Finland .fi domains management to change in September
The managemenent of Finnish .fi top level domains (TLDs) will be available globally after September 2016 in a change to management of the domains. This is a radical change as private personns and companies can no longer reserve domains from FICORA, the body governing telecommunications in Finland.
The registry is switched from FICORA to individual domain registrars. This is following the trend for many country level TLDs such as .se, .ee, .de, .uk and .NL. And Switzerland is also in the process of moving to this Registry-Registrar model.
The changes are done because there is a number of new generic domains becoming available with domains. In addition many customers have been bounced between FICORA and service providers as there was no clear entity who was the entity responsible for their sercie.
For service providors FICORA will be an easier partner as they will use the standard EPP API. This means registrars will need to do less custom work to provide .fi domains. In addition it will be easier than before to reserve a .fi domain
Over 80% of domains registered under the finnish TL already have a service provide. For their customers no actions are required. If you are uncertain if you have only been in contact with FICORA, it is worth checking with your service provider. Even if there is no registrar, the domain will be in full functionality until the date it expirence. Without a registrar changes to the domain are not possible.
Pricing for .fi TLD domains is expedted to stay the same or go down in price once the change is complete.