ISNIC, the ccTLD registry for Iceland’s .IS domain have shortened the grace period for the ccTLD from 60 days to 30 days. With this move, ISNIC seeks to reintroduce the deleted domains quickly into the market and neutralize the price of domain renewals and registrations.
According to ISNIC, the long grace period of 60 days brought instability to the process of registering and renewing deleted domain names (the time from suspension to deletion), escalated the price of the domain names and affected the registration and renewal process of domain names. By shortening the grace period to thirty days, ISNIC say that the deleted domains will enter the market much quicker and bring the price of domains to a fair figure.
In addition to this, ISNIC also say that by shortening the grace period, they will be able to bring the availability of the domain to the notice of customers in advance. They further added that they will inform the registrants about the deletion of the domain name regardless of holidays i.e. the holiday rule stated that the domain could not be deleted on a holiday. But with this grace period reform, the holiday rule shall be abandoned.
In closing, ISNIC stated that shortening the grace period will also allow them to increase the rate of automating the process of domain registrations itself.