Acceptable Use Policy
This Acceptable Use Policy (AUP or “Policy”) describes actions by Users that are prohibited by Affiliated Technology Solutions, LLC, dba Voice for Pest Voice for Turf, Voice for Pros, and all its affiliates and subsidiaries (ATS). “Users” means any Customer or user of any Service provided by ATS pursuant to any applicable customer agreement including, without limitation, any applicable terms of service and/or supplements to any applicable agreement(s).
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This AUP is subject to change from time to time with such changes effective upon posting at www.affiliatedtech.com/aup. ATS encourages Users to review this Policy regularly.
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ATS’ Services may be used only for lawful, proper and appropriate purposes.
Users must use any services only in a manner that, in ATS’ sole discretion, is consistent with the purposes for such services. Users will not engage in any legal or illegal activity that either:
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harms ATS, the network operated by ATS, the services and/or any User.
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interferes with the network operated by ATS and/or the provision or use of the services by ATS or any User.
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ATS’ Services may not be used for illegal, improper and/or inappropriate purposes including, but not limited to using any Service to violate any law, rule or regulation; or engaging in threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, libelous, deceptive or fraudulent behavior.
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ATS reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to determine if a Service is being used for any of the foregoing purposes or activities.
Violation of this AUP may result in civil or criminal liability and ATS, in its sole discretion, in addition to any remedy that it may have at law or in equity, may immediately terminate permission for the User to use the Services or any portion of the Services, and may charge User any applicable rates and cancellation or termination fees. In addition, ATS may investigate incidents that are contrary to this AUP and provide requested information to third parties who have provided notice to ATS stating that they have been harmed by a User’s failure to abide by this AUP. ATS may bring legal action to enjoin violations and/or collect damages caused by any violation of any part of this AUP.
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Any violations or attempted violations of this AUP by any User (or any third party on behalf of any User) will constitute a violation of this AUP by the User and a material breach of any applicable Customer agreement including, without limitation, any applicable terms of service and/or supplements to any applicable agreement(s).
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ATS’ failure to enforce this AUP in every instance in which it might have application does not amount to a waiver of ATS’ rights.
In no event will ATS be liable to any User or third party for any direct, indirect, punitive, special, consequential or other damages for any actions taken or not taken pursuant to this AUP, including, without limitation, any lost profits, business interruption, loss of programs or data, or otherwise, even if ATS was advised of the possibility of such damages. This limitation of liability in favor of ATS is in addition to any limitations set forth in any written agreement between ATS and any applicable user and will apply whether the action in which recovery is sought is based in contract or tort (including, without limitation, negligence or strict liability) or any applicable laws.
Unlimited Voice Services
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ATS reserves the right to periodically review usage levels of unlimited minute service plans to ensure that Users are not using such Services in violation of this AUP and if such an abuse or violation is discovered to terminate or adjust the plan as appropriate. User agrees to use the unlimited minute service plans for traditional voice or fax call of a duration comparable to that of the average small business customer presently utilizing ATS’ Services and will not employ methods, devices or procedures to take advantage of unlimited plans by using the voice or fax services excessively or for means not intended by ATS. Excessive Use is defined by ATS when the total number of domestic inbound minutes plus outbound minutes in a given month exceeds 2,000 minutes times the number of physical phone Users subscribed to the Service. Inbound Toll Free minutes are never part of any unlimited minute service plans unless specified in Customer Contract. International minutes are never part of any unlimited minute service plans.
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The following types of services are specifically prohibited and may not be accessed through ATS’ unlimited voice service plan: monitoring services, data transmissions, transmission of broadcasts or transmission of recorded material. ATS may terminate your service or change your service plan if, in its sole discretion, ATS determines that your use of the unlimited plan violates this prohibition or is otherwise “unreasonable” or results in abuse of the unlimited minute service plan.
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ATS considers a User’s use of our Unlimited plan to be potentially excessive and subject to immediate termination or fee adjustment if User utilizes autodialing; continuous, repetitive or extensive call forwarding; continuous call session connectivity; fax broadcasting; fax blasting; telemarketing or any other activity that would be inconsistent with reasonable business use patterns. For given months where Customer exceeds what ATS defines above as Excessive Use, ATS shall invoice Customer for all minutes over the Excessive Use threshold at a rate of $0.02 per minute unless Excessive Use is defined differently under a separate agreement.
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SMS Messaging
For the purposes of this policy, an SMS message segment is defined as a unit of text up to 160 characters in length for GSM-7 encoding and 60 characters in length for UCS-2 encoding, in accordance with standard SMS messaging protocols. Encoding is automatically set based on the message sent. Messages that exceed these limits are broken into multiple segments, each of which is billed separately and subject to applicable usage limits and policies.
The following uses of SMS message segments are strictly prohibited:
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Unsolicited Messaging: Sending SMS messages without the recipient’s consent, including spam, phishing attempts, or promotional content not explicitly requested.
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Harassment or Abuse: Using SMS to intimidate, threaten, defame, or otherwise harass individuals or groups.
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Illegal or Fraudulent Content: Sending content that is false, deceptive, or in violation of any local, state, federal, or international laws.
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Sensitive or Restricted Content: Including confidential personal information (e.g., Social Security numbers, credit card details) or content that violates privacy laws.
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High-Risk Use Cases: Using SMS for emergency services, life-safety applications, or other critical systems without explicit prior written approval.
Violation of this SMS segment policy may result in service suspension, throttling, or termination at the discretion of the provider.
SMS Best Practices
UCS-2 encoding creates longer messages, which are sent in more segments, causing an increase in the cost to send messages. Each Segment is considered 1 message.
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Keep the message short. Sending an email-style message including carriage returns and special characters will certainly increase the number of message segments.
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Check your message for special characters and how many segments the message will be by using one of these tools:
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Smart Encoding is set to no by default
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Encoding is set to Automatic
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If the Encoding used comes out to UCS-2, there may be special characters that is causing it to default to UCS-2 encoding. Check for things like right-single quote vs an apostrophe, which will force the message to UCS-2
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Scroll down in the message and look for any numbers that the text is red, and these will highlight the special characters you are using.
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Paste your message into the SMS Message Window. If Unicode Detected appears, scroll down and look for RED colored characters to see which characters are being detected as Unicode characters.
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Click on the “Enable Unicode Replacement” slider to replace any characters that are Unicode so your message can be sent as GSM-7, increasing the per-segment size and reducing the number of message segments you are sending.
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Once replaced, copy the message with the replaced Unicode characters and use that message to send out
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If typing a message in MS Word, copy it into Notepad or notes and then try to paste it into the message segment calculator to see if there is a change. Sometimes, MS Word or other word processing programs will add characters that force a message into UCS-2
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Reduce the message content and use a web page URL to get the recipient to click on a link that will get to more information that is properly formatted.
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Nothing in this AUP will limit or be deemed a waiver of any rights or protections of ATS pursuant to any written agreement between ATS and any applicable User. This AUP will be read in connection with any such written agreement and not in conflict with any such agreement. This AUP, in connection with any such agreement, supersedes any other oral or written representations or agreements made by ATS and/or its representatives regarding the Services.
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Subject to any arbitration, forum or choice of law provisions of any written agreement between ATS and applicable User, this AUP will be govern by, construed under and enforced in accordance with the laws of the State of New Jersey; and in the event any party brings a civil action or initiates judicial proceedings of any kind related to this AUP, Users consent to the exclusive personal jurisdiction and venue of the federal and state courts located in Middlesex County, New Jersey.
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If any provision of this AUP is held to be invalid or unenforceable, the validity and enforceability of the remaining provisions of this AUP will not be affected thereby.