CEO addresses layoffs and technical issues.
I’ve heard more chatter about Epik over the past couple of weeks, and I reached out to Epik CEO Brian Royce for an update.
First, I noticed a couple of Epik employees/contractors posting that they’d left the company. Commenting on the layoffs, Royce wrote via email:
Epik continues to restructure, and while we do this, we will continue to make changes that benefit the creditors, the shareholders, and the customers. I am happy to report that Epik has made many positive changes in the past weeks. The company is looking forward to a great 2023 calendar year.
It’s worth noting that some of the creditors are Epik customers awaiting disbursements.
I’ve also seen tweets and comments from people who paid for renewals, but the domains weren’t renewed immediately. Royce wrote:
There were some technical issues with the website, which have been addressed last week. Epik is reviewing ALL of the website processes and procedures and we are updating our software addressing speed and performance issues. All domains are renewing, the purchase of new domains is happening, and the customer can buy and sell domains without issue. We have not restarted escrow services, but we are close to a solution for that as well.
It is a crime of stolen funds
Clearly, they sold money from the customers
When an employee steals money from the company cash registers. the employee is prosecuted and goes to jail- no questions about it BUT
when a company steals money from the employees( Amazon “stole” tip money from their drivers, they did not pay them or wage thefts), the company just admit no wrong doing, pay a small fine, donate money to some charities and life goes on and no CEOs go to jail but they get big bonuses for being “competent”
Go figure!!
Maybe Brian could answer these –
1.) How did the domain Patterns.com come into Epik’s ownership?
2.) Why were 4,000+ domains moved from Epik to Key Systems towards the end of January?
I have seen some reports of a portfolio sale, but no confirmation. This transfer included Patterns.com.
There have also been reports from customers that their domains might have been included in this transfer. We are still trying to dig through that.
3.) If this was a portfolio sale, where did the funds go? I have not seen many reports of existing customer debts being paid.
For instance the reported $1.5M owed to Domain Empire, or the $91K to Kathleen Kalaf for the Candida.com sale that DNW reported on. You took $100K for that domain and stuck her with $91K in Masterbucks, or magic beans which can’t be withdrawn.
This sale happened well after Rob was replaced as CEO. Brian reportedly asked Kathleen to settle for $50K. That is just ridiculous.
4.) How much is actually owed in total customer debt. Does Epik even know?
Just from reports, it is in the millions.
5.) Who is even left working at Epik after the exodus of employees?
I never saw you respond to the $20K in Masterbucks that was removed from former employee May Chen’s account.
6.) There have been many reports of renewals not being applied for weeks at the registry level and the funds being returned in store credit.
Even more troubling, this reportedly lead to some of the domains being sold at Name Liquidate because the renewal was not applied.
Brian Royce seems way over his head, and a a noob in the domain field.
Brian, feel free to stop by the lengthy NamePros thread about this debacle.
You might learn something.
Brad
Andrew,
No disrespect, but this article is not helpful IMO.
It simply allows Brian to dismiss the very serious issues going on in a couple paragraphs.
I asked specific questions that need to be answered. So far, Brian Royce refuses to answer any of these.
You also should really link to the NamePros thread that details the actual depth of these problems –
https://www.namepros.com/threads/the-fund-cant-be-withdrawal-from-epik-com-via-masterbucks-wallet.1284050/latest
Brad
It might not be helpful to people endlessly talking/discussing about it in NamePros, but keep in mind most people aren’t going to NamePros and digging through all of that. I think this is helpful to people who aren’t in that thread on NamePros (I haven’t looked lately) who should be aware of the issues.
I should clarify that I think it’s awesome that you guys are digging into this so much on NamePros, you just need to understand that most people aren’t, so it’s important for them to get high level updates.
Well good news for Brian then… I presented a nice summarized list of questions he needs to answer. There are many more, but that is a good starting point.
Let’s see if he actually answers the direct questions.
Andrew, feel free to ask him these questions. These are specific things, that can’t just be dismissed with a paragraph or two.
Brad
Aware of the issues? These are the issues you are not covering in any detail whatsoever. I would imagine Epik are an advertiser on DNW.
That’s funny. First time here?
Epik sure is giving a bad reputation to this domain industry. Domaining use to be an honest fun business with full of integrity but now being tarnished with cheats, lies, dishonesty and full of scams.
The domain industry was always like that.
@Snoopy Yup and Epik just made the domain Industry worse.
I told everyone to stay away from Epik but most didn’t listen. Now they’re paying the price. Literally
Is this sarcasm ?
I have to say, this is quite an insulting “article” from DNW here. Tip toeing around Epik and being a mouthpiece for their lies and propoganda is a dangerous game for DNW to be playing.
Article reads like Epik advertisement instead of a news or journalism work. Could have done some real journalism by asking real questions about issues all Epik customers are crying about from the rooftops for months now.
I’ve been writing about these issues for months. This article explains the latest problems people are experiencing.
I have to agree here. This “update” from DNW really shines Andrew in a bad light. He seems to take Brian’s word as gospel whilst ignoring all the evidence. And in the process, ignoring the people who are owed millions of dollars.
This is the last time I will visit DomainNameWire.
Adios
creditors, the shareholders, and the customers. hopefully thats not the order of his priorities, but im think a freudiuan skip that it is
all domains are renewing – thats not true for my .co domain names, and no refund yet either. Brian, can you just tell us what tlds you cant renew or cant renew after expiration so we can know.
Andrew needs to ask the tough questions, or not cover the story at all. This is arguably the biggest ever scandal to hit a domain related company – it’s got everything – stolen domains, millions of dollars stolen from customers, FBI investigations, employees having their wages stolen – not to mention the lies that Rob Monster and Brian Royce have made throughout.
So come on Andrew, grow a pair, and get to the bottom of this story…
The comments on this thread are the real story. How did this slimy CEO, with obviously zero industry experience, get hired? Insert dumpster fire memes here.
When a comment is made about Epik, it’s amazing how passionate some of you have to disqualify Andrew, DNW I like and learn from Andrew and other colleagues with their comments.
Regarding the comments against Epik etc., how many of you have a mother-in-law who is a supporter of the US Ultra Right? (The question is a joke)
In relation to Epik and what is happening with the domains, I ask, do any of you remember what happened in Moniker 2014 that was horrible compared to Epik in Moniker we lost many domains, it was chaos, there was no support, it was blocked, the transfers of domains were false, they were lost, security failures all at once, I lost 50 domains (Com) renewed out of 100 domains I had.
If by “Technical Issues” you mean that they didn’t actually follow through with four separate domain name registrations over the course of a week, left my domain names unregistered and vulnerable, never offered any assistance when the names were later registered at GoDaddy, and never returned my registration fees, then yes I can confirm they are having epik technical issues.
https://www.namepros.com/threads/epik-doesnt-actually-register-domain-names-that-you-purchase.1293293/
Finger on the pulse journalism here. Next question to Brian Royce will be “What is your favorite barnyard animal?”
Who says that you can’t renew domains at Epik.com, notice that there is no problem, everything works very well, I have renewed several domains (Com) 20 minutes ago, and when making the payment they were already renewed immediately until 2024.
I feel like a genius having never done business with Epik.
Well, I do think you’re a genius 🙂
Long time Epik fanboy here who has finally experienced some of these ‘technical issues’ for myself. As a Libertarian and pro-free speech advocate I admired them for their stance on that in the face of Big Tech and their censorship. And over the years the customer services has always been excellent for me and with a personal touch e.g. they put me on their domainer discount years ago even though I only have about 200. But if you start messing with people over money and their digital assets, it doesn’t matter how much you might agree with them.
So my latest batch of renewals for which the invoice came through as normal as paid, has yet to be actioned. So as of tomorrow some of these domains will officially be hitting their expiry date, though there is the 30 day grace period. However it is inexcusable for a registrar in 2023 not to be able to instantly auto-renew domains as soon as payment has been received. Their support has responded via email and said they currently have problems renewing .com and .net domains, so hopefully it will get resolved. But you can’t take any risks on losing digital assets so I’m afraid it’s a one strike and they are out for me and I will need to start transferring domains elsewhere. Dynadot and Namecheap seem to be the best alternatives.
Hello Eugene Fraxby, you will not lose the domains that you have renewed, this happened to me twice last year.
This year I have renewed several domains without any problem, I renew manually.
If the support has replaced this, calm down, they are renewed until this same problem that they had last year is solved.