Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Web Hosting : Web Hosting Tutorials : Terms of Service and Acceptable Use Policies

[dsonnie]

One thing that gets mention quite frequently, but is hard to stress the importance of, is reading the Terms of Service (ToS) and Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) BEFORE signing up.

Notable things to look for:
Acceptable Content
Are services contract based or month-to-month
What are the network / server uptime guarantees
What is the guaranteed level of support
What is the cancellation policy
What is the refund policy
What will cause your account to be removed without notice
(if you are worried about this, stop doing naughty things)
How is your data guaranteed
Idemnification clauses
(any lawyer written document will have one of these, company's like to protect their own rear-ends)

These are just some of the main points which should be outlined in a ToS/AUP.
Why should these documents be read in full before agreeing to them?
As a paying customer you should want to know exactly the situation you are entering. If data is not guaranteed you should look for off-site backup options. If the money-back guarantee only lasts for a week, you know this up front. You won't inadvertantly violate any part of the agreement and potentially lose your valuable data. If you have customers, your own ToS/AUP will be accurate as it will need to reflect your providers'. Too many times we have seen angry ex-customers come into a forum complaining about lose of server, data, time, money, etc..., because they did not bother to read the service agreements. Smart companies have these documents written by experienced lawyers, and the agreements are air-tight. This may come after being burned by a customer, or from prior business knowledge, but you as the customer are responsable for understand the documents. The company is in no way liable if you don't read them, which is a situation you definitely do not want to be in.

This is by no means a complete list of the important sections or features of these documents, just a truncated list to help stress the importance of taking ten minutes to read them. If after you have read them you still have some questions, ask the staff. It is much better to delay ordering by an hour or a day and to know what you are getting into than to rush into a contract and waste your time and money.

I hope this helps some of you, happy hosting.

[ka4ax]

this is a very good point, with the amount of phishing and spam operations that could occour without the reseller's knowledge they can find their service cut off very quickly and without warning.

[waleedzuberi]

Do you think it's necessary to have a lawyer write a Terms of Service document for a reseller?

[Burhan]

Well, not to write it, but certainly to review them to make sure you didn't say/do something that can some to bite you later.

I forgot the exact term, but there is something in law that states that a contract or agreement is not lawful if it is not enforceable (or something to that effect).

Basically saying that if you write something in your contract/AUP/TOS that cannot be monitored or enforced, then the entire contract is null (in the eyes of the law).

[waleedzuberi]

That's good to know.

One thing I'd like to discuss is the format of a TOS doc - typography, paragraphing, etc. Nearly all of the TOS I've encountered have been formatted seemingly to make it hell for me to read. It will all be in a scrollable frame that's height is no more than the hieght of the quick reply box on here; a portion will be ALL CAPS; another will be a paragraph that goes on and on and on, some will be ALL CAPS and all bold.

I understand one needs atleast a basic idea of how law works in order to read between the lines of these documents and extract from it, what is allowed and what is not; all the while, these docs are meant for the eyes of regular people who don't know 2-cents worth of law.

Although I don't see why, do you think this type of wording, formatting and presentation is deliberate? So less and less users read it and understand it? Or is it some obligation these docs have to follow?

[surrealer]

I think it's due to the nature of TOS's and how detailed they need to be that contributes towards their horrible formatting. There isn't really an easy way to format them without separating key points that need to be put together.

If you deliberately write a TOS that's hard to read, then you're not a very good businessman

[thejazzyj]

I agree with the above post, I tried to make my T's & C's easy and accessible but gave up and lumped it all on in the end so as not to miss anything.

Onee thing I would definitely reccomend is haveing a solicitor or someone in the legal profession look through your TOS or Terms and Conditions in order to check for loopholes. In today's world nothing should be assumed.

[ldcdc]

Basically saying that if you write something in your contract/AUP/TOS that cannot be monitored or enforced, then the entire contract is null (in the eyes of the law).

I believe that's why severability clauses are generally included in these agreements.