Summary of recent updates and clarifications to our Terms of Service (TOS):
1. Our new $79 Acorn plan includes a 3% performance fee assessed on ALL purchases and donations recorded on your event site. The fee is automatically withheld from all credit card transactions and is billed monthly for all other transactions.
2. The third-party services we utilize for credit card processing and SMS/text messaging prohibit transactions and messaging regarding any illegal or REGULATED items. What this means is that you cannot use our SMS service to promote gambling, or the auction or sale of firearms or alcohol. Further, should you auction or sell alcohol or firearms, you will not be allowed to collect payment on these orders via our credit card processor.
3. The third-party service we use for bulk SMS/text messaging requires recipients to opt-in BEFORE being included in a bulk send list.
Please review the full terms and conditions for complete details.
Full Text of Terms of Service for the SchoolAuction.net, TofinoAuctions.com, and PartySupporters.com services
This TOS contains provisions that you (“the Customer”) are required to apply to your customers and patrons (End Users). It is your responsibility to ensure that these provisions are included in contracts and other agreements with your End Users. You are responsible for your End Users under this TOS.
Northworld reserves the right to update and change the Terms of Service from time to time without notice. Any new features that augment or enhance the current Service, including the release of new tools and resources, shall be subject to the Terms of Service. Continued use of the Service after any such changes shall constitute the Customer’s consent to such changes. The most current version of the Terms of Service can be reviewed at any time at: https://www.schoolauction.net/terms
Violation of any of the terms below will result in the termination of the Customer’s Account. The Customer understands and agrees that Northworld cannot be responsible for the Content posted on the Service by the Customer’s End Users and the Customer may nonetheless be exposed to materials that violate this Agreement. Site content is the Customer’s responsibility.
The failure of Northworld to exercise or enforce any right or provision of the Terms of Service shall not constitute a waiver of such right or provision. The Terms of Service constitutes the entire agreement between the Customer and Northworld and governs the use of the Service, superseding any prior agreements between you and Northworld (including, but not limited to, any prior versions of the Terms of Service).
Questions about the Terms of Service should be sent to info@northworld.com.
General Account Terms for the Customer
- You must be 18 years or older to use this Service.
- You must provide your legal full name, a valid email address, and any other information requested in order to complete the signup process.
- You are responsible for maintaining the security of your account(s) and password(s). Northworld cannot and will not be liable for any loss or damage from your failure to comply with this security obligation.
- You are responsible for all Content posted and activity that occurs under your account (even when Content is posted by others who have accounts under your account).
- You may not use the Service for any illegal or unauthorized purpose. You must not, in the use of the Service, violate any laws in your jurisdiction (including but not limited to copyright laws).
- Customers using games of chance as a part of their fundraising are responsible for the specific laws of their jurisdiction.
- By signing up for products with limitations in features and/or quantity, the Customer is acknowledging those limitations and attempts to violate those limitations will lead to immediate termination of the agreement and deletion of the contents.
- The Customer’s use of the Service is at their sole risk. The service is provided on an “as is” and “as available” basis.
- Technical support is available via email, and, on the day of the auction only, via telephone. Top subscription service agreements may also include phone support.
- The Customer understands that Northworld uses third-party vendors and hosting partners to provide the necessary hardware, software, networking, storage, and related technology required to run the Service.
- The Customer must not modify, adapt or hack the Service or modify another website so as to falsely imply that it is associated with the Service, Northworld, or any other Northworld service.
- The Customer agrees not to reproduce, duplicate, copy, sell, resell or exploit any portion of the Service, use of the Service, or access to the Service without the express written permission of Northworld.
- We may, but have no obligation to, remove Content and Accounts containing Content that we determine in our sole discretion are unlawful, offensive, threatening, libelous, defamatory, pornographic, obscene, or otherwise objectionable or violates any party’s intellectual property or these Terms of Service.
- Verbal, physical, written, or other abuse (including threats of abuse or retribution) of any Northworld customer, employee, member, or officer will result in immediate account termination.
- The Customer understands that the technical processing and transmission of the Service, including Content, may be transferred unencrypted and involve (a) transmissions over various networks; and (b) changes to conform and adapt to the technical requirements of connecting networks or devices.
- The Customer must not transmit any worms or viruses or any code of a destructive nature.
- Customers using the Virtual Auction feature have an annual subscription that includes 750 streaming hours (“one end user streaming content for one hour”) at a bandwidth limit of 1.5mbs/s. This supports the equivalent of 250 viewers for a 3 hour broadcast at full bandwidth (or more viewers for a shorter period of time). Your livestream will not be interrupted or throttled if you exceed the limit of 750 streaming hours, but you will be responsible for any overage charges from Amazon Web Services (you will be billed for the actual cost, we do not mark-up overages).
- Products which include SMS/Text Messaging have an annual message allocation of 30,000 messages. Customers that exceed 30,000 messages will be responsible for any overage charges from our SMS/text provider (you will be billed for the actual cost, we do not mark-up overages).
Payment and Refunds Terms
- The Subscription Service is billed in advance on a yearly or single event basis and is non-refundable. There will be no refunds or credits for partial years of service, or years unused with an open account. In order to treat everyone equally, no exceptions will be made.
- Acorn (“pay-as-you-go”) Service is billed and fees are collected as revenues accrue on a single site. The site is available for use for one year. In addition to a starting fee of Seventy Nine Dollars ($79), a platform fee of three percent (3%) of all purchases and monetary donations recorded on the site is owed by the Customer. The 3% fee will be:
- assessed on ALL purchases and cash donations recorded on your event site. This includes ticket sales, “round-ups”, offset fees, and donations made through our campaigns feature, in addition to auction purchases and fixed-price item purchases.
- automatically withheld from all credit card payments (in addition to WePay's normal processing fee).
- calculated and billed on non-credit card transactions monthly. Northworld reserves the right to defer billing on unpaid/open orders and/or de minimis amounts.
- invoices not paid in full by the due date will incur a monthly late fee of 1.5% or $10.00, whichever is greater. Northworld reserves the right to remove access to the event site if billed fees are 30 or more days past due.
- All fees are exclusive of all taxes, levies, or duties imposed by taxing authorities, and you shall be responsible for payment of all such taxes, levies, or duties, excluding only United States (federal or state) taxes.
Specific Responsibilities and Conditions for 3rd Party software such as Mass Email, SMS Messaging, and Credit Card Services
- Customers are solely responsible for credit card fees that are collected through their credit card accounts.
- By utilizing WePay’s credit card service, the Customer is responsible for knowing and abiding by WePay’s terms and conditions which can be found at https://go.wepay.com/terms-of-service-us/ including #7 Prohibited Merchants and Activities. Customer is liable for damages to Northworld in the event violation of these terms causes loss of service.
- The guidelines for Customers using text messaging provided by Northworld are articulated by the 3rd party services used by Northworld. They are responsive to the FCC’s “TCPA Omnibus Declaratory Ruling and Order” found at https://www.fcc.gov/document/tcpa-omnibus-declaratory-ruling-and-order
- Customer using Text-to-Give are responsible for abiding by the use policies for Twilio - https://www.twilio.com/legal/messaging-policy
- Customers using bulk custom SMS messaging to their guests are responsible for abiding by the use policies set by Trumpia - https://www.trumpia.com/resources/tcpa-and-ctia The most specific examples are the requirement that all end users pre-approve receiving messages and that no attempt is made to violate the law by selling a prohibited item.
- The software reflects these guidelines so attempts to thwart or violate the rules are considered a knowing violation and the liability for damages falls to the Customer. Ignorance or disinterest is not a defense so ask us if there is a questionable action being considered.
Cancellation and Termination
- You are solely responsible for properly canceling your account. An email or phone request to cancel your account is not considered cancellation. You can cancel your account at any time by submitting your cancellation request in writing to:
Northworld, LLC
1631 NE Broadway #139
Portland, OR 97232-1425
- All of your Content may be immediately deleted from the Service upon cancellation. This information cannot be recovered once your account is canceled.
- If you cancel the Service before the end of your current paid-up year, or before your single event, your cancellation will take effect immediately.
- Northworld reserves the right to refuse service to anyone for any reason at any time including, as noted above, the non-payment of fees for the service.
Modifications to the Service and Prices
- Northworld reserves the right at any time and from time to time to modify or discontinue, temporarily or permanently, the Service (or any part thereof) with 30 days’ notice.
- Prices of all Services, including but not limited to yearly annual plan fees to the Service, are subject to change upon 30 days’ notice from us. Such notice may be provided at any time by posting the changes to https://www.schoolauction.net/terms/
Copyright and Content Ownership
- We claim no intellectual property rights over the material you provide to the Service. Your profile and materials uploaded remain yours. However, by setting your pages to be shared publicly, you agree to allow others to view and share your Content.
- Northworld does not pre-screen Content, but Northworld and its designee have the right (but not the obligation) in their sole discretion to refuse or remove any Content that is available via the Service.
- The look and feel of the Service is copyright©2007-2022 Northworld, LLC. All rights reserved. The Customer may not duplicate, copy, or reuse any portion of the HTML/CSS, Javascript, or visual design elements or concepts without express written permission from Northworld.
Responsibility for Compliance with PCI Regulations
Customers are responsible for following all applicable PCI compliance regulations. Please speak to your bank regarding PCI requirements and how they affect your event. All systems used during the event should follow PCI compliance guidelines not limited to:
- System should ideally be a clean operating system installed with all current security patches.
- System should be password protected.
- System should contain firewall, spyware, virus, and intrusion detection software.
- Ideally, a full system scan for viruses and spyware should be performed immediately before the event.
Limitation of Liability
- You agree that Northworld has no liability, whatsoever, for (i) content that you or an End User access from the Internet; (ii) for unauthorized access to, or any corruption, erasure, theft, destruction, alteration, or inadvertent disclosure of, data, information or content, transmitted, received, or stored on our system; cyber attacks that may affect access; and/or (iii) for your inability to access the publicly switched telephone network.
- IN NO EVENT WILL NORTHWORLD’S LIABILITY HEREUNDER EXCEED THE FEES ACTUALLY RECEIVED BY NORTHWORLD FROM YOU FOR THE 12-MONTH PERIOD IMMEDIATELY PRECEDING THE EVENT GIVING RISE TO SUCH LIABILITY. FOR THE PURPOSES OF THIS PARAGRAPH ONLY, THE TERM NORTHWORLD SHALL BE INTERPRETED TO INCLUDE NORTHWORLD’S EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, OWNERS, DIRECTORS, OFFICERS, AFFILIATES, AND THIRD PARTIES PROVIDING SERVICES TO YOU THROUGH NORTHWORLD.
- THE CUSTOMER AGREES THAT, TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, THE CUSTOMER WILL NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, GROSS NEGLIGENCE, HOLD NORTHWORLD OR ITS LICENSORS, AGENTS, EMPLOYEES, OFFICERS AND/OR THIRD PARTY VENDORS, LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES WHATSOEVER INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF PROFITS, COST SAVINGS, REVENUE, BUSINESS, DATA OR USE, OR ANY OTHER PECUNIARY LOSS BY YOU, ANY OF YOUR END USERS OR ANY OTHER THIRD PARTY. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOREGOING LIMITATIONS APPLY WHETHER IN AN ACTION IN CONTRACT OR TORT OR ANY OTHER LEGAL THEORY AND APPLY EVEN IF NORTHWORLD HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. SOME JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW THE LIMITATION OR EXCLUSION OF LIABILITY FOR INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES; YOU AGREE THAT IN THOSE JURISDICTIONS NORTHWORLD’S LIABILITY WILL BE LIMITED TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW.