Forum Rules

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Posting Guidelines for CarBizOnline.com's Forums

CarBizOnline.com's forums were established in 2009 to create a friendly environment for automotive dealership professionals, 3rd party vendors, and organizations to interact in a laid back, professionally-orientated environment. In order to foster this friendly, professional interaction and create an environment where industry professionals feel comfortable posting and sharing ideas, we have created a set of rules and guidelines which all members are asked to follow. These rules are general in nature, as it is impossible to spell out every possible reason that may result in a thread being locked, deleted, or edited.

The rules are as follows, but are subject to change at any time with or without notice:

1. Expletives

While using the occasional off-color word is okay in a post, profanity will not be allowed in thread titles. Also, many people are deeply offended by vulgar language, so if you feel you must swear to get your point across, please keep the amount of profanity in your posts to an appropriate minimum so as to not be overly offensive. Phrases such as "damn" or "pissed off" are not considered profanity.

2. Spamming

Spamming or intentional business advertisements by businesses that do not sponsor CarBizOnline.com are not allowed outside of the NON-Dealerships Employees forum. Threads or PMs determined to be "spam" will be deleted or forwarded to the Administration. This type of posting could possibly result with privileges to our board being restricted or denied without notice. The use of a company name as an ID is in itself an advertisement. If it is in direct competition to our paying sponsors it cannot be allowed. While this may seem unfair, your business name on the site is an ad and, as such, is a disservice to our paying sponsors. If you currently have an ID that is a business name and it is in a competitive market to our paying sponsors, contact an administrator OR make a request in the "Requests and Feedback" forum for a name change. We will allow 7 calendar days to satisfy the request before initiating action to arbitrarily change the ID to a non-business designation.

Lottery schemes being advertised on this board are considered Spam. Excessive advertisement of any other "for profit" forums is also considered spam, and will be dealt with accordingly. If you are interested in sponsoring CarBizOnline.com, please send inquiries to admin@carbizonline.com.

Soliciting for Members of this site to go and join another site is also considered a form of Spam. Mentioning another site for reference or as an information source is acceptable but direct solicitation aimed at our Members to bolster some other site's Membership is inappropriate and subject to Moderator disciplinary action.

Chain Letter type threads are not allowed on this site.

MLM (multi-level marketing) programs are not allowed. Please do not post any affiliate links.

3. Flames, or Derogatory Insults

Flames or derogatory insults are strictly against the rules. If you disagree with another member's point of view, do so in a mature and civil manner. If someone posts to discuss their personal problems or seek help from other forum members, please do not respond unless you have something positive or helpful to add. If you find yourself being flamed or insulted by another member, please do not dignify that person with a response. Notify a moderator and let us handle it. If you feel you must respond to a flame or insult directly, please do NOT do so on the board. Use private messages or e-mail.

4. Racism, Religion, or Sexism

Threads or replies promoting or expressing intolerant views towards any group (race, religion, sexual preference) are not appropriate, and will not be allowed. This includes the usage of racial slurs, and making stereotypical statements that will incite intolerant comments on the board.

5. Threatening other board members

Threatening other board members will not be tolerated. This includes threats of physical violence, threats of property damage, death threats, terroristic threats, or threatening to hack another person's online identity or computer.

6. Porn, NWS, or Copyrighted Picture violation

Porn is not welcome here. Pictures showing nudity are not allowed. Links to pornographic material are strictly prohibited. Any offensive topics (graphic sex, specific sex act, violence, snuff films or videos(human or animal) that depict graphic death, graphic violence, torture, and/or dismemberment, gore, dead bodies, or violent sexual acts will not be allowed.

This is a forum for professionals. All threads and posts should reflect professionalism and respect. No NWS (not work safe) material will be allowed.

Sexual acts of any kind are not acceptable.

Any person that adds content to a thread that will give the thread a NWS status will be in violation of the "Porn" policy. You MAY NOT place content to the initial thread topic that will change the thread content to NWS. Members posting requests for PMs, or offering to PM material which violates our NWS policies will be considered in violation of this rule.

In addition to the above, posting or linking to, any copyrighted or watermarked pictures is expressly forbidden by http://www.carbizonline.com.

7. Avatars or Signatures

Avatars and Signatures: Avatars, user titles, and signatures must be WORK SAFE. Please keep that in mind when adding them. Keep them respectable. If complaints are made about your avatar due to work related viewing, your avatar will be removed from view. If you put something offensive or unsuitable in there, we will turn off "your" avatar and no one will see it but you.

All Avatars may be sized up to the following maximum limits:

100 X 100 Pixel maximum

20,000 Byte maximum

Signature tests and avatar tests will be allowed in "Practice" forum.

Avatars that promote other car sites or businesses that are not a sponsor will not be allowed.

8. Posting in Appropriate Forums

Please post your topics in the most appropriate forum.

9. Rude, Disruptive, or Immature Posts

Threads involving topics such as toilet humor (i.e. poop, urination, vomiting, flatulation, restroom habits, /kill, boobs or ban, bag of dicks), graphic depictions of sexual acts and/or conquests, posting of IM conversations in an effort to shame or harass others, malicious parody threads, or other similarly disruptive topics will not be allowed.

10. Illegal Activities

Threads/replies encouraging other illegal/unethical action will not be endorsed by http://www.carbizonline.com. Threads about using and/or obtaining illegal copies of copyrighted material such as software, music, videos/movies, and sharing registration and license keys of copyrighted material will be removed. Discussion of drugs and alcohol is limited to the purpose of substance abuse policies in the workplace. Soliciting information on obtaining illegal drugs or information on the use and purpose of the illegal drug is not appropriate on our site. Using the site's PM system to sell or obtain illegal drugs is expressly forbidden and anyone reported to be using the PM System for this purpose, and if the fact is proven by a copy of a forwarded PM to an Administrator, will be immediately banned from the board.

Sharing CarFax subscriptions is forbidden by the EULA of the CarFax subscriber. Therefore, no CarFax threads are to be run to share the CarFax service outside of the EULA in any of our forums.

Threads to promote organized gambling or lottery type money activities are not appropriate. We have no gambling license or affiliations with gambling businesses and therefore we cannot condone any real organized gambling activities on the site.

11. Trolling

"Trolling", or making posts with the sole intention of creating discontent or problems on the forums is obviously against the forum guidelines. This includes registering an alternate ID for the sole purpose of creating problems on the forums. "Troll ID's" will be locked immediately and permanently, and can be locked without notification to the offender. A second ID, by the same person, on this site is considered "trolling".

This also includes creating posts on this site to organize, instigate, or stage trolling attacks on other sites. CarBizOnline.com does not recommend or condone any such activity.

12. Posting Harmful URL's/HTML code

Any Member of the CarBizOnline.com site that posts malicious or harmful URL links that cause:
-"Other Member" PCs to become locked or have to be rebooted in order for the PC to regain functionality (Like the link to the -"You're an idiot" page that ends up spawning countless little browser windows dancing all over your screen)
-Screaming, (cannot be viewed safely for content or sound at work)
-Links that add another forum member to your ignore list
-Links that log you off of the forum
-HTML code that disrupts or distorts the appearance or functionality of the site.


Will lose posting privileges for a time determined by the administrators. A repeat offender may be permanently banned from the board.

13. Sponsor Bashing

Our paying Sponsors deserve respect and restraint. Attacking a sponsor on the board is inappropriate. If you have a complaint with a sponsor, you may post the information in the appropriate forum and show the facts pertinent to the problem at hand. If you do post on the board about a specific problem involving a sponsor, please remain calm and state the facts. Do not let emotion cloud the issue at hand.

We really hope situations can be resolved off-line, but we will not prohibit a statement of fact. However, we will control the thread so as to stop the "hate" or "Me too" replies these threads often generate.

If the situation resolution seems to be totally unacceptable or completely ignored, you should contact the Board Administrator directly with your situation. Send all pertinent information to admin@carbizonline.com

14. Attacking Forum Moderators

Please utilize the board's Private Message function, or e-mail, if you wish to discuss a situation with a moderator. As long as you bring up your concerns maturely and civilly to the moderator or administrator in question, we will do our best to address your concerns fairly and promptly. Continued attacks to a moderator on-line will usually result in restriction for some interval from our site even for the first offense. Starting threads to criticize or complain about a moderator action will be considered a violation of this rule.

15. Classified Policies

We have no intentions of having a "classifieds" listing forum. This is not a place to buy or sell goods. Go to http://www.ebay.com for that.


16. CarBizOnline.com site Communications

Using the CarBizOnline.com e-mail link or the CarBizOnline.com PM process to send threats of violence, racial attacks, personal or sexually harassing messages is prohibited. You may or may not be warned once, and further violations will result in a permanent ban from the board.

Anyone that feels they are a victim of this problem should immediately contact a moderator or a site Administrator for assistance. DO NOT DELETE THE MESSAGE(S). Please keep the offending message(s) on hand so that you can forward them to the Administrator, as evidence, for action against the perpetrator.

We take great pains to provide security to our members and we ask that our members return the favor. Take precautions to secure your ID and Password. If your ID and Password are "used" by someone else that has access to your PC, YOU ARE responsible for their actions. If they get YOUR ID banned or restricted, then YOUR ID is banned and restricted as if YOU WERE the poster. Simply logging off will require that your password be known rather than automatically entered or cookied.


17. CarBizOnline.com forums will utilize the following warning system. Each member is allowed a maximum of 5 warning points at any given time. Below is a list of the # of warning points, and the penalty that each represents.

1 point = 20%, point expires after 1 week
- Your posts will need moderator approval for 24 hours
2 points = 40%, points expire after 1 week
- Your posting privileges will be suspended for 8 hours
3 points = 60%, points expire after 2 weeks
- Your posting privileges will be suspended for 24 hours
4 points = 80%, points expire after 4 weeks
- You will be banned from the site for 1 week
5 points = 100%, points expire after 3 months
- You will be banned from the site for 3 months

All issuances of warnings and their affiliated points are at the sole discretion of the CarBizOnline.com moderators and administrators.

The above rules and guidelines are necessary to make CarBizOnline.com's forums comfortable and enjoyable for ALL automotive industry professionals. If you feel you can not comply with the rules above, please refrain from using CarBizOnline.com's forums.

Thank you,

CarBizOnline.com's Administrators