The following terms and conditions govern all use of the CHOICE.Community website and all content, services and products available at or through the website, including, but not limited to, CHOICE.Community Forum Software, CHOICE.Community Support Forums and the CHOICE.Community Hosting service (“Hosting”), (taken together, the Website). The Website is owned and operated by CHOICE Australia (“CHOICE”). The Website is offered subject to your acceptance without modification of all of the terms and conditions contained herein and all other operating rules, policies (including, without limitation, CHOICE.Community’s Privacy Policy and Community Guidelines) and procedures that may be published from time to time on this Site by CHOICE (collectively, the “Agreement”).

Please read this Agreement carefully before accessing or using the Website. By accessing or using any part of the web site, you agree to become bound by the terms and conditions of this agreement. If you do not agree to all the terms and conditions of this agreement, then you may not access the Website or use any services. If these terms and conditions are considered an offer by CHOICE, acceptance is expressly limited to these terms. The Website is available only to individuals who are at least 13 years old.

1. Your CHOICE.Community Account

If you create an account on the Website, you are responsible for maintaining the security of your account and you are fully responsible for all activities that occur under the account. You must immediately notify CHOICE of any unauthorised uses of your account or any other breaches of security. CHOICE will not be liable for any acts or omissions by you, including any damages of any kind incurred as a result of such acts or omissions.

2. Responsibility of Contributors

If you post material to the Website, post links on the Website, or otherwise make (or allow any third party to make) material available by means of the Website (any such material, “Content”), You are entirely responsible for the content of, and any harm resulting from, that Content. That is the case regardless of whether the Content in question constitutes text, graphics, an audio file, or computer software. By making Content available, you represent and warrant that:

  • the downloading, copying and use of the Content will not infringe the proprietary rights, including but not limited to the copyright, patent, trademark or trade secret rights, of any third party;
  • if your employer has rights to intellectual property you create, you have either (i) received permission from your employer to post or make available the Content, including but not limited to any software, or (ii) secured from your employer a waiver as to all rights in or to the Content;
  • you have fully complied with any third-party licenses relating to the Content, and have done all things necessary to successfully pass through to end users any required terms;
  • the Content does not contain or install any viruses, worms, malware, Trojan horses or other harmful or destructive content;
  • the Content is not spam, is not machine- or randomly-generated, and does not contain unethical or unwanted commercial content designed to drive traffic to third party sites or boost the search engine rankings of third party sites, or to further unlawful acts (such as phishing) or mislead recipients as to the source of the material (such as spoofing);
  • the Content is not pornographic, does not contain threats or incite violence, and does not violate the privacy or publicity rights of any third party;
  • your content is not getting advertised via unwanted electronic messages such as spam links on newsgroups, email lists, blogs and web sites, and similar unsolicited promotional methods;
  • your content is not named in a manner that misleads your readers into thinking that you are another person or company; and
  • you have, in the case of Content that includes computer code, accurately categorized and/or described the type, nature, uses and effects of the materials, whether requested to do so by CHOICE or otherwise.
  • you have checked facts prior to posting. The Community is here to help resolve consumer issues but it takes considerably more time to check and when necessary refute spurious claims than to make them.
  • You follow the other conditions contained in these terms.

3. User Content License

User contributions are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Without limiting any of those representations or warranties, CHOICE has the right (though not the obligation) to, in CHOICE’s sole discretion (i) refuse or remove any content that, in CHOICE’s reasonable opinion, violates any CHOICE policy or is in any way harmful or objectionable, or (ii) terminate or deny access to and use of the Website to any individual or entity for any reason, in CHOICE’s sole discretion. CHOICE will have no obligation to provide a refund of any amounts previously paid.

4. Responsibility of Website Visitors

CHOICE has not reviewed, and cannot review, all of the material, including computer software, posted to the Website, and cannot therefore be responsible for that material’s content, use or effects. By operating the Website, CHOICE does not represent or imply that it endorses the material there posted, or that it believes such material to be accurate, useful or non-harmful. You are responsible for taking precautions as necessary to protect yourself and your computer systems from viruses, worms, Trojan horses, and other harmful or destructive content. The Website may contain content that is offensive, indecent, or otherwise objectionable, as well as content containing technical inaccuracies, typographical mistakes, and other errors. The Website may also contain material that violates the privacy or publicity rights, or infringes the intellectual property and other proprietary rights, of third parties, or the downloading, copying or use of which is subject to additional terms and conditions, stated or unstated. CHOICE disclaims any responsibility for any harm resulting from the use by visitors of the Website, or from any downloading by those visitors of content there posted.

5. Content Posted on Other Websites

We have not reviewed, and cannot review, all of the material, including computer software, made available through the websites and webpages to which CHOICE.Community links, and that link to CHOICE.Community. CHOICE does not have any control over those non-CHOICE.Community websites and webpages, and is not responsible for their contents or their use. By linking to a non-CHOICE.Community website or webpage, CHOICE does not represent or imply that it endorses such website or webpage. You are responsible for taking precautions as necessary to protect yourself and your computer systems from viruses, worms, Trojan horses, and other harmful or destructive content. CHOICE disclaims any responsibility for any harm resulting from your use of non-CHOICE.Community websites and webpages.

6. Intellectual Property

This Agreement does not transfer from CHOICE to you any CHOICE or third party intellectual property, and all right, title and interest in and to such property will remain (as between the parties) solely with CHOICE. CHOICE, CHOICE.Community, the CHOICE.Community logo, and all other trademarks, service marks, graphics and logos used in connection with CHOICE.Community, or the Website are trademarks or registered trademarks of CHOICE or CHOICE’s licensors. Other trademarks, service marks, graphics and logos used in connection with the Website may be the trademarks of other third parties. Your use of the Website grants you no right or license to reproduce or otherwise use any CHOICE or third-party trademarks.

7. Current and ongoing formal or legal disputes

CHOICE recognises that consumers can have ongoing disputes and frustrations in relation to consumer rights or products/services that may become escalated into formal or legal disputes (‘escalated disputes’).

While CHOICE will endeavour to assist with general advice and support where possible, the complex nature of ‘escalated disputes’ and the potential for legal ramifications for CHOICE Community members mean we may not be able to host discussions containing ‘escalated disputes’ on our site.

Examples of posts that are considered to contain ‘escalated disputes’ may include:

  • Posts about an issue currently before the courts or an official judicial body.
  • Posts about an issue with ongoing legal and formal activity.
  • Posts that specifically target persons, employees or small businesses that could potentially be considered libellous.

In such cases, posts will be temporarily removed until reviewed by a team of staff and moderators. If the post content is deemed to be an ‘escalated dispute’ the post will be removed permanently.

8. Changes

CHOICE reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to modify or replace any part of this Agreement. It is your responsibility to check this Agreement periodically for changes. Your continued use of or access to the Website following the posting of any changes to this Agreement constitutes acceptance of those changes. CHOICE may also, in the future, offer new services and/or features through the Website (including, the release of new tools and resources). Such new features and/or services shall be subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement.

9. Termination

CHOICE may terminate your access to all or any part of the Website at any time, with or without cause, with or without notice, effective immediately. If you wish to terminate this Agreement or your CHOICE.Community account (if you have one), you may simply discontinue using the Website. All provisions of this Agreement which by their nature should survive termination shall survive termination, including, without limitation, ownership provisions, warranty disclaimers, indemnity and limitations of liability.

10. Disclaimer of Warranties

The Website is provided “as is”. CHOICE and its suppliers and licensors hereby disclaim all warranties of any kind, express or implied, including, without limitation, the warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. Neither CHOICE nor its suppliers and licensors, makes any warranty that the Website will be error free or that access thereto will be continuous or uninterrupted. If you’re actually reading this, here’s a treat. You understand that you download from, or otherwise obtain content or services through, the Website at your own discretion and risk.

11. Limitation of Liability

In no event will CHOICE, or its suppliers or licensors, be liable with respect to any subject matter of this agreement under any contract, negligence, strict liability or other legal or equitable theory for: (i) any special, incidental or consequential damages; (ii) the cost of procurement for substitute products or services; (iii) for interruption of use or loss or corruption of data; or (iv) for any amounts that exceed the fees paid by you to CHOICE under this agreement during the twelve (12) month period prior to the cause of action. CHOICE shall have no liability for any failure or delay due to matters beyond their reasonable control. The foregoing shall not apply to the extent prohibited by applicable law.

12. General Representation and Warranty

You represent and warrant that (i) your use of the Website will be in strict accordance with the CHOICE Privacy Policy, Community Guidelines, with this Agreement and with all applicable laws and regulations (including without limitation any local laws or regulations in your country, state, city, or other governmental area, regarding online conduct and acceptable content, and including all applicable laws regarding the transmission of technical data exported from the country in which this website resides or the country in which you reside) and (ii) your use of the Website will not infringe or misappropriate the intellectual property rights of any third party.

13. Indemnification

You agree to indemnify and hold harmless CHOICE, its contractors, and its licensors, and their respective directors, officers, employees and agents from and against any and all claims and expenses, including attorneys’ fees, arising out of your use of the Website, including but not limited to your violation of this Agreement.

14. Self promotion

Sales posts, gratuitous self promotion and gratuitous off-topic political promotion is forbidden on CHOICE.Community. Bloggers, business owners or promoters of any type can only refer to their own products, services, profiles, messages or websites if it is relevant to the topic or conversation, and with a clear disclaimer of any relationships involved. If you are found frequently referring to your own material (including using hyperlinks), this will be considered unwelcome self promotion and your posts may be removed. You may also be banned from the Community. If you wish to refer to your own material, please add a link to your profile page.

15. Declaring interests on the CHOICE Community

CHOICE Community is a place for people first, and an open forum for consumer discussions and opinions. If you have a link to or an interest in a company, organisation, business, organised group, political party or similar collective entity, you agree to declare this in an up front and honest way. An interest can include a short-term affiliation or involvement, employment connection, business relationship, close family connection or previous relationship.

If you represent an interest such as a business and would like to leave a comment or reply in this capacity, please add your name, position and website link to your profile. For example, your profile should read “Sarah, Manager at CompanyX” or similar. You are welcome to offer advice, insight, help or in the event of a negative review, a right of reply. However, please ensure your comments are respectful, personal (not copy/paste) and relevant. If you feel a review is false or extreme, you can also flag the comment or email us at community@choice.com.au.

Please also take care to read rules 2. and 13. in conjunction with this rule, along with the guidelines. In the capacity of representing a business within the forum, such representation is limited to responding to questions which may be posed by other forum members. It does not extend to the creation of posts which principal function is solely to promote or advertise services or products of the business.

16. Duplicate accounts

It is our policy that an individual only has a single account on the Community. Duplicate accounts will be removed and any previous comments sent into anonymous mode in the event a duplicate account is detected.

17. Get in touch

We’re always here to help. If you ever have a problem with your membership, just get in touch: by calling us 1800 069 552 during business hours or emailing us at community@choice.com.au.

18. Miscellaneous

This Agreement constitutes the entire agreement between CHOICE and you concerning the subject matter hereof, and they may only be modified by a written amendment signed by an authorised executive of CHOICE, or by the posting by CHOICE of a revised version. This site has been developed primarily for Australian consumers and it is assumed most users will be resident of Australia. The applicable law for matters concerning CHOICE.Community is that of the state of New South Wales Australia.

This document is CC-BY-SA. It was last updated January 21, 2022.

Originally adapted from the WordPress Terms of Service.