by Toma HabashiDo you really need to create a ‘Terms and Conditions’ page for your website?
You can’t be friends with all of your clients. And there will come a day when you tangle with an awkward customer who, through no fault of your own will want their pound of flesh. The ‘Terms and Conditions’ page, although you may think that nobody ever reads them, are there to limit your liability and to reduce any ambiguity and misunderstandings come drawn down or should a renegade client wish to take you to court (which can be scary business for any company, large or small).
Considering a court can reference your ‘Terms and Conditions’ page to determine the contractual terms between you and the customer, you’ll want to take this page seriously enough for it to hold up in court. While the specific content included in ‘Terms and Conditions’ may vary based on your business and website type, here are a list of some of your more basic consdierations:
- Limit your liability: You’ll want to have some kind of disclaimer aimed at limiting your liability in cases where there are errors in your web content. This will be some kind of clause that says you can’t be held responsible for any errors in content or that the information provided is accurate, complete, or suitable for any purpose.
- In addition, if you allow visitors to post content to your website, you’ll want to add language that limits your liability from their offensive postings. Add a disclaimer that you don’t endorse and aren’t responsible for the statements made by third parties.
- Copyright: Regardless of what your website does, you should always include a notice about copyright and trademark eg; Copyright©2014. Your website.com.
- Privacy Policy: If you are collecting any information from your customers (such as email addresses or credit card information), you need to post a privacy policy outlining how this information will be used or not used. This is the only part of the ‘Terms and Conditions’ that is legally required.
- Defining the governing law: Your ‘Terms and Conditions’ should also mention where your website is operating from in terms of the governing law (county and country). For example, ‘These terms and conditions are governed by the laws of the United Kingdom.’
Check out our own ‘Terms and Conditions’ here at www.silvertoad.co.uk