Website Management Terms of Service

Introduction

The following terms & conditions (the “Website Management Terms”) are incorporated into and are material terms and conditions of CauseLabs General Terms of Service (the “Terms”) entered into by CauseLabs and you, our Customer.

In the event of any conflict between the Terms and the Website Management Terms, the terms of the Website Management Terms shall prevail.

In the event of any conflict between the Website Management Terms and the Service Agreement, the terms of the Service Agreement shall prevail.

We may update these Website Management Terms from time to time at our sole discretion; the current version may be found at:

https://www.causelabs.com/policies/website-management-tos/.

In the event of any material change, we will notify you. Your continued use of our services following such updates constitutes your acceptance of the same. If you do not agree to the terms of any modification, you may terminate the Agreement in accordance with the provisions for Termination.

Website Management Services

Our Website Management Services include but are not limited to software updates, remote backups and restoration, uptime monitoring, WordPress security hardening, and other add-on services such as website hosting.

Software Updates

Each month, at our discretion, we will apply available updates for the WordPress core software, your parent theme files, and your plugin files. We typically perform these updates twice per month. We also monitor WordPress industry security news and proactively perform these updates more frequently during times of enhanced threat levels.

Remote Backups and Restoration

Your website’s files and database will be backed up automatically each day your website has activity (if your website does not have activity, there is no need for a backup to occur). This backup is stored remotely in our cloud data vault, where we typically retain the previous 30 backups.

Should your site become compromised by a hack or if your site becomes inoperable because of user error, we will restore a backup for you as follows: 

• If the restorations are the result of a hack, there is no limit to the number of restorations we will perform for you under this service. 
• If the restorations are due to user error, we will perform a maximum of 2 restorations in any 30-day period. Additional user error-related restorations will be performed at our Current Hourly Rate (defined hereunder) with a one-hour minimum per restoration.

WordPress Security Hardening

Our lockdown protocols harden the WordPress system to make it more resistant to the actions of hackers. We employ industry-leading security software that actively guards your website against hack attempts at multiple levels in the WordPress system.


While it is impossible to guarantee that your site will never be hacked, all of these techniques make your website a more difficult target for hackers. In addition, it is well known that hackers tend to exploit easier targets first – sites without security measures in place. However, in the event that your site is hacked, we will restore it to pre-hack condition at no additional cost either by restoring a site backup or performing a malware cleanup solely at CauseLabs discretion. We shall have no other or further liability beyond the restoration of the site to the nearest available pre-hack condition.

Premium (Paid) Themes and Plugins

Many websites use themes and/or plugins that require the payment of a recurring license fee to maintain access to ongoing software updates. We have secured appropriate licensing for many of the most popular and highest-quality plugins available on the market.

If we have appropriate licenses for the themes and/or plugins used by your website, the cost for recurring license fees is included as part of your Website Management Services, and licensing will be maintained for you as long as you are an active subscriber to our Website Management Services.

If your website uses premium themes and/or plugins for which we do not maintain appropriate licensing, the responsibility is yours to maintain the appropriate licensing to ensure the availability of updates. 

We will advise you of the themes and/or plugins for which you will need to maintain licensing and assist you as needed in the process of obtaining them.

WE CAN NOT BE HELD LIABLE FOR PROBLEMS SUCH AS BUT NOT LIMITED TO HACKS, INOPERABILITY, OR INTERCOMPATIBILITY THAT ARISE FROM PREMIUM PLUGINS THAT YOU CHOOSE NOT TO LICENSE AND ARE OUT OF DATE.

Plugin Compatibility

If an update to a plugin creates conflicts or causes issues with the functionality of your website, we will consult with you to determine the best course of action.

Typically, we will remove the offending plugin and replace it with a similar plugin or other programming. If the time required to resolve a plugin compatibility issue exceeds 1 hour, additional time will be billable at our Discounted Hourly Rate (defined hereunder).

IT IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY TO INFORM US IF YOUR SITE IS EXPERIENCING PROBLEMS AND NEEDS ATTENTION.

IF YOU ELECT TO DISCONTINUE OR NOT PURCHASE OUR WEBSITE MANAGEMENT SERVICES, THE TOTAL RESPONSIBILITY IS YOURS FOR PERFORMING BACKUPS AND KEEPING ALL COMPONENTS OF YOUR WEBSITE BACKED UP, SECURED, AND UPDATED.

Website Hosting

As part of our Website Management Services, we offer optional fully-managed website hosting as a paid add-on service (the “Website Hosting Services”). If you elect not to host your website on our servers, we are not responsible for the speed of your website, the performance of any of your website features, security certificates for your website, the uptime of your website, or any other hosting-related matter. 

FIXING ANY PROBLEMS RELATED TO WEB HOSTING OR PROJECT DELAYS RELATED TO WEB HOSTING ON SERVERS OTHER THAN OUR OWN IS BILLABLE AT OUR CURRENT HOURLY RATE.

Hosting Service Level Agreement

CauseLabs, its service vendors, and subcontractors shall use commercially reasonable measures to protect our Customer’s websites against unscheduled outages. However, unplanned service interruptions happen from time to time, and such interruptions shall not constitute a default by CauseLabs under the Agreement.

In the event your website experiences a Website Hosting Services outage, except for Excused Downtime (defined hereunder), you are entitled to receive a credit equal to a pro-rata portion of the Website Hosting Services fees for the period of downtime. The credit will be calculated by dividing the number of minutes of downtime by the total number of minutes in that billing cycle. In order to receive a credit, you must request a credit from CauseLabs within 30 days of the event giving rise to the credit. Credits are based on our monitoring, shall not exceed 100% of the applicable monthly web hosting fees, may not be carried over or aggregated, are forfeited at the expiration or termination of the Agreement, and will not be paid or provided as a refund.

Scheduled Maintenance, any maintenance performed outside the Scheduled Maintenance window without advance notice where such maintenance is reasonably and urgently required to protect the integrity, availability, or security of any online systems (“Emergency Maintenance”), Force Majeure events, and the actions or omissions of you, your users, or any third party acting on your behalf or at your direction, including any unauthorized use of the Services, breach of the Agreement or AUP, or any use or configuration of the Services that exceeds CauseLabs’ recommendations or advertised limits will not be considered when calculating service interruptions (collectively, “Excused Downtime”).

DNS Management

As part of our Website Hosting Services, we require Domain Name System (DNS) record management to be handled through our Cloudflare account. This requires you to update your domain Nameservers.

Upon request, CauseLabs will create one (1) user account in our Cloudflare portal with access to edit the DNS settings of the Customer’s domain.

Hourly Rates

CauseLabs’ hourly rate is the hourly rate that is determined by CauseLabs at the time a service is requested, not at the time that you agree to the Terms by executing the Agreement (the “Current Hourly Rate”). We will provide you with our Current Hourly Rate upon request.

Discounted Hourly Rate

CauseLabs offers a discounted hourly rate of $175 per hour for participating Website Management Services customers (the “Discounted Hourly Rate”). CauseLabs may, at our sole discretion, change the Discounted Hourly Rate at any time, for any reason. Changes to the Discounted Hourly Rate will be made known the Customer via email and will only apply to new service requests.

The Discounted Hourly Rate only applies to service requests for minor enhancements, hourly retainers, consultation, and support time. The Discounted Hourly Rate may only be applied to the first 20 hours of any engagement or request and may not be applied to more than 40 total hours per year.

Availability and Communication

We are available via email Monday through Thursday from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM Central Time and on Fridays from 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM Central Time. Our normal response time is one business day, though our response time may vary. We do not work on weekends or holidays as specified on the CauseLabs Holiday Schedule available at: https://www.causelabs.com/holiday-schedule/. Clients with current Website Management Services accounts receive priority response times according to their service plan.

Email is the primary means of communication accepted for our work together. We do not communicate via mobile phone, text message, social media, or use instant/private messaging (like Facebook Messenger) to communicate as we’re unable to track these requests as a team.

Payments and Cancellation

Payment for Website Management Services is due on the first day of the period (monthly, quarterly, or annually) in which that service will be performed.

If you wish to cancel the Website Management Services, you may terminate the Agreement in accordance with the provisions for Termination.

WE DO NOT OFFER REFUNDS ON WEBSITE MANAGEMENT SERVICES.

If you terminate the Agreement and desire to migrate your website to another web host. We will, at your discretion, (1) provide you with an administrator login for your WordPress site so a backup can be performed and migrated to the new location, (2) provide you a backup created using an industry-standard WordPress backup system at a cost of one hour at our Current Hourly Rate, or (3) perform a website migration for you at our Current Hourly Rate. 

Late Payments and Collections

All invoices pertaining to web hosting, security, maintenance, or any other work on your website are payable on receipt. If an invoice goes unpaid for more than 30 days after the invoice was sent, WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO SUSPEND YOUR WEBSITE FROM PUBLIC VIEW UNTIL ALL OUTSTANDING INVOICES ARE PAID IN FULL.  

Your Security Responsibilities

We incorporate industry-standard WordPress security techniques when managing your website. Since one prevalent method hackers use to breach a website is through compromised user devices, you agree to uphold robust security measures when accessing your website, and this includes:

Device Security

Protect any computer or device you control that has access to the website by:

• Installing and maintaining up-to-date security software.
• Use the latest version of your preferred web browser.
• Keeping the operating system updated with recommended patches.
• Regularly updating any other installed software.

Password Protocols

• Use a strong password (as indicated by the WordPress password strength meter) that is exclusive to your website.
• Refrain from sending passwords or other sensitive credentials openly via SMS, email, chat programs, or any other unencrypted and exposed methods.
• We strongly recommend utilizing a password manager like 1Password to ensure you use robust, unique passwords for every site.

You further commit that any employees, contractors, or other parties you grant (or ask us to provide) website access to will adhere to the above security measures.

Third-Party Services

From time to time, our customers might employ a third party (such as but not limited to a social media professional or content writer) whose services involve modifications to the website. 

CAUSELABS WEBSITE MANAGEMENT SERVICES DO NOT COVER WORK NECESSARY DUE TO ACTIONS PERFORMED BY A THIRD PARTY. SHOULD OUR SERVICES BE NECESSARY DUE TO ANY WORK PERFORMED BY A THIRD PARTY, THESE SERVICES ARE BILLABLE AT OUR CURRENT HOURLY RATE. 

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO services are not included as part of our Website Management Services unless explicitly described in the terms of the related Service Agreement. Your website’s ranking and placement on search engines depend on a myriad of factors. CAUSELABS DOES NOT GUARANTEE RANKING OR PLACEMENT ON ANY SEARCH ENGINE.

Email Deliverability 

Your website sends emails when certain events occur, such as but not limited to the completion of a contact form, the sale of a product, or the update/reset of a user’s password (“Transactional Emails”). Transactional Emails that are automatically generated by the WordPress system may often be flagged as spam (or not delivered at all) by email providers like Google/Gmail, Microsoft, Yahoo, and others.

SINCE WE CANNOT CONTROL THE RECEIPT OF EMAILS, WE CANNOT BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY EMAILS THAT ARE NOT DELIVERED FOR ANY REASON.

IT IS THE CUSTOMER’S RESPONSIBILITY TO REGULARLY CHECK SPAM FOLDERS, WEBSITE FORM MANAGERS, AND ORDER INTERFACES FOR ANY NOTIFICATIONS THAT WERE NOT DELIVERED.

Email Service

CAUSELABS DOES NOT PROVIDE OR SUPPORT EMAIL SERVICE. We recommend consulting with an IT Professional about implementing professional email service from a reliable vendor.

Domain Names

Registering a domain name for your website and paying the accompanying registration fee is your responsibility. We can assist in the process of registration and connecting your domain name to the website if you desire.

It is your responsibility to ensure that the credit card the domain registrar has on file for your domain registration is current for rebilling.

CAUSELABS IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE SUSPENSION OR LOSS OF DOMAIN NAMES FOR ANY REASON. If you lose access to your domain name through non-payment, suspension, or any other reason, your website will no longer be accessible or viewable by the public. Work needed as a result of domain expiration is billable at our Current Hourly Rate.

Website Accessibility and Compliance

Customer shall inform CauseLabs of any specific legal, regulatory, or accessibility requirements that may apply to the Customer’s website, including but not limited to compliance with disability accessibility standards or other regulations such as but not limited to HIPAA and FERPA regulations. 

Unless expressly stipulated in the applicable Service Agreement, CauseLabs makes no representations or warranties regarding the website’s compliance with any such requirements or regulations. Any guarantees to meet compliance for current accessibility standards or other regulations must be explicitly detailed and agreed upon as part of the applicable Service Agreement.

AI Generated Content

At times, we may utilize text, images, code, or other information generated by Artificial Intelligence systems (collectively, the “AI-Generated Content”). If we elect to use AI-Generated Content, we will do so in compliance with applicable laws, regulations, and ethical guidelines and will obtain any necessary permissions or licenses for the use of such content on Customer’s website.

Should the Customer supply any AI-Generated Content for inclusion on the website, the Customer shall ensure that such content complies with all applicable laws, regulations, and ethical guidelines and shall obtain and provide evidence of all necessary permissions, licenses, and consents required for the use of the AI-Generated Content.

Legal Pages and Privacy Requirements

Depending on the nature of your site and your location, legal pages such as Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, Return Policy, etc., may be mandated by government entities, vendors, or licensing agencies.

CUSTOMER ACKNOWLEDGES AND AGREES THAT IT IS THE CUSTOMER’S SOLE RESPONSIBILITY TO DETERMINE WHETHER SUCH PAGES ARE REQUIRED.

We have informed you that applicable (state, national, or international) law may require your website to have a Privacy Policy with specific disclosures. We are not lawyers, we do not develop Privacy Policies as a service, and we are not responsible for your business complying with any applicable privacy laws.

It is strongly advised that you consult an attorney to determine your responsibilities in this matter. If you need assistance in linking legal pages, we have a relationship with a third-party Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions generator service, Termageddon, and we can assist you with linking those policies to your website. You are under no obligation to utilize Termageddon, but it is the service that we use on our own websites, have a business relationship with, and recommend. Please note, should you choose to use Termageddon’s services, your relationship will be directly with them, governed solely by their Privacy Policy and Terms of Service.

If we provide any standardized privacy policies and terms of use, we expressly do not guarantee that this language complies with any governing body’s requirements. 

YOU ARE HEREBY INFORMED, AND YOU ACKNOWLEDGE, THAT YOU SHOULD HAVE ANY STANDARDIZED LANGUAGE REVIEWED BY YOUR ATTORNEY.

CUSTOMER FURTHER ACKNOWLEDGES AND AGREES THAT IT IS THE YOUR SOLE RESPONSIBILITY TO INFORM US IF YOUR WEBSITE MUST BE COMPLIANT WITH ANY REGULATORY BODY, SUCH AS BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE EU’S GENERAL DATA PROTECTION REGULATION (GDPR) OR THE CALIFORNIA ONLINE PRIVACY PROTECTION ACT (CALOPPA).

CauseLabs bears no responsibility for maintaining compliance with these, or any other regulations or laws, unless explicitly detailed and agreed upon as part of the applicable Service Agreement.