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Last Update December 5, 2001
Welcome to Cybersmoke.com! Our company mission is to deliver to you the highest quality service, personal satisfaction, quick delivery and the lowest tobacco prices on the Internet for your smoking pleasure. We add value to our products by ensuring your order will be processed within 24 hours of purchase. Our goal is to provide customers with the most affordable prices and get our tobacco brand sent out as soon as possible.
Here at CyberSmoke.com we have three convenient ways for you to place your order:
· Call us toll free at 1-888-802-9661 and place your order with one of our friendly customer service representatives today.
· Or print out our order form and fax it to us at 716-549-2125.
· Or place your order online with us via our secure server.
Cybersmoke.com has a large variety of tobacco products available. We carry your favorite premium brand cigarettes, such as Marlboro, Winston, Camel, Barclay, Newport, Salem, Kool, Parliament, True, Benson & Hedges, Virginia Slims, Duhills and many others as cheap as $24.95 for a carton of 12. For those of you who prefer to roll your own we carry various brands of roll tobacco from makers such as Zig Zag, Top, rolling papers made by Zig Zag, Bamboo, Easy Wider, Top, and Joker. For those who are economy minded we stock economy brand cigarettes such as Bronco, Double Diamond, Liggett Select, Niagara, Seneca, Sport, and many others. For generic cigarettes we carry American Spirit, Bristol, Doral, Magna, Monarch, Pall, Basic, and many others. For Cigar Smokers check out our special section offering the finest hand rolled cigars from around the world. We also carry less exotic Cigars such as Coronas, White Owls, Don Fuego, Garcia Vega, Swisher, Erik, Tijuana Smalls, Winchesters, Dutch Master, and many more. When you can’t light up on those long plane flights we’ve got you covered with premium brands of snuff, smokeless tobacco brands such as Skoals, Timberwolf, Beechnut, Redman, Durango, Copenhagen, and many others.
On the first page of our web site, at the bottom of the page we have the following disclaimers:
Important Notice: You must be at least eighteen years of age to purchase tobacco products.
Surgeon General's Warning: Smoking causes lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema and may complicate pregnancy. Smoking by pregnant women may result in premature birth, fetal injury, and low birth weight. Cigarette smoke contains carbon monoxide. Quitting smoking now will greatly reduce serious risks to your health.
We may appear to be a small company at a glance, however have employed a very competitive workforce. We have fifty employees handling an average of fifteen thousand Internet transactions per day operating 24/7 in order to fulfill your orders. We ship up to thirty thousand cartons of cigarettes to various places around the world. CyberSmoke.com is quite capable of handling large volumes of e-commerce due to a dedicated work team and superior processing methods through highly automated information systems.
You may wondering why CyberSmoke’s employees are so motivated and devoted to CyberSmoke.com’s success. Perhaps it is because of the numerous benefits bestowed upon them. We consider our employees our most valuable asset. All employees are offered healthcare, retirement plans, paid vacations, company parties, labor contests and impressive bonuses. We treat our employees as though they are family and thus treat them with the utmost respect. The fact that the company operates as effectively as a trade union also protects workers rights and offers fair compensation. The structure of the company is such that it consists of a C.E.O. and one manager per group of ten people. CyberSmoke.com maintains a flat organizational structure versus a hierarchical structure. By maintaining such a structure, the employee becomes an integral part of the decision making. By streamlining our management team we can provide a better compensation package for the people on the front line. Although income compensation varies, everyone at CyberSmoke.com has equal opportunities to receive bonus awards and promotions. CyberSmoke.com functions on a two-week accounting pay period and we offer our employees the option of direct deposit.
The average CyberSmoke.com customer is racially diverse according to our marketing research studies. Our marketing statistics conclude that among American Indians and Alaskan natives, smoking is much more prevalent. Caucasian, African American, Hispanic, and Asian men are equally likely to be smokers, but compromise a much smaller population compared to American Indians and Alaskan natives. Caucasian and African American women are similar in their percentages of being smokers. Hispanic women however, are less likely to smoke and Asian women are the least likely to take up smoking. Adolescent smoking rates are on the rise in recent years. First time tobacco use usually leads to continuing smoking habits, which accounts for the increase of new smokers reported in statistics today.
Statistics recently compiled by CyberSmoke.com reports that first time use has significantly increased by thirty percent and that first daily use has increased by a whopping fifty percent. These statistics are extremely significant and reflect an upward trend in cigarette smoking. According to our studies is safe to conclude, therefore, that we at CyberSmoke.com will not be hurting for long term customers.
The development of increasing tobacco businesses over the Internet poses a public threat because we have no adequate way of currently verifying the age of our consumers. With ineffective age checks, our business is at risk of the illegal sales of tobacco products to minors, thus breaking the law of selling tobacco to minors.
With the increase of state sales tax on cigarettes to reduce smoking, and to increase state revenues, CyberSmoke.com is in violation of many state laws by not collecting state sales tax from our customers. Many Tobacco websites do not collect taxes further encouraging customers to purchase online instead of facing huge taxes when purchasing at a store near them. At present we are circumnavigating this problem because there are no laws as of yet that we are aware of saying that in order to sell cigarettes online within a particular state that we must collect the state tax.
Most tobacco web sites do not put the General Surgeon’s Warning on their domain. This is a huge concern within the domain of the United States because this information by law must be listed stating all possible and permanent damages a drug may cause. This legality is easily resolved by putting a disclaimer at the bottom of the home page as mentioned above.
Tobacco companies as a whole have been quite unethical for a long period of time. So why would we be the first ethical company. Many campaigns have come out and voiced what tobacco companies don’t tell their customers. The bottom line is tobacco is a leading cause of lung cancer in human beings. The ongoing trend is for state governments to increase the sales tax placed on tobacco products, as a direct consequence, as the sales tax increases the potential of recruiting new smokers is reduced and in addition more long time smokers quit due to the expense. In order for companies such as CyberSmoke.com to remain in business, we must find new ways to attract business and satisfy our clients. Tobacco companies such as CyberSmoke.com smuggle tobacco products through United States boarders by avoiding U.S. taxes and secondly, we sell our products with great ease to a great deal of customers whether they are of age or minors because of our attractive pricing. Unless we here at CyberSmoke.com can establish proper taxation and enforce improved methods of verifying the age of our consumers age, our services are unethical and go against the concerns for reducing the smoking community for the future.
Our responsibility, as is the responsibly of our growing tobacco Internet competitors is to establish the same set of rules that are supposed to be followed by brick and mortar retailers within the United States. There is a need for proper taxation, an effective age verification system, and the company must list the General’s Surgeon’s warning in greater detail — most Internet companies do not list the permanent damages of smoking to consumers.
CyberSmoke.com sells cigarettes and other tobacco products to under-aged teenagers thus, indirectly promoting underage smoking. Age verification is not a primary concern of CyberSmoke.com. Although, the company has a small disclaimer at the bottom of the main webpage, announcing that minimum age to make purchase is 18 years, it has never been easier to make an illegal purchase. It is virtually impossible for CyberSmoke.com to enforce. Any minor with a credit card can order tobacco products online. Assuming that federal regulations require minimum age of eighteen, in order to acquire a credit card, CyberSmoke.com does not require or validate any type of identification (Fisher, 1). It is needless to mention that many teenagers under the age of eighteen have a checking account with debit VISA or MasterCard cards, which are accepted by CyberSmoke.com. In addition many teenagers use their parents’ credit cards to make cigarette purchases and CyberSmoke.com has no intention to validate these purchases. Moreover, CyberSmoke.com considers minors as part of their target market, taking into consideration that it is difficult for the minors to make cigarette purchases at brick and mortar retail stores. A viable alternative is to buy cigarettes online at cheaper prices and without following the legal procedure of presenting a valid ID. In addition, it is impossible for the parents to know that cigarettes have been purchased on a credit card. This purchase appears on the credit card statement as an “Internet purchase” and has a different company’s name that is not related to tobacco sales or smoking.
Furthermore, all online cigarette purchases violate the tax laws of the United States. Even though the tax on cigarettes varies from state to state, all purchases must be taxed. Without taxes, online cigarettes are 70% cheaper than in the retail sector, therefore significantly lower prices attract more customers to companies such as CyberSmoke.com. Many states have passed laws prohibiting the sale of cigarettes online without a special license and a legal tax collection system in place; nevertheless, most online retailers, including CyberSmoke.com continue to not collect nor pay state taxes. Tax evasion is also in violation of United States Interstate commerce regulations (Durr, 1). As an example, the state of New York has banned online cigarettes sales and the decision has been supported by the federal court. Moreover, New York City filed law suits against fifteen online cigarette retailers for tax evasion. Another law suit has been started by the California Attorney General, Bill Lockyer, “against five non – California online cigarette retailers alleging they are selling to California minors and avoiding responsibilities to pay California sales taxes” (Wasserman, 1).
Clearly CyberSmoke.com is conducting business in an unethical manner violating:
· Age Verification Regulations for Tobacco Sales
· Tobacco Products tax law in most of the states
CyberSmoke.com violates many tax and tobacco sales laws, in order to make a substantially larger profit. Online tobacco distributors tend to link their malpractices with the concept of free trade and global commerce, meanwhile avoiding taxes and harming more teenagers daily. Although individual states are attempting to pass new legislation in order to regulate e-commerce by online cigarette retailers, as long as there are no clear federal regulations, there will continue be ways to conduct illegal and dishonest sales of tobacco.
CyberSmoke currently has no age verification/validation methods set up in order to comply with state and federal mandates that prevent the sale of cigarettes to minors. Henceforth, it cannot and does not prevent minors from obtaining cigarettes by ordering them online. In this day and age, most adolescents have access to a computer some time during the course of their day whether within school or home. As a result, it is not difficult for children to find a point in time when adult supervision while on the computer is non existent. Given enough free time, teenagers can acquire the skills necessary to benefit from self-taught programs available on printed disks that allow them to create forged identifications.
The chief executive officers (CEO's) within a corporation set the ethical atmosphere and business practices which employee's follow in order to conduct daily business operations. If CEO's morally believe that selling cigarettes to minors is unethical, then they must lead by example by not targeting youth as consumers and the trend must begin with new ad campaigns. In the case of Cybersmoke, the CEO's would have to make the decision that selling cigarettes to minors is unethical and would have to put the necessary age verification strategies in place to prevent minors from ordering.
Cybersmoke is currently operating under the weak ethical position of egoism. “Egoism is the view that actions taken are correct that are within the company's own self interest; making a profit” (Wilson, 2003). Without having age verification methods in place, the company’s executives are conducting business from the position that one should always act to promote the company's personal well being and perceived self interest, that of making a profit. The weakness of this position is that the executive’s ethical judgments are self-centered, selfish and unrealistic. What Cybersmoke judges is good for itself is good but does not take into account what is good for society as a whole.
The company executives could argue from the weak ethical position of ethical relativism. “In ethical relativism all evaluative judgments are relative to social/cultural norms or individual norms” (Wilson, 2003). American culture for the most part is unified in the belief that minors should not smoke, but Cybersmoke could objectively argue that a parent has approved of the minor's smoking and that it is a part of the minor's rite to passage. One of the company’s public relations people could use the following scenario in order to lend credibility to their argument. A parent who started smoking at age twelve knows the kid smokes and gives the kid their credit card in order to keep them from bugging people in front of convenience stores to buy them cigarettes. "Hey, I started smoking when I was twelve and I know he smokes. So instead of making him get cigarettes by other means I just toss him my credit card." The scenario is probably quite rare, but still likely. The executives would be coming from a weak ethical position by claiming that there still parts of society within the U.S., say blue collar families, single parent, or poor families who don't care if the kid smokes because they could be doing worse things.
Cybersmoke’s executives could also choose to argue from the weak ethical position of Hedonism. "Hedonism is the view that the best life is a life devoted to pleasure" (Wilson, 2003). Hedonism a common theme used in most cigarette sales advertising. People socializing, laughing, relaxing, having a good time, and part of that good time is the good taste of tobacco. The weakness in the ethical view of hedonism is that the agent, Cybersmoke, perceives smoking as the primary factor in having a pleasurable experience. On the other hand, according to the surgeon general, and all to many studies, cigarette smoking will lead to lung cancer, tuberculosis, heart disease, birth defects and other medical problems to numerous to mention which are far from being pleasurable experiences.
Morals and ethics go hand in hand. Executives are interested in profits and the economic health of their company. On the other hand, deontology is a stronger position argumentation and that Cybersmoke's moral behavior should emphasize that some actions, such as preventing minors from buying cigarettes are obligatory irrespective of the benefits the company receives in increase profits. In other words, "doing good based upon the formulation of good intentions and business practices based on duty to do what is socially responsible" (Wilson, 2003).
The other strong ethical position the executives should adapt is that of Contractarianism. “Contractarianism is the view that the company has an agreement to uphold with society that it will not contribute to the corruption of minors” (Wilson, 2003). It is a way of justifying moral and political norms by considering that there is unwritten contract with American society to prevent minors from obtaining cigarettes. For Cybersmoke’s executives to think about moral and political obligations does not justify them by showing how they are derived from a real agreement; instead, the executives should attempt to reveal the character of the practice of not selling to minors by treating as it were the result of an agreement.
CyberSmoke.com has been selling tobacco product to minors with intend to increase their profits, despite of knowing of harmful tobacco effects on the minors. Moreover, Cybersmoke.com intentionally did not perform full age verification and violated Section 897.14 of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations, including amendments of 2003. Section 897.14 has defined rules and specifications prohibiting tobacco sale to person that has not reached eighteen years of age.
Section 897.14 requires all retailers - online and physical stores:
· Not sell tobacco products to persons who has not reach eighteen years of age.
· Retail must verify purchaser’s age by physically looking at photo ID.
· Retailer allowed to “sell cigarettes or smokeless tobacco only in a direct, face-to-face exchange without the assistance of any electronic or mechanical device” (FDA RULES REGULATING CIGARETTES [09/11]).
· Retail should not market tobacco products to the minor.
Section 897 has various specifications for marketing and sales of tobacco products to entire population, including minors. FDA “requires retailers to check for photo identification of anyone younger than age twenty seven who attempts to purchase cigarettes or smokeless tobacco and prohibits the sale of these items to anyone under age eighteen” (FDA Talk Paper). FDA inspectors have conducted compliance checks more then once and CyberSmoke.com has failed to comply. Failure to comply upon second check has resulted in $250 fine, third time fine amount has been increased to $1500. Nevertheless, Cybersmoke.com has consistently violated regulations and is subjected to maximum fine of $15000. “The FDA has the authority to impose fines up to $15,000” (FDA Tobacco Carding: Employee Compliance Form). All minors who have purchase tobacco products from CyberSmoke.com should not be fine in any form.
Cybersmoke.com has been operating unethically and illegally in order to increase their profits, company has sold tobacco products online and did not collect any required taxes nor paid required amount form its profits to the company state of residence and the state of purchaser residence. CyberSmoke.com intentionally violated tax laws of fifty states and should be liable for state losses. For the past three years CybersSmoke.com has been sealing tobacco product and did not charge, nor pay any state and federal taxes. Each state has imposed specific amount of tax that should have been charged and the paid back to state:
Courtesy of http://www.taxadmin.org/fta/cigarett.html as of December 22, 2003
CyberSmoke.com has violated Title 15, chapter 10A, Sec. 376 of Federal Jenkins Act and must be responsible for violation of tax law of state that tobacco products has been shipped to. Jenkins Act requires Retailer to:
· “File with the tobacco tax administrator of the State into which such shipment is made or in which such advertisement or offer is disseminated” (U.S. Code Collection).
· Company must file tax no later than the 10th of each month with the tax administrator of the State into which such a shipment is made.
There is evidence and documentation that CybserSmoke.Com intentional failed to file tax in the last three years and should be subject to maximum penalty for violations of Jenkins Act. Cybersmoke.com directors must be imprisoned for six months and CyberSmoke.com shall be fined 1,000 dollars. Moreover, CyberSmoke.com should repay in full all tax that should have been collected from the purchaser plus any additional expenses incurred by states and all legal fees. In addition, CyberSmoke’s sales license must be reworked for constant violations of federal laws.
CyberSmoke recognizes that Internet tobacco sales are one of the fastest growing and lucrative business lines on the World Wide Web. Currently several states have taken legislative action to either regulate or ban the sale of tobacco products in their states, most notably New York State and Wisconsin. Other States such as California and Washington State have embraced this as an evolving industry and have not banned Online sales of tobacco products, but rather have only asked that retailers adhere to the Jenkins Act requiring all purchases be taxed and no tobacco products be sold to minors.
Cybersmoke and other online tobacco retailers view the ban of online tobacco sales as a violation of interstate commerce laws and mainly as a reaction recognized losses in revenue generated from cigarette sales tax. Cybersmoke recognized the loss in revenue by the states.
California state law has required Cybersmoke turn over all records of sales in their state for the purpose of collection the required $0.87 per pack tax on all cigarettes sold in this state. In an example of CyberSmokes willingness to fully comply with all state laws governing internet tobacco sales we supplied California’s State tax administrator with our sales records, resulting in 78% compliance in collection internet sales excise taxes. We have also turned over our records to the states of Washington and New York. This high rate of compliance can be directly attributed to CyberSmoke's rigorous screening process designed to prevent illegal online tobacco purchases.
CyberSmoke.com implemented one of the Internet’s most reliable age verification screening processes. Industry standard age verification technology only prevents about 60% of underage internet access including online tobacco retailers, CyberSmoke.com estimates our underage verification process also blocks approximately 60% of all underage purchasers.
Cybersmoke.com also believes that no ethical violations are taking place. Cybersmoke.com is acting in the same manner as any retailer selling tobacco product, we are not judging society or their right to smoke, and we are merely providing a cost effective and time saving alternative for consumers to by tobacco products.
CyberSmoke.com also realizes that the recent laws passed are not just meant to prevent underage purchases, but rather as a means of replenishing various states tax revenue. CyberSmoke has agreed to turn over all records relating to sales in states wishing to collect lost revenue. These laws also discriminate against Native American Indians and Native Alaskan’s as well. American Indians and Alaskans comprise of the majority of online tobacco retailers and banning sales in any state discriminates against these two minority groups. Suits have also been filed on behalf of several handicapped individuals that do not have the luxury of leaving their homes at will to purchase tobacco product.
CyberSmoke.com found guilty on both accounts as company failed to comply with Jenkins Act and FDA regulations (section 897.14) for the last three years.
For violation of Jenkins Act:
· Chief Executive Officer will be imprisoned for six months.
· CyberSmoke.com must repay all sales tax to the states in amount of five million dollars.
· CEO should pay fine in amount of twenty five thousand for encouraging violation of Jenkins Act.
For violations of section 897.14 of Federal Food and Drug Administration.
· CyberSmoke must pay a fine in amount of ten thousand dollars, taking into consideration fact that a new age verification system is being implemented at CyberSmoke.com.
CyberSmoke.com has turned over sales records to the states and has started filing tax on a regular basis, therefore their sales license will not be revoked for CyberSmoke.com, if the company does satisfy all of the requirements specified above in a six month period starting December 5, 2003.
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“Very-Cheap-Cigarettes.” Online. 8 Oct. 2003. http://www.very-cheap-cigarettes.com
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