Is a tick box on a website legally binding?

[rossmc]

I'll eventually get round to creating my new site and I'm wondering...

If I sign up new people to take part in a business opportunity/franchise can they do so simply by agreeing to terms and conditions on my site, clicking the 'accept' box and moving on to sign-up OR would I need them to mail/fax a signed copy of the agreement?

[ken_uk]

If its a business contract, then I would recommend you get it on paper - at least that way you have a signature..

If its online only, it could be rather hard to prove they did tick that box, they could argue someone else ticked it, or that you edited the data yourself... No signature, nothing on paper, just near to impossible to trace electronic data.

I guess its all down to how important it is you can prove the contract was formed....

[DanLyddon]

A company I used to work for accepts ticking the Terms and Conditions (whether you've read them or not) as legally binding, and doesn't even send out a paper contract (although they do ask for signed Order Confirmations). They've been pretty successful in securing most (if not all) of the money from people who've ticked the box even if they haven't used the product at all...it goes down well in court.

I don't know the legalities of it myself, but I think it's a pretty watertight case. Having said that, it's not too good for customer service. If word gets out that some people feel a bit "trapped" after ticking the box, it could damage your company in some way.

[quote=ken_uk;291635]If its online only, it could be rather hard to prove they did tick that box, they could argue someone else ticked itquote]

In the case of the guys I used to work for, their system could tell the date, time and IP address of when and where the box was ticked, so that they could prove the customer (or employee of) had ticked the box, and therefore whoever ticked the box was nothing but an internal issue for the customer's company.

Just a bit of info, not sure if it'll be any good to you! :)

Dan

[rossmc]

Thanks for the advice, thinking about using http://www.echosign.com/es/ as am alternative, what do people think?

[kulture]

It all depends on the amount of money involved, the likelyhood of needing to go to court and who your target customers are. In the end, nothing beats a signature on a piece of paper. It solves the problem of proving who ticked the box. It solves the problem of people claiming you changed the terms after they ticked (otherwise you have to keep an audited archive or changes). Signatures on paper are without doubt accepted by courts, anything else, including faxes, can be questioned and can be harder to uphold.
That said the vast majority of ecommerce sites have a tick box for accepting terms and conditions and do not allow checkouts to conclude without the box being ticked. This is because that is the reasonable thing to do for the vast majority of ecommerce sites.

If you were dealing with a one off transaction of £100 or so then a tick box would probably suffice. If on the otherhand this was a multi thousand pound transaction with a complex service then pen and paper rule.

[stevefrost]

Online contracts are just as binding if done correctly.
This article may offer you some help.
www dot out-law dot com/page-431

Swop the dots.