HEADS UP! The TE Industry is in big trouble. PayPal is limiting a lot of fairly decent TEs on several grounds. Most can be tracked back to a few important issues like …
NO REAL TOS– Terms of Agreement. In place of a legal TOS, there is a personal statement for the reason the owner is on line. It won’t wash when it comes down to daily operations and what is allowed or refused. The Verbiage in any of these items is extremely important.
Read the Terms of Agreement on one TE, and check the next ten.
By comparing the TOS of each, you will find many are copycats.
Thus the copycats are not legal and draw attention to the one
the original owner had every reason to believe was legal.
The intent of EVERY business model is different. Most owners
strive to be unique in design and values offered. Why is their
TOS a copycat rather than presenting true statements of their
own business?
Privacy Issues: Another ignored and badly used MUST. It
includes the position on children having access to your
sites and even having their own accounts for the lack of
good checking of new members. Try googling COPA for
the exact wording of this act.
And the fact you will never share is a misnomer. If you
sell your business, you will ‘share’ it all. The database of
members goes to the new owner. IF there is a legal issue,
the information concerning one or more members will be
produced under court order. IF owners face hackers or
suspected cheaters, there will be an exchange of information.
Watch how you state the Privacy position of your company.
DISCLAIMERS: – there are two here that must be on every page
of site or promotions.
1.The owner’s position in respect to who gets paid what. Having
it in your TOS is not enough. This is where it gets explained.
2. The member rights to earnings and how they will be paid.
Again, many lump this matter into the TOS but it needs its own
place.
A codicil of this issue is the failure to make sure the information
in the DISCLAIMERS is inclusive in the TOS AND that each owner
and member adheres to this policy.
Contact information is supposed to be found on every page that
is a site page used by owner or members. A link on promo pages
suffices.
Again, you will find owners dumping contact and support into the
FAQ page. Really? That’s a fact (faq) huh?
BOTH contact and support are different so each needs its own page.
AND how about getting with the times? Security is a big issue
for all concerned but very few include the Digital information
that is a must if you do business online.
The digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 – US Copyright Office
copyright.gov/legislation/dmca.pdf
In this respect, many owners are dealing with responsive site issues.
What they bought was pure HTML or HTML and CSS3 but not
responsive to fitting Digital items like laptops, notebooks, smart
phones and other forms of data communicating devices.
In Summary
ANY and all of the above can get you ‘limited’ or suspended with
PayPal and Payza, when they catch up to any owner or member
abusing these very important parts of your business.
The Traffic Exchange model has become a lazy attempt at creating
income without being upfront and clear to what any consumer can
find on each business. And that is also a fact, a TE IS a business.
Failure to treat it as such means another strong reason any Traffic
Exchange, mailer etc can be closed down period.
By combining several issues in one document, the ability to define
the proper law gets lost in jargon.
Your efforts in putting these pages in their own order of authority
shows your compliance with consumer law.
By posting All of them to every site page; by linking the important
Earnings Disclaimer, Privacy, and Contact or Support links on every
promo page, you are meeting legal requirements.
Keep in mind, each of these areas completes the foundation of your
business. They are what gives it authority and proof it is legal
from the very beginning.
Full ownership and address must be inclusive on site pages.
Adding it to the FAQ re support is not appropriate. Full
information needs to be inclusive in your TOS as well.
There is a lot here that requires research on your part in
order to get it right. Download this PDF file that will provide
you with both a guide and legal documents that you just have
to virtually fill in the blanks that will help you define the reality
of the business, you may believe is legal now.
Don’t fool yourself and don’t put your hard work on the line for
non-compliance. Check them out. Fill them in and then compare
them to what you have posted now.
Good luck and let us know how you are making out.
© 2016 – 2018, Fran Klasinski. All rights reserved. on republishing any parts of this post, you must supply a link to the original post
I sure hope most will not think of this post
as BS.
It can be a real scary blow to your business –
just ask Shane Camus over at TheTrafficTrader.net!
Made me realize we have even more work to do
on our sites as well.
Thank you for the comment George. We all have work to do to improve
our online business ventures. It can be really scary for sure.
It was a pleasure to help Shane get his issues under control and
back up and running with the approvals of PayPal.
As with everything over regulations kills the spirit of the little guy attempting to swim in the shark infested waters of online business. Same thing is killing small business in America right now.
Unfortunately, that seems to be a very sad truth.
The mom and pop business was one victim and look
at the right of any person to run a home business that
will feed their families and keep a roof over their heads?
Fran, great post – you hit right on some things that might should’ve been a long time ago, in terms of sites (and the owners) in the traffic niche ensuring their web properties adhere to the legal baseline. DMCA, COPA, Privacy and so much more need to be considered by any website owner or operator. Thanks for putting this together in black and white!
Thank you for your feedback, Kurt. It is never too late to accept and make necessary
changes to the Traffic Industry as a whole. What needs to be realized, is that time
is not on our side. Every member better must start thinking and acting pro-active.
First and foremost…. Well written explanations. This is the first post on this topic were someone outlined something I’ve been saying for years! TOS on these sites including Trusted owners are not clear about anything. The TOS pages are straight from a script. Half the time they don’t even tell when or how you’ll be paid. Or they don’t follow their own TOS. I have know clue what the future will be for the industry. My fear for most the is the losses will be too large to overcome and over the next couple of months with no new revenue/sales. Those popular visited sites cost money to host on dedicated servers, especially the owners running multiple sites and doing it as a Full Time Job/Income are going to struggle.
So true, Mike. Those owners limited and not able to get PayPal to even talk to them,
have forgotten the whole reason for a TOS and that it applies to both the user and
the owner.
As for the future, if owners begin to really tear apart their business, and make sure
they not only have a business plan but that they are looking for quality members and not
quantity memberships they might just find it increases sales not lose them.
Final point, if the pages submitted are not vetted to make sure they are TOS
compliant, then they are just not paying attention to what their TOS vs. Paypal
TOS ergo user compliant means. Should be no gaps in comparison.
Great post Fran! Understanding what exactly is required as far as legal documentation for a legitimate online business has long been overlooked. Unfortunately, some very legitimate businesses online have been seriously damaged because of it. Something that I will be spending more time learning about so big brother doesn’t come knocking at my door.
But I really think that it comes down to this, if we want to earn money online from home it must be treated like the business that it is. We certainly would not be so hap hazzard if it were a standard brick and mortar building, would we? Thanks for shedding light on this. BTW syndicated this post across my social media.
It is so difficult to understand why an owner would run like they are guilty of something, to a new processor,thinking that will be a working solution. It never is. There is a problem and if the problem is to be solved, then it means fixing what is so it becomes legal, not howling at the moon yelling foul.
Very nice explanation Fran. thanks for the info
You are welcome James. Thanks for the reply.