Terms of Service Agreement

1. Refund & Cancellation Policy

1.1 - Money-Back Guarantee

We offer a 14 day money back guarantee on all of our hosting accounts. If for any reason you are not completely satisfied with your hosting or simply decide you don't need it, we will refund you 100% (according to terms below).

1.2 - Cancellation

Cancellation requests must be submitted to our Client Support and Billing system at https://www.vortexhost.com/billing/ within 5 days of your next billing date. Account cancellation will be processed on your next billing date and will result in all of your files, including emails, mysql databases, mailing lists, and backups, removed from our servers.

• Monthly Billed Accounts: After the initial 14 day period, no refunds on monthly accounts will be issued. Please cancel your account before your next billing date if you wish to discontinue your hosting.

• Quarterly & Semi-Annually Billed Accounts: We will refund you for all full, unused months remaining in your term.

• Yearly Billed Accounts: We will refund you for all full, unused months remaining in your contract, billed at the regular monthly rate for your plan. We offer 1 month free on yearly pre-payment, so cancellation before the end of your term will void this offer and your account will revert to the regular monthly rate.

1.3 - Exceptions

No refunds are issued for setup fees, domain registration fees, SSL certificates, or accounts that have breached this Terms of Service Agreement. The 14 day money back guarantee does not apply to accounts that have used over 50% of their allocated monthly data transfer.

2. Billing

2.1 - Payment Schedule

Payment in full is due on your renew date or invoice date. You will receive a notice via email 5 days prior to your due date.

• Credit Card Billing: We will attempt to automatically bill your credit card on your due date. Please be sure that your billing details are up to date on our billing site at https://www.vortexhost.com/billing/. You may update your billing details by clicking on the Credit Card icon next to your domain name.
  
• PayPal Billing: All PayPal billed accounts are initially set up to pay via automatic Subscription. You are free to cancel this subscription at any time and make manual payments if you choose. Please send any manual payments to our paypal address: paypal@vortexhost.com. Payment must be received by your due date. Please include your domain name and invoice number on any manual payments.
  
• Checks / Money Orders: Please let us know in advance before sending any payments via post. Payments may be sent to the address listed on your invoice.

2.2 - Account Suspension

Accounts 7 days past due will be suspended and will remain suspended until the account is paid in full. No access to your account or our servers will be provided until the account is paid in full.

2.3 - Account Termination

Accounts 14 days past due will be completely removed from our servers.

We will make every effort to contact you to ensure that this does not happen! We recognize that there are certain circumstances where payment cannot be made on time (illness, family emergency, etc). If this is the case, please contact us so that we may make alternate arrangements for payment. We are reasonable people and are happy to work with you.

Accounts terminated due to non-payment will incur a $10 fee to re-open the account upon request by the account holder.

Account termination does not remove the account holder's obligation to pay their outstanding invoices.

2.4 - Automatic Billing

We utilize an automatic billing system and all accounts will be automatically re-billed at their agreed upon rate. The account holder agrees to allow VortexHost to charge his or her credit card on a monthly, quarterly, semi-annually or annually basis.

2.5 - Bank & Service Charges

We cannot be held liable for any overdraft or service fees incurred by the account holder due to insufficient funds/credit in your bank account or credit card. Returned checks are subject to a $25 fee.

2.6 - Large Payments

We may require that payments over $150 be made by check or money order.

3. Domain Names

3.1 - Domain Name Registration

Domain registration fees are $15 per year for the following TLDs: .com, .net, .org, .us, .info, .biz, .co.uk, .org.uk and .name. Additional TLDs are available but may include additional fees. Domain registration fees are non-refundable. If we register a domain name, on your behalf, as part of a free registration promotion - cancellation or termination of your account will void the promotion offer and you will be charged the appropriate fee for your domain name registration.

3.2 - Domain Name Changes

Domain name changes are not permitted. You must sign up for a new account to host your new domain name, but you may cancel your old hosting account and request a refund or credit for any unused time remaining on your term.

4. Data Backups

4.1 - Responsibility

To prevent data loss due to hardware failure, we make complete backups of all accounts on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. However, your files are your sole responsibility and we make no guarantees of data backup availability. Our control panel provides you with a method to backup your entire account with the click of a button, and you are strongly encouraged to do so often. We cannot be held responsible if your files are lost.

4.2 - Fees

If an account requires a restore from backup, at the account holders fault, there may be a $10 fee for the restore of any files.

5. Data Transfer

5.1 Responsibility

Bandwidth usage is checked daily on all accounts. Accounts are automatically suspended once they exceed their data transfer limit. If you expect your account to exceed its monthly data transfer limit, please contact us in advance so we may increase your limit. It is the account holder's responsibility to monitor their data transfer usage.

5.2 - Fees

Account holders who exceed their data transfer limit have the option to:

1. Pay $1.00US per gigabyte of overage, in advance.
2. Upgrade to an account with a bandwidth allowance greater than the amount of data estimated to be used for the current month and pay the difference between the two accounts for the specified month
3. Leave the site disabled until data transfer limits are reset on the 1st of the following month.

6. Usage Policy

6.1 - CPU & Memory Usage

Excessive CPU & Memory usage, causing interruption or slowdown of service to other customers is not allowed and offending accounts will be suspended or disabled.

Additionally, all accounts are subject to the following terms on all of our shared servers:

• Use of Flat-File database systems with any bulletin board is prohibited.
• Users may not run any script, program, or process for more than 30 seconds at one time.
• Java-based chat systems are prohibited. Also, any chat system with more than 5 users at any time is prohibited.
• Users may not send excess of 60 email messages per hour.
• Cron jobs must not be executed more than once every 30 minutes.

6.2 - Content

All services provided by VortexHost are to be used for lawful purposes only. Transmission, storage, or presentation of any information, data or material in violation of any United States Federal, State or Local law is prohibited. This includes, but is not limited to: copyrighted material, material we judge to be threatening or obscene, material that jeopardizes national security, or material protected by trade secret or other laws. The subscriber agrees to indemnify and hold harmless VortexHost, from any claims resulting from the subscriber's use of VortexHost services which damages the subscriber or any other party.

Additional content that is not allowed:

• Adult sites (artistic sites are allowed - please see below)
• Gambling sites
• Hacking / Cracking / Phishing material

6.3 - Illegal Material

VortexHost does not allow any illegal material on any of our servers. Offending accounts will be terminated without refund the moment we learn of any illegal material residing on our servers.

6.4 - Background Running Processes

Your account on VortexHost is strictly for Web Hosting and Email only. Background Daemons, including, but not limited to, IRC servers, IRC services, IRC bots, IRC clients, BNC, torrents and any other program that interferes with normal server operation, are prohibited on all servers.

6.5 - Distribution of Internet Viruses, Worms, Trojan Horses, or Other Destructive Activities

Distributing information regarding the creation of and sending Internet viruses, worms, trojan horses, pinging, flooding, mail bombing, or denial of service attacks is strictly prohibited. Also, activities that disrupt the use of or interfere with the ability of others to effectively use the network or any connected network, system, service, or equipment is prohibited.

6.6 - Intellectual Property Violations

Engaging in any activity that infringes or misappropriates the intellectual property rights of others, including copyrights, trademarks, service marks, trade secrets, software piracy, and patents held by individuals, corporations, or other entities is strictly prohibited. Also, engaging in activity that violates privacy, publicity, or other personal rights of others is prohibited. VortexHost is required by law to remove or block access to customer content upon receipt of a proper notice of copyright infringement. It is also VortexHost's policy to terminate the privileges of customers who commit repeat violations of copyright laws.

6.7 - Server Abuse

Any attempt to undermine or cause harm to any VortexHost server is prohibited. Additionally, any attempt to view a file outside of your home directory is prohibited. Anyone caught abusing a server in this way will have their account terminated, and no refund will be given.

6.8 - Illegal or Unauthorized Access to Other Computers or Networks

Accessing illegally, or without authorization, computers, accounts, or networks belonging to another party, or attempting to penetrate security measures of another individual's system (often known as "cracking"). Also, any activity that might be used as a precursor to an attempted system penetration (i.e. port scan, stealth scan, or other information gathering activity).

6.9 - Defamatory or Abusive Language

Using VortexHost's network as a means to transmit or post defamatory, harassing, abusive, or threatening language will result in immediate account termination.

6.10 - Adult Material

VortexHost does not allow adult material on any of our shared hosting servers. Offending accounts will be asked to remove all adult content within 24 hours. If content is not removed within 24 hours, the account will be suspended until the content is removed. VortexHost will cooperate fully with any criminal investigation into a user's violation of the Child Protection Act of 1984 concerning child pornography.

What does VortexHost consider "Adult Material?"

• Any site whose revenue is gained in part or whole from its adult content.
• Photos or videos showing frontal nudity on either men or women for non-scientific or non-artistic purposes.
• Revenue-generating hyperlinks to sites who violate policy #1.

VortexHost has established this policy to protect the best interest in our customers and servers. VortexHost reserves the right to decide what it considers "adult content", "adult material", "sexually explicit", or "sexually related".

6.11 - Other Illegal Activities

Basically, if it's illegal, we don't allow it. Engaging in activities that are determined to be illegal, including, but not limited to, ponzi schemes, pyramid schemes, fraudulently charging credit cards, pirated software, and phishing is strictly prohibited.

6.12 - Other Activities

Engaging in activities, whether lawful or unlawful, that VortexHost determines to be harmful to its clients, operations, reputation, goodwill, or customer relations is strictly prohibited.

6.13 - Threatening behavior

Making threats of any kind toward VortexHost, its customers or employees will not be tolerated. This includes, but is not limited to, threats of legal action and threats of defamation. Account holders issuing threats will have their accounts immediately terminated, no refunds will be issued, and all electronic contact will cease.

7. Email

7.1 - Zero Tolerance Spam Policy

We have a Zero Tolerance policy for spam. The sending of unsolicited bulk email is a serious offence and is strictly prohibited on any of our servers or our network. Any account holder caught spamming will have their account terminated immediately and will be fined $25 for every complaint filed.

7.2 - Spam Filtering

All of our hosting accounts feature advanced spam filtering techniques. We hold no responsibility for any mail incorrectly filtered by our software. If you notice you are not receiving mail that you should be receiving, please let us know and we will try our best to allow the mail through.

VortexHost will not be held liable for any damages caused by email not being received due to our spam filters.

7.3 - Virus Filtering

Our mail software will automatically attempt to filter out viruses. Because there are so many different types and variants of viruses, it is impossible for us to guarantee that no viruses will get through. Please be sure to also have up to date virus scanners on your PC.

VortexHost will not be held liable for any damages caused by viruses sent or received by our servers.

7.4 - Free / Anonymous Email

You may not offer free or anonymous email access to your website visitors. Doing so would allow anyone to send out spam email and will result in account suspension and a manditory $25 fee to re-open the account, plus $25 for every complaint filed.

7.5 - Mailing Lists

We allow our customers access to mailing list software, however, our limit of 60 messages per hour still applies. Large mailing lists have extremely high CPU and memory usage and any mailing list causing service interruption to other customers will be disabled and the account holder notified. All subscribers must be confirmed opt-in subscribers. This means that your subscribers must have specifically asked to be added to your mailing list. Purchased mailing lists are not allowed.

Hosting Support

8.1 - Overview

VortexHost will provide the account holder with reasonable support in a timely and professional manner via our HelpDesk located at http://www.vortexhost.com/support/.

8.2 - Limitations

VortexHost does not provide support for third party scripts, third party software, ISP problems, or web design issues.

8.3 - Resellers

Resellers are responsible for providing support to their own customers. We will not support your customers if they come to us for assistance. If you would like us to provide support to your customers, please contact us to set up a payment plan.

8.4 - Professional Conduct

All VortexHost representatives will maintain a friendly, helpful and professional attitude towards all customers. It is required that all customers do the same towards all VortexHost representatives. Any harassing, abusive, or threatening language toward any VortexHost representative or customer will result in immediate and permanent account termination without refund.

9. LIMITATION OF LIABILITY

All services provided by VortexHost are provided with no warranty whatsoever. VortexHost shall not be held liable for any claimed damages, including incidental and consequential damages, due to service interruption, crashes, or data loss. We cannot be held liable for any predicted estimate of profits in which a client would have gained if their site was functioning. Furthermore, VortexHost shall not be responsible for any claimed damages, including incidental or consequential damages, resulting from the corruption or deletion of any web site from one of VortexHost servers. Moreover, VortexHost holds no responsibility for the use of our clients accounts. VortexHost reserve the right to remove any account without advanced notice for any reason without restitution as VortexHost sees fit.

10. Termination

Violators of this Terms of Service Agreement and Acceptable Use Policy will have their accounts immediately terminated. All files, emails, databases and backups belonging to the customer will be deleted. Violators of this Terms of Service Agreement and Acceptable Use Policy will not be issued a refund.

VortexHost reserves the right to close any account at any time. If VortexHost terminate a customer's account for reasons not contained in this agreement, a pro-rated refund will be given to the customer for all services paid for that were not provided.