At that point, I had used my personal domain for close to 10 years when suddenly it stopped working. I contacted them and they said that it was put on hold because I hadn't paid the yearly expense. It would cost 16 times the normal cost to get it back, or I could wait a couple of months until it was released and see if I was able to buy it again at the normal rate before it was taking by someone else. I asked what they meant by expense? I usually get a reminder from them on email a month before due date, every year for the last 10 years, but my latest expense reminder from them was dated a year back. They explained that they have had trouble sending out reminders for this particular TLD for a while now. I asked why they hadn't contacted their users about these problems, to which they replied that it's my own responsibility to get the expense paid in due time, and that the reminders are just a friendly reminder, nothing more, nothing to be relied on, and I have to pay 16 times normal cost or it will get released in a couple of months.
I decided that I was not going to pay that, and that I wouldn't be using them as a domain registrar again. Luckily I wasn't that happy with the domain anyways and have never been. I have been fiddling with ideas for a new domain name for years, but have yet to find one, so it wasn't that big of a loss. But I sure as hell think it's shitty service from my domain registrar.