Written by: Jacqui Sealy – The Pro Forum Community of Practice

When has terms and conditions ever been an overarching condition of everything that involves the organisation?  When large corporations such as Disney thinks they can use their streaming channel’s T&Cs to waiver arbitration when being sued by the husband of the woman that died from an allergic reaction after dining at a restaurant in Disney World last year.

The most shocking of claims is that the man signed up to a free trial to Disney+ years prior to the incident and cancelled it during the trial, and yet Disney feels that their T&Cs are perpetually valid in any situation that involves their organisation and their affiliated businesses.

This practice is apparently quite common in large corporations, when they provide overarching conditions that they feel can be upheld in a court of law for just about anything that remotely meets these conditions.

Terms and conditions for businesses are generally aimed at the purpose and the nature of the business and over a limited period of time, with the most common aspects of the terms and conditions is to provide limited liability in case something goes wrong and to protect the business’ intellectual property.  From there, the inclusions of the T&Cs will depend on the nature of the business or the purpose of the T&Cs, such as Website or Online Terms of Use are to protect the website’s owner from any liability claims of allege loss resulting from the use of their website, or a business that sells goods will have payment terms and terms on returns and refunds to protect them from goods being returned in a poor condition or after a lengthy period of time.

 

Having robust terms and conditions is mostly to protect the business’s best interest, however from a consumer’s point of view, you really do need to read these carefully when accepting the terms of a purchase, subscription, or for a service.  Too often are people clicking on the checkbox to say they agree without actually reading the terms and conditions that they agree to, only to regret it when something goes wrong.

 

What do you think? Do you read the terms and conditions? We would like to hear. 

 

NOTE: The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter, and specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances. The content must not be relied upon as legal, technical, financial or other professional advice.