Domain migration cost and annual spend: FOI release

Information requested

1. What was the cost the government incurred to migrate all the government domains to .scot? i.e to have all the web pages updated to .Scot, all the hyperlinks updated, etc.

2. Is there any information available, or can you provide the information, with regards to the annual cost of paying for all the .Scot domains, as well as the previous annual cost for having .co.uk domains? I want to see if one is cheaper than the other.

Response

1. What was the cost the government incurred to migrate all the government domains to .scot? i.e to have all the web pages updated to .Scot, all the hyperlinks updated, etc

Not all Scottish Government websites and services use .scot domains. The migration of the Scottish Government website from its previous www.scotland.gov.uk domain to the current www.gov.scot domain occurred in 2015/16. The cost of purchasing the domain gov.scot was £22.00 (ex VAT) and the cost of the first registration with the gov.scot Registry was £110.00 (ex VAT). Other than existing staff/resource, these were the only costs associated with moving to the new domain at the time. All links and hyperlinks were maintained as part of our normal redirects and content review process. Any work to update marketing materials or stationary happened organically at no additional expense to normal operational costs.

Scottish Government maintains domain registrations for some Scottish public sector organisations, but not all. While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance we do not have some of the information you have requested. In specific relation to the www.gov.scot website, all work to update web pages and hyperlinks was carried out by existing staff/resource at no additional cost.

2. Is there any information available, or can you provide the information, with regards to the annual cost of paying for all the .Scot domains, as well as the previous annual cost for having .co.uk domains? I want to see if one is cheaper than the other.

Our contracted domain cost records go back to April 2016, the .scot domain was launched in September 2014 and the gov.scot domain in 2015. While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance we do not have some of the information you have requested. Scottish Government maintains domain registrations for some Scottish public sector organisations, but not all.

Contracted period - April 2016 to April 2019

Domain	No. owned*	Contracted cost
.scot	103	£22.00** (ex VAT)
.co.uk	142	£8.00** (ex VAT)
.gov.scot***	8	£24.00** (ex VAT)

* number of domains owned at time of contract renewal from April 2016
** price includes annual domain renewal cost and management fee (ex VAT)
*** there is a higher initial charge for new registrations of gov.scot. The registration/management charge for any new registrations of gov.scot is £96 (ex VAT) per name and the annual renewal/management charges in subsequent contracted years are set out above.

Contracted period - April 2019 to April 2022

Domain	No. owned*	Contracted cost
.scot	201	£23.00** (ex VAT)
.co.uk	159	£8.00** (ex VAT)
.gov.scot***	31	£24.00** (ex VAT)

* number of domains owned at time of contract renewal from April 2019
** price includes annual domain renewal cost and management fee (ex VAT)
*** there is a higher initial charge for new registrations of gov.scot. The registration/management charge for any new registrations of gov.scot is £96 (ex VAT) per name and the annual renewal/management charges in subsequent contracted years are set out above.

Contracted period - June 2022 to June 2024

Domain	No. owned*	Contracted cost
.scot	292	£20.00** (ex VAT)
.co.uk	193	£10.00** (ex VAT)
.gov.scot***	55	£35.00** (ex VAT)

* number of domains owned at time of contract renewal from June 2022
** price includes annual domain renewal cost and management fee (ex VAT)
**NB. there is a higher initial charge for new registrations of gov.scot. The registration/management charge for any new registrations of gov.scot is £140 (ex VAT) per name and the annual renewal/management charges in subsequent contracted years are set out above.

Contracted period - September 2024 to September 2026

Domain	No. owned*	Contracted cost
.scot	334	£22.00** (ex VAT)
.co.uk	205	£12.00** (ex VAT)
.gov.scot***	58	£37.00** (ex VAT)

* number of domains owned at time of contract renewal from September 2024
** price includes annual domain renewal cost and management fee (ex VAT)
**NB. there is a higher initial charge for new registrations of gov.scot. The registration/management charge for any new registrations of gov.scot is £148 (ex VAT) per name and the annual renewal/management charges in subsequent contracted years are set out above.

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