WEB HOSTING & MANAGED SERVICES

1. FINANCIAL OBLIGATIONS, BILLING & WORK SCOPE

1.1 Billing Cycle & Due Dates: All recurring monthly hosting and maintenance fees are invoiced in advance and are due in full on the first (1st) day of each calendar month.

1.2 Late Penalties & Arrears: Invoices remaining unpaid thirty (30) calendar days past the due date will automatically accrue interest at a rate of 2.0% per month (26.82% per annum), compounded monthly, calculated from the original due date until fully paid.

1.3 Service Suspension: Accounts reaching ninety (90) calendar days past due will face immediate service suspension. The website, DNS routing (if managed by Cree IT), associated web applications, and server instances will be taken offline without further notice.

1.4 Reconnection Fee: Restoration of suspended services requires settlement of the entire outstanding balance plus a non-negotiable Reconnection Fee equivalent to two (2) hours of technical labour at Cree IT’s Standard Hourly Rate. Services will not be provisioned or brought back online until funds clear.

1.5 Standard Hourly Rate & Out-of-Scope Work: Any technical request, design alteration, page addition, content reformatting, emergency intervention, or administrative support outside the explicit inclusions of the Client’s active subscription tier will be billed as Out-of-Scope work in accordance with the current Cree IT Pricing and Fee Policy.

1.6 Minimum Billing Increments: Out-of-scope work is subject to a strict minimum charge of thirty (30) minutes. Work exceeding the initial 30 minutes is billed in fifteen (15) minute increments thereafter.

 

2. SUPPORT PROTOCOLS & BOUNDARY ENFORCEMENT

2.1 Authorised Support Channel: All support inquiries, change requests, technical tickets, and formal notices must be submitted exclusively in writing to [email protected].

2.2 Support Boundaries & Triage: Cree IT personnel do not accept, log, or action service requests submitted via SMS, personal phone numbers, instant messaging apps, or social media platforms. Unofficial messages will be discarded without acknowledgment. Turnaround and SLA response clocks begin only once a formal ticket is logged via the designated email channel.

2.3 Standard Operational Hours: Standard operations run Monday through Friday, 08:30 to 17:00 Mountain Time (MT), excluding statutory holidays in the Northwest Territories.

 

3. INFRASTRUCTURE, UPTIME & FORCE MAJEURE (NORTHERN CLAUSE)

3.1 Northern Infrastructure Realities (Force Majeure): Cree IT operates within the Northwest Territories. Cree IT is explicitly held harmless and relieved of liability for service interruptions, degraded performance, latency, or server downtime resulting from:

• Extreme sub-Arctic or Arctic weather conditions and freeze-thaw cycles;

• Regional power grid failures, utility blackouts, brownouts, or surges;

• Third-party telecommunications infrastructure, transport-layer line cuts, satellite degradation, upstream ISP disruptions, or backhaul fiber severed outside Cree IT’s direct local control.

3.2 Response Times vs. Resolution Times: Stated SLA metrics define initial Response Time (time to triage and acknowledge by a qualified engineer). Resolution times depend on the complexity of the fault and the stability of underlying upstream provider services.

3.3 Strict Limitation of Liability: For any unplanned service outage within Cree IT’s direct infrastructure control lasting longer than forty-eight (48) consecutive hours, Cree IT’s sole financial liability to the Client is strictly capped at a credit or refund of that specific Client’s monthly hosting fee for that single billing cycle.

3.4 Exclusion of Consequential Damages: Under no circumstances will Cree IT, its directors, officers, or contractors be liable for any indirect, punitive, incidental, or consequential damages, including loss of business profits, customer leads, business interruption, goodwill, or third-party claims arising from server downtime or data loss.

 

4. ACCEPTABLE USE & SECURITY POLICY

4.1 Prohibited Content & Behavior: The Client agrees not to upload, store, display, or distribute content that:

• Facilitates financial fraud, deceptive practices, or illegal gambling;

• Displays astroturfed, fabricated, or intentionally misleading customer reviews;

• Infringes on third-party intellectual property, copyrights, trademarks, or trade secrets;

• Distributes malware, phishing scripts, unauthenticated mail relays, or unlicensed software.

4.2 Enforcement & Remediation: Upon discovery of an Acceptable Use violation, Cree IT will issue a formal written notice. The Client must remediate or remove the non-compliant material within five (5) calendar days. Failure to comply, or clear instances of malicious cyber threats, will result in immediate termination of hosting services without refund.

 

5. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY & DOMAIN MANAGEMENT

5.1 Client Assets: The Client retains full ownership of their pre-existing intellectual property, proprietary logos, supplied marketing copy, brand assets, and raw photography delivered to Cree IT.

5.2 Cree IT Design, Layout & Code Assets: Cree IT retains exclusive ownership of all underlying source code, custom styling sheets (CSS), JavaScript routines, bespoke database structures, custom server configurations, backend logic, and layout architectures created by Cree IT. The Client is granted a non-transferable, revocable license to display the compiled website strictly while an active hosting agreement with Cree IT remains in good standing.

5.3 Domain Registration & Registrar Control:

The Client must register and maintain legal ownership of their own top-level domains (.ca, .com, .org, etc.) through an accredited registrar.

Cree IT will provide DNS record routing, nameserver mapping, and domain connectivity assistance exclusively for Clients on Tier 2 and Tier 3 service tiers. Cree IT will not pay registry renewal fees or hold domain legal title on behalf of Clients.

 

6. CANCELLATION, OFFBOARDING & DATA RETENTION

6.1 Contract Cancellation: Either party may terminate monthly hosting by providing thirty (30) calendar days’ written notice to [email protected].

6.2 No Mid-Month Prorating: Monthly hosting fees are non-refundable. Cancellations taking effect mid-cycle remain billable through the final day of that billing month.

6.3 Offboarding Deliverables & Scope: Cree IT does not package, transfer, export, or deploy fully functional proprietary environments to third-party hosts. Upon cancellation, the Client’s offboarding package consists exclusively of:

• An export file (SQL dump) containing raw database tables;

• An archive containing original media uploads (Client images and raw copy).

6.4 Offboarding Fee: Extraction, verification, and provision of the data package requires a mandatory offboarding fee covering two (2) hours of technical labour at Cree IT’s Standard Hourly Rate. Data archives will not be generated or released until this fee and all outstanding invoice balances are cleared.

6.5 Data Purge Policy: Client data and backup archives will be retained on Cree IT infrastructure for exactly thirty (30) calendar days following the effective cancellation date. On Day 31, all customer virtual machines, databases, files, and server images will be permanently and securely scrubbed.

 

7. SERVICE TIERS & DELIVERABLES

Service Feature	Tier 1: Static Sovereign	Tier 2: Essential Managed	Tier 3: Premium Concierge
Primary Use Case	Digital Card / Informational	Dynamic / Commercial Site	High-Touch / Content Driven
Core Architecture	Pure Static HTML/CSS/JS	Dynamic CMS / DB Driven	Dynamic CMS / DB Driven
Direct Backend Server Access	No (Strictly Prohibited)	No (Strictly Prohibited)	No (Strictly Prohibited)
Database & Contact Form Support	No	Yes	Yes
Software Patching & Core Updates	N/A (Static Build)	Yes (Automated & Managed)	Yes (Automated & Managed)
Local Regional Backups	Git/Static Repo Archive	Yes (Automated Local Pool)	Yes (Automated Local Pool)
Domain Management / DNS Support	No (Client Manages DNS)	Yes	Yes
Included Content Maintenance	None (All changes billed)	1 Image Update / Month	Weekly Blog/News Post + Seasonal Layout Refresh
Client Content Requirements	Client supplies all text/photos	Client supplies raw photo files	Client supplies text outlines/facts/media
Critical Failure Response Time	1 Business Day	1 Hour (Biz Hours) / 2 Hours (After)	1 Hour (Biz Hours) / 2 Hours (After)
Standard Turnaround (Changes)	24 Hours (Billed hourly)	24 Hours (Included item / balance billed)	24 Hours (Included items)

Tier 1: Static Sovereign Hosting

Scope: Tailored for lightweight informational presences requiring zero administrative overhead and high resilience.

Inclusions: Hosting of compiled, static website assets on local high-reliability infrastructure; 1 Business Day response time for critical failures.

Exclusions: Dynamic databases, automated PHP/backend execution, dynamic form handling, free content updates, DNS management assistance, or access to server root/cPanel/SSH environments.

Tier 2: Essential Managed Hosting

Scope: Tailored for growing commercial businesses requiring functional interactivity, dynamic forms, and routine backend maintenance.

Inclusions: Dynamic web architecture hosting; active core, theme, and plugin maintenance; daily/weekly automated local infrastructure backups; DNS record management; one (1) image swap per billing month (client-supplied); 1-hour critical response time during business hours (2-hour after hours).

Exclusions: Backend shell/root/administrative code access; complimentary layout redesigns, page additions, structural overhauls, or copywriting services.

Tier 3: Premium Concierge Hosting

Scope: Full-service operational hosting and regular content deployment for active commercial brands.

Inclusions: All Tier 2 infrastructure management, patching, security, and backup frameworks; formatting, layout, and publication of one (1) weekly blog or news update (client supplies core notes/text); seasonal graphic and structural text tweaks; priority 1-hour business hours / 2-hour after-hours critical response; 24-hour turnaround for queued requests.

Exclusions: Direct backend/server access; net-new content ghostwriting from scratch (Client must supply the base facts, core draft, and primary media).

 

8. DISPUTE RESOLUTION & GOVERNING LAW

8.1 Governing Jurisdiction: This Agreement, its interpretation, and all operational disputes arising out of it are governed exclusively by the laws of the Northwest Territories and the federal laws of Canada applicable therein.

8.2 Venue: The parties submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts located within the Northwest Territories for the resolution of any legal proceedings.

8.3 Severability: If any provision of this Agreement is held to be invalid or unenforceable by a court of competent jurisdiction, the remaining terms will remain in full force and effect.

 

END OF POLICY