Does A Website Need Terms & Conditions?

Don’t let the word ‘solicitor’ scare you off? I pride myself on my personal approach and working with clients to understand their business needs and commercial objectives. I recognise that in today’s world, businesses in the digital sector are increasing with many choosing to solely operate and trade online and what comes with a change in business operations, also comes with changes in laws compliance.

It is a huge benefit for businesses to understand the legal documentation they need in place and to ensure they are complying with the relevant   laws. We often find that businesses think that because they have terms and conditions and a cookie policy, they are compliant, without   considering the content in detail. The legal documentation you need and its content, will depend on the nature of your business and its functionality and purpose. 

In short, yes. Website terms and conditions are the legally binding contract between you and your users. They set out all the rules and guidelines that users must agree and follow in order to use and access your website. If you’re ever facing a legal battle, it is your website terms and conditions that will be reviewed to determine the contractual terms between you and your user. 

No matter what type of business you are and website you are operating, it is important to have valid terms and conditions in place.

If you are selling goods or services via your website, your terms and conditions will differ from those who are not. For example, if you are selling goods and services online, it is a requirement to abide by the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations, and therefore certain details must be set out. If you are not selling goods or services, it is still important to have valid terms and conditions in place to show you have set out what users can and cannot use your website for. This can help secure the business’ intellectual property by ensuring that your users understand the limitations of how they can use the website content including text, image, videos and music. You can set out those issues that are important to you, such as nobody is to use your logo’s, content or videos and post without written authorisation from yourself, to ensure you are protecting your business. 

Furthermore, we are seeing an increase of websites allowing user generated content. As a result of this, laws are regularly being updated and amended to facilitate online platforms, it is therefore important for a website owner to be able to prove that they have made every effort to discourage any undesirable activity by users and to comply with the relevant laws. You do not want to be held accountable for any user’s inappropriate or undesirable behaviour on your website!

These type of cookies are not the edible ones we know and love, but are small data files stored on a user’s computer, phone or tablet and they allow an online service, such as your website, to recognise an individual user and store certain information about them such as login details, the contents of shopping baskets and site preferences. 

Unless an exemption applies (which is rare), it is always necessary to have a cookie policy in place and to obtain consent for placing cookies on a user’s device. A cookie policy is a declaration to your users on what cookies are active on your website, what user data they track, for what purpose and where that data is being sent. 
Once you have an adequate cookie policy in place, you should regularly be reviewing and updating the same to ensure that the information is accurate. Any non-compliance leads to a risk of enforcement action from the Information Commissioner’s Office and in certain cases, could lead to a fine. Furthermore, any non-compliance may mean customers avoid engaging with the website as they believe their privacy is at risk (which no business wants!)

Do not do this. Do not get me wrong, there are websites out there that will generate basic terms and conditions for you however, this is not a good idea. The documents which your business’ website will need, are likely to be different to another business’ website. This is because, just like every business is different, the legal documentation covering the business should be bespoke to them. 
You need to ensure that your terms and conditions cover your business correctly and that they are able to hold up any legal argument, for your business. 

Any document downloaded from one of these websites is likely to require further tailoring to ensure all rights and liabilities are covered. For example, if you sell goods and services via your website then users will need to accept the relevant terms and conditions every time they place an order and specific terms will need to be included, such as delivery, returns, cancellation and termination, which would not be required for websites not selling goods or services. 

Furthermore, a cookie policy will need to be tailored to how your website processes information, why your website processes that information, the types of cookies in which your website uses, where the data is sent and if any third parties access the information. This is likely to be different to every company, depending on who has created the website amongst other factors. 

It is worthwhile having accurate legal documentation in place from the outset, or as soon as practicably possible, which covers your website correctly and prevents any potential costly and lengthy disputes in the future – which nobody wants!

Hopefully this information has been helpful regarding your website's legal documentation.

Jacksons Law Firm have created a special offer for drafting of policies for The Digital Gene's website design clients.

Get in touch if you'd like to find out more.