Website hosting and domain agreement template

Website Hosting and Domain Agreement

Parties: Provider · Customer

1. Purpose

This agreement sets out the terms on which the Provider hosts the Customer’s website and, where stated below, registers and manages its domain name. The Customer uses the service for its own business or personal project and is responsible for what it publishes.

2. The hosting service

The Provider hosts the Customer’s website on servers it operates or rents and provides the following:

[[Describe the services and deliverables]]

Plan and limits: [[Plan name]], with [[10]] GB of storage, [[100]] GB of data transfer per month and [[5]] email accounts. Use above the limits is charged at the rates in the price schedule, or the Customer moves to the matching plan.

Server location: [[Country or region of the servers]]. The Provider may move the website to other servers of at least the same standard and tells the Customer in advance if the move needs action from the Customer.

3. Domain names

Domain name: [[Domain name]]

Where the price schedule includes domain registration, the Provider registers and renews the domain name through a registrar as the Customer’s agent, with the Customer entered as the registrant (the holder). The domain name belongs to the Customer, subject to the rules of the registry and the registrar, which the Customer accepts.

The Customer gives correct contact details and keeps them up to date. The Provider does not promise that a domain name is available or that a registration will be approved or kept; registry rules, trade mark disputes and similar matters are outside its control.

The Customer pays the registration and renewal fees stated in the price schedule. A domain name is renewed unless the Customer tells the Provider at least [[30]] days before the renewal date that it should not be. On request, and once all fees are paid, the Provider releases the domain name to the registrar the Customer chooses within [[7]] days, as far as the registry rules allow.

4. Customer content

The website, files, databases, emails and other material that the Customer or its users put on the Provider’s servers (the content) remain the Customer’s. The Customer gives the Provider the right to store, copy and transmit the content as far as needed to provide the service.

The Customer is responsible for the content, for having the right to publish it and for what its users do. The Provider does not check the content in advance but may act as the clause on suspension describes.

5. Acceptable use

The Customer uses the service only lawfully. It does not publish or send unlawful or harmful content, unsolicited bulk messages, malware or material that infringes the rights of others; does not use the servers to attack other systems or to run services that overload the shared servers; and does not resell the service unless the plan allows it.

The Customer keeps its software, plug-ins and passwords up to date and secure.

[[Further rules of use, if any]]

6. Availability and maintenance

The Provider aims to keep the website available [[99.5]]% of the time per calendar month, measured at the Provider’s servers and excluding announced maintenance, faults of the Customer’s own software or internet connection, attacks the Provider could not reasonably prevent and events beyond its reasonable control. This target is what the Provider works towards, not a promise of uninterrupted availability.

The Provider announces planned maintenance that will interrupt the website at least [[48]] hours in advance and places it outside usual business hours where practicable. Urgent security maintenance may be done without notice.

7. Backups and security

The Provider makes backups of the Customer’s content [[daily / weekly]] and keeps them for [[14]] days, for use if its own systems fail. They are a safeguard, not an archive; the Customer keeps its own copies of what it cannot afford to lose. A restore requested by the Customer [[is included / is charged at the rate in the price schedule]].

The Provider protects the servers with appropriate technical and organisational measures, such as security updates, access controls and monitoring, and tells the Customer without undue delay if it finds that the Customer’s content was accessed without authorisation. The Customer keeps its logins secret and tells the Provider at once if it suspects they are compromised.

8. Fees and payment

The Customer pays the fees shown in the price schedule of this contract: hosting fees [[monthly / yearly]] in advance and domain fees when they fall due, on the payment terms stated in it. Fees for a period already started are not refunded except where this agreement says so.

The Provider may change the fees for a renewal period by notifying the Customer at least [[60]] days before it starts; the Customer may then end the agreement at the end of the current period.

Where taxes apply, they are added to the fees.

9. Support

The Provider offers support by [[email / support portal]] on [[business days]] from [[09:00]] to [[18:00]] in the time zone of [[City]], and aims to answer within [[1]] business day. Support covers the hosting service and the management of the domain name, not the design, content or software of the website unless the price schedule says so.

10. Suspension

The Provider may suspend the website, in whole or in part, if a payment is more than [[14]] days late, if the content or its use breaches the rules of use or the law, if a court or authority orders it, or if the website threatens the security or stability of the servers.

Except in an emergency, the Provider warns the Customer first and gives it a reasonable time to put things right.

The website is restored when the cause has been removed. Fees continue to run during a suspension caused by the Customer.

11. Term, renewal and termination

This agreement starts on the effective date and runs for [[12]] months. It renews for further periods of the same length unless either party gives notice in writing or in electronic form at least [[30]] days before the end of a period.

Either party may end it by notice with immediate effect if the other party seriously breaches it and does not remedy the breach within [[14]] days of being asked to.

When the agreement ends, the Provider keeps the content available for [[30]] days so that the Customer can copy it, then deletes it, except for copies it must keep by law, which stay confidential. Domain names are handled as the clause on domain names says. Fees already paid for the remaining period are refunded only if the Provider ended the agreement without the Customer being in breach.

12. Personal data

Where the website or its email accounts hold personal data, the Customer decides why and how that data is used, and the Provider handles it only to provide the service and on the Customer’s instructions. The Provider keeps it secure as the clause on backups and security says, uses helpers only under equivalent duties and deletes it as the clause on term, renewal and termination says.

Where the law that applies to the parties requires a data processing agreement, the parties sign one, and it then prevails over this clause as far as personal data is concerned.

13. Liability

The Provider provides the service with reasonable care and skill; it does not warrant that the service is free of all errors, that the website will reach a particular number of visitors or that it will rank in search results.

Except for intent, gross negligence, personal injury or where the law does not allow a limitation, each party’s total liability under this agreement is limited to the fees paid or payable under it in the [[12]] months before the claim, and neither party is liable for lost profits, for lost data the Customer could have backed up, or for indirect damage. This does not limit the Customer’s duty to pay the fees.

14. Notices and entire agreement

Notices under this agreement are given in writing or by email to the addresses stated for the parties, or to another address a party has notified.

This contract, including its price schedule, is the entire agreement between the parties on its subject. Amendments are valid only if both parties agree to them in writing or in electronic form.

15. Governing law and disputes

This agreement is governed by the law stated under Governing law. The parties will first try to settle any dispute in good faith. Otherwise the courts stated under Jurisdiction decide, unless mandatory law provides otherwise.

Payment terms

Hosting fees in advance for each [[month / year]] and domain fees when they fall due, within [[14]] days of receiving the invoice, by bank transfer to the account stated on the invoice.

Governing law

[[Country or state whose law applies]]

Jurisdiction

[[Courts that decide disputes, e.g. the courts of your city]]