Updated as of: Feb 2019
PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING CAREFULLY.
The Costco Auto Program is operated in the United States by Affinity Auto Programs, Inc., doing business as “Costco Auto Program” (“CAP”, “we”, “us” or “our”), which is an independent company, not an affiliate of Costco Wholesale Corporation (“Costco”).
This document sets out those terms and conditions (the "Agreement") under which we allow you ("you", "your") to use our website ("Website"), whether you do so just to find out about us and our services or to provide us with information in order to participate in the Costco Auto Program or in any other activities through the Website.
If you are visiting our Website as a Visitor (see below for definitions), your use of the Website confirms that you agree to this Agreement. To access other services or parts of the Website, you may have to confirm that you have read, accepted and agreed to this Agreement by clicking on "Accept" or you will not be able to view or use those portions of the Website.
THIS AGREEMENT LIMITS THE LIABILITY OF COSTCO AUTO PROGRAM, DISCLAIMS CERTAIN WARRANTIES, GRANTS YOU A LIMITED LICENSE AND GIVES THE COSTCO AUTO PROGRAM CONTROL OVER THE INFORMATION YOU ELECT TO PROVIDE TO US. ALL PERSONAL INFORMATION PROVIDED BY INDIVIDUALS ALSO BECOMES SUBJECT TO THE COSTCO AUTO PROGRAM'S PRIVACY POLICY https://www.costcoauto.com/privacy.aspx DO NOT USE THE WEBSITE OR PROVIDE US WITH ANY PERSONAL INFORMATION IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO THESE TERMS,
1. Help and feedback
If you require assistance using the Website or wish to provide us with feedback, please call us at 1-877-500-1470
2. Agreement May Change
We may change any of the terms or conditions of this Agreement from time to time without notice. You should revisit the Website periodically to review the terms and conditions of the then-current Agreement. Any revisions to this Agreement are effective once posted on or accessible from or through the Website.
3. Definitions
Many of the words and phrases in this Agreement have specific meanings so we have provided those for you to read:
“Agent” means any person who provides Personal Information to the Costco Auto Program in any manner on behalf of another individual.
“CAP Service(s)” means any one or more of the services or benefits offered by the Costco Auto Program from time to time; which may include a referral to a participating CAP dealer, issuance of a dealer parts and service coupon, or issuance of an authorization number to register to participate in an OEM promotion or any other service or benefit offered by the Costco Auto Program.
"Data" means any and all records, documents, data and information collected by CAP related to any Guest’s use of any CAP Service from a Guest, an Agent, a Participating Dealer or an OEM; including, without limitation, certain non-Personal Information about vehicle purchases (such as a vehicle make, the vehicle model and model year, purchase date and price paid or capital cost of lease), Personal Information related to Guests, and related matters.
“Guest” means an individual who submits information to the Costco Auto Program to participate in one of more of the CAP Services. A Guest may access the Website as a Visitor on a different occasion without disclosing information or requesting a CAP Service. A Guest may provide certain Personal Information personally and/or directly, or they may use instruct an Agent or representative to do so.
"OEM" an original equipment manufacturer.
"Personal Information" means all information about an identifiable individual; including, without limitation, name, email address, telephone number, home address, geolocation, demographic information (such as postal code, gender and age), contact information, Costco membership number, and certain information about vehicle purchases whether provided by a Guest, Agent, Visitor Participating Dealer or OEM (such as the vehicle purchase agreement or a vehicle sales file which may include the vehicle identification number, model and model year, purchase date, price paid or capital cost of lease, MSRP and invoice price).
“Visitor” means anyone who visits the publicly available parts of our Website, but who is not asked to provide information related to a request to use one or more of the CAP Services. Visitors can access information from the Website's publicly available areas without creating an account or otherwise submitting information about themselves. However, by using the Website, Visitors agree to accept all of the terms and conditions of this Agreement. A Visitor may not utilize a CAP Service and cannot request to access the Data.
Please note that CAP collects and archives your IP address as provided in our Privacy Policy.
4. Purpose for access
You agree that the purpose for our providing you with access to the Website is to (i) allow you to obtain information and (where applicable) upload, download, create, and add to the Data for purposes reasonably connected to a request to participate in one or more of the CAP Services on behalf of yourself or on behalf of another person for whom you have the authority to do so, and (ii) to allow CAP to generate and review reports on your activities, or those of Guests you act on behalf of as may be permitted by CAP from time to time. Once received by CAP, the Data becomes part of a database, which CAP owns. Any Personal Information in the Data will becollected, used and disclosed by CAP pursuant to the CAP Privacy Policy.
5. Your warranty and representations to CAP
You warrant and represent to CAP as follows:
- If you act on behalf of an organization, whether a motor vehicle dealership (on behalf of a Guest) or otherwise, that organization has implemented a legally compliant privacy policy and appointed responsible individuals with respect to the collection, use and disclosure of personal information, including by you;
- By accessing the Website and/or adding to, deleting or modifying Data with respect to any Guest, you are not breaching any contract, duty or law or infringing anyone's intellectual property, privacy or other legal rights;
- If you are a bona fide Agent, as defined in this Agreement, your access to this Website is permitted solely for the limited purpose of carrying out your role as an Agent, and any access or use other than as permitted to an Agent is hereby prohibited. As an Agent, you are permitted to access this Website only to the extent reasonably required to fulfill your obligations to the other individual or individuals you are assisting regarding their use of one or more of the CAP Services; and,
- You are aware of the content of this Agreement and agree to follow its terms and conditions.
6. Compliance with rules and regulations
You agree that you will follow all of the rules, requirements and regulations set forth by CAP from time to time. Those rules, requirements and regulations are currently as set out in this Agreement. These rules, requirements and regulations will apply to any use of the Website and access to the Data and will apply to you whether you are a Guest, Visitor or Agent.
You agree and confirm that:
- you are at least 18 years old; and
- you possess the legal authority to enter into this agreement and to use the Website in accordance with all of the terms and conditions contained in this Agreement.
7. Privacy
We respect your personal privacy. We will collect, use and disclose personal information as described in our Privacy Policy, which is available at www.costcoauto.com/privacy. By using or accessing the Website, you consent to the collections, uses and disclosures of your personal information for the purposes described in our Privacy Policy.
8. Your agreement
You agree that at all times:
- Your access to this Website is for your use for the stated purposes in this Agreement only. You will not allow or provide access to this Website to any unauthorized person or any person under the age of 18, unless such access is continuously supervised by you;
- You are using this Website solely to determine whether you wish to use one or more of the CAP Services;
- If you are a bona fide Agent, as defined in this Agreement, your access to this Website is permitted solely for the limited purpose of carrying out your role as an Agent, and any access or use other than as permitted to an Agent is hereby prohibited. As an Agent, you are permitted to access this Website only to the extent reasonably required to fulfill your obligations to the other individual or individuals you are assisting regarding their use of one or more of the CAP Services;
- If you are a bona fide Visitor or a Guest, you are permitted to access this Website and download copies of content from this Website for non-commercial and personal use only; and
- Whenever you access, use or otherwise interact with the Website, you will comply with all:
- applicable laws, including, but not limited to, privacy laws;
- acceptable-use policies and other policies that we implement with respect to the Website from time to time, as posted on or made available through the Website; and
- Other rules, policies and procedures we communicate to you from time to time.
9. Prohibited Activities
You will not use the Website for any purpose that is unlawful or prohibited by this Agreement.
In addition to, and without limiting, any other prohibitions set out in this Agreement, you may not do any of the following when accessing, using or interacting with the Website:
- use the Website in any manner that could damage, disable, overburden, or impair the Website or interfere with any other party's use and enjoyment of the Website;
- engage in harassment in any manner, including via e-mail, chat, or by use of obscene, offensive or abusive language (as determined by us in our sole discretion);
- impersonate others, including a CAP employee or representative, or other members or visitors to the Website;
- upload to, distribute or otherwise publish any content that is defamatory, obscene, threatening, invasive of privacy or publicity rights, abusive, illegal, or otherwise objectionable, or which may constitute or encourage a criminal offence, violate the rights of any party or which may otherwise give rise to liability or violate any law;
- upload any commercial content or solicit others to join or become members of any other online service or other organization;
- circumvent or disable any access control technology, security device, procedure, protocol, or technological protection mechanism that may be included or established in or as part of the Site or any hardware or software used to provide the Site, or third party hardware, software or services;
- use the Website or any hardware or software used to provide the Website to perform cyber currency or crypto currency mining; and
- collect any content or information from CAP, our licensee’s or any user or otherwise access the Website personally or through any automated means (such as harvesting bots, robots, spiders, or scrapers) without our permission.
10. Relationship
You agree that by using the Website or by submitting personal information on your own or a Visitor or Guest's behalf, you and CAP are not entering into:
- An employment relationship
- A business partnership or joint business venture;
- A consulting relationship; or
- A relationship where CAP or you act as each other's legal agent.
11. Withdrawal of access for cause
This Agreement grants no rights, only privileges and permission. You agree that CAP, in its absolute discretion, will be the sole judge of whether you have breached any provision of this Agreement and that any privileges or permission granted to you under this Agreement may be revoked, suspended or terminated by CAP at any time without notice.
12. Waiver
You acknowledge that the Internet and websites accessed by you are inherently dangerous and subject to computer, system and network failure as well as malicious human activity. While CAP will take such steps as are reasonable in the circ*mstances to maintain the security of this Website and the Data and your privacy and confidentiality with respect to information you provide, you agree that you use this Website completely at your own risk and that in no event shall CAP be held liable for any loss or damages, however caused, except as expressly provided in this Agreement, even if caused by the negligence or reckless behavior of CAP.
13. Disclaimer
THE COSTCO AUTO PROGRAM DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THIS WEBSITE WILL OPERATE ERROR-FREE OR THAT IT AND ITS SERVER OR SERVERS ARE OR WILL BE FREE OF COMPUTER VIRUSES, TROJAN HORSES, OR OTHER HARMFUL CONTENT, DEVICES OR PROGRAMS. THIS WEBSITE AND ITS CONTENT AND MATERIAL, AND ACCESS TO THE DATA, ARE ALL PROVIDED ON AN "AS IS, WHERE IS", AND "AS AND WHEN AVAILABLE" BASIS WITHOUT ANY REPRESENTATIONS, GUARANTEES, CONDITIONS OR WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY THE LAW, THE COSTCO AUTO PROGRAM DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL CONDITIONS AND WARRANTIES, WHETHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING THE CONDITION OR WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY AND THE CONDITION OR WARRANTY OF FITNESS FOR ANY PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE COSTCO AUTO PROGRAM MAKES NO WARRANTY OR REPRESENTATION OF NON-INFRINGEMENT. THE COSTCO AUTO PROGRAM FURTHER MAKES NO WARRANTIES OR REPRESENTATIONS CONCERNING THE ACCURACY, RELIABILITY, COMPLETENESS, OR TIMELINESS OF THE DATA ACCESSED BY USE OF THE WEBSITE.
CAP strives to ensure information is accurate and current. However, we make no representations to you about the accuracy of the information contained on the CAP Website. This includes, without limitation, the availability of any CAP Service to you on a local or national basis.
14. Limitation of damages
You further agree THAT THE COSTCO AUTO PROGRAM will not be liable to you for any damages you may suffer and that IN NO EVENT WILL COSTCO AUTO PROGRAM BE LIABLE FOR indirect, general, special, economic, consequential, EXEMPLARY or punitive damages resulting from the use of (or inability to use) this Website or any cap service, whether in tort (including negligence), contract or any other cause of action, including without limitation, for availability of any cap service, loss of data, information or programs, or damage to computers or networks, or from breach of privacy and similar personal rights, or from infringement of intellectual property rights, OR FROM DEFAMATION, LIBEL OR SLANDER, or any other damages whatsoever, whether or not CAP shall have been advised of the possibility of such damages.
15. Exceptions to disclaimers and limitations of damages
THIS AGREEMENT DOES NOT EXCLUDE OR LIMIT CAP’S LIABILITY (IF ANY) FOR DEATH OR PERSONAL INJURY CAUSED BY CAP’S NEGLIGENCE, FRAUD, FRAUDULENT MISREPRESENTATION OR ANY MATTER WHICH IT WOULD BE ILLEGAL FOR CAP TO EXCLUDE OR ATTEMPT TO EXCLUDE CAP’S LIABILITY.
SOME JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW LIMITATIONS ON IMPLIED WARRANTIES OR EXCLUSION OF LIABILITY FOR CERTAIN TYPES OF DAMAGES; AS A RESULT, ONE OR MORE OF THE ABOVE LIMITATIONS OR EXCLUSIONS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU.
16. Further disclaimer of CAP
Except as provided in the Privacy Policy, while CAP will make reasonable commercial efforts to make access to review the Data available on a reasonable basis, CAP accepts no obligation to do so on any pre-agreed basis or at all. CAP may interrupt access to the Data, or terminate access to the Data at any time, without notice or liability. Access to the Data shall in all cases be a privilege and not a right or proprietary interest of any kind. Subject to its privacy policies and applicable law, CAP shall be free to modify, change, delete, share the Data with Costco Wholesale, Participating Dealers and OEM’s and generally deal with the Data as it sees fit. Other parties may have access to the Data and can change, modify, amend or delete the Data. CAP has no control over such third parties and no event will CAP be liable for any reliance by you on the Data.
17. Events Outside our Control
CAP will not be liable or responsible for any failure to perform, or delay in performance of, any of our obligations under this Agreement that is caused by events outside our reasonable control. CAP’s performance will be deemed to be suspended for the period that any such event continues, and we will have an extension of time for performance for the duration of that period or such longer period as we may reasonably require. We will use our reasonable efforts to end the event or to find a solution by which our obligations may be performed despite the event.
18. Enforcement
CAP's performance of its obligations under this Agreement is subject to all applicable laws and regulatory requirements. Nothing contained in this agreement is in derogation of CAP’s rights and obligations to comply with law enforcement requests or requirements relating to your use of the Website or information provided to, or gathered by CAP with respect to such use.
19. Evidence
Computer records stored in reasonably secure conditions by CAP with respect to the Data, the Website and your access to them will be accepted as conclusive evidence of your conduct, communications and dealings with the Data and the Website. Computer records will be deemed to be stored in reasonably secure conditions if systematically recorded on a durable and inalterable medium, including a write-protected disk, tape, CD or DVD or similar medium, or, if upon an alterable medium, upon reasonable proof that such record has not been altered.
20. Injunctive and similar relief
You agree that any breach by you of this Agreement will not be fully compensable in damages and you therefore agree that CAP shall be entitled to immediate equitable, injunctive and other similar relief against you without notice and without the necessity of proving damages or the likelihood of damages.
21. Indemnity
You agree to indemnify and save harmless CAP for any damages sustained should you breach your warranties and representations or any term or condition of this Agreement.
22. Ownership and Grant of limited license
The Website, its organization and design (including all software code and architecture and the look and feel of the Website and its user interfaces), and all information, images, artwork, text, video, audio, pictures and other material and content on the Site, all of which CAP owns or has the right to use, are protected by copyright and other proprietary rights.
CAP grants to you a non-exclusive, limited and revocable license to download and view the content available on this Website on your computer for the purposes stated in this Agreement and no other purposes.
23. Feedback
If you send any communications, comments, questions, suggestions, or related materials to us by any method of communication suggesting or recommending changes to the Website, any CAP Service or any product, services or materials offered through the Website or that you would like to see offered through the Website (“Feedback”) then:
- all Feedback is not, and will not be treated as, your confidential or proprietary information or property;
- CAP is free to use, without any attribution or compensation to you, any ideas, know-how, concepts, techniques, or other intellectual property and proprietary rights contained in the Feedback for any purpose whatsoever, and you acknowledge that CAP may independently develop its own updates or improvements to the Website or any CAP Service that may be similar or identical to the Feedback; and
- you understand and agree that CAP is not obligated to use, display, reproduce, or distribute any such ideas, know-how, concepts, or techniquescontained in the Feedback, and you have no right to compel us to do so.
24. Assignment
CAP may assign this Agreement to any affiliate or any third party at any time. You may not assign this Agreement or any rights or benefits offered to you by CAP. This Agreement shall remain personal between you and CAP.
25. Termination
In its absolute discretion, CAP may terminate this Agreement at any time with or without notice to you. You may not terminate this Agreement or any provision. This Agreement will remain in force between you and CAP unless and until terminated by CAP and CAP may enforce any and all provisions of this Agreement against you, and, if you are an Agent, against any organization you are employed with or on whose behalf you access the Website or the Data.
26. Entire agreement
This is the entire agreement, contract and understanding between you and CAP and supersedes any prior terms and conditions, agreement or understanding between you and CAP.
27. Other sites and Linking
You agree that (i) CAP has no control over the content or performance of any website linked to or from this Website, (ii) CAP expresses no opinion concerning the content or performance of any such linked website, and, (iii) CAP shall not be held liable or responsible for the content or services of any such linked website. CAP provides all such links for your convenience only; they are not an endorsem*nt or referral by CAP. You access and use those linked sites at your own risk. Those linked sites may have terms of use and privacy policies different from ours, and those terms and policies will apply to your activities on those sites.
If you wish to provide a link to our Website from your own web site, youmay only link to our home page at www.costcoauto.com. You may not use any of our icons or logos on your web site without our prior written approval, and you may not use the link to suggest that we sponsor, endorse, approve of or are affiliated with you or your web site.
28. Modifications and Updates
We may from time to time add new features to the Website, remove existing features from the Website, or otherwise modify the Website, the CAP Services and any of the products, services and content made available through the Website (including their functionality, “look-and-feel”, universal resource locators and software components), all without notice to you or any liability to you.
29. Governing law
This Agreement shall in all respects be governed by the laws of State of Delaware. You agree that any and all disputes will be adjudicated by the Delaware courts. You expressly submit to the jurisdiction of such Delaware courts. The use of the Website in any jurisdiction not giving effect to all provisions of these terms and conditions is unauthorized.
30. Severance
Should any term or provision of this Agreement be held by a court of competent jurisdiction to be unenforceable, then such term or provision shall be severed from this Agreement; provided, however, that the remaining provisions terms and provisions of the Agreement shall continue to be valid and enforced.
31. Copyright and trademark notices
All contents of the Website are: Copyright © Affinity Auto Programs, Inc. Other trade-marks of third parties displayed on the Website are the property of such parties, used with permission. All rights are expressly reserved.
