Ethical and Environmental Policy

Overview

Being profitable and successful is important for any business, however here at cloudabove we feel that it is essential that honesty and integrity are not forgotten in the pursuit of this. As a company, we (cloudabove) want to ensure that we make business decisions ethically and take care of our customers, employees, local community and wider environment whilst growing a prosperous business. Cloudabove is an accredited ‘Good Business Charter’ organisation, which recognises responsible business practices.

Goals

  1. Fair pricing for our customers
  2. Fair pay and working conditions for employees
  3. Reducing our environmental impact
  4. Responsible waste management
  5. Ensuring a responsible and ethical supply chain
  6. Working to improve standards of our business ethics and environmental responsibility

Fair pricing

Here at cloudabove, we don’t believe in ‘upselling’ for profit. We will only ever sell you the service that you choose and any advice given by us will be based on your needs, not our profit.

We will not hide costs from our customers. Features that are important/essential to our customers are included in the pricing for all of our hosting packages, and not optional extras that come with additional charges.

If we need to increase our prices, we will explain to our customers why we are making these changes. This will only be to reflect changes in the market/industry and where our direct costs have increased.

Workers rights

cloudabove promotes a workplace culture that is supportive of its employees. We condemn workplace intimidation, forced labour or pressure to work overtime or excessive hours. We support our employees professionally and personally, encouraging professional progression and opportunities to explore personal development.

We strive to create a positive work environment where employees feel valued, are paid fairly and enjoy their job. We provide a generous sick pay allowance to ensure that employees can take care of themselves and their families if unwell, without the stress and strain of an impact on their income. Employees are able to request unpaid time off, or time off in lieu of overtime, in addition to their holiday allowance should they wish to do so. We are an accredited ‘Living Wage Employer’.

Environmental impact

Web hosting is an industry that is completely reliant on electricity and electronic hardware use. Whilst we cannot change this, we can do our best to reduce the impact of this on our local and wider environment.

We use data centres that share this commitment and employ facilities that rely on 100% renewable energy and have achieved ISO50001 accreditation (“requiring organisations to establish and maintain the required processes and systems to enable the continual improvement of energy performance”) to support their commitment of minimising their impact on the environment.

We use 100% renewable energy in our office and try to reduce the energy consumption in our office where this is possible (heating schedules so as not to heat an empty office, turning lights and equipment off when not in use/necessary).

When purchasing hardware and provisioning systems, we aim to choose energy efficient/low power consumption products wherever possible.

To minimise our businesses impact on the environment at large, cloudabove has signed up with Ecologi (cloudabove | Ecologi) to help us offset our carbon emissions. As of April 2022, we have been with Ecologi for 22 months and have 11,467 trees planted on our behalf around the world, offsetting 154.4 tonnes of C02. We appreciate that carbon offsetting has its critics and isn’t a solution in itself and so we are using this service alongside other efforts to reduce our impact.

Waste management

  • Electronic Waste:

    Wherever possible, we will reuse our equipment when it is no longer required for its initial purpose. Once equipment is no longer suitable for our needs, we will aim to sell or donate it. We buy refurbished equipment if it meets our needs.

    Where electronic equipment is beyond reasonable repair, it is disposed of with a properly licensed electronic waste recycling facility.

  • General Waste:

    At cloudabove, we aim to have a ‘paperless office’ as much as possible. We don’t send out paper invoices and avoid communicating with clients/suppliers via post where possible. Our office administration paperwork is minimal; office documents are mainly online, with paper copies only made upon request.

    We aim to recycle as much of our office waste as we can, from mail to packed lunch and hot drinks waste, and try to choose recyclable options wherever possible.

Supply chain

It is vitally important to us here at cloudabove that we choose suppliers that meet our ethical values and international laws around forced labour, fair living wage, excessive working hours, child labour of any kind, and discrimination based on protected characteristics.

One of our biggest suppliers, Freethought, has a robust ethical policy and has a carefully considered approved supplier list. We are working on ensuring that we have assessed all of our suppliers for this purpose and aim to have this completed within 12 months.

Wider community

Whilst it is imperative that we (cloudabove) ensure that we are looking after our customers, employees and environment, we feel that it is important that cloudabove supports the local and wider community around where we live and work.

Charities are often an integral part of our communities and so we try to support them whenever we can. We regularly provide reduced cost, or even free hosting services for smaller charities. Cloudabove also makes monetary donations to local charities and chooses a ‘Charity of the Year’ to donate to and promote.

Our employees engage in local community projects of their choosing, with further support (including monetary donations) provided by the company if needed.

Further Improvement

cloudabove is committed to making further improvements to our business practices, staff welfare, customer support and environmental responsibility. We welcome suggestions from staff and clients as to how we can improve our services. You can contact us at any time on hello@cloudabove.com or through our customer service telephone number +44 (01872) 672 050. You’re also welcome to write to us at 1 King Mark House, Stret Constantine, Newquay, Cornwall, TR7 1GF.

History

Updated: May 2022
Version: 1.0

Revision history

  • 1.0 Initial release