The registrar is merely the path to edit registry records; most of the ICANN agreements and registry-registrar agreements are structured to minimize exposure of

The registrar is merely the path to edit registry records; most of the ICANN agreements and registry-registrar agreements are structured to minimize exposure of registrants to bad/failed/incompetent/evil registrars. There are some registries which don't have registrars, and in that case "suspend the registrant's domain name until paid" would be a reasonable expectation, but it's definitely the expectation of most registrants that their registrar isn't providing availability-critical service, merely facilitating updates. (Unless the registrar is also providing DNS hosting, which is generally a bad idea IMO.)