OT: totalnic.net?

Anyone know what's up with Registrar services from totalnic.net (AU)? We had a client register a domain with them a couple days ago. That new domain was working yesterday, but has since disappeared from the gtld root servers. The domain totalnic.net is itself missing from gtld roots (whois shows their own domain is paid through 2010). So, if a given Registrar were suffering a complete loss of connectivity, would that affect their entries at the gtld roots? Or is this more likely a result of some type of dispute/unpaid bills with ICANN? TIA, Mike