Account suspension

BordersHub can suspend a company's account. While the suspension lasts, nobody in the company can use BordersHub and its trust profile isn't shown to anyone. Nothing is deleted. When the suspension is lifted, everything works again exactly as before.

A suspension applies to the whole organization. It's different from an admin removing one member from your team, or an account being locked for a while after too many failed sign-ins (see Team & roles).

Why an account is suspended

An unpaid subscription is not a reason for suspension: when a subscription ends, its paid features stop and, after a grace period, your trust profile becomes inactive until you subscribe again (see Subscription & billing). You can still sign in.

The Terms of Service set out when BordersHub can suspend an account:

• A security threat to BordersHub or to other companies, such as an account that appears to be compromised.
• A material breach of the Terms, such as false statements made to mislead partners, or misuse of other companies' information.
• Prohibited content (section 9): sexually explicit or other adult material, material that infringes copyright or other intellectual property, or content unrelated to your trust, compliance or business information. This counts wherever it appears: evidence files, your company's name and logo (shown on your public registry page), members' names, titles and profile pictures, trust profile answers and other text, and support ticket messages and attachments. For this, BordersHub can act without notice: the content can be deleted, and the person or the whole company suspended (see Evidence Vault). This includes problems another company reported, once BordersHub finds the report accurate and reasonably founded.
• False or abusive reports about other companies, which also break section 9.
• Legal risk, or when the law requires it (for example, a court order).

Where it's practical, BordersHub gives notice before suspending, and keeps the suspension to what's reasonably necessary, except for prohibited content, where no notice is required. In serious or urgent cases (a security threat, prohibited content, fraud, impersonation or abuse of reports), BordersHub can suspend your whole company's account at once. Your subscription stays payable while you're suspended, and no money is returned, neither for the time suspended nor if the agreement then ends.

How you'll know

• Anyone in your company who is signed in is signed out at once. Signing in again shows Your company's account has been suspended and the address to contact.
• That message appears only after a correct password. With a wrong one you see the usual sign-in error, so the page never reveals to strangers that an account is suspended.
• Your systems using the API get 401 responses with the error code organization_suspended.
• The reason isn't shown on the sign-in screen. BordersHub gives it to you by email, see "Getting access back" below.

What happens while you're suspended

What stays the same

• Your trust profile versions, evidence files, team members and their roles, trust relationships, support tickets and audit log are all kept.
• Records you published can still be checked on the Verify page. The result also says that your account is currently suspended.
• Your Company ID and public link don't change.

Getting access back

1. Email contact@bordershub.com from your work email address. If you can, write as one of your organization's admins.
2. Give your company's name and its Company ID (BH-TP-…). You'll find the Company ID in your public link (/trust/BH-TP-…), on your verifiable copies, and in the code of your website badge.
3. BordersHub replies with the reason for the suspension and what's needed to resolve it, for example paying an overdue invoice, confirming your account is secure, or correcting your profile.
4. Once it's resolved, BordersHub lifts the suspension. Everyone in your company signs in as before, with the same password and authenticator app. Your profile, badge, directory listing and trust relationships come back on their own; nothing has to be set up again.

You can't use support tickets while suspended, because they need you to be signed in. Use email instead.

If it stays unresolved

If the cause of a suspension isn't resolved, or the breach is serious or repeated, BordersHub may end the agreement, after giving you a chance to export your information where the Terms allow it (section 17). Because you can't sign in or use the API while suspended, ask contact@bordershub.com how to get your export. Your data is deleted only if the agreement ends, never just because the account is suspended.

For prohibited content (section 9), a serious or repeated breach can also end the agreement immediately and without notice, with the account closed and no refund of fees already paid (section 17.2).

If you think the suspension is a mistake, reply to BordersHub at the same address and explain why. If you can't resolve it that way, the Terms explain how disputes are handled.

When one person's account is suspended

BordersHub can also suspend a single user account instead of the whole company. Only that person is affected: everyone else in your organization keeps working as usual, and nothing in the account is deleted.

• The person is signed out at once and can't sign in. After entering the correct password they see Your account has been suspended, with what to do next.
• Your organization's admins see the account under Suspended by BordersHub on the Team page, with the date and the reason BordersHub gave.
• While the account is suspended, nobody in your organization can change it. It can't be restored, unlocked, given another role, sent a password reset link, removed or deleted from the Team page. This is so the suspension can't be worked around. If the person was one of your admins, they don't count as one: the Team page makes sure an admin who can still sign in remains.

To have the account restored:

1. An admin of your organization selects Ask BordersHub to lift it next to the account on the Team page. This opens a support ticket that's already filled in with the person and the reason. Add why the suspension should be lifted and send it.
2. If nobody else in your organization can sign in to raise a ticket, the person emails contact@bordershub.com from their work email address.
3. BordersHub replies in the ticket. Once the suspension is lifted, the person signs in as before, and your admins manage the account as usual again, including removing it from the team if they want.

When a partner's account is suspended

• Its page shows Account suspended and, because you have a trust relationship with it, the reason BordersHub gave. Its full profile and evidence aren't available until the suspension is lifted, in the app and through the API (error code company_suspended).
• Your trust relationship isn't changed. When the suspension is lifted, it comes back without anyone asking, unless you end it first. You can end it in either direction while the company is suspended:
  • Its access to your profile: under Incoming Requests, select Revoke Access. It won't get access back when the suspension is lifted.
  • Your access to its profile: under Outgoing Requests, select End relationship, or Withdraw request if it hadn't answered yet. This option appears only while the other company is suspended. To see its profile again later, you'd have to request access again and wait for it to approve.
  Both sides' audit logs record it.
• You can't approve a request from a suspended company, but you can deny it.
• Your partner workspace with it stays readable but can't be changed: no new requests, replies or contact changes until the suspension is lifted.
• Evidence you downloaded earlier and verifiable copies you saved are still yours, and those copies can still be verified.
• BordersHub doesn't share more about another company's suspension than the reason shown. For anything else, ask the company directly.