209.

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LCN would like to thank you in advance for your continued support.

Kind regards

The LCN Team