11 Essentials All Course Terms and Conditions Must Have for Course Creators
Want to know what you need in your course terms and conditions? These are the essential terms you need as a course creator.
Creating your own online course is extremely fun and exciting, and if you’re anything like me, you are researching everything you need to ensure you have everything you need to legally protect your course content and your money. As a lawyer myself who drafts contracts for course creators like you, I am giving you the essential terms you need in your course terms and conditions.
I will tell you what you need in your terms and conditions for training courses and how to write terms and conditions, whether you are purchasing a training course terms and conditions template or grabbing a free online course terms and conditions template online.
After learning about what you need in your course terms and conditions, you will have everything you need to protect your course content from copycats and your money from leeches.
This post is all about the critical elements all course terms and conditions must have for course creators.
Ultimate Course Terms and Conditions
Terms and conditions for training courses
Now, let’s get into the “meat” of this blog post and what exactly those essential elements are for your course terms and conditions.
1. License to use
When giving students access to your course, you are giving them permission to use your course content and material, not for them to own any of it by using it.
Thus, you must first make clear that your students receive the right to use your content, not the ownership of your content. The right to use your content is called a license. Your course terms and conditions must state that the student receives a license to use the course content, including the materials you provide.
And ensure that it is explicitly stated in your terms and conditions for students that the license is:
non-exclusive, meaning you can give this same license to anyone else (“you are not the only student”);
non-transferrable, meaning they can not give the rights they have to use the content to someone else, basically transferring the contract to someone else;
non-sublicensable, meaning the student does not have the right to give the same license the student has to someone else (while keeping the license themselves too);
limited, meaning that not all your rights are transferred to the student, just those specified in the course terms and conditions (an unlimited license would mean the student has the right to use the course content without limitation in the same manner as you can); and
revocable, meaning you still have the right to revoke the license and basically stop the student from using the course content, so if the student does not comply with your terms, you can stop the student from accessing your course content.
2. Protection from copycats
That brings me to the next essential element of your course terms and conditions.
Now, you have given someone a license to use the course content and material, but you have to specify what your students may use it for and, maybe more importantly, what they may not use it for.
It happens all the time that students take the course content and repackage it to resell it to others, their own customers. You need to protect yourself from these copycats by explicitly stating in your terms that your students:
can only use the license for their own personal use; and
may not use the course content for commercial purposes, in other words, starting their own business replicating your content.
By having the proper terms in place, you will be protected, but you can also send the copycats cease-and-desist letters if they infringe your copyrights, and this will also serve as proof in court that these are your copyrights, should it get that far.
3. Protection from the Charity Bee: sharing is not caring!
Another type of student that is kind of like the copycat is, what I call, the “Charity Bee.” The Charity Bee is the person who shares everything they have with other people for free. So, they may not use your content for their own commercial purposes, i.e. resell the course to their own customers. But they share your content with family, friends, and maybe even the public. They are pollinating the world with your content for free, and you do not want them to do that. Sharing is not caring when it comes from a Charity Bee!
Therefore, you want to include in your terms and conditions for students that they may not:
share any of the course content with third parties; nor
share their account information, including, but not limited to, their username and password, with anyone or provide access to their accounts in any other way.
Also, include the right to revoke their license and restrict them from accessing their accounts if they break these rules.
4. Disclaimers for helpless admirers
Another type of student that may seem like a great student at first glance is the admirer. However, these students may mistakenly put you on a pedestal so high that you can’t reach them. They may think that just by following your course, they will get certain answers or results that they will not in practice. So, those admirers may turn on you because they did not achieve what they wanted or thought they would.
But you are not nor can you be responsible for their results or outcomes. It depends on factors other than just following your course from A to Z. Examples are their educational background and qualifications, capabilities, resources, knowledge, and their unique way of implementing what they learn from your course.
Therefore, you need disclaimers for the helpless admirers stating that you are not responsible for your student’s actions and results, and you disclaim any and all guarantees, warranties, and liabilities.
5. Payment options: upfront or in instalments
Speaking of different types of students, you need to consider your pricing and your potential students’ budgets. Some students may not be able to afford to pay the full fee upfront. Do you want to offer those students the possibility to pay the fee in instalments?
In that case, you need to think about the different payment plans you want to offer. You need to be very specific about what amounts they pay and when. Also, you need to specify whether your students will gain access to all or only part of the course. If possible, I recommend having the students get access to a proportionate part of what they pay for, like, for example, access to 50% of the course if they pay 50% upfront and access to the remaining 50% only after they pay the remaining 50%. That way, you are still protected, and they can’t get the full enjoyment of the course if they later default on their payments.
Don’t forget to state in the course terms and conditions that the student agrees to and gives you permission to charge their payment accounts or credit cards automatically.
6. Refunds & satisfaction guarantees
Now that you have specified how you will accept payment of your course fee, you need to protect your money from being taken away from you.
Because of the digital nature of online courses, an online course is not like a physical product that your customers can return. So, you can’t provide refunds upon return of the course material.
You need to think about whether you will offer refunds or not, and if so, under which conditions.
First of all, if your students are consumers (as opposed to business owners), they will have rights to a “cooling-off” or “withdrawal” period after their purchase unless they explicitly waive those rights. So, you need to have in writing that they waive those rights to cancel and get a refund. Additionally, you need to set clear provisions on the date they may ultimately cancel the contract and get a refund or if you do not provide refunds at all.
You may want to provide a satisfaction guarantee to your students, meaning they can get their money back if they are not satisfied with the course content or if it was not what they expected. In that case, you need to specify in your course terms and conditions the period during which a student may request a refund.
You must also stipulate under which conditions a student may ask for a refund and what the refunded amount will be. If they only watched 20% of your course, should they get a full refund if they have not even tried? Do they get a refund equal to 20% of the fee in that case? Do they not have the right to a refund at all?
Perhaps you want to have proof that the student really tried. Does the student have to show that the student did the homework by providing copies of the completed course material?
These are things you must stipulate and be very clear about.
And, even if you have been very clear in your communication about your refund policy, trust me, some students will still try to get a refund when they do not even qualify by a long shot. But, by having clear terms in place, you can refuse a refund and simply refer them to your policy.
7. Life-long or limited access
Now that we are thinking about the value of your course, we should also consider how long students may access your course. Will that be for a limited time only because that is what they pay for, or is the content not evergreen?
Many use the term “life-long access,” but what does that even mean? Does it mean the life of your customer or the life of your business, or the life of that specific course? I’m pretty sure some customers and your business will outlive your course. You must define the term “life-long access” in your course terms and conditions if you give your students access for that long. Otherwise, some students might ask you for compensation when you stop providing the course.
8. Course updates
Speaking of life-long, from time to time, you may update your course with new content.
You must also be very clear about whether or not you provide updates, or when you make updates, whether those customers will get access to the new content.
If you make major updates to your course five years later and the value increases by 200%, should they still receive access to that without paying additional fees?
9. Bonus offers
You may also want to offer bonus content and materials to your existing students in addition to the basic package within your course.
Maybe you don’t offer them yet, but you might in the future.
You want to ensure that your current course terms and conditions will also apply to any of those (future) bonuses, so you need to have a provision in your terms stating that those terms will also apply to those bonus modules.
10. Student groups
Many course creators offer their students the opportunity to connect and cheer each other on their progress. That’s great, but you need to protect yourself from certain risks that come with a private group.
First of all, you need to make clear in your course terms and conditions that the private group is not part of your course. The private group should not be considered a feature of the course. The group may end for whatever reason or get hacked, especially if it’s on another platform, like Facebook, which will most likely be the case. You have no control over that, so you should not be responsible.
You want to ensure that your students will not make any claims against you for not providing them with all course features. It’s a “nice-to-have” and not a “must-have.”
You also want to protect yourself by having a disclaimer stating that you are not responsible nor liable for whatever other students say in the group. But, you also want to insert in your terms the right to remove a student from the group if they cause mayhem because you still want to protect your students and your brand wherever you can.
11. Compliance with laws
When a student purchases your course and creates an account to access your course, you are collecting personal data from your students.
Thus, you must comply with privacy and data protection laws.
Therefore, you will also need a privacy policy and a statement in your course terms and conditions stating that you comply with applicable laws and a reference to your privacy policy so your students are informed on how you collect, store and use their personal information.
I know this is boring, but you need to comply with these laws because otherwise, you might be hit with governmental fines or lawsuits, and it’s not worth the risk.
Ultimately, this is why you need all these essential elements in your course terms and conditions, not only to ensure you receive the money you deserve but also to protect your hard-earned cash.
Training course terms and conditions template
If you want a training course terms and conditions template containing all the essentials I just discussed, my course terms and conditions have all of them and more!
My training course terms and conditions template is fully customizable for your specific course and your (business) needs. You can purchase your course terms and conditions on this page of my contract shop.
Free online course terms and conditions template
If you already have a template or want to grab a free online course terms and conditions template online, then make sure it contains all the essential terms I just discussed. You can use this list as your checklist for your course terms and conditions!
This post was all about the essentials your course terms and conditions must have to protect your course content & your money.
You can get your course terms and conditions on this page of my contract shop!
Are you also providing 1-on-1 online consultations or coaching calls? Then you need terms and conditions for online coaching calls or consultations. You can get my Virtual Meeting Policy on this page!
