Comment policy

COMMENT POLICY FOR THE
COMMONWEALTH CONVERSATIONS: TAXES, REVENUE AND LOCAL SERVICES - OPENDOR BLOG

 

Purpose of the Blog

 

The purpose of the Commonwealth Conversations: Taxes, Revenue and Local Services – OpenDOR Blog (DOR Blog) is to facilitate an ongoing dialogue between the public and employees of the Massachusetts Department of Revenue (DOR) that relate to DOR’s various constituencies.

We welcome your participation and hope you will share your ideas and experiences with fellow readers.   

 

By contributing to this blog, you acknowledge that you agree to the terms of this policy and to DOR’s Privacy and Terms of Use Policies.  DOR reserves the right to change this policy at any time, without notification. 
Comments are welcome at any time, but will generally be reviewed and posted within regular business hours (Monday through Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.).  Please do not resubmit your comment if it does not appear immediately. 

 

Posting to the Blog

 

All submitted comments are subject to review and approval by DOR’s blog moderators before posting. 

 

Comments will not be approved if they contain:

• Threats of physical or bodily harm
• Profanity and vulgar or abusive language
• Offensive terms that target specific ethnic or racial groups
• Excessive and/or inappropriate links.

We expect conversations to follow the rules of polite discourse and we ask that participants treat each other, as well as our employees, with respect.  To maintain appropriate discussion, we ask that all comments remain “on-topic.” Comments should relate to the topic that is being discussed within the blog post. The following types of comments will not be posted:

• Identical posts by the same or multiple users;
• Submissions of any claim, demand, informal or formal complaint, or any other form of legal and/or administrative notice or process, or legal and/or administrative remedy;
•  Reports of criminal activity unrelated to tax or child support  issues  (if you have information for law enforcement, please contact your local police agency);
• Questions from the media; or
• Unsolicited proposals or other business ideas or inquiries.

All comments within this blog are the responsibility of the commenter, not the blog owner, administrator, contributor, editor, or author.  By submitting a comment on our blog, you agree that the comment content is your own, and to hold this site and all representatives harmless from any and all damages, or liability.
If you feel that a DOR employee was rude or unprofessional, or may have behaved in an unethical or illegal manner, you should immediately contact the Department’s Inspectional Services Division (ISD). ISD is responsible for ensuring the highest standards of integrity throughout the Department and conducts investigations of employees who are suspected of wrongdoing.  To report allegations of suspected misconduct or impropriety involving DOR employees, please call ISD’s Integrity Hotline at 800-568-0085 or write to PO Box 9568, Boston, MA 02114-9568.

 

Privacy and Security Policies

 

With respect to content collected through this blog site, the Massachusetts Department of Revenue follows its Privacy policy which can be accessed here.  However, the technology supporting this blog site is provided by TypePad, and is also subject to their privacy policies.

 

To protect your own privacy and the privacy of others, please do not include personally identifiable information, such as Social Security number, Federal Identification Number, phone numbers or e-mail addresses in the body of your comment. If you do voluntarily include personally identifiable information in your comment, your comment may or may not be posted on the Blog. If your comment is posted, your name will not be redacted or removed. In no circumstances will comments be posted that contain Social Security numbers, Federal Identification Numbers, street addresses, e-mail address or phone numbers. You have the option of posting comments anonymously, but if you opt not to, any information, including your login name, may be displayed on our site.

 

Finally, if you have a general service question or if you require a longer or more private means to convey an issue to the Department, please e-mail us directly via one of the e-mail addresses on our website’s Contact Us page.