Terms and Conditions with Acceptable and Fair Use Policies
We are a Social Enterprise registered as a Community Interest Company which is Limited by Guarantee and as a Customer you are a member of our company (see para 27.5 in Article of Association at https://swale.life/about-us/ ) – it is your company.
This contract is about protecting you, the customer and the Company (Swale Life CIC) known in this document as Swale Life Broadband.
All you have to do is click “Join Us” and complete the form.
Terms and Conditions
Your service
Swale Life Broadband will provide the Service to the Customer in accordance with the Conditions of this Agreement and with reasonable skill and care. It is technically impracticable to provide the Service free of fault in our environment and Swale Life Broadband does not undertake to do so.
Swale Life Broadband will use its reasonable endeavours to provide an effective and continuing Service however service interruptions will occur:
- Planned maintenance is required and we will let you know as soon as is practical;
- the system may fail, and we will fix it.
Despite us being sorry the Customer shall have no claim against Swale Life Broadband for any such interruption (although see Complaints and dispute resolution).
Data Protection
To use the Service, the Customer needs to supply Swale Life Broadband with certain details on the Application Form. Swale Life Broadband will respect the privacy of this information and will comply with applicable data protection legislation. Our privacy policy can be found on our Website https://swale.life/privacy-policy/
Your responsibilities
You will pay your bills through Direct Debit as invoiced
You will not move our equipment to another premise or otherwise interfere with it.
You will not resell our service.
You will avoid illegal activity using our services and will follow our Acceptable Use Policy
You will be responsible in the utilisation of our service and will take note of our Fair Use Policy
You will need to let the Company representatives (potentially including sub-contractors) on your premises from time to time to maintain the equipment that provides the Service.
If you are a relay site, you agree to provide power free of charge (it will only be £20-30 per annum) and not to disconnect your neighbours’ services which are relayed through your installation.
Breaches of Conditions or Acceptable Use Policy
Swale Life Broadband will always act reasonably and fairly but if you, the Customer, breach the conditions or acceptable use policy, we will talk to you.
If all else fails or the breach is serious, we will terminate your service and then let you know in writing.
Complaints and dispute resolution
We are your neighbours so please let us know about any problems or disappointments.
If you feel one or more of us is not taking your problem seriously please put this in writing and the Directors will arrange an informal meeting within 14 days of receipt to work out a solution.
If you really feel we are not listening and the problem is serious we are members of CISAS (https://www.cedr.com/consumer/cisas/) – CISAS is managed independently by the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR), an Alternative Dispute Resolution Provider, certified by Ofcom, to resolve disputes related to communication and internet services. The service is free of charge to customers as required by the Communications Act 2003.
Amendment of these Conditions
Swale Life Broadband reserve the right to add to and/or amend the Conditions at any time – you as a member will be party to these changes. Such changes shall be notified to you as the Customer.
Changes in this manner shall be deemed to have been accepted if the Customer continues to use the Service after a period of two weeks from the date of posting on the Website.
If you wish not to accept these changes and wish to argue the changes are detrimental to you we will consider your early exit from the contract.
Acceptable Use Policy
Swale Life Broadband believes in a safe Internet and works with other organisations and regulatory bodies to prevent illegal use of the internet.
This Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) specifies the actions prohibited by Swale Life CIC (“Swale Life Broadband”) to a User of the network utilised by Swale Life Broadband Services and must be read in conjunction with our Terms and Conditions.
(“User”) may be defined as “a Customer or anyone who uses Swale Life Broadband Services or accesses the network utilised by Swale Life Broadband Services or Internet service”.
The primary purpose of this policy is to prevent the illegal use of Swale Life Broadband Services as defined in UK law or the inappropriate use or misuse of the Services on the basis of Swale Life Broadband’s own judgement and discretion.
This policy further defines the rights that Swale Life Broadband has to ensure consistent and acceptable use of Swale Life Broadband Services and the Network by all Users, as well as safeguard and protect its own commercial interests.
Swale Life Broadband reserves the right to modify this Policy at any time. Changes made to the Policy become effective upon posting of the modified Policy to our website and we will inform you be email.
Swale Life Broadband reserves the right to suspend or terminate the User’s Service immediately and without notice, if the User is in breach of any aspect of this AUP.
Fair Usage Policy
Swale Life CIC acts as a Community Internet Service Provider – our aim is to provide high quality fast internet access for all clients. Swale Life have a policy of not restricting our core bandwidth at any time – this means that whatever bandwidth you can get on your particular circuit is the speed you will receive across our network and out to the internet. This is one of the key benefits of using Swale Life, we have no artificial restrictions or traffic shaping policies that other ISPs sometimes use to save money.
Our policy of providing clean, fast bandwidth across our network could allow customers to download huge amounts of data.
Our fair use policy is designed to combat customers who wish to use the service for inappropriate usage, which includes people who consistently download very large files, using file sharing software, downloading large amounts of video (files or streaming) or using peer to peer software. This type of activity can affect the performance of the network for all users meaning everyone has slower connections to the internet.
The steps we will take include the following:
- Contacting a high use customer to inform them they are an excessive user and enquire if they understand why they are using so much bandwidth. In many cases a customer is unaware why their internet connection is used to such an extreme – for instance syncing cloud file stores across multiple devices (e.g. dropbox) or iPhone updates; or there may be a virus that is causing
- If usage is not brought within acceptable limits, we will restrict bandwidth
- We will then discuss with the customer a resolution to the problem.
Our Fair Usage Policy is unlikely to affect you. If you are using your internet for normal purposes it is extremely unlikely that you will be affected unless you are using file sharing, peer to peer, or are regularly uploading/downloading video or very large files.