{"id":523,"date":"2014-06-09T16:15:58","date_gmt":"2014-06-09T21:15:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/?p=523"},"modified":"2019-10-29T15:04:38","modified_gmt":"2019-10-29T19:04:38","slug":"businesses-dealing-with-on-line-deal-sites","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/2014\/06\/businesses-dealing-with-on-line-deal-sites\/","title":{"rendered":"BUSINESSES DEALING WITH ON LINE DEAL SITES!"},"content":{"rendered":"

At one point, sooner or later, you, a business owner or principal of the business principal, will consider offering your services on a Groupon like or on one of the on line deal-promotion kind sites to expose your product or services to show potential customers your service.\u00a0\u00a0 However, Forbes\u2019 article Are Daily Deal Sites Like Groupon Still Worth\u00a0It?<\/a> points out the wariness of the consumer.\u00a0 In the article, the writer didn\u2019t use her coupon.\u00a0 She stated that customers became disillusioned by the deals and were burnt from experiences.\u00a0 She ended her article with a list of great advice that was generated towards the buyers.\u00a0 List below is a great to connect with customers and figure how to make your business last.\u00a0 The list below will take it a little further and list issues that businesses may deal with when working with companies that providing on line deals.\u00a0 Keep in mind that the list is not exhaustive and not all companies are the same; nor they should be.<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Deals are contractual agreements.\u00a0 When dealing with a corporation that offers an on line deal you will be provided with an already prepared contractual agreement that contains multiple clauses. \u00a0One of the most commonly used clauses is expiration date.\u00a0 Each contract varies.\u00a0 In 2012, Groupon, Inc. paid $ 8.5 million and settled a class-action lawsuit, which alleged illegal expiration dates when customers didn\u2019t use their vouchers.\u00a0 See, In re Groupon Inc. Marketing and Sales Practices Litigation, 11-MD-2238, U.S. District Court, Southern District of California. <\/i>The result affected businesses that now must accept monies customers paid even after the deal, sans the discount.<\/i><\/p>\n

When facing with on line deal like contract, this is the time to review every clause very carefully. \u00a0It is important to understand the company\u2019s motive, which is to sell.\u00a0 This means what is said is not always what is in writing. \u00a0One Boston magazine offered an on line deal to a business where the salesperson verbally offered a deal-type scenario that consisted the company would provide the deal on their website and keep 100% of proceeds from the deal while the business would provide a service to the customers who would buy the deal in exchange for the publication.\u00a0 When they sent the contract to the business, it was shocking to see that no deal-type scenario was included anywhere in the contract.\u00a0 In fact, the business would be solely responsible for the publication.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cancel the contract clause.\u00a0 Deal-type companies retain the right to cancel the contract with the business at any time without warning or explanation.\u00a0 That means whatever efforts you made to prepare your business to deal will go to waste.\u00a0 They also can change a day and a time of the without being liable to you.\u00a0 The contract can limit the business\u2019s right to cancel which renders the clause illegal when one sided.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Another big one is condition of approval clause.\u00a0 If the business isn\u2019t careful and signs this clause, the company can get the right to strip you of your right to condition for approval, which I think, is atrocious.\u00a0 You want to see your final version of advertisement before it goes out in print or on line.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Watch out for your own property rights.\u00a0 One company wanted to retain rights to own and sell to third parties of businesses\u2019 pictures or images and trademark perpetually.\u00a0 This means that not only they can use your images that you\u2019ve spent time, money and energy to obtain and belong to you, but also to sell them to whoever they please forever.<\/p>\n

5.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Customer dissatisfaction.\u00a0 All on line deal like companies contain limitation clauses in their contracts.\u00a0\u00a0 They also will make sure to be indemnified from further liability and the responsibility will fall almost entirely on the business.\u00a0 It is important to be aware what type of liability the business will absorb.<\/p>\n

Groupon like companies retained attorneys to draft contracts for them.\u00a0 There is nothing wrong if you get help from one.<\/p>\n

Written by Margarita Smirnova, Esq.<\/p>\n

If you have a specific question relating to your business or any other legal questions, please contact Margarita<\/p>\n

Call: (617)398-7482\nE-mail: margarita.smirnova@gmail.com\nThis post is for informational and educational use only and does not create attorney-client relationship.<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
At one point, sooner or later, you, a business owner or principal of the business principal, will consider offering your services on a Groupon like or on one of the on line deal-promotion kind sites to expose your product or services to show potential customers your service.\u00a0\u00a0 However, Forbes\u2019 article Are Daily Deal Sites Like …<\/p>\n
  BUSINESSES DEALING WITH ON LINE DEAL SITES!<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":291,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":""},"categories":[92,3,4,6,76,77,78],"tags":[14,22,37,10,23,27,52,53,30,32,18],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/291"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.margaritasmirnovalaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}