If the balance is less than 100 yuan and cannot be withdrawn, is it a reasonable rule or an overbearing clause?
The court found that the platform’s use of its advantageous position to set format clauses was invalid
In the era of self-media, content creation has become a hot topic. In order to stimulate users' enthusiasm for creation, many platforms have launched incentive programs such as "traffic sharing" and "exclusive rewards". This was supposed to be a win-win cooperation model between the platform and users, but the platform’s setting of the withdrawal threshold caused many disputes.
Recently, the Guangzhou Internet Court heard an Internet service contract dispute arising from the withdrawal of royalties from a content creation platform.
【Case review】
A certain platform is a content creation platform operated by a company in Tianjin. The platform calculates the final revenue based on the display volume of advertisements in articles and provides authors with profit sharing. In February 2018, Lin opened a self-media account on a certain platform and generated revenue of 281.9 yuan through operations. As of June 2019, Lin had withdrawn a total of 216.89 yuan. But when Lin withdrew cash again, the website prompted "If the balance is greater than or equal to 100 yuan, you can apply for cash withdrawal", "Income payment period: before 10 o'clock on the 11th of every month", "Cash withdrawal application period: between 10 o'clock and 15 on the 11th of every month" 24 o'clock" and other regulations. The above regulations have prevented Lin from withdrawing the 65.01 yuan balance in his account.
Lin believed that a company in Tianjin did not specify the withdrawal terms in the platform service agreement, and that the existing withdrawal rules violated the principle of fairness, so he sued a company in Tianjin to the Guangzhou Internet Court, requesting the court to confirm that "the balance can only be applied if the balance is greater than or equal to 100 yuan." Withdrawal" is an invalid clause.
After trial, the court held that the clause involved in the case, "You can apply for cash withdrawal only when the balance is greater than or equal to 100 yuan," was a clause that was drawn up in advance by a platform and uniformly announced to many platform users and applied repeatedly. Users cannot conduct different negotiations, and it is a standard clause. This clause is a regulation set by a certain platform to facilitate management. After setting the withdrawal time and frequency standards, it also superimposes a limit on the withdrawal amount standards, and does not provide users with withdrawal channels or other alternative compensation methods after canceling their accounts. , unilaterally neglected to undertake the platform's obligation to pay benefits to users, and unreasonably restricted users' rights to freely dispose of their personal property. The above-mentioned withdrawal terms set by the platform involve the abuse of the principle of freedom of contract and the unreasonable expansion of one's own rights by taking advantage of the advantageous position of the Internet platform, causing some users, including Lin, who have less influence and unstable income growth to be unable to predictably , withdrawing its own property within a relatively fixed period of time is contrary to the principle of fairness, so the clause is deemed invalid.
[Judge’s statement]
Duan Liqiong, president of the Third Comprehensive Trial Division of the Guangzhou Internet Court, pointed out that in order to reduce network transaction costs and improve operational efficiency, Internet platforms usually pre-formulate format clauses to establish platform management models and rules, and platform users cannot differentiate the content of the agreement. Consultation, freedom of contract and autonomy of will under the traditional individual consultation paradigm are facing challenges.
In this case, a certain platform is a self-media content creation and distribution platform, and users earn revenue by creating content within the platform. According to the nature and purpose of the contract involved in the case, agreements regarding the calculation, payment, and withdrawal of creative income are the core of the rights and obligations of both parties. The minimum withdrawal amount clause set by a certain platform is a regulation set by the platform to exercise autonomous management rights. After setting the withdrawal time and frequency standards, it then superimposes the limit on the withdrawal amount standard, and does not provide users with withdrawal channels or other means after canceling their accounts. The alternative compensation method failed to fulfill the platform's obligation to pay users income and unreasonably restricted the user's right to freely dispose of their personal property. Therefore, the court determined that this clause was invalid.
“Therefore, the judiciary should pay more attention to the phenomenon of Internet platforms taking advantage of their advantageous position to abuse the principle of freedom of contract, unreasonably expanding their own rights, and restricting the main rights of users, and guide the platform through referees to adopt a fairer content production, distribution and revenue mechanism to equally protect unfair rights. Specific and decentralized legitimate rights and interests of content creators." Duan Liqiong said.
【Expert Reviews】
According to Xue Jun, professor at Peking University Law School and director of the Peking University E-Commerce Law Research Center, Internet platforms have dual roles as service providers and network order managers. They rely on their advantageous position to provide "one-to-many" services to the relevant public. Dataization, virtualization, and interactive network services have a natural adaptability to the application of format clauses. How to properly handle the interest relationship between Internet platforms and unspecified Internet users and adhere to the governance concept of encouraging innovation and regulating development are key issues that need to be paid attention to at present.
"The judgment in this case takes into account the freedom of income disposal of content creators and the management needs of platform operations, and guides the healthy and orderly development of the platform economy by standardizing the specific application of platform format clauses. At the same time, in this case, we also see that the court seems to have no regard for the public Continuous attention and protection of 'subtle' rights and interests, as well as active response to the judicial needs of public participation in cyberspace governance." Xue Jun said.
(Compiled by reporter Zhang Chen of Rule of Law Daily to abide by the law and popularize the law)