How do I transfer my Web hosting service to another Web hosting company?

Very few of our Web hosting customers transfer their sites elsewhere. But if you do ever decide to do that, we want to make sure that the process goes as smoothly as possible.

On this page:

Transferring away your Web hosting service

You can transfer your Web hosting service to another company and keep your existing domain name. To do so:

  • Login to the “My Account” control panel (having trouble?)
  • Click Billing and Contact Information
  • Click Cancel Hosting Service
  • Choose Transfer Web Hosting and follow the instructions

You'll be able to update the DNS nameservers to "point" your domain name at the new hosting company. (The new hosting company should have provided you with the DNS nameservers; contact them if you're unsure.)

Updating the DNS nameservers will also automatically cancel your Web hosting service with Tiger Technologies in three days' time. Leaving your old site active on our servers for three days is the way to ensure a smooth transition, because during this period, it's possible that some of your Web site visitors will still reach our servers due to "DNS caching". The three day overlap ensures that these visitors do not not see a blank page or an error message saying your account has been canceled.

By the way, we don't charge any Web hosting cancellation fees and we don't have fixed-term contracts, so you're free to cancel at any time.

Keeping your domain name

When you transfer your Web hosting to another company, we'll convert your domain name to a normal domain name only account with our company.

There may be a prorated domain registration fee to cover the domain name registration until it expires. For example, if you cancel a .com Web site after nine months of Web hosting, and you want to keep the domain name for use with another Web hosting company, we would charge you one-quarter of the annual domain name only fee to cover your use of the domain name until it expires in three months' time.

You're welcome to keep the domain name itself registered through Tiger Technologies for as long as you want, even if you use another company for your Web hosting service. Simply renew the domain name with us when we send you messages saying that it's going to expire.

Transferring the domain name also

If you're going to transfer the domain name (as well as the Web hosting service) to a different company, we recommend transferring the domain name as the final step:

  • First update the DNS nameservers as described above, which will automatically cancel your Web hosting with us after three days.
  • Once the three day period is over and your Web site transfer is finished, see the instructions on our domain name transfer page to transfer the domain name.

Doing it in this order ensures that the domain name transfer won't interfere with the Web hosting DNS nameserver update. If you instead started by transferring the domain name first, the central domain name registry can block any DNS nameserver changes for up to seven days while the domain name transfer is in progress, which would prevent you from "pointing" the Web site at a new hosting company before the domain name transfer is complete.

What if I really want to transfer the domain name before moving the Web hosting elsewhere?

If you're transferring both the domain name and the Web hosting to another company, and you really want to transfer the domain name first despite our advice above, that's fine, too. Just follow our domain name transfer instructions, then cancel your Web hosting service when you're no longer using our Web or e-mail servers.

Please keep in mind that:

  • Merely transferring your domain name elsewhere does not automatically cancel your Web hosting service with us and stop the monthly fees. You'll still need to cancel your Web hosting service as a separate step. We'll send you weekly reminder notices until you do so.
  • There may be a period of up to seven days during which you can't make nameserver changes while the domain name transfer is in progress, as mentioned above.

By the way, the reason we don't automatically cancel Web hosting service for transferred domain names is that customers sometimes continue using our servers for a long time after transferring a domain name. If you've transferred the domain name elsewhere, we can't tell how long you might still need any files, databases and e-mail messages remaining on our servers. For safety, we don't close your account or delete any of your data until you explicitly cancel (but we will send you weekly reminders to cancel so you don't forget).