A. Margaret Merchant

A. Merchant The term Merchant means any person who offers a Consumer good or service and accepts orders directly from Consumers.

B. Consumer The term Consumer means a customer, including a licensee, subscriber, or buyer, of any good or service acting primarily in a personal, family, or household capacity¾ other than for purposes of resale.

C. Transaction The term Transaction refers to any agreement for provision of a good or service between a Merchant and Consumer.

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Consumers should have a prompt, easy, and effective means of contacting the Merchant.The Merchant should disclose its legal name ; the name under which it conducts business ; the principal physical address or an address of an agent for service of process for the Merchant ; mail, and e-mail or telephone contact information ; and a point of contact within the Merchant organization that is responsible for inquiries from Consumers.

IV. Marketing Practices

Merchants should not make any representation or material omission or engage in any practice that is deceptive, misleading or fraudulent.If a representation about a good or service or the Merchant is likely to be relied on by Consumers engaging in Transactions, Merchants should take reasonable steps to ensure that such information is current, accurate, and not deceptive or misleading to Consumers and that the truthfulness of objective claims are substantiated.

V. Information About the Goods or Services

Merchants should clearly disclose the basic features of the good or service that they offer using terms that Consumers can understand.

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E. Costs Merchants should disclose the entire price, type of currency, and expected costs of the goods and services to be collected by the Merchant.A general description of routine costs and fees not collected by the Merchant that will likely be incurred by the Consumer also should be provided.

F. Shipping and Payment Merchants should disclose to Consumers when the Merchant will be able to ship the goods or provide services, and the time when a Consumer will be charged for a Transaction.A consumer should not be charged for a product or service unless shipment of such product or service is expected within a reasonable period of time.

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For data containing credit card information being transferred from the Consumer to the Merchant, Merchants should take steps such as the use of password protection, encryption, or similar technologies to protect information about the Transaction.

X. Customer Service and/or Support

Merchants should disclose to Consumers basic information regarding customer service and/or support for goods or services purchased online from the Merchant.If no customer service and/or support is available from the Merchant, this should be stated.

XI. Warranty

Merchants should disclose to Consumers applicable warranties or limited warranties that they offer regarding the products or services sold or made available to Consumers.Such information should include the scope, duration, and means of exercising rights made available in the warranty or limited warranty.

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Merchants should provide Consumers with reasonable access to the records of the individual Consumer. s Transactions with the Merchant upon request.

XIII.Self-Regulatory Programs

Merchants should disclose and provide contact information for any self-regulatory programs in which they participate and applicable dispute resolution processes.

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Similarly, the Consumer and the Merchant may agree that the Consumer. s claims will be submitted to third-party dispute resolution.

XV. Effective Enforcement

Merchants should participate in effective self-regulatory enforcement programs to provide validation that Merchants adhere to these or equivalent guidelines.Validation of adherence can be demonstrated in a number of ways, including the use of a seal or other recognizable symbol.Organizations that administer seal programs must be easily available to consumers, competitors, and others to accept complaints and to act on them.Such seal organizations shall deny the continued use of their seals by any organization that is not in material compliance with the Guidelines.
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Merchant

The term Merchant is defined as any person who, directly or through an agent or business partner, offers a good or service and accepts orders directly from Consumers.The Guidelines apply only to Merchants who both make available a good or service online and accept the order online for the good or service.Thus, the Guidelines would not apply in a situation where a product is made available online and the Transaction occurs offline.

Consumers on the Internet may interact with more than one Merchant in a Transaction for a particular good or service.Portals, malls, and auctions present the most common occurrence of the multiple-Merchant situation.In these situations, the Guidelines would apply to each Merchant solely for the goods or services that it provides and not for the entire transaction.For example, the Guidelines would not apply to a portal, mall, or auction site, as to a good or service, that facilitates the transaction without offering that good or service.The Guidelines would apply to the facilitator only for its facilitation services.Thus, the host of an auction site would not be subject to the guidelines for the products and services that are auctioned from its site.For example, if a Merchant other than the auction site offers a computer for sale from the site, the Guidelines would not apply to the auction site.The Guidelines would apply to the auction site, however, to the extent that it provides services such as insurance, warranty, or security.

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Transparent, clear and accurate information posted by the Merchant is key to Consumers making choices about conducting transactions online.Information is clear and accurate if it is understandable to Consumers and provides them with correct information about the Transaction.Likewise, for Consumers to be able to benefit from the information posted, it should be easy to find.This can be accomplished by making the information available through a hyperlink from the Merchant. s homepage or entry point to the site and, if technically possible, at a place where the Transaction is offered.The Transaction is offered where an individual can place an order for the good or service.The hyperlink should describe the information that is being linked to so that the nature of the information that will be linked to is readily apparent to consumers.

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The Merchant should disclose its legal name so that Consumers are aware of who they are doing business with.This Guideline is intended to assist Consumers in knowing the ownership of the business.The principal physical address of the Merchant or its agent for service of process also should be provided.This will allow Consumers to contact and locate Merchants in case a dispute arises.Merchants also should disclose either their mail, e-mail, or telephone contact information.The Guidelines allow flexibility and allow the Merchant to determine the means by which Consumers can contact them.Finally, Merchants should provide a point of contact within their organization for Consumers to direct their inquiries.It is not necessary that a specific individual be designated ; however, at least a point of contact that will address inquiries should be provided.

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If Consumers are likely to rely on a representation by a Merchant regarding a good or service that is offered, the Merchant should take reasonable steps to ensure that such information is current, accurate, and not deceptive or misleading to Consumers.

A marketing practice is deceptive or misleading to Consumers if it is information that will be relevant to the Consumer. s decision to enter into a Transaction and is misleading and is harmful to the Consumer.For example, if a site claims to independently evaluate goods or services, when in fact the evaluation of the good or service is paid for by an advertiser, this practice, without further disclosure, would likely be misleading to Consumers.

Merchants also should be able to substantiate the truthfulness of objective claims.Thus, if a Merchant makes a claim about the fitness or quality of a product, such a claim should be able to be supported by the facts.

Information About the Goods or Services

Merchants should disclose the basic features about the goods or services they offer.Such features that describe the good or service could include whether the good or service is new or used, the quality or grade of the good or service, and other relevant information that Consumers can use in evaluating the Transaction.

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For example, if the Merchant allows Consumers to place products into a virtual shopping cart, the Merchant should allow Consumers to review and not proceed with the Transaction prior to its becoming a binding obligation.A Merchant could, for example, provide a check-out screen that indicates to Consumers that by proceeding through the check-out by clicking on an icon the Transaction will be complete.This does not mean that a Consumer can rescind or terminate a transaction that has been entered into by the Merchant and Consumer.In addition, if a purchase is on a pop-up screen or other similar device, the fundamental elements of the transaction should be apparent to the Consumer.

The Guidelines state that material information about the Trans

Robert Arathoon, Paul Carter, A. Margaret Merchant and Leonard Presta.
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A. Margaret Merchant and Scot Weinberger (2000) Recent Advancements in Surface Enhanced Laser Desorption/IonizationTime-of-Flight Mass Spectrometry.
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A. Margaret Merchant, Zhenping Zhu, Jean Q. Yuan, Audrey Goddard, Camellia Adams, Leonard Presta and Paul Carter (1998) An Efficient Route to Human Bispecific IgG.
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Paul Carter and A. Margaret Merchant (1997) Engineering Antibodies for Imaging and Therapy.
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A. Margaret Merchant, Yasuo Kawasaki, Ming Lei, Yanru Chen and Bik Tye (1997) A Lesion in the DNA Replication Initiation Factor Mcm10 Induces Pausing of Elongation Forks through aChromosomal Replication Origin in Saccharomyces cerevisiae.
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Hong Yan, A. Margaret Merchant and Bik Tye (1993) Cell cycle-regulated Nuclear Localization of Mcm2 and Mcm3, which are Required for the Initiation of DNA synthesis at Chromosomal Replication Origins in Yeast.
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B. Jack Longley, A. Margaret Merchant and Barry Kacinski (1989) In situ Transcription and Detection of CD1a mRNA in Epidermal Cells: An alternative to standard in situ techniques.