Terms & Conditions for use of e-Joburg

Introduction

These conditions will govern the relationship between the Municipality and the registered account holder as rendered by the City of Johannesburg via the e-Joburg Service
The account holder understands that by submitting their registration to subscribe to the service that they have familiarized themselves with the contents in the Terms and Conditions, and that the account holder intends to be bound by the contents.
This Agreement will commence when the City of Johannesburg accepts the account holders request to subscribe to Service, which acceptance will manifest at that point in time when the City of Johannesburg sends the account holders an activation confirmation (the "commencement date").

Definitions

"Agent" means a person who acts on behalf of a User or a Registered Account Holder;
"City of Johannesburg" means a municipality established in terms of section 12 of Local Government Act, 1998 (Act no: 117 of 1998)
"e-Joburg site" means the website through which the City of Johannesburg provides the Service.
"Registered Account Holder" means the registered holder of an account, whether it be in a personal or business capacity, held with the City of Johannesburg for services rendered by or on behalf of the City.
"Service" means the electronic statement presentation, enquiry and payment solution as well as any other services provided on the e-Joburg site.
"Registration" means the action whereby the User indicates to the City of Johannesburg that they want to utilize the service.
"User" means all persons who access, view, download from, or use the e-Joburg site whether on the Internet, mobile device or kiosk. "Users" includes "Registered Account Holders".
"Writing" means the act or process of producing and recording words in a form that can be read and understood and shall include emails, facscimile, e-registered or registered post;
An expression which denotes:
any gender includes the other genders;
a natural person includes a juristic person and vice versa;
the singular includes the plural and vice versa.

Application

These Terms and Conditions shall apply to all Users and becomes binding between the City of Johannesburg and a user immediately upon the user accessing, viewing or using the Service or its contents.

Electronic Communications

When a user visits the e-Joburg website or sends an email to the City of Johannesburg, that user consents to receiving communications from the City of Johannesburg electronically and agrees that all agreements, statements. Bills, notices, disclosures and other communications sent by the City of Johannesburg satisfies any legal requirements, including but not limited, to the requirement that such communications are considered to be "in writing" with the same legal stature as a written document.
The User accepts and acknowledges that, once the account is registered on e-Joburg, the City of Johannesburg will cease to send the account holder statements via manual postal delivery.

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS AND DOMAIN NAME USE

All intellectual property rights in all materials and software made available through the e-Joburg Service or site are owned by the City of Johannesburg or a third party, or alternatively the City of Johannesburg is the lawful user thereof, and are protected by both South African and international intellectual property right laws. The User agrees not to do anything that may infringe the City of Johannesburg's' intellectual property rights in this regard, including but not limited to unauthorised copying, reproduction, retransmission, distribution, dissemination, sale, publication, or other circulation or exploitation of such material and shall comply with all laws applicable to any intellectual property rights (including without limitation trade secrets, copyright, trademarks, registered designs, and patents) in respect of any data, files and/or information accessed, retrieved or stored by the User through the User's use of the e-Joburg Service.

The User warrants that it will not use the e-Joburg Service in any way that will infringe any person's intellectual property rights, and that it recognises and uses any service in accordance with the City of Johannesburg's intellectual property rights. The User is prohibited from using the trademarks, logos, brand names, domain names or other marks of the City of Johannesburg or e-Joburg.

City of Johannesburg Agent

Where the User registers on behalf of a Registered Account Holder and uses the service on behalf of such Registered Account Holder, or acts as an agent of such Registered Account Holder, then the User warrants that they have obtained a written mandate from such Registered Account Holder, which mandate will contain at least the following conditions:
The User acts as a duly authorised agent on behalf of the Registered Account Holder;
The Registered Account Holder and the User are jointly and severally liable towards the City of Johannesburg for all claims that the City of Johannesburg might have in terms of this agreement against the Registered Account Holder and/or the User, and;
The User has disclosed the contents of this agreement to the Registered Account Holder.
Where a User registers, invites or authorises access to another person or third party, then such User warrants that they are jointly and severally liable towards the City of Johannesburg for all claims that the City of Johannesburg might have in terms of this agreement against the Registered Account Holder and/or the User for all actions performed by such other person or third-party.

User Name and Password

During registration by the User on the e-Joburg site, the User will create a unique username in such format as the City of Johannesburg may determine from time to time.
Unless otherwise specified, the User must change the initial password to a unique password of choice when requested to do so and/or when the e-Joburg Service is accessed for the first time.
The User undertakes to ensure that the username and password are neither easily accessible nor disclosed to any unauthorized person. Storing the username and/or password on a computer or network will be regarded as prima facie negligence.
The account holder undertakes to report any actual or attempted unauthorised access to the City of Johannesburg, without delay, via the e-Joburg call centre and provide the City of Johannesburg with written confirmation thereof within 24 (twenty-four) hours of such notification. On receipt of notification, the City of Johannesburg reserves the right to deactivate the user name and/or password without further notice.
The City of Johannesburg may at its sole discretion and for whatever reason, require a User to change their username and/or password from time to time and the User undertakes to unconditionally comply with such a requirement.
The City of Johannesburg may temporarily or permanently suspend a User's access to the e-Joburg Service in the event that the User abuses, commits or attempts to commit any form of fraud or undesirable activity, or the City of Johannesburg detects any potential threat by the User on the e-Joburg site.

Payment and Relation to the City of Johannesburg

As part of its service offering, the City of Johannesburg will co-operate with various banks (the "bank") to enable the Registered Account Holder or User to make payments due to the City of Johannesburg and to reconcile such payments with the account holder's records.
The Registered Account Holder and the User understands that they enter into a direct agreement with the bank and that the City of Johannesburg is not a party to this agreement.

Duties of the City of Johannesburg

The e-Joburg Service will provide access to monthly account statements and inform Users when a new statement or bill is made available on the e-Joburg site.
The Registered Account Holder remains liable for payment of services rendered and the failure to provide a notification or statement to the Registered Account Holder or User does not negate this liability.
The e-Joburg Service will provide facilities to register linked accounts, submit information and provide an on-line enquiry facility.
Where the User elects to make payment to the City of Johannesburg through one of the payment services, the Service will maintain an online record of all payments for a period of 24 months, provided that the User complies with the prescribed procedures for such payments.

Disputes

The User will refer any dispute that may arise out of this Agreement to the e-Joburg call centre, who will attempt to resolve the dispute through settlement, negotiation or mediation.
If the dispute has not been resolved within 10 (ten) business days after it was referred to the e-Joburg call centre, the User may refer the dispute to the City of Johannesburg's legal department, or if payment related to the Chief Financial Officer of the City of Johannesburg.

Refund Policy

Payments for municipal services are non refundable. In the event that a user makes an erroneous payment or in the event that a user wishes to dispute any payment already processed then the registered account holder must log a dispute with the Joburg Metropolitan Municipality Finance department.
No refunds will be processed via the e-Joburg service.

Information and Privacy

The City of Johannesburg understands that the information provided by the User or Registered Account Holder to the City of Johannesburg (the "information"), includes private and sensitive information. The City of Johannesburg will, save for the circumstances as set out in this clause 11, not share any such information with any third party without the prior consent of the User or Registered Account Holder.
The City of Johannesburg will only disclose the information to a third party:
to perform the Service;
if the City of Johannesburg is required by law or court order to disclose the information; and/or
if legislation or a government Act provides for such disclosure.
The City of Johannesburg will store information on its system for a period of 12 (twelve) months after the termination of this agreement, or for a period of 2 (two) years after submission of information if this agreement remains in force for longer than 2 (two), whichever might be the case.
Although the City of Johannesburg will take all reasonable measures to ensure that the information will not be compromised, the User and Registered Account Holder acknowledges that they need to keep copies of the information under their own control in order to mitigate potential damages that might result from a loss or corruption of information.

Use of User Information by the City of Johannesburg

The City of Johannesburg may in the widest sense possible distribute, loan, sell or otherwise share with other persons or entities information constituting or descriptive of demographic information, habits, usage patterns, preferences, survey data or other descriptive or related data which does not permit recipients to individually identify any particular User of the service.
The City of Johannesburg will be entitled in its sole discretion, and without notice, to provide user information and records to the courts, law enforcement agencies, others involved in prosecuting claims or investigations for conduct or conditions alleged or believed to be illegal or the violation or threatening of rights of any person or entity, and to maintain and use such information and records internally.
The City of Johannesburg may provide online, mobile communication methods, and email communications to the user on matters pertaining to the service, its features, its sponsors, or its use without compensation to the user, but shall do so reasonably and in good faith.
The user acknowledges:
that communications within the e-Joburg Service may be monitored or reviewed for quality control and other reasonable business and/or legal purposes;
The use of User information and the disposal or dissemination thereof shall not constitute invasion of privacy by the City of Johannesburg.

Use of e-Joburg and Software

It is the responsibility of the User to acquire and maintain, at his/her own expense, the computer hardware, system and information security, software, telecommunications lines and access to the Internet and the e-Joburg website and/or download content from e-Joburg.
Software, if any, made available for download on or via the website is governed by the license conditions establishing a legal relationship between the User and the licensor of such software. The user indemnifies the City of Johannesburg against any breach of such license conditions.
The City of Johannesburg gives no warranty and makes no representation, whether express or implied, as to the quality or compatibility of such software.
The City of Johannesburg hereby grants the User the right to view, download and print the content of the e-Joburg site for the purposes of accessing and using the e-Joburg services, provided that such content is only used by the User for personal, educational or non-commercial purposes. No further reproduction or any form of distribution of the content on the e-Joburg site is permitted.
Users may only access and use the e-Joburg Service for the purpose of interacting with the City and paying for services.
The City of Johannesburg and its agents shall not be liable, in any manner whatsoever, for any damage, loss or liability that results from the use of the e=Joburg Service or information contained within the e-Joburg site.

Unavailability of the City of Johannesburg Services

The City of Johannesburg shall at all times and for whatever reason, have the sole and exclusive right to suspend or terminate the Service with prior written notification and provide reason for such termination or suspension. However, without prejudice to the foregoing, the City of Johannesburg will not exercise its rights in terms of this clause without just cause.
The user acknowledges and accepts that the City of Johannesburg service may become unavailable from time-to-time due to various circumstances, including:
technical failure or problems with the e-Joburg service ;
infrastructure or technical problems with third party information technology systems;
unavailability of telecommunication or electricity services;
or other circumstances beyond the control of the City of Johannesburg.
Without derogating from the provisions of this clause, the user undertakes to limit their potential debt caused by any unavailability of the Municipal Service by making use of alternative account statement enquiry and payment methods available to consumers.

Changes and Amendments

The City of Johannesburg expressly reserves the right, in its sole and absolute discretion, to do any of the following, at any time without prior notice to the User:
change these Terms and Conditions;
change the content and/or services available from e-Joburg;
discontinue any aspect of the e-Joburg service; and/or
change the software and hardware required to access and use e-Joburg.
Any new version of the Terms and Conditions will be displayed on e-Joburg. It is the Users obligation to visit e-Joburg on a regular basis in order to determine whether any amendments have been made to the Terms and Conditions. By accessing e-Joburg, the User will be bound by the latest version of the Terms and Conditions, as published on e-Joburg.

No Warranties or Representations

The Terms and Conditions evidences the sole terms and conditions governing the Services.
Users acknowledge and agree that any warranties, statements or representations of whatever nature and in whatever form, including promotional materials, granted or made by the City of Johannesburg, its employees, agents or advisors which are not stated in the Conditions of Use shall not be valid and enforceable and Users shall not hold the City of Johannesburg liable to any such warranty or representation, whether made prior to, during or after concluding the Conditions of Use.
To the extent permitted by law, the City of Johannesburg (including its employees, suppliers, Internet service providers, partners, affiliates and agents) shall not be liable for any damage, loss or liability of any nature incurred by person and resulting from;
access to e-Joburg;
access to websites linked to e-Joburg;
inability to access e-Joburg;
inability to access websites linked to e-Joburg;
content available on e-Joburg;
services available from e-Joburg; and/or
downloads and use of content from e-Joburg.
The City of Johannesburg site and Service are provided "as is" and the City of Johannesburg makes no express or implied representations or warranties with regard thereto. Without limiting the generality of the a foregoing:-
the City of Johannesburg does not warrant that the website, its contents, any third party content and services, payment or the Municipal Services will be error free or will meet any particular criteria of accuracy, completeness or reliability of information, performance or quality. The City of Johannesburg expressly disclaims all implied warranties, including, without limitation, warranties of merchantability, title, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, compatibility, security and accuracy; and
whilst the City of Johannesburg has taken reasonable measures to ensure the integrity of the Services, no warranty, whether express or implied is given that any files, downloads or applications available via the website are free of viruses or any other data or code which has the ability to corrupt or affect the operation of a user's system.

Governing Law and Jurisdiction

These conditions are governed by the laws of the Republic of South Africa.