Tractis ProBono, free services and readers for political initiatives

The whole team is very proud to announce the official launch of “Tractis ProBono“, a Tractis initiative to promote the use of electronic certificates for political initiatives.

Tractis ProBono is geared to any not for profit movement or initiative wishing to  use the full spectrum of Tractis services for free, as well as acquiring smart card readers at heavily discounted prices or, soon, completely free.

Our definition of “movement or political initiative” is quite wide and includes any not for profit project aiming to bring about some change in society. This goes from signature gathering platforms for PLIs (Popular Legislative Initiative, EU Law), such as MiFirma, to services to improve your city, like Ziudad, electronic voting systems, like Kuestion, political parties, citizens movements or associations promoting citizen participation.

Rights and duties

You can read the full text regulating Tractis ProBono use terms.

The main rights (benefits) are the use of all Tractis services at zero cost and the possibility of buying smart card readers with heavy discounts or, even, for free.

The main obligations as a participant in Tractis ProBono are to comply with Tractis Attribution Policy and give permission to Tractis to use the initiative name as a reference.

Enrollment

If you are part of a movement or a political initiative and wish to make use of Tractis ProBono, the procedure is quite simple. To enroll, the legal representative of your initiative has to fill out and sign electronically the “Tractis ProBono Application”.

Once this request has been reviewed and made sure it meets the acceptance criteria, we at Tractis will sign electronically the document, thereby becoming binding for both parties.

Free services

The initiatives under Tractis ProBono can use all Tractis services at zero cost, both front-end services (identity verification, electronic signature) and back-end (AA, SVA, TSA, LTA).

The definition of Tractis services able to be used for free excludes expressly all fees that third party Certification Authorities may apply to Tractis. In these cases (i.e.: FNMT) the initiative will be free to decide whether they want to take these charges on themselves and be able to fully validate the certificates from such Authorities or, alternatively, use only those Certification Authorities whose access is free and open (practically all).

In contrast with the rest of Tractis users, the political initiatives accepted under Tractis ProBono are not subject to  Tractis reasonable use policy, and can make use of Tractis free services without limitation.

Discounts on readers

Just as many of you think, we believe that, in order to succeed, any political initiative relying on electronic certification services needs to have a clear strategy for massive distribution of readers at low cost or free.

Political initiatives accepted under Tractis ProBono can acquire readers at heavily discounted prices or, eventually, get them for free in the near future thanks to a number of campaigns that we are working on. The discounted prices for the Tractis Slim Reader are:

• Delivered to multiple addresses. Express delivery, 24-48 hours. Delivery costs paid by Tractis: 11.99 €.
• Delivered to a single address. Carrier delivered in bulk. Delivery costs paid by the initiative: 5.99 € (10 units minimum).

Customized readers

Gladly implementing requests from several political initiatives that have been collaborating with us, participants in Tractis ProBono can customize their reader package by adding contents of their own. Some ideas for additional content are: leaflets, stickers, USB key rings, smart cards… The costs of customization are:

• Add or stick an external object to the outside of the reader box: 0.00 € for the first object added.
• Insert an object in the reader box: 0.50 € for the first object inserted.
• Add, stick or insert more than one object: 0.05 € per object after the first one.

Each initiative has to take responsibility (and assume the cost) of designing, producing and delivering their content to the processing center chosen by Tractis. Tractis shall not take part in these activities in any way.

Our logistic suppliers operate with a level of automation that permits that the type of object, whether generic or custom (i.e.: a letter or a smart card with a given certificate that has to be delivered to a concrete person), has no effect on the per package price.

Migration of existing collaborations

As those political initiatives we have been collaborating with before the official launch of Tractis ProBono know well, we have been providing our services free of charge without having some formal document defining the mutual understanding. Should this be your case, we ask you to enroll formally now in Tractis ProBono by submitting a complete application form.

We have established a 30 day period to formalize these existing relationships. As of January, 1^st, 2011, all those Accounts not having submitted a complete application shall revert to ordinary fess. There is no need to say that you can always apply to Tractis ProBono at a later date, but given the cost on us of this kind of pro bono initiatives, we ask for your greatest collaboration at this time to achieve the smoothest migration for both parties.

Campaign planning

If your political initiative is not using currently Tractis free services and you would like to make use of them, we ask you not to wait until the last minute and submit your application as soon as you can. Only that way we are able to determine the configurations and integrations needed, dimension the capacity, identify contacts and exchange useful information with the lead time required. Acting this way both parties will be prepared and your campaign success shall not be impeded by lack of planning or last minute rushes.

Likewise, if you are considering taking advantage of the discounts to acquire readers, we recommend you that you do it as soon as your decision is firm. Depending on our stock at hand at the time it might be necessary to place new orders and these have supply times of around 2 months (manufacturing and delivery).

Comments welcomed

In writing Tractis ProBono terms we have tried to use plain, clear and accessible language, avoiding unnecessary legalese, to facilitate reading and understanding.

These use terms are evolving all the time and your feedback is more than welcomed. We encourage you to share with us your interests and suggestions to improve them. You can do this in the Comments section of the form.

By David Blanco
Saved in: Announcements, Tractis, Tractis Hardware | No comments » | 2 December 2011