National Center for Safety Initiatives LLC ("NCSI") Terms and Conditions

NCSI provides background screening and other Services (“Services”) to organizations and their authorized users (“Clients”), allowing them to collect information about individual consumers (“Candidates”). Candidates may provide the information directly through the platform.

In using this website, you are deemed to have read and agreed to the following terms and conditions associated with the use of NCSI background screening Services ("Terms"):

1. Terms applicable to Candidates only:

1.1   Electronic Signatures. Agreeing to these Terms, you are consenting to receive all communications, including any legally required notices, electronically and have agreed to transact electronically. In order to use these products and Services, you must provide at your own expense an Internet connected device that is compatible with the minimum requirements outlined below. You also confirm that your device will meet these specifications and requirements and will permit you to access and retain the Communications electronically each time you access and use the applicable Services.

1.2   Technology Requirements. To use our website or our Services, you must have an internet connection, an internet browser (i.e. Safari, Google Chrome, Internet Explorer or Fire Fox) issued in the last two years and a computer capable of managing that software and connection. Our site may also operate with other configurations, but we do not guarantee it. In particular, you must have the hardware, software and telecommunications connection necessary to access the electronic records related to your use of our website or Services.

1.3   Access and Use License to the Services. You may access and use the Services to submit your information (“Submissions”) to NCSI so that it may carry out the Services for a Client or for you. The extent to which you can access the Services is determined by NCSI and is further limited as specified in the Services user documentation provided by NCSI. You may not use, distribute, display, transmit, reproduce or otherwise exploit any of the Services, or its contents, for any other purpose. Your use of the Services will include your review and execution of a provided disclosure and authorization as required under the FCRA.

1.4   Submissions. By making Submissions, you warrant that you are the individual who the Submissions relate to and have only disclosed information that is true, accurate and not misleading (including by omission) and nothing submitted is known by you to be false, inaccurate or misdealing.

 

2. Terms applicable to Clients only

 

2.1   Electronic Signatures. Agreeing to these Terms, you are consenting to receive all communications, including any legally required notices, electronically and have agreed to transact electronically. In order to use these products and Services, you must provide at your own expense an Internet connected device that is compatible with the minimum requirements outlined below. You also confirm that your device will meet these specifications and requirements and will permit you to access and retain the Communications electronically each time you access and use the applicable Services.

2.2   Technology Requirements. To use our website or our Services, you must have an internet connection, an internet browser (i.e. Safari, Google Chrome, Internet Explorer or Fire Fox) issued in the last two years and a computer capable of managing that software and connection. Our site may also operate with other configurations, but we do not guarantee it. In particular, you must have the hardware, software and telecommunications connection necessary to access the electronic records related to your use of our website or Services.

2.3   Access and Use License to the Services. You may access and use the Services to submit your information (“Submissions”) to NCSI so that it may carry out the Services for a Client or for you. The extent to which you can access the Services is determined by NCSI and is further limited as specified in the Services user documentation provided by NCSI. You may not use, distribute, display, transmit, reproduce or otherwise exploit any of the Services, or its contents, for any other purpose. Your use of the Services will include your review and execution of a provided disclosure and authorization as required under the FCRA.

2.4   Certification of FCRA Permissible Purpose(s). You certify that all of your requests for information products from NCSI shall be made, and the resulting reports shall be used, for the following Fair Credit Reporting Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1681 et seq., permissible purposes only:

Section 604(a)(2). As instructed by the consumer in writing.

Section 604(a)(3)(B). For employment purposes including evaluating a consumer for employment, promotion, reassignment or retention as an employee, where the consumer has given prior written permission.

2.5   Certification of Legal Compliance. You certify to NCSI that the information products it receives will not be used in violation of any applicable federal or state laws, including equal employment opportunity laws. You accept full responsibility for using the information products it receives from NCSI in a legally acceptable fashion and the consequences of your use and/or dissemination of those products. You further agrees to put into place reasonable procedures for the fair and equitable use of background information and to secure the confidentiality of private information, keeping it confidential when obtaining, retaining, using and destroying such confidential information. You agree to take precautionary measures to protect the security and dissemination of this information including, for example, securing access to, dissemination of, and destruction of hard copy reports. You agree to abide by the security requirements provided by NCSI. Likewise, as a condition of entering into these Terms, you also certify that you has in place reasonable procedures designed to comply with all applicable state and federal laws, including equal employment opportunity laws. You certify that you will retain any information it receives from NCSI for such period(s) as may be required pursuant to federal and applicable state laws, whichever is longer. You certify that a clear and conspicuous disclosure, in a document consisting solely of the disclosure has been made in writing to the consumer explaining that a consumer report and/or investigative consumer report may be obtained for employment purposes, and that this disclosure satisfied all requirements identified in Section 606(a)(1) of the FCRA, as well as any applicable state or local laws, including equal employment opportunity laws.

 

You also certify that the consumer has authorized, in writing, the obtaining of the report by you. Receipt and use of information in "investigative consumer reports" imposes significant specific legal obligations upon you. You acknowledge that you are advised by NCSI to consult your own legal counsel regarding your specific legal requirements and responsibilities under federal, state, and local laws and ordinances, including equal employment opportunity laws.

 

If the consumer is denied employment, or other adverse employment action taken based in whole or in part on the information products provided by NCSI, you will provide to the consumer: (1) a copy of the report; and (2) a description, in writing, of the rights of the consumer entitled: "A Summary of Your Rights Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act" and (3) the pre-adverse and adverse notifications as required by the FCRA. When you are notified that a consumer disputes the findings presented in information products provided by NCSI, your agree that you will not take any adverse employment action regarding that consumer until the dispute has been investigated and the results of the investigation have been reported. You hereby acknowledge that you has received a copy of the Summary of Rights (16 C.F.R. Part 601, Appendix A) and Notice to Users of Consumer Reports: Obligations of Users Under the FCRA (16 C.F.R. Part 601, Appendix C).

2.6   Guarantee of Information. We do not guarantee that our information is complete or up-to-date. Our information is obtained from public record sources at different times. The information is subject to change as new information becomes available. Additionally, public records may have mistakes in them. We may report to you information that matches your search criteria, but it may not be about you. This is because many government agencies do not provide unique identifying characteristics (like a social security number) for us to search. If you would like to correct any information reported by NCSI about you, see please call our Customer Services Department at (866) 833-7100 or send an email to [email protected].

 

3. General Terms (applicable to both Candidates and Clients)

 

3.1   Delivery Method. Background screening results will be delivered to the customer representative via secure website or through electronic means. The method of delivery is determined by the customer representative when your account is established with NCSI.

3.2   Return/Refund Policy. You agree to pay for all Services that we provide at the agreed upon price when your account is established. Refunds will only be issued for duplicate screenings submitted within an agreed upon time frame. No refunds will be issued for mistakes made in entering your search criteria or if we find no criminal information to report to you.

3.3   Method of Payment. You may pay for our Services using Visa or MasterCard. By providing us with the credit card number, you give us permission to charge that credit card for all purchases you make from us, you confirm you are authorized to make purchases with that credit card and you agree to abide by the credit card issuer's agreement.

3.4   Security of Information Provided to NCSI. You can submit your personal and billing information to www.ncsisafe.com with confidence. We have partnered with PayPal, a leading payment gateway to accept credit cards payments safely and securely for our registrants and customers. The PayPal manages the complex routing of sensitive customer information through the credit card processing networks. The company adheres to strict industry standards for payment processing, including 256-bit Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology for secure Internet Protocol (IP) transactions; Industry standard encryption hardware and software methods and security protocols to protect customer information; and compliance with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS).

3.5   Ownership of Intellectual Property. The Services contains confidential trade secret information of NCSI and its suppliers. NCSI and its Suppliers retain all right, title and ownership of the Services, including NCSI Intellectual Property, and any and all proprietary rights (including patent rights, copyrights, trade secrets, trademarks, trade names, Services marks, designs or design marks or proprietary inventions, designs, information, sequence, structure, organization, and functionality) with respect to all of the foregoing. Nothing in these Terms is intended to convey any rights therein to you, other than the right to use the Services in the manner and to the extent permitted in these Terms.

3.6   Passwords. If applicable, upon your registration, NCSI will provide you the registrant with a unique registrant ID to access your information in the future. If you are an authorized client administrator you will select a login ID and unique password to access the Services. You agree to (a) provide true, complete, accurate and current data, as requested in the registration process (and maintain and update such data); (b) prevent unauthorized access or use by you or others by using your unique ID or password; (c) promptly report any unauthorized use or disclosure of your unique ID or password or other breach of any Services security; and (d) not assign or transfer (or attempt to do the same) any rights granted to you under these Terms.

If your account password becomes compromised or you believe it may have been compromised, you will immediately change it and promptly notify NCSI. You further agree that you will not discuss your User ID or password by telephone with any unknown caller, even if the caller claims to be an employee of NCSI.

NCSI reserves the right to suspend, or to refuse any further, access or use of the Services if NCSI learns or reasonably suspects that your registration information is false or inaccurate, if you refuse to provide complete and updated registration information, or if you misuse or permit another to use your login ID or password who is not authorized to do so or for any other breach of security. You acknowledge and agree that you (and not NCSI) are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of the password and that you (and not NCSI) are liable for any harm that may result from disclosing (or allowing the disclosure of) your password or other breach of these Terms.

3.7   Prohibited Actions. As a condition to your authorized use of the Services, you must use the Services in compliance with all applicable federal and state laws and only as expressly permitted in these Terms. You agree to not do any of the following, in any manner whatsoever, alone or through any other person or entity, and your compliance is something that NCSI, in its sole and absolute discretion, will determine:

1. Transmit to or introduce at the Services any viruses intended to damage, interfere with, disrupt, intercept or expropriate the Services ("Viruses"), or otherwise implement or engage in on-line activities, attacks or actions in a manner that have a disruptive or detrimental effect ("System Attacks");
2. Use the Services for any purposes that are unlawful or illegal under any law, regulation or legal requirement or that could give rise to civil or criminal liability or actions against NCSI (or its Suppliers), you or any other third party;
3. Transmit, access or communicate any data that you do not have a right to transmit under any law or under contractual or fiduciary revisions (such as proprietary and confidential information learned or disclosed as part of employment relationships or under non-disclosure agreements); or
4. Post, submit, upload, e-mail or otherwise transmit any content, material or other thing at, to or through the Services that infringes or violates the rights of others, including without limitation, copyright, trademark, trade secret or other intellectual property and proprietary rights, privacy or publicity rights.

3.8   Confidentiality. The Services is confidential and proprietary to NCSI (and its Suppliers). You agree that, unless you have the express written consent of NCSI, you will not disclose, transfer or otherwise provide to any third party all or any part of such Services except as authorized by these Terms.

3.9   Limitations on Reverse Engineering, Decompilation and Disassembly. You may not reverse engineer, decompile, or disassemble NCSI Intellectual Property, including any other technology utilized to provide the Services.

3.10 No copies or modifications. You may not modify, publish, participate in the transfer or sale of, or create new works from any of the Services, in whole or in part.

3.11 Rental. You may not rent or lease any of the Services.

3.12 Proprietary Notices. You may not remove any copyright, trademark or other proprietary notices from the Services or any content or information generated from it.

3.13 Termination. Your access to and use of the Services may be terminated, limited, denied or disabled at any time, without the necessity of NCSI sending you notice or otherwise advising you of your loss of rights, if you use the Services in a way that is not authorized or if you otherwise violate any of the terms, conditions or restrictions stated in these Terms. Accordingly, you may or may not be able to recover information stored on the Services. Termination or cancellation of these Terms will not affect any right or relief to which NCSI or its Suppliers may be entitled, at law or in equity. Upon termination of these Terms, all rights to use the Services will terminate.

3.14 Disclaimer of Warranty. The Services is provided "AS IS," without warranty of any kind. TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, NCSI AND ITS SUPPLIERS DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES AND CONDITIONS OF QUALITY, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT, WITH REGARD TO THE HOSTED SERVICES, AND ACCESS TO THE HOSTED SERVICES. NCSI DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THE OPERATION OF OR ACCESS TO THE HOSTED SERVICES WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED OR ERROR-FREE. YOUR ACTUAL RIGHTS MAY VARY FROM STATE/JURISDICTION TO STATE/JURISDICTION.

3.15 Indemnification. You agree to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless NCSI and its Suppliers from and against all claims, losses, expenses, damages and costs (including, but not limited to, direct, incidental, consequential, exemplary, and indirect damages), and reasonable attorneys' fees, resulting from or arising out of (a) use or misuse of the Services by you or any other person who accesses the Services using your login ID or password; (b) any violation of these Terms; or (c) any violation of any rights of a third party.

3.16 Limitation of Liability. TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, IN NO EVENT WILL NCSI OR ITS SUPPLIERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES WHATSOEVER (INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF BUSINESS PROFITS, BUSINESS INTERRUPTION, LOSS OF BUSINESS INFORMATION, OR ANY OTHER PECUNIARY LOSS) ARISING OUT OF THE USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE THE HOSTED SERVICES, EVEN IF NCSI HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. BECAUSE SOME STATES AND JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OR LIMITATION OF LIABILITY, THE ABOVE LIMITATION MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU.

 

NOTWITHSTANDING ANY OTHER PROVISION OF THIS AGREEMENT, IN NO EVENT WILL NCSI'S ENTIRE LIABILITY UNDER THIS AGREEMENT, FOR ANY AND ALL CAUSES OF ACTION, REGARDLESS OF LEGAL THEORY, EXCEED $100.00 (ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS).

3.17 Claims Regarding Your Use of the Services. These Terms are governed by and are to be construed under the laws of the State of Ohio and any disputes shall be resolved pursuant to procedures set forth in Section 20 below. The United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods will not apply. If NCSI brings a lawsuit, claim or other proceeding against you to enforce these Terms or brings you into one in connection with enforcement of these Terms, NCSI will be entitled to recover from you (and you agree to pay), in addition to all damages that may be awarded, reasonable and necessary attorney's fees and any costs of litigation. If any provision of these Terms is found to be unlawful or unenforceable in any respect, the court will reform such provision so as to render it enforceable (or, if it is not possible to reform such provision so as to make it enforceable, then delete such provision) and, as so reformed or modified, fully enforce these Terms.

 

4. Mutual Agreement to Arbitrate. Any controversy or claim arising out of, or relating to, these Terms of Use, or breach thereof, shall be settled by binding arbitration in accordance with the governing law as determined by these Terms of Use, the Federal Arbitration Act (insofar as it governs the arbitrability of such controversy or claim), and the Commercial Arbitration Rules (excluding Expedited Procedures) of the American Arbitration Association in the City of New York. Three qualified arbitrators shall be appointed in accordance with the Commercial Arbitration Rules (excluding Expedited Procedures) of the American Arbitration Association and these Terms of Use. Such qualified arbitrators shall be members of the New York bar and shall have at least five years of experience in the law relevant to the dispute in question. Each party shall have the right of discovery as set forth in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. A stenographer shall be present at the arbitration proceedings and the stenographic record shall be the official record of the proceeding. The arbitrators shall provide written findings of fact and conclusions of law in justification of any arbitration award. Either party shall have the right of appeal of any decision by the arbitrators by filing a request for reconsideration of any arbitration decision with the American Arbitration Association. Upon receiving such a request, the American Arbitration Association shall reconsider the matter de novo using the foregoing procedures. Should the arbitration award be inconsistent with the governing law as specified by these Terms of Use, either party may immediately appeal the arbitration award to any court of competent jurisdiction over NCSI. Judgment on the award rendered by the arbitrators may be entered in any court having competent jurisdiction over the parties, unless a subsequent request for reconsideration has been filed by a party under this Section, or the award has been appealed to a court of competent jurisdiction under this Section.

 

The parties waive any right to bring representative claims on behalf of a class of individuals, on behalf of the public, as a private attorney general, or otherwise (the “class action waiver”). Except for this class action waiver, this clause may be severed or modified if necessary to render it enforceable under the Federal Arbitration Act.

 

Any legal suit, action or proceeding arising out of, or related to, these Terms of Use or the Website, and allowed pursuant to this Section, shall be instituted exclusively in the federal courts of the United States in the Southern District of New York or the courts of the State of New York located in the City of New York. You waive any and all objections to the exercise of jurisdiction over you by such courts and to venue in such courts.

5. Entire Terms; Changes to these Terms. The terms of these Terms constitute the entire and exclusive agreement between you and NCSI regarding the Services and its use, and supersede all other agreements, understandings and communications regarding the subject matter of these Terms, if any, both oral or written, whether made prior or subsequently to or contemporaneously with your use of the Services. NCSI retains the right to modify the terms or conditions of these Terms at any time without notice or warning. You are bound to all changes NCSI may make to these terms and, therefore, should periodically revisit these terms and review them to make sure you comply with all changes. Otherwise, these Terms may not be superseded or modified except in a writing signed by an authorized representative of NCSI. If at any time you cannot comply with any of the terms and conditions of these Terms, then you should terminate and discontinue all access to and use of the Services.

If you have any questions concerning these Terms, please contact NCSI by writing or emailing: NCSI, PO Box 39008, Cleveland Ohio, 44139; [email protected]; (866)833-7100.