PLEASE READ THESE TERMS OF USE CAREFULLY BEFORE USING OUR SITE
ThinkTravel.info is a website run by Somerset Council. For the purposes of these terms of use, references to 'Somerset Council', 'ThinkTravel', 'ThinkTravel.info', 'we', ‘our’ and ‘us’ are made interchangeably to refer to Somerset Council.
By using our site you accept these terms
By using our site, you confirm that you accept these terms of use and that you agree to comply with them.
If you do not agree to these terms, you must not use our site.
You are also responsible for ensuring that all persons who access our site through your internet connection are aware of these terms of use and that they comply with them.
We may suspend or withdraw our site
Our site is made available free of charge.
We do not guarantee that our site, or any content on it, will always be available or be uninterrupted. We may suspend or withdraw or restrict the availability of all or any part of our site for business and operational reasons.
Our responsibility for loss or damage suffered by you
We make reasonable efforts to keep the information on our site up-to-date, however we make no representations, warranties or guarantees, whether express or implied, that the content on our site is free from errors.
The Noticeboard section of our website contains contributions and/or information posted and/or uploaded by other users of the site. Such contributions and information have not been verified or approved by us. The views expressed by other users on our site do not represent our views or values.
If you are a consumer user:
Please note that we only provide our site for domestic and private use. You agree not to use our site for any commercial or business purposes, and we have no liability to you for any loss of profit, loss of business, business interruption, or loss of business opportunity.
If you are a business user:
We exclude all implied conditions, warranties, representations or other terms that may apply to our site or any content on it.
We will not be liable to you for any loss or damage, whether in contract, tort (including negligence), breach of statutory duty, or otherwise, even if foreseeable, arising under or in connection with:
- use of, or inability to use, our site; or
- use of or reliance on any content displayed on our site.
In particular, we will not be liable for:
- loss of profits, sales, business, or revenue;
- business interruption;
- loss of anticipated savings;
- loss of business opportunity, goodwill or reputation; or
- any indirect or consequential loss or damage.
How you may use material on our site
We are the owner or the licensee of all intellectual property rights in our site, and in the material published on it. Those works are protected by copyright laws. All such rights are reserved.
You must not use any part of the content on our site for commercial purposes.
How we may use your personal information
We will only use your personal information as set out in our Think Travel : Privacy (imaginet.co.uk)
Registering to use the Noticeboard
In order to register as a user of the Noticeboard, you must be 18 years old. If you are under 18, any purported registration shall be void.
You must keep your account details safe and not disclose these to any third party.
You can close your account at any time. Any comments or posts that you have placed on the Noticeboard will remain visible but will appear anonymously. If you wish to close any posts or remove any comments, this must be done by you, in advance of you closing your account.
We have the right to disable any user account at any time, if in our reasonable opinion you have failed to comply with any of the provisions of these terms of use.
Posting content to the Noticeboard
Whenever you make use of the Noticeboard to post and/or upload to our site, or to make contact with other users of our site, you must comply with the content standards set out below.
You warrant that any such contribution does comply with those standards, and you will be liable to us and indemnify us for any breach of that warranty. This means you will be responsible for any loss or damage we suffer as a result of your breach of warranty.
Any content you post and/or upload to the Noticeboard will be considered non-confidential and non-proprietary. You retain all of your ownership rights in your content, but you are required to grant us and other users of our site a limited licence to use, store and copy that content and to distribute and make it available to third parties.
We also have the right to disclose your identity to any third party who is claiming that any content posted or uploaded by you to our site is defamatory or constitutes a violation of their intellectual property rights or of their right to privacy.
We have the right to remove any posting you make on our site if, in our opinion, your post does not comply with the content standards set out below.
Lift-sharing arrangements made through the Noticeboard
All lift-sharing arrangements made through the Noticeboard are undertaken entirely at the risk of the individuals involved. Somerset Council, as the provider of the Noticeboard, assumes no responsibility or duty of care in respect of such arrangements.
You are only authorised to post an offer of transport to the Noticeboard if you meet the following criteria:
- you hold a valid driving licence;
- you either own, or have permission to use the intended vehicle, and are authorised to use it for the offered purpose;
- the vehicle to be used is appropriately taxed and insured;
- the vehicle to be used is roadworthy, with a current MOT;
- you have no contraindication or medical incapacity for driving.
It is the responsibility of the parties to a lift-sharing arrangement to verify the identity of the other parties, and for the passenger to check that the criteria above have been met. For this purpose, it is expected that drivers will share any documentation required for the passenger to verify that these criteria are met. Vehicle tax and insurance can be checked at https://vehicleenquiry.service.gov.uk/, by entering the vehicle registration number.
If arranging a lift for an unaccompanied minor, you must inform the driver of this and seek their approval. The vehicle must be fitted with the appropriate safety equipment depending on the child’s age and size, in accordance with the law.
Any exchange of money in return for transport, even if arranged through the Noticeboard, is an agreement entirely between the parties involved. Somerset Council, as the provider of the Noticeboard, does not accept any responsibility for financial transactions made between users. You are entirely responsible for any financial or tax implications resulting from lift-sharing arrangements. Further information relating to tax implications of lift sharing can be found here https://www.gov.uk/guidance/check-if-you-need-to-pay-tax-on-mileage-payments-as-a-volunteer-driver.
Offers or requests posted to the Noticeboard for one-off journeys will be automatically closed 30 days after the date of the journey.
Posts to the Noticeboard for regular journeys, or posts with journey type marked as ‘Other’, will be automatically closed one (1) year after the post is created.
Noticeboard groups
Users may suggest new groups to be created on the Noticeboard. It is at the discretion of the website administrator whether suggestions for new groups are accepted.
Administrators of closed groups are responsible for accepting or declining new members. The decision of the group administrator is final and cannot be challenged.
Posts and comments made in closed groups are visible to the website administrator as well as other members of the group.
Upon requesting to join a group, a user's publicly visible information (name and bio) will be visible to the group administrator. Group administrators will not have access to users' personal information.
These website terms of use will apply to all posts and comments, regardless of whether they appear in a closed group.
The same procedure for reported content will apply to all posts and comments, regardless of whether they appear in a closed group.
Members of closed groups are expected to respect the closed nature of these groups by not sharing other users' personal information with individuals who are not members. However, we cannot guarantee that this will not happen, and we accept no responsibility for any information which is shared or made public.
We reserve the right to remove a group if there has been no activity for a prolonged period. This will be entirely at our discretion.
Prohibited uses
You may use our site only for lawful purposes. You may not use our site:
- In any way that breaches any applicable local, national or international law or regulation.
- In any way that is unlawful or fraudulent or has any unlawful or fraudulent purpose or effect.
- For the purpose of harming or attempting to harm minors in any way.
- To bully, insult, intimidate or humiliate any person.
- To send, knowingly receive, upload, download, use or re-use any material which does not comply with our content standards.
- To transmit, or procure the sending of, any unsolicited or unauthorised advertising or promotional material or any other form of similar solicitation (spam).
- To knowingly transmit any data, send or upload any material that contains viruses, Trojan horses, worms, time-bombs, keystroke loggers, spyware, adware or any other harmful programs or similar computer code designed to adversely affect the operation of any computer software or hardware.
You also agree:
- Not to reproduce, duplicate, copy or re-sell any part of our site in contravention of the provisions of our terms of website use.
- Not to access without authority, interfere with, damage or disrupt:
- any part of our site;
- any equipment or network on which our site is stored;
- any software used in the provision of our site; or
- any equipment or network or software owned or used by any third party.
Noticeboard content standards
These content standards apply to any and all material which you contribute to the Noticeboard (Contribution).
The Content Standards must be complied with in spirit as well as to the letter. The standards apply to each part of any Contribution as well as to its whole.
Somerset Council will determine, in its discretion, whether a Contribution breaches the Content Standards.
A Contribution must:
- Be accurate (where it states facts).
- Be genuinely held (where it states opinions).
- Comply with the law applicable in England and Wales and in any country from which it is posted.
A Contribution must not:
- Be defamatory of any person.
- Be obscene, offensive, hateful or inflammatory.
- Bully, insult, intimidate or humiliate.
- Promote sexually explicit material.
- Include child sexual abuse material.
- Promote violence.
- Promote discrimination based on race, sex, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age.
- Infringe any copyright, database right or trade mark of any other person.
- Be likely to deceive any person.
- Breach any legal duty owed to a third party, such as a contractual duty or a duty of confidence.
- Promote any illegal content or activity.
- Be in contempt of court.
- Be threatening, abuse or invade another's privacy, or cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety.
- Be likely to harass, upset, embarrass, alarm or annoy any other person.
- Impersonate any person or misrepresent your identity or affiliation with any person.
- Give the impression that the Contribution emanates from Somerset Council.
- Advocate, promote, incite any party to commit, or assist any unlawful or criminal act such as (by way of example only) copyright infringement or computer misuse.
- Contain a statement which you know or believe, or have reasonable grounds for believing, that members of the public to whom the statement is, or is to be, published are likely to understand as a direct or indirect encouragement or other inducement to the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism.
- Contain any advertising or promote any services or web links to other sites.
We do not monitor the Noticeboard
We are under no obligation to monitor the Noticeboard provided on our site and we do not do so. We expressly exclude our liability for any loss or damage arising from the use of the Noticeboard by a user in contravention of our content standards.
The use of any of our Noticeboard by a minor is not permitted. We advise parents not to permit their children to use the Noticeboard.
How to complain about content posted on the Noticeboard
If you wish to complain about content posted and/or uploaded by other users, please contact us on Think Travel : Contact us (imaginet.co.uk).
Reported posts and comments will be removed from the Noticeboard, pending review by website administrators.
Reported content will be reviewed at the earliest convenience, but we do not promise or commit that this will be completed within a defined timeframe. Following the review, the administrators reserve the right to permanently remove any posts or comments. The decision of the administrators on whether to permanently remove reported content will be final.
Breach of these website terms of use
When we consider that a breach of these website terms of use has occurred, we may take such action as we deem appropriate.
Failure to comply with these website terms of use may result in our taking all or any of the following actions:
- Immediate, temporary or permanent withdrawal of your right to use our site.
- Issue of a warning to you.
- Legal proceedings against you for reimbursement of all costs on an indemnity basis (including, but not limited to, reasonable administrative and legal costs) resulting from the breach.
- Further legal action against you.
- Disclosure of such information to law enforcement authorities as we reasonably feel is necessary or as required by law.
We exclude our liability for all action we may take in response to breaches of our terms of use. The actions we may take are not limited to those described above, and we may take any other action we reasonably deem appropriate.
We are not responsible for viruses and you must not introduce them
We do not guarantee that our site will be secure or free from bugs or viruses.
You are responsible for configuring your information technology, computer programmes and platform to access our site. You should use your own virus protection software.
You must not misuse our site by knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material that is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to our site, the server on which our site is stored or any server, computer or database connected to our site. You must not attack our site via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of service attack. By breaching this provision, you would commit a criminal offence under the Computer Misuse Act 1990. We will report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and we will co-operate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them. In the event of such a breach, your right to use our site will cease immediately.
Rules about linking to our site
You must not establish a link to our site in such a way as to suggest any form of association, approval or endorsement on our part where none exists.
You must not establish a link to our site in any website that is not owned by you.
Our site must not be framed on any other site, nor may you create a link to any part of our site other than the home page.
We reserve the right to withdraw linking permission without notice.
The website in which you are linking must comply in all respects with the content standards set out in our terms of use.
If you wish to link to or make any use of content on our site other than that set out above, please contact thinktravel@somerset.gov.uk.
Which country's laws apply to any disputes?
These terms of use, their subject matter and their formation, are governed by English law. You and we both agree that the courts of England and Wales will have exclusive jurisdiction to determine any claim arising from the use of our website.
