Should you force your prospects to acknowledge that they've read your TOS before orde

SenseiSteve

SenseiSteve

HD Moderator
Staff member
Should you force your prospects to acknowledge that they've read your TOS before ordering?

I know we've all seen lots of variances in Terms of Service agreements between providers. I wonder if those agreements would carry more weight if there was a checkbox when ordering a dedicated server - where the prospect acknowledged reading and and agreeing to comply with the TOS. Would that affect sales? Would it alleviate any confusion on policies down the line? Pro's and con's?
 
SenseiSteve said:
Should you force your prospects to acknowledge that they've read your TOS before ordering?

I know we've all seen lots of variances in Terms of Service agreements between providers. I wonder if those agreements would carry more weight if there was a checkbox when ordering a dedicated server - where the prospect acknowledged reading and and agreeing to comply with the TOS. Would that affect sales? Would it alleviate any confusion on policies down the line? Pro's and con's?
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Would not effect sales, but if they raise a dispute and you can show they accepts your TOS they they have no leg to stand on.

Even if they say they have not read your TOS, if they tick the box on ordering , then they accept and agree to them whether they read them or not.
 
We have 2 check boxes during the checkout process the client has to check before completing the order so there is no excuse as to why you didn't read the TOS and provided truthful info.:thumbup:
 

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If you have had they tick a box saying that they 'agree', then it implies they have read them. I personally think it would be a waste of time.

The TOS is there to protect the host from abusers, and you can leverage the rules whether or not they have read them.

The more obstacles you place in a users way, the fewer conversions you will get.

After all, the only way you can check they have actually read them would be to test them, let's see what that would do to our conversions.
 
ughosting said:
If you have had they tick a box saying that they 'agree', then it implies they have read them. I personally think it would be a waste of time.
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it is to cover you as a host, if they dispute something and you say 'well it was in our TOS' and if they say they never knew, then you can say well you ticked the box accepting our TOS.

All major utility providers do this by asking you to tick a box accepted their T & C.

It is upto the client to actually read them and understand them
 
Harv45 said:
To an extent, if I asked a provider to explain "abc" then I expects them to explain "abc" until I am able to understand it.

If not then I don't want them anyways. :)
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Yes, but then you know they have actually read them to ask about them, but for some reason not a lot of people will actually read them, but tick the box to say they agree to them.

It is the same with Facebook Groups.

i have a group and a pinned post which the first line is 'No animals what so ever ( THIS INCLUDES DOGS AND CATS). Free or selling. Any posts giving away/selling animals will be removed and the person will be banned.'

and people still post animals for sale.

people just don't read terms these days, then moan or insult you if you penalise them for not adhering to them.
 
I have them tick a box to say they "agree".
I'm not wasting time having tick a second box saying they've"read" it!
 
I would advise to declare with terms and conditions; otherwise there's no legal contract for both parties to which you could be liable for in the end. I would not force them as it were, but if they don't agree then simply ask why? It wouldn't hurt I'm sure.
 
nodhop said:
I would advise to declare with terms and conditions; otherwise there's no legal contract for both parties to which you could be liable for in the end. I would not force them as it were, but if they don't agree then simply ask why? It wouldn't hurt I'm sure.
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Regardless if you have a tick box or not, if they take out hosting with you then they are legally bound by your TOS.

Getting a user to tick a box accepting the TOS at the purchase point is more legally binding as the law looks at it as if they read the TOS and accepted them.
Also if i use does not agree with any of your TOS then they dont tick the box, which means they wont be able to proceed with the order ( which they wont if they dont agree with your TOS anyway)
 
easyhostmedia said:
How do you add that second tick box?
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You would need to edit "/templates/orderforms/*your active template*/viewcart.tpl" to add a second checkbox. I think I did a Google search and found a guide to implement it, but I can't remember which since it was years ago. :(
 
Not only yes, but hell yes.
And when you change them
And you should have separate terms in general (ie: AUP, TOS, etc) that should also be accepted.
 
whmcsguru said:
Not only yes, but hell yes.
And when you change them
And you should have separate terms in general (ie: AUP, TOS, etc) that should also be accepted.
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we have separate TOS, AUP and Privacy Policy.
If we make a change we get this approved by Local Trading Standards before adding to the policy, then once added we send a link to all clients and basically ask then if they accept the new policies they need do nothing as continued use of our services is acceptance of the revised policy
 
+1 for ticking the box to accept the TOS.

There's always going to be a customer that tries to pull some form of mischief or even a scam...and the acceptance of the TOS is what will save you it the scammer tries to make it ugly.
 
I think the legal terms need a shake up in general for the web hosting industry most of them are worth nothing in a court room.

None the less on some google products google actually makes you scroll down to the bottom before being able to "accept terms" I think that is a really clever approach to getting customers to skim over the terms atleast.
 
HostLeet said:
We have 2 check boxes during the checkout process the client has to check before completing the order so there is no excuse as to why you didn't read the TOS and provided truthful info.:thumbup:
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This I like. I can't tell you how often someone signs up and their phone number is on the East coast, their IP is on the West coast, their domain was registered overseas and their address doesn't match any of the above.
 
SenseiSteve said:
This I like. I can't tell you how often someone signs up and their phone number is on the East coast, their IP is on the West coast, their domain was registered overseas and their address doesn't match any of the above.
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and dont forget they will also have whois blocked on the domain, so apart in knowing where the domain is from you have no idea who or where it is registered too
 
I've actually strongly considered writing an addon to WHMCS for this... Not the "I accept our terms part", that's good there, but the ability to

A> allow admins to have various terms (user agreement, AUP, per service terms, cancellation terms, etc), and require the user to agree to each of these...

B> Allow admins to actually modify said terms (obviously) inside of WHMCS

C> Allow the user's login to be checked each time. If their terms acceptance is out of date, then they need to re-accept before anything.

D> Allow for non payment of invoices (automatically) if the user hasn't accepted the updated terms. This could get ugly, but very good

This is just a thought in my head at this time, but it seems like a more effective way to get this done. Each time a user accepts the terms, their ip, time / date is recorded in the DB
 
whmcsguru said:
I've actually strongly considered writing an addon to WHMCS for this... Not the "I accept our terms part", that's good there, but the ability to

A> allow admins to have various terms (user agreement, AUP, per service terms, cancellation terms, etc), and require the user to agree to each of these...

B> Allow admins to actually modify said terms (obviously) inside of WHMCS

C> Allow the user's login to be checked each time. If their terms acceptance is out of date, then they need to re-accept before anything.

D> Allow for non payment of invoices (automatically) if the user hasn't accepted the updated terms. This could get ugly, but very good

This is just a thought in my head at this time, but it seems like a more effective way to get this done. Each time a user accepts the terms, their ip, time / date is recorded in the DB
Click to expand...

This is a really good idea, let us know how it goes :D If you really do this don't stop just at TOS :thumbup:
 
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