Fire-IT Business Fibre Services Agreement

This agreement applies to the business fibre internet services quoted on this proposal. The carrier, product, speed, contention ratio, contract term, monthly price and any once-off charges are the values shown on this proposal at the time of signing, and together with this proposal they form the agreement between you and Fire-IT (Pty) Ltd, registration number 2012/173035/07, VAT number 4610272165, of 36 Regency Dr, Route 21 Business Park, Centurion, Pretoria, Gauteng 0178. Fire-IT is your internet service provider and manages the service end to end. The fibre network the service is carried on is owned and operated by the carrier named against the option you choose, and Fire-IT does not own it. Where this proposal also quotes a licensed wireless service, that service is supplied under the Fire-IT Enterprise Microwave Solutions Agreement and carries its own notice period.

Your contract starts on the day your fibre goes live, which is the date on the Service Confirmation we issue once the service passes testing. Signing this proposal does not start the contract term; it authorises Fire-IT to order the line. Getting a business line live runs in phases: the order is placed with the carrier, the site is surveyed and any wayleaves and approvals are obtained, the civil works and build are done, the fibre is installed and tested, and the service goes live. Each phase commits money that the carrier charges Fire-IT whether or not the line is ever switched on. If you stop the installation at any phase after the order has been placed, a penalty is payable: everything Fire-IT has incurred or committed on your behalf up to that phase, including the carrier's build charge, civil works, trenching, wayleave and permit costs, any third-party link or equipment charges, and the carrier's own cancellation charge, subject to a minimum of R1,000 excluding VAT. The term, renewal and cancellation clause below applies from the day the service goes live.

Business fibre is sold in three shapes and this proposal says which one each option is. Dedicated Internet Access (DIA) is uncontended, at a 1:1 ratio: the speed you buy is allocated to you and is not shared with anyone else. Business Internet Access (BIA) is contended at 1:5, which means the capacity behind your line is shared with a limited number of other business services and is sized so that ordinary business use does not collide. A GPON product is contended at 1:10 and is the cost-effective option for a branch or a small site. The ratio that applies to the service you have chosen is the one stated against its carrier in the terms below, and where a carrier has not contracted a ratio with us the terms say so rather than implying one. The service is uncapped and unshaped in normal operation, and Fire-IT applies no fair usage policy and no data limit of its own. The carrier's network rules, including any fair usage policy it applies to its network, still apply to the line, and we tell you if the carrier acts under one.

Dedicated Internet Access includes a /29 static block. A /29 is eight addresses, of which five are usable by you once the network, broadcast and gateway addresses are taken. Business Internet Access and the GPON products include one static public address. Additional addressing is available and is priced on this proposal or on request. Addresses are assigned to you for the duration of the service, remain part of Fire-IT's allocation, and cannot be moved to another provider when the service ends.

Fire-IT commits to 99% monthly availability on your business fibre service, measured at our network edge. We will acknowledge a fault you report to us within 4 hours. Our target to restore service is 24 hours in business hours. Where a fault sits with the carrier and is not resolved, we escalate it inside that carrier within 72 hours and keep escalating until it is. Business hours are Monday to Friday, 07:00 to 17:00 South African time, excluding South African public holidays. Report a fault by email to support@fire-it.co.za, by phone on 012 004 0615, or through any other channel Fire-IT confirms to you in writing. The fault acknowledgement and the restoration target run from when a fault reaches us through one of those channels; a message to a Fire-IT employee's personal phone, WhatsApp or social media account does not start them. Faults can be reported at any time and we monitor your line continuously; work outside business hours is arranged with you.

The following do not count against the 99%: scheduled maintenance we have given you at least 24 hours' notice of; an outage caused by your own equipment, network or configuration; a power failure or environmental problem at your premises; a failure of third-party infrastructure that is outside Fire-IT's control; anything we cannot reach because access to your site is refused or unavailable; and force majeure, including weather, natural disasters and regulatory action. Congestion during a period of peak demand beyond the capacity of the service you bought is not an outage.

Where your service is down for a reason the availability commitment counts, Fire-IT credits your account: 3 days of the monthly charge after 7 or more consecutive days without service, 7 days of the monthly charge after 14 or more consecutive days, and 5% of that month's charge where the downtime that counts adds up to more than 10% of a calendar month. For a single outage the higher credit applies rather than both. Total credits in any month are capped at 20% of that month's charges for the affected service. Credits are applied to a later invoice and are not paid out in cash, and you claim one by telling us in writing within 15 days of the end of the month in which the outage happened. These credits are your sole and exclusive remedy for downtime, and for any failure to meet the availability commitment, the fault acknowledgement or the restoration target.

Your service depends on a carrier's fibre network, and Fire-IT has no control over that carrier's quality, availability or maintenance schedule. We raise and drive every fault with them, and we escalate as set out above, but we cannot compel a carrier to attend within a time of our choosing. A carrier's typical ticket response is 24 to 72 hours and a work order typically completes in 3 to 10 business days, longer at peak periods. Fire-IT is not liable for a carrier's network outage or service degradation, for damage to or destruction of its infrastructure, for changes it makes to its network, equipment or configuration, for its business failure or discontinuation of a product, or for delays in its repairs and maintenance. Where the carrier withdraws the product or ends its supply of your line for a reason that is not your breach, Fire-IT will offer you an alternative where one is available, and if there is none, or you decline it, either of us may end the affected service by written notice without a cancellation charge.

Fire-IT carries international traffic over more than one international link and fails over between them, so a single international break does not take your internet access away. It can still slow it down. When a large international link goes down, the traffic it was carrying moves onto the remaining capacity, and while that lasts international traffic may be shaped so that every client keeps a working service rather than a few sessions consuming what is left. Local and South African traffic is not affected. Undersea cable breaks and the time taken to repair them are outside Fire-IT's control, and no credit is due for the period a failover is in place. Where shaping is applied, business-critical and voice traffic is prioritised as far as is technically possible, we tell you it is in place, and we remove it as soon as primary capacity is restored.

Throttling means limiting the total data throughput of an individual service, so the speed achievable on that connection is restricted regardless of the package bought. It is applied per user, on usage over a rolling 30 day window, only when demand exceeds available capacity, and it is lifted when demand falls. Shaping means prioritising some types of traffic over others: real-time and interactive traffic such as voice and video calls ahead of downloads and streaming. It applies to everyone rather than to an individual, and it too is applied only when demand exceeds capacity and removed when demand falls. Contention is the sharing of network capacity between services, and it is what the ratio on your option describes. Neither throttling nor shaping is applied to a business fibre service in normal operation.

Installation typically takes 2 to 8 weeks where fibre infrastructure already exists at the address. Wayleave applications, municipal and property owner approvals, trenching and ducting for a new build, weather, and the carrier's own scheduling can extend that materially, and where road crossings or wayleaves are required delivery can exceed 16 weeks. The once-off installation charge on this proposal covers the carrier's standard build charge and the equipment Fire-IT installs, and is confirmed on site survey; where a survey finds abnormal civils we quote any additional charge to you in writing for your approval before work starts. Our Service Delivery team keeps you updated through the build and gives you an estimated date based on where the order actually is.

A suitable installation environment with adequate power and protection from the weather; a network cabinet with at least 3U of free space for the carrier's equipment; reasonable access to the site for Fire-IT and carrier technicians during business hours; notice of any health and safety requirements that apply at your premises; the property owner's permission and any wayleave consent that is needed; and an accurate installation address. Internal cabling and network preparation are yours, and any site preparation cost or alteration to the building is for your account. Fire-IT's installation ends at the service demarcation point. Giving us an incorrect address delays the installation.

Installing fibre can mean drilling through walls, floors and ceilings, running ducting, and on a new build the carrier trenching on the property. Before work starts you must tell us where water pipes, electrical cables, gas lines, irrigation and other services run in the areas being worked on, and where nobody knows, have them professionally located. Fire-IT is not liable for damage to services that were concealed and not disclosed to us. Fire-IT's liability for damage to your premises caused by installation work is limited to damage that results directly from negligent installation, and to R5,000 excluding VAT per incident.

Carriers charge Fire-IT for attendances and costs that were not part of the order, and where the cause is on your side the charge is passed on to you at what the carrier charges us, with the carrier's breakdown on request. That covers a technician dispatched to a reported fault who finds no fault, or finds it in your own equipment, cabling or network; an installation or repair appointment that is missed, or a site that is not ready or cannot be accessed at the time agreed; repeat call-outs for the same cause; and build, wayleave or administration charges that arise from a change you ask for after the order is placed. A Fire-IT technician who attends for one of those causes is charged at Fire-IT's call-out rate at the time, which we give you on request.

South African law requires us to record who is taking the service before it can be activated. For a business we need identification for the authorised representative, your business registration and CIPC documents, verification on your business letterhead, and a letter of authority confirming that the representative is authorised to sign. We cannot activate the service until that documentation is complete, and time spent waiting for it is not part of the installation estimate above.

Before we hand the service over we test connectivity, speed and stability, and we issue you a Service Confirmation once it passes. On a new installation billing starts 5 business days after the Service Confirmation. On an upgrade or a change to a service you already have, billing changes the same day. The service itself commences on the date Fire-IT activates it. Services are billed monthly in advance and your first month is charged pro rata.

The service is delivered to a Network Interface Device at a single fibre entry point, configured with one access port and one network port, powered by AC or DC as is technically appropriate. There is no port redundancy at this service level. The Optical Network Terminal, the Network Interface Device where the carrier supplies it, and any other equipment the carrier installs belong to the carrier. You may not move, modify, relocate or interfere with it, or with the labels on it, and it may only be repaired or serviced by the carrier's own technicians. The router and any other equipment Fire-IT installs belong to Fire-IT, during the service and after it. You may not access, modify or interfere with their configuration, and unauthorised access voids the service warranty and support. Where Fire-IT provides a router, its configuration is Fire-IT's intellectual property and may not be copied. Fire-IT and the carrier may inspect, test, maintain and replace their equipment at reasonable times. When the service ends the equipment is removed or returned as set out below, and neither Fire-IT nor the carrier is obliged to restore the building to the state it was in before the fibre was installed.

The router Fire-IT installs is sized to the service it runs, so its replacement value follows the service rather than being one figure for every line. Excluding VAT, it is R10,000 on Business Internet Access and on the GPON and other single-tier products, R20,000 on Dedicated Internet Access, and R30,000 on any service of 10 Gbps or faster, whichever tier it is. That figure is agreed in advance as a genuine pre-estimate of what losing the router costs Fire-IT, including supplying, configuring and installing a replacement at your premises and attending to do it, and it is the figure charged wherever this agreement makes you liable for the router. Other equipment Fire-IT installs is valued at its full replacement cost.

From the day equipment is installed at your premises until it is back with Fire-IT or the carrier, the risk of its loss or damage is yours. If the Fire-IT router is lost, stolen, damaged or destroyed, you pay its replacement value above whether or not it was your fault, including damage caused by fire, lightning, a power surge, flood, storm or any other event outside anyone's control, and you pay the same where it has to be replaced because its configuration was accessed, changed or tampered with without our written approval. Other Fire-IT equipment is charged on the same basis at its full replacement cost, and the carrier's equipment at what the carrier charges Fire-IT to repair or replace it. You are also liable for damage to the carrier's fibre, ducting or equipment caused by you or your employees, agents, contractors or suppliers, which the carrier repairs at your cost. You are not liable for loss or damage caused by Fire-IT, the carrier or anyone working for either of them, and a router that fails because of a fault of its own or fair wear and tear is replaced by Fire-IT at no charge. You must insure the equipment at your premises, ours and the carrier's, against theft, damage and destruction for as long as it is there, because the carrier requires the same of Fire-IT. Fire-IT does not insure it for you. Tell us within 24 hours of any loss, theft or damage.

The equipment is never yours to sell, lend, pledge or offer as security, and you must keep it free of any attachment, lien, hypothec or other claim. If a creditor, landlord, sheriff, business rescue practitioner or liquidator claims it or tries to attach it, you must tell them in writing that it belongs to Fire-IT or the carrier, and tell us straight away. Where your premises are leased, you must, if we ask, tell your landlord in writing that the equipment is not yours.

The router Fire-IT supplies is sized for the line rather than for Wi-Fi across your premises. One router will not give full-speed wireless coverage to most offices, to more than one floor or to outdoor areas. Wider coverage needs wireless access points, which Fire-IT supplies, installs and supports on a separate quote, and which are not part of the monthly price.

You may use your own router. If you do, Fire-IT is not liable for degraded performance or for a failure of the service caused by it, we cannot monitor or manage it, and support for your own equipment is quoted separately. You remain responsible for making sure your own equipment is compatible with the service, and changes you make to your premises network can affect service delivery. If you replace a Fire-IT router with your own, ours still has to be returned.

You may use the service only for lawful purposes, and in line with South African law including the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act and the Regulation of Interception of Communications Act. You may not transmit, store or distribute content that is unlawful, that constitutes child pornography, obscenity, hate speech or incitement to violence, or that discriminates on racial, gender or religious grounds. You may not defame, harass, stalk or threaten anyone, including Fire-IT staff. You may not infringe intellectual property rights, including downloading or distributing pirated software or media. You may not collect or share personal information without consent, engage in fraud, pyramid schemes, impersonation or phishing, or breach exchange control regulations. You may not send unsolicited bulk email, maintain mailing lists without consent, or continue mailing a recipient who has asked to be removed, and you must secure any mail server you run against public relay. You are responsible for securing your account and your network against unauthorised access and misuse.

This is a business service and it is sold for your business to use at the address on this proposal, including for servers, virtual private networks, remote access, hosted applications and site-to-site connectivity. You may not resell the service or use it to provide internet access to a separate business at another premises, and you may not operate as an internet service provider on it. If you need to extend the service to another site, ask us and we will quote it.

You may not do anything that jeopardises the operation, security or integrity of Fire-IT's network, the carrier's network, or any third-party network. That includes attempting unauthorised access or bypassing security measures, using the service to circumvent authentication on any host, network or account, forging TCP/IP or email headers, accessing another person's computer, software or data without their consent, denial-of-service attacks, network flooding, unauthorised scanning or probing, distributing or linking to viruses, trojans, worms, malware or botnets, monitoring traffic on Fire-IT's network without our written consent, running services with known vulnerabilities such as open recursive DNS or open SMTP relays, and failing to act promptly on a denial-of-service attack once notified.

You may not use the service to harm or attempt to harm a minor, including by hosting, possessing, distributing or transmitting unlawful material such as child pornography.

Fire-IT has no control over content carried over the internet and is not liable for any loss arising from your use of or reliance on it. Our network is a conduit to third-party websites and services that we do not control, and you assume the risk of what you access through it. Fire-IT does not guarantee the security of data transmitted over its network, and you are responsible for safeguarding your own data.

Fire-IT may suspend the service, immediately and without notice where the circumstances require it, for non-payment or another breach of your payment obligations, for a breach of the acceptable use terms above or unlawful activity, for a threat to network security, for emergency maintenance or to protect infrastructure, and where a court order or a regulatory or legal requirement obliges us to. We give you advance notice where that is reasonably practicable, and tell you the reason and the expected duration. Monthly charges continue during a suspension, a reconnection charge applies when the service is restored, and you are liable for the costs of the suspension and the restoration.

If something goes wrong, raise it with us and let the escalation path in this agreement run before taking the matter into a public forum. Fire-IT reserves its rights in respect of untrue public statements about it or its contractors, including the right to recover its legal costs and any damages.

To order, install and support your service Fire-IT has to share information about you with the carrier, and with the suppliers who help us deliver it: your business name, registration and VAT numbers, the installation address, and the names and contact details of the people we deal with. You consent to that sharing, and to Fire-IT processing that information under the Protection of Personal Information Act for as long as the service runs and afterwards for as long as the law or our records require. The carrier processes it under its own privacy terms. Where you give us the personal information of your staff or other people, you confirm that you are entitled to. Tell us when any of it changes.

Before a fixed-term service is confirmed, Fire-IT may verify the information you have given us and obtain a credit report on your business, and you consent to that for the purpose of assessing the account and preventing fraud. Where the result is inconclusive we may ask for trade references, or for a deposit or other security before the order is placed, and we will tell you what is being asked for and why. Fire-IT may report a failure to pay on time to a credit bureau, but only after the written notice set out under late payment below.

A Fire-IT invoice is prima facie proof of the amount you owe. Invoices are issued monthly in advance on Net 5 day payment terms and are settled by debit order from a bank account you nominate, or on payment terms agreed with us in writing. A 30 day payment option is available at a higher rate. Cheques are not accepted. You remain liable for payment whether or not you received an invoice. To dispute an invoice, tell us in writing before it is due, or before its collection date where you pay by debit order, saying which invoice, the amount in dispute and why. The undisputed part remains payable on time. Where you pay by debit order the invoice is collected in full, and an amount you disputed that is found not to be owing is credited to your next invoice or refunded. Payments are made without deduction or set-off to the fullest extent the law allows. All prices on this proposal exclude VAT, which is charged at the prevailing rate.

If you do not pay an amount by its due date, that amount bears interest from the due date until it is paid, at 2% a month on the amount outstanding, which is a rate of 24% a year, and it is not compounded. Where the law sets a lower maximum rate for your account, that lower maximum applies instead. No separate penalty or late payment fee is payable. Interest, together with any fees and collection costs, stops accruing once it equals the unpaid capital that was owed when you first fell into default, and starts running again only once you have brought the account up to date. A failed debit order attracts an administration fee of R150 excluding VAT, plus the bank's charges; where the National Credit Act 34 of 2005 applies to your account, that fee and any collection costs are limited to the maximum that Act and its regulations allow. If an amount remains unpaid, Fire-IT may suspend the service until it is paid in full, and minimum charges continue while it is suspended. Fire-IT may also hand the account over for collection. Before Fire-IT reports any adverse information about you to a credit bureau it will give you at least 20 business days' written notice of its intention to do so, and it will not report the information if you pay the arrears within that period, if you have disputed the amount in writing on reasonable grounds, or if the debt has prescribed. These are the same rules as clause 5 of the Fire-IT Standard Terms and Conditions.

Fire-IT's own portion of the monthly price is fixed for the contract term. The carrier's portion is not ours to fix: where the carrier, or a third party whose link or equipment your service depends on, increases what it charges Fire-IT for your service during the term, Fire-IT may pass that increase on to you, and no more, with written notice setting out what changed as soon as we have been told. Once the contract term has ended and the service continues month to month, Fire-IT may change the monthly price on one calendar month's written notice.

The service runs for the contract term stated on this proposal from the date it is activated. When that term ends it continues month to month on the same terms until either of us cancels it in writing. Cancellation requires one full calendar month's written notice to accounts@fire-it.co.za, and is effective only once we acknowledge it in writing. The notice period starts on the first day of the calendar month after we receive the notice and the service ends at the end of that month, and charges remain payable in full for the whole notice period whether or not the service is used. If you cancel a fixed-term service before the end of its term, the balance of the remaining term becomes immediately due. If you cancel after the order has been placed but before the service goes live, the penalty set out under when your contract starts, and stopping during installation, above applies. If the service is cancelled, or ported to another provider, within 6 months of activation, a cancellation fee of R1,000 excluding VAT is payable in addition, before the cancellation is processed.

A move or relocation needs one full calendar month's notice and is a new order to the carrier rather than something Fire-IT can simply redirect. It is subject to feasibility at the new address and a new installation charge applies. Carriers do not generally carry a fixed term across to a new address: where the carrier treats the move as a cancellation, the cancellation terms above apply to the old address, and Fire-IT will tell you what that comes to before the move is placed. Where the new address cannot be served at all, the service has to be cancelled on those same terms.

You can move to a faster speed at any time during the term, subject to feasibility and to any charge the carrier makes for the change, which we tell you before it is placed; the new monthly price applies from the day the change is made, and where the carrier starts a new term on an upgrade, so does this service, which we also tell you before the change is placed. You cannot move to a slower speed or to a lower tier during the term, because Fire-IT is committed to the carrier at the speed you ordered for the whole of it. Once the term has ended, a move to a slower speed needs one calendar month's written notice.

When the service ends, Fire-IT's equipment must be returned to us at your cost, or made available for collection, in good working order and with its power supply and cabling, and the carrier's equipment must be made available for the carrier to remove. A router that is neither returned nor made available for collection within 7 days of the service ending, or of our asking for it if that is later, is invoiced at its replacement value above, and any other Fire-IT equipment on the same basis at its full replacement cost. Anything the carrier charges Fire-IT for its own equipment that was not made available is passed on to you.

Fire-IT may amend the acceptable-use terms of this agreement and will publish the current version. Fire-IT may act against anyone breaching this agreement or acting unlawfully, to the fullest extent of the law, and may investigate and act on forms of abuse not listed here. Fire-IT may monitor user and network traffic to protect the security and integrity of its systems, may suspend or terminate a service where the safety or integrity of its resources is at risk, and may remove content it regards as unlawful. If Fire-IT does not enforce a term, that is not a waiver of its right to enforce it later.

If either of us is in material breach of this agreement, the other may give written notice of it. A breach that can be put right must be put right within 7 days of that notice. A breach that cannot be put right, or that is not put right in time, entitles the other party to cancel or to require performance, in either case without giving up any claim for damages. Seven days is deliberate rather than generous: it is the period the carriers behind these services allow Fire-IT, and a longer one here would leave Fire-IT cancelled upstream while still bound downstream. Either of us may also cancel by written notice, to the extent the law allows, if the other is placed in liquidation or business rescue, has a receiver or administrator appointed, compromises with its creditors, or stops or threatens to stop carrying on business. Where Fire-IT cancels for your breach or on one of those grounds, the charges that would apply had you cancelled the service yourself on that day become due.

You indemnify Fire-IT against any claim by the carrier or anyone else, and against any loss, cost or charge Fire-IT incurs, that arises from your breach of this agreement, from content carried on your service, or from damage that you or your employees, agents or contractors cause to the carrier's network or anyone else's.

Fire-IT's address for legal notices and the service of legal process is 36 Regency Dr, Route 21 Business Park, Centurion, Pretoria, Gauteng 0178, and yours is the installation address on this proposal, unless either of us gives the other written notice of a different physical address in South Africa. Other notices under this agreement may be given by email, to accounts@fire-it.co.za for Fire-IT and to the email address of the person who signed this proposal for you, and an email is treated as received on the next business day. Cancellation notice goes to accounts@fire-it.co.za as set out above.

South African law governs this agreement. The parties consent to the jurisdiction of the Magistrate's Court or the High Court of South Africa, Gauteng Division, where applicable. Fire-IT's liability for this service is limited, for any single event, to six times the average monthly charge for the affected service, and in total in any twelve month period to the fees paid for it in the twelve months before the event giving rise to the claim. Fire-IT is not liable for indirect, consequential, special, incidental or punitive damages, for loss of profit, loss of data, business interruption or lost opportunity, or for a failure of third-party infrastructure. Neither party is liable for a failure or delay caused by something beyond its reasonable control, but that does not excuse paying for service already provided. This proposal and this agreement are the whole agreement for the services they cover, and may be amended only in writing. Where a Fire-IT Master Service Agreement is also in place between us, this agreement governs the business fibre services it covers and prevails over that Master Service Agreement to the extent of any conflict. You may not cede, assign or transfer this agreement or any right under it without Fire-IT's written consent; Fire-IT may cede or assign it to a company in its group or to the buyer of all or part of its business, and will tell you if it does. Where the Consumer Protection Act applies to you, this agreement is read subject to it, and nothing in it is intended to take away a right that Act gives you. If any provision is found invalid, the rest of the agreement remains in force. Acceptance is binding under the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act, and an electronic signature has the same effect as an original.

This agreement applies together with the general terms that cover every Fire-IT service. Read the Standard Terms and Conditions.