Modification
IceBlueHost reserves the right to add, delete or modify any provision of this policy at any time without notice. You agree to be bound by any changes IceBlueHost may reasonably make to this agreement when such changes are made. If you have purchased services or software from IceBlueHost, the term of this agreement shall continue in full force and effect as long as you take advantage of and use the software or services that we provide. You can find the latest update time at the bottom of this page.
Satisfaction Guaranteed
30 Day Guarantee Statement for Shared and Reseller Hosting Accounts
If for any reason you are unhappy with the services you receive from IceBlueHost during the first 30 days of service, you may request in writing via email or by the cancellation form within your client area that your services be discontinued, at which time you will receive a full refund. You must also state a detailed reason as to why you are cancelling (as we request for any cancellation, no matter the time frame). We are the sole arbiter as to if your reason is a valid reason and if all possible steps were taken on your side and on ours to correct the situation causing the interest to cancel.
Please note that in order to take advantage of the 30 Day Money Back Guarantee, you must have used less than 50% of your available bandwidth.
Free offers which have been included with the accounts (such as, but not limited to: domain name, SSL certificate, WHMCS license, ...) will be deducted from the refund.
No refunds of any kind will be given if the account in question has violated our Terms of Service prior to the cancellation request.
New Accounts
All new shared and reseller hosting accounts purchased on our order page are set up instantly by our system, after receival of payment and an automated online fraud check. You will receive several emails including login details after your purchase, as well as the login details for your client area. Due to unforeseen complications with various mail servers and any connection problems between your ISP and IceBlueHost, this process may sometimes be delayed.
Please note that, even though the above mentioned accounts are set up automatically, we additionally perform manual fraud checks on all newly ordered accounts, and may need to suspend accounts which do not pass these checks.
Domain Names and Domain Registrations
In order for your domain name to point to the IceBlueHost server your new account is located on, you must change your DNS (Domain Name Servers) at your registrar. These DNS are located in your welcome email and they are defined in a pair (primary- ns*.icebluehost.com and secondary- ns*.icebluehost.com). Please note: Our DNS are unique to each server so if you sign up and then a few months later open another account, you might not be using the same DNS as before.
Please be aware that the above process is not known as a domain transfer. A domain transfer is if you want to physically transfer your domain to IceBlueHost and away from your original registrar. You will need to contact us or submit a support ticket to initiate a domain transfer.
IceBlueHost will take necessary steps to register domain names on behalf of the client when requested. However, clients are responsible for renewing their domain names. IceBlueHost does not take responsibility for failing to renew domain names. If your domain name was registered via our company, you must check and take appropriate actions to renew a domain that is about to expire. If you have any questions at all about DNS changes or domain names in general, please open a support ticket.
Content
IceBlueHost believes in freedom of speech. However, any content (written, visual, or implied) in the following areas will not be tolerated and is grounds for immediate suspension of service (in most cases customer will be allowed a zip file of their account): racism or prejudice due to colour, creed, or belief; any violent/malicious/obscene content written, visual or implied. We will not tolerate any type of hate site including terrorist related websites on our network. If we receive notice that there is such a hate site hosted within our network, the customer hosting the material will be notified immediately. They are required to remove the content within a certain timeframe or will face account suspension and/or termination.
We prefer that you self-govern your content and remain responsible and all-knowing of what your website publically provides. Even if other users have access to your account, you are responsible for their actions. The resources and time needed to govern our servers by checking each website individualy, which have growing and evolving content, is impossible. However, if IceBlueHost is made aware of any questionable content on a IceBlueHost-hosted site, we will address the concerns immediately and directly with you to seek an amiable resolution. If any person contacts us about content they have found on a IceBlueHost server that copyrights their own material or that they wish to be removed, we require a proper written notice to begin investigation.
Content Liabilities
IceBlueHost makes no endorsement, claims, or promises regarding the services offered by our customers and will not be held liable for any disputes or claims against said customers. In no event shall IceBlueHost be liable for any direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, special and exemplary damages, or any damages whatsoever, arising from the use or performance of a customer web site or from any information, services or products provided through a customer web site. If there is questionable content on any server in our network, we will not take any action against any material or action until the website is brought to our attention by contacting our abuse department.
Payments and Agreement to Pay
As consideration for the software or services purchased by you and provided to you by IceBlueHost, you agree to pay IceBlueHost at the time of your order. All fees are due immediately and are non-refundable unless otherwise expressly noted, even if your services are suspended, terminated, or transferred prior to the end of the services term. IceBlueHost expressly reserves the right to modify pricing through email notification and/or notice on its web site. You may make payment by providing either a valid credit card or PayPal email address.
All hosting accounts, including VPS and dedicated servers, are billed at the same anniversary date as when you signed up, be it monthly, quarterly, annually or biennially.
If for any reason, IceBlueHost is unable to charge your payment method for the full amount owed, or if IceBlueHost is charged a penalty for any fee it previously charged to your payment method (such as a charge back dispute), you agree that IceBlueHost may peruse all available remedies in order to obtain payment. You agree that among the remedies IceBlueHost may peruse in order to effect payment, shall include but will not be limited to, immediate cancellation without notice to you of any domain names or services registered or renewed on your behalf.
You agree that you are solely liable for arranging that your services are renewed, and that IceBlueHost shall not be liable to you or any third party if it is unable to charge your payment method in order to renew your services. You also agree that you are liable for all services that have been rendered on your behalf until a termination of service has been officially received by the accountholder for services.
Late Payments
If at any time, your hosting payments become past due, you will receive notifications via email (3 notifications in total, to the most recently updated email address on file within your client area) with instructions on rectifying the situation. Please note that IceBlueHost holds the right to deny access to and/or de-activate accounts hosted on our servers of which have unpaid past due balances.
All accounts 5 days past due will be assessed a 25% late fee, with a minimum of € 5.00 EUR, which will be added to the overdue invoice.
Accounts and servers will get automatically suspended of service if payment for hosting is not received 7 days after the due payment date.
If an account holder submits a bank assisted dispute for services rendered, their hosting account will be de-activated within 48 hours if the payment issue has not been recovered. A € 25.00 EUR charge back fee will be added to the amount disputed by the customer.
We only accept credit cards, PaypPal or bank transfer for payment of services. In the event that your payment is not made and we are unable to contact you, then the previously mentioned fees to enable your account shall apply. Installments will incur for the entire duration services are rendered and you remain subscribed to until you submit proper cancellation of the account.
Any debt not paid 60 days after the due date will be forwarded to an outside collections agency for proper collection. At that time, the account holder will incur a € 25.00 EUR collection fee added to the balance previously due.
Please address any questions regarding payments to our billing department by opening a ticket in our support area.
Overage Charges
Our service plans are designed to accommodate the majority of usage scenarios given the needs of our customers. However, your usage may vary and require additional allocations, specifically in the areas of storage and traffic. We will never charge you automatically if your account requires more resources. You must keep your email address updated within your cPanel and client area, so that you may receive an email when your account reaches certain limits determined solely by our system, ie. bandwidth exceedment warning at 80% at which time you may contact us to purchase a higher transfer quota for your account. If you do not contact us, the system will suspend your site if your allotments exceed.
Cancellations
If you wish to cancel your services, you must notify us at least seven (7) business days prior to your renewal date (i.e. before you receive the renewal invoice). If your notice of cancellation is not received within this time frame, you will be liable for payment of the proceeding installment period and hereby agree to complete payment as invoiced accordingly. You may cancel by sending a support ticket or by using the cancellation form within your client area.
Ignoring and not paying the invoices is not a valid reason for cancellation. Invoices will continue to be due, even if this account has been suspended and terminated due to previously unpaid invoices, and will be forwarded to a collections agency if necessary.
If you cancel your account and your payments still continue to recur for any reason such as 1) by fault of IceBlueHost staff 2) by fault of the credit card processor 3) by fault of any other payment collection company, we are to be held free of liability for any overdraft fees that are issued by your financial institution.
Refunds/Account Termination
If, for any reason, IceBlueHost fails to deliver said services to you, a prorated refund will be issued. No refunds will be issued if abuse of our Terms of Service forces IceBlueHost to suspend or terminate your services prematurely. In the event you request account cancellation, once your service has been cancelled, your account will be suspended from use. It will then be deleted within 30 days. Cancellations of accounts pre-paid for on a monthly basis will not receive a refund for the remainder of the billing period. Cancellations of accounts pre-paid on a yearly basis will only receive a pro-rated refund based on the monthly rate of the same hosting plan. All add-on service or domain payments are non-refundable as they are included only during the life of the hosting plan. If for any other reason your account becomes suspended and remains suspended it will be deleted after a 30-day period.
Bandwidth Usage Policy
All leased dedicated server plans include an allocated continuous data transfer rate within a 30-day calendar month. If your monthly usage exceeds the allocated bandwidth transfer rate within your 30 day billing cycle, you will be billed for overages exceeding your allocated limit, based on 95th percentile metering. In accordance to these terms of service, you are liable and agree to pay such overages at the rate of € 40.00 per 1 Mbps of bandwidth.
If you anticipate high bandwidth usage, please contact our sales department via our support center for further information on the availability of other plans with higher bandwidth allocations for lower rates.
Note: The rate of 1 Mbps of continuous data transfer in a 30 day period is aproximately 320 GB of bandwidth.
Acceptable Use
Activity which results in the suspension or deactivation of an account will result in a forfeiture of all fees paid. Complaints made regarding abuses of an account will be investigated and if found guilty will be grounds for immediate suspension.
To report suspected abuses or any violations of these policies, please contact our abuse department by submitting a support ticket or via our contact form.
IceBlueHost servers may be used for lawful purposes only. Transmission, storage, or distribution of any information, data or material in violation of any applicable law or regulation is prohibited. This includes, but is not limited to: copyrighted material, trademark, trade secret or other intellectual property right used without proper authorization, prescription drug sales, and material that is obscene, defamatory, constitutes an illegal threat, or violates export control laws. Examples of non-acceptable content or links: Pirated software, Hackers programmes or archives, Warez sites, MP3, and IRC bots. The subscriber to IceBlueHost service agrees to indemnify and hold harmless IceBlueHost from any claims resulting from the use of the service that damages the subscriber or any other party.
No online pharmacies are allowed on our network.
Adult Content
Legal adult content is allowed on our servers, but on a case per case basis. Pornography and hardcore adult content are not allowed on shared servers. Please contact the sales department prior to signing up if you are unsure.
Security
Violations of system or network security are prohibited, and may result in criminal and civil liability. Examples include, but are not limited to the following: unauthorized access, use, probe, or scan of a systems security or authentication measures, data or traffic. Interference with service to any user, host or network including, without limitation, mail bombing, flooding, deliberate attempts to overload a system and broadcast attacks. Forging of any TCP-IP packet header or any part of the header information in an email or a newsgroup posting.
Server Resource Usage
Any website that uses a high amount of server resources (such as, but not limited to: CPU time, memory usage, and network resources) will be given an option of either upgrading to a dedicated server / semi-dedicated server (which depends on the resource needed) or reducing the resource used to an acceptable level. IceBlueHost shall be the sole arbiter of what is considered to be a high server usage level.
Proxies & Torrents
We do not allow proxy servers or scripts, torrent trackers or torrent clients to be run from our shared hosting servers.
Chat Rooms
IceBlueHost does not provide nor allow chat rooms on shared hosting environments. You may elect for a Dedicated Server or VPS to run a chat room efficiently.
Background Running Programmes
IceBlueHost does not allow background Daemons such as IRC bots; eggdrop; BitchX; XiRCON; and any other program that interferes with normal server operation.
IRC
IceBlueHost does not allow IRC servers, IRC bots, or IRC shells to be operated on our servers.
Backups
IceBlueHost performs weekly automated system backups on all shared servers to ensure critical files are never lost in case of a hardware failure. However, IceBlueHost is NOT responsible for lost data, time, income or any other resource due to faulty backups or non-existent backups. Please always backup your own data for redundancy. You may opt to backup your data to a secondary account or dedicated backup account. Please contact the sales department for more information on this.
Client Responsibility
The client is responsible for all activity originating from the account unless proven to be a victim of outside hacking or address forgery. The client is responsible for securing their username/password. The client assumes responsibility for all material on their site that may be put on by a third party (such as the usage of Free For All links pages). Use of IceBlueHost's service requires a certain level of knowledge in the use of Internet languages, protocols, and software. This level of knowledge varies depending on the anticipated use and desired content of the web space by the client. The following examples are offered: Web Publishing: requires knowledge of HTML, properly locating and linking documents, FTPing Web contents, Graphics, text, sound, image mapping, etc. FrontPage web publishing: knowledge of the FrontPage tools as well as Telnet and FTP understanding and capability. CGI-Scripts: requires a knowledge of the UNIX environment, TAR & GUNZIP commands, Perl, C Shell scripts, permissions, etc. Mail: a use of mail clients to receive and send mail, etc. The client agrees that he or she has the necessary knowledge to create and maintain their web space. Client agrees that it is not the responsibility of IceBlueHost to provide this knowledge or support outside matter specific to IceBlueHost servers.
UCE (Unsolicited Commerce Email) - SPAM
Spamming, or the sending of mass unsolicited email, from or through a IceBlueHost server or using an email address that is maintained on a IceBlueHost machine is STRICTLY prohibited. IceBlueHost will be the sole arbiter as to what constitutes a violation of this provision. If you engage in any of the foregoing activities using the service of another ISP or IPP, but channeling activities through a IceBlueHost server as a mail drop for responses, you are in violation. Violators will be assessed a minimum of € 50.00 EUR fine and will face an immediate suspension.
Server Abuse
Any attempts to undermine or cause harm to a IceBlueHost server or customer of IceBlueHost is strictly prohibited.
Any sub-networks of IceBlueHost and dedicated servers must adhere to the above policies. The failure to meet or follow any of the above guidelines are grounds for account deactivation. We reserve the right to remove any account without prior notice.
Actions Taken by IceBlueHost
When IceBlueHost becomes aware of an alleged abuse of its servers, IceBlueHost will initiate an investigation. During the investigation, IceBlueHost may restrict a customer's access in order to prevent further potentially unauthorized activity. Depending on the severity of the violation, IceBlueHost may, at its sole discretion, restrict, suspend, or terminate a customer's web hosting account and/or pursue other civil remedies. If such violation is a criminal offense, IceBlueHost will notify the appropriate law enforcement authorities of such violation.
IceBlueHost does not issue credits for outages incurred through service disablement resulting from any above mentioned violations.
IceBlueHost customers agree to indemnify and hold harmless IceBlueHost from any claims resulting from the use of our services that damages them or any other party. The IceBlueHost service is provided on an as is, as available basis without warranties of any kind, either express or implied, including, but not limited to, warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose or non-infringement. IceBlueHost expressly disclaims any representation or warranty that the IceBlueHost service will be error-free, secure or uninterrupted. No oral advice or written information given by IceBlueHost, its employees, licensors or the like, will create a warranty; nor may you rely on any such information or advice. IceBlueHost and its partners and suppliers will not be liable for any cost or damage arising either directly or indirectly from any transaction or use of the service.
Resource Abuse
Any website on our shared servers that uses a high amount of server resources (CPU, memory usage, and network resources) will be given an option to pay for a dedicated server or VPS. The abuse and misuse of shared system resources is a serious problem. Accounts on a shared server must share resources with other users so we must limit how much of the CPU and memory that can be used by any one account.
In all fairness, we cannot allow one or two clients to use all of the system resources on a shared machine and have all other clients suffer because of it. Excessive CPU & memory usage by one or more clients causes extreme slowness in all areas: MySQL, Email, HTTP and more. If the CPU & memory usage by a few clients gets out of hand, all sites hosted on the machine will return errors and not be accessible in any way.
Average Server Resource Limits
Memory usage may not exceed 10% per domain/file/application
CPU usage may not exceed 20% per domain/file/application
Apache connections may not exceed 30 connections
25 MySQL maximum user connections allowed
300 emails per hour, per domain
There are special exceptions to these rules to be determined at the time we discover abuse. There are different combinations of usage that can create problems and other special cases. At any given time a server is unstable and an account is found to be the cause, we reserve the right to suspend the account to keep the server online and operating normally. If the usage is an increasing trend, we recommend the user invest in a dedicated server so the website can grow at a normal rate without restriction.
Suspensions
In the event your website has been suspended for resource abuse (abuse that cannot be resolved by removing/changing a script, etc.) and you do not wish to upgrade to a dedicated server to accommodate your site needs, we will only release the suspension within 24-48 hours. This is to ensure the CPU intensive site slows down in traffic to avoid further damage and problems. A backup will then be provided of your files or you will be allowed FTP/cPanel access for a certain time period. Any questions about our abuse policy may be answered by opening a ticket with our abuse division.
Last updated: May 15, 2011
