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Benjamin Fitts Consulting/Custom Card Guy Anti-Spam Policy
(Last updated May 9, 2007)
Benjamin Fitts Consulting is committed to permission-based email marketing
practices, and as a result has established this no-tolerance Anti-Spam
Policy. Benjamin Fitts Consulting will occasionally update this Anti-Spam
Policy. When it does, Benjamin Fitts Consulting will also revise the “last
update” date at the top of this Anti-Spam Policy. For changes to this
policy, Benjamin Fitts Consulting will notify you (the customer) by placing
a notice on its web site home page.
1. What is Spam?
Spam is commercial email or unsolicited bulk email, including “junk
mail”, which has not been requested by the recipient. It is intrusive
and often irrelevant or offensive, and it wastes valuable resources.
Spam messages are the opposite of permission-based email, which are
normally anticipated, personal, relevant and/or associated with a
pre-existing business or personal relationship. Inappropriate newsgroup
activities, consisting of excessive posting of the same materials to
several newsgroups, are also deemed to be spam.
2. Preventing Spam
Customers of Benjamin Fitts Consulting products and services have agreed
during their registration process, upon accepting the Terms of Use, to
comply with this Anti-Spam Policy. Specifically, each customer agrees
not to use the Benjamin Fitts Consulting products or services to send
unsolicited email or bulk email, whether or not for commercial purposes.
Benjamin Fitts Consulting reserves the right to determine in its sole
discretion what constitutes actionable spam, as well as what measures
are necessary in response to such spam activities.
3. How Benjamin Fitts Consulting Helps You to Avoid Spamming
Benjamin Fitts Consulting has developed its Internet marketing tools to
incorporate a strict permission-based philosophy. This anti-spam
philosophy is implemented through the following:
(a) Communication and Agreement – The Terms of Use that you have agreed
to as part of registering for the Benjamin Fitts Consulting products and
services state how and for what purposes you can collect your site
visitor addresses, and that you will follow the Benjamin Fitts Consulting
Privacy Policy and Anti-Spam Policy.
(b) Unsubscription – Each email created using Benjamin Fitts Consulting
products contains an “unsubscribe link”. If your web site visitors use
the link to request that they be unsubscribed, your subscriber lists
will automatically be adjusted to eliminate the prospect of sending
unwanted email to such persons. Additionally, each person on your
subscriber list has the option of unsubscribing through a web-based
method provided on the Benjamin Fitts Consulting web site. Customers of
Benjamin Fitts Consulting who try to remove the unsubscribe link will be
warned that they are doing so, and if they persist in having the link
removed or deactivated in any way, then Benjamin Fitts Consulting will have
the right to terminate their account.
(c) Purchased Mailing Lists - Mass mailings to purchased email lists are
not allowed. Benjamin Fitts Consulting only allows opt-in mailing lists.
Purchased or inherited lists are by definition not opt-in. Similarly,
you cannot use an email list relating to particular subject matter, and
then use it for an unrelated topic.
4. Laws Restricting Spam
Spam laws vary from state to state, and from country to country. This
Benjamin Fitts Consulting Anti-Spam Policy has been developed to conform to
the highest commercially reasonable standards. As a result, and without
limiting the general prohibitions against all spam activities, the
following are expressly prohibited:
(a) Use of false headers, or other false information, to identify the
point of origin or the transmission path of the email, or to hide the
true origin of the email sender,
(b) Unauthorized use of a third party’s internet domain name without the
permission of such third party, to make it appear that the third party
was the point of origin of the email,
(c) Use of any false or misleading information in the subject line of
the email, and
(d) Assisting any person in using the products or services of Benjamin Fitts Consulting for any of these previously mentioned activities.
5. Questions to Ask Yourself
To help in establishing whether you are participating in activities
constituting spam, ask yourself the following questions:
(a) Are you sending email to non-specific addresses, such as info@domain.com
or sales@domain.com?
(b) Have you deliberately falsified your transmission path information
or originating address?
(c) Are you sending email to mailing lists or distribution lists, which
then send indirectly to various other email addresses?
(d) Have you imported for use a purchased list of any type?
(e) Are you continuing to mail to anyone who has asked to be deleted
from your mailing list?
(f) Does your email not provide a fully functioning link to unsubscribe?
(g) Does you email subject line contain false or misleading information?
(h) Have you used a third party’s email address or domain name without
the party’s consent?
If you answer yes to any of these questions, you are likely involved in
spam activities, and should contact Benjamin Fitts Consulting customer
support service
here.
6. Measures to Enforce the
Anti-Spam Policy
Any Benjamin Fitts Consulting customer found to be using Benjamin Fitts Consulting
products or services for spamming purposes may, at Benjamin Fitts Consulting's
discretion, be immediately cut off from use of all Benjamin Fitts Consulting
products and services and/or fined US$ 1,000 per occurrence, with no refund of
fees that have been paid.
Benjamin Fitts Consulting warns all of its customers when signing up that if they
participate in spamming activities they will be subject to the loss of Benjamin Fitts Consulting services, fines and possible legal action.
Benjamin Fitts Consulting has the right to actively review its customers’ subscriber
lists and email for suspiciously large broadcasts. If Benjamin Fitts Consulting
finds any customers to be spamming, it will issue a warning, and if the
activities are serious enough, Benjamin Fitts Consulting will take action
immediately. If Benjamin Fitts Consulting has any reason to believe that the
customer, despite warning being given, threatens to or is continuing to send
spam, then Benjamin Fitts Consulting may take action immediately, including
disabling the customer’s account and/or reporting the customer and the incident
to the proper authorities.
Benjamin Fitts Consulting does not attempt to censor any content, nor to curtail the
business of its customers. However, spam activities do not fall within uses
authorized by Benjamin Fitts Consulting, and will not be tolerated.
7. Reporting Spam
If you believe that you have received spam from or through Benjamin Fitts Consulting's facilities, please send a complaint from your email account
along with the unsolicited email, with completed header,
using this form. Please provide any other information that you
believe may help us in our investigation. Benjamin Fitts Consulting does not
investigate or take any action based on “anonymous” spam complaints.
8. False Spam Complaints
Benjamin Fitts Consulting supports the efforts of various organizations working to
responsibly eliminate spam activities. However, if an individual has opted-in to
receive email from a customer of Benjamin Fitts Consulting, and then falsely or
maliciously files a spam complaint against Benjamin Fitts Consulting or its
customers, Benjamin Fitts Consulting will cooperate fully with the appropriate
agencies to ban the complainant from use of anti-spam software and the Internet
community.
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