Subscriber Agreement and Privacy Policy

The metered paywall system is intended to be applicable to individual service providers and other professionals who routinely use our web site. Those who wish to continue using this site once they've surpassed their allotment of free page views are expected to subscribe, with no exceptions.

A subscription to MassResources.org provides a subscriber with unlimited access to the content of the web site as well as use of the site's eligibility check tools for the duration of the subscription.

Our policy is one subscription per individual who uses the site. A subscription to MassResources.org is intended for use by an individual subscriber and is not to be shared with others. The account name and password that is provided to a subscriber may be used by that individual to access the web site on multiple computers (e.g., office/home) or devices (e.g., personal computer, tablet computer such as an iPad). As a general rule, we assume that a subscriber can only be in one location, or using one device, at any given time to access the MassResources.org web site.

It is expressly prohibited to allow others to share a subscriber account name/password with you, including non-subscribing co-workers in the same organization. We reserve the right to cancel a subscription (thereby blocking access to the site) for a subscriber account, where the sharing of subscriber log in information appears to have taken place.

You may request to transfer your subscription to another individual provided you notify us in advance and give us the necessary information to update the account.

The ability to transfer a subscription may be convenient for some organizations when a subscribing employee leaves (or changes job duties) and is replaced by another individual with similar need to access the web site. For instance, an organization that needs three staff positions to have access to the web site may purchase three subscriptions total and request that we reassign these subscriptions to different employees if, or as, there is staff turnover.

The rights and responsibilities of the subscription also transfer to the individual who becomes the named subscriber. The policy of one subscription per individual user of the web site is still in effect; meaning that the username/password for one subscriber account may not be shared by multiple individuals, including the previous subscriber.

Upon transfer of a subscription, its expiration date and whether it is auto-renew or non-auto renew will remain the same. To request the transfer of a subscription, please e-mail us at: Subscriptions.

Payment for subscriptions should be made in U.S. dollars paid either by major credit card or debit card.  To pay by credit card and have immediate subscription access to the web site go to the Subscription Sign-Up page.

If you need to pay by check instead, please contact Subscriptions and specify the number of individual subscriptions you would like to purchase for staff in your organization.  For those who need to pay by check, it will require that a staff person at MassResources.org set up individual subscription accounts for each individual in your organization who needs a subscription; hence, we will need to obtain further information from you in order to do so. 

You may cancel your subscription at any time without incurring a fee. If you cancel your subscription, you will no longer be able to log in with your username/password to view the site on a computer that has reached its limit of free page views.

Our policy on refunding subscriptions fees is as follows:

• The one-month and one-week temporary subscription options are non-refundable.
• The annual subscription option is partially refundable within the first six months after starting (or renewing) it. We will refund the subscription price minus $10 for each month (and/or portion of month) the subscription has run. Some possible refund scenarios for a $75 subscription are as follows:
  1. A cancellation after just one week has elapsed on the subscription would receive a $65 refund.
  2. A cancellation after 4 months & 10 days have elapsed would receive a $25 refund.
  3. A cancellation after 6 months and 7 days have elapsed would receive no refund.

For an annual subscription, we offer a lower annual subscription price for those who choose the auto-renew (automatic-renewal) option. This is because it greatly simplifies the subscription renewal process for us (and you) and allows us better visibility in predicting our subscription revenue over time. For people who anticipate that they will need ongoing access to the web site for the foreseeable future, choosing the auto-renew option can save on the cost of subscribing. The auto-renew subscription option is not available for temporary subscriptions.

If you do not select the auto-renew option for an annual subscription, your subscription will not be automatically renewed when its 12-month term has expired. Near the time of its expiration, you will need to decide whether or not to renew your subscription in order to continue accessing the web site.

By selecting the auto-renew option, you should understand that we will automatically renew your subscription at the end of its 12-month term for an equivalent 12-month term. You will not be prompted by us, nor do you need to contact us, for this subscription renewal to be processed. The credit card used to pay for the initial subscription will be charged. (At any time you can update your credit card information we have on file by logging in to your User Account.)

If you subscribed with the auto-renew option and later change your mind, you can contact us to opt your subscription out of auto-renew. Opting out of auto-renewal does not cancel your subscription. Rather, your subscription will remain active through your then-current term; however, it will not be automatically renewed upon the expiration of this term. Those wishing to remove the auto-renew feature from their subscription should send an e-mail to: Subscriptions with their request and the username (e-mail address) on their account.

As a protection to auto-renew subscribers, if your user account/subscription appears to be inactive (e.g., you have not logged in to visit the web site for quite some time), we may decide to switch your subscription over to non-automatic renewal before it is due for renewal. While you would then need to deliberately renew your subscription when it expires, this could safeguard you from being billed for a service you are no longer using. However, the responsibility remains with the subscriber to contact us in order to opt out of auto-renewal (or cancel a subscription altogether) if no longer using the web site.

Your privacy is very important to us at MassResources.org. This Subscriber Privacy Policy outlines the types of information we gather from subscribers to this web site, how we use it, with whom we might share it, and the means by which we keep it secure.

We do not gather personal information on the users of the MassResources.org web site before the point where individuals decide to become subscribers. We only collect personal information on subscribers to the MassResources.org web site. The personal information we collect is for the purpose of credit card billing to pay for a subscription and includes the following:

• Your name, phone number, and e-mail address
• Your employer (or name of organization with which you are affiliated)
• Your credit card number
• Billing address of credit card

We do not share the personal information we gather from subscribers with third parties.

The computer servers that we utilize to receive or store personal information are secured by firewalls and other security measures. Additionally, sensitive data such as credit card numbers are encrypted using SSL and other industry standard measures, to provide an additional level of security. Our security and privacy policies are periodically reviewed and enhanced as necessary and only authorized individuals have access to the information provided.

If you are a subscriber, we ask that you ensure your contact information is updated as needed. If you have selected the automatic renewal option on an annual subscription, your credit card billing information should also be kept current. Once you become a subscriber, if you need to update any personal information you may do so by accessing the User Account log in page and entering your subscriber username and password.

In general, computer "cookies" are used to send information from a web site to a web site visitor's computer and to return information from the visitor's computer back to the web site. Cookies do not reveal the identity of the individual user but do identify the computer utilized by that user. Using "cookies," our paywall system counts page views of the MassResources.org web site conducted on specific computers. The paywall is presented only if a specific computer exceeds the standard allotment of free page views. We use cookies solely to gather information about the number of page views a computer has made to our web site as well as for purposes of "authentication" (i.e., to determine whether or not the computer is being used by a subscriber who has logged into the site).

The cookies we use in our paywall system do not track browsing habits of any visitor (subscriber or non-subscriber), either within the MassResources.org web site, or external to it.

When an individual subscribes to the web site, s/he is provided with a unique username and password (which s/he selects) in order to log into and view the site. We have the capacity to learn when a username logged into the site, how many successful log ins there were in a given day, and the Internet Protocol (IP) address of the computer that was used to visit the site. Our interest in tracking this information is to monitor the appropriate use of subscriptions and to flag situations where the same subscriber account login information may have been shared among multiple individuals. For further information, see Section A.2: Appropriate Use of a Subscription.

Changing web site practices and circumstances may require that we make adjustments to this subscriber privacy policy from time to time. Any changes will be reflected on this website.

If you have any questions about this Subscriber Agreement or about privacy practices of MassResources.org as they pertain to subscribers, please e-mail us at: Subscriptions.