Terms and Conditions

The following Terms and Conditions of Service apply to all products and services provided by The Content Cottage.

All work is carried out by The Content Cottage on the understanding that the client has agreed to The Content Cottage’s terms and conditions. Copyright is retained by The Content Cottage on all design work
including words, pictures, ideas, visuals and illustrations unless specifically released in writing and after all costs have been settled. If a choice of design is presented, only one solution is deemed to be given by The Content Cottage as fulfilling the contract. All other designs remain the property of The Content Cottage, unless agreed in writing that this arrangement has been changed.

Project Acceptance
At the time of proposal, The Content Cottage will provide the customer with a written estimate or quotation. The Terms and Conditions can be read on the The Content Cottage’s website. A copy of the written estimate or quotation is to be signed and dated by the customer to indicate acceptance and should be returned to The Content Cottage. Alternatively, the client may send an official order in reply to the estimate or quotation which binds the client to accept The Content Cottage terms and
conditions, or an email acknowledging acceptance of the quotation. No work on a project will commence until acceptance of the quotation has been received by The Content Cottage.

Design Charges
Charges for design services to be provided by The Content Cottage will be set out in the written estimate or quotation that is provided to the customer. At the time of the customer’s signed acceptance of this estimate or quotation, indicating acceptance of the Terms & Conditions, a nonrefundable deposit of 50% of the quoted fee will become immediately due. Work on the project will not commence until The Content Cottage has received this amount. Unless agreed otherwise with the Client, all design services require an advance payment of a minimum of fifty (50) percent of the project quotation total before the work is supplied to the Client for review. The remaining fifty (50) percent of the project quotation total will be due upon completion of the work prior to upload to the server or release of materials.

Source Files
Charges for design work do not cover the release of copyright design files including indd, psd, ai, png, fla or any other source files; if the Client requires these files, they will be subject to a separate
quotation or ‘buy-out’ charge.

Charges for Other Services
Charges for any additional services over and above the estimated design, will become fully payable
(100% of the quoted amount) at the time of estimate or quotation acceptance.

Payment
The customer will be provided with an Approval Form and Invoice prior to final publication. At this time the remainder of the amount due will become payable and the customer will also be required to sign and return the Approval Form to The Content Cottage. Accounts which remain outstanding for 30 days after the date of invoice, will incur an extra charge of 2% per month of the outstanding amount. Payments may be made by online transfer, cash, credit card (Visa, Mastercard) or Debit Card.

Default
An account shall be considered default if it remains unpaid for 30 days from the date of invoice, or following a returned cheque. The Content Cottage shall be considered entitled to remove The Content Cottage and/or the customer’s material from any and all computer systems, until the amount due has been fully paid. This includes any and all unpaid monies due for services, including, but not limited to, hosting, domain registration, search engine submission, design and maintenance,
sub-contractors, printers, photographers and libraries. Removal of such materials does not relieve the customer of its obligation to pay the due amount. Customers whose accounts become default agree to pay The Content Cottage reasonable legal expenses and third party collection agency fees in the enforcement of these Terms and Conditions.

Copyrights and Trademarks
By supplying text, images and other data to The Content Cottage for inclusion in the customer’s website or other medium, the customer declares that it holds the appropriate copyright and/or trademark permissions. The ownership of such materials will remain with the customer, or rightful copyright or trademark owner. Any artwork, images, or text supplied and/or designed by The Content Cottage on behalf of the customer, will remain the property of The Content Cottage and/or its
suppliers. The customer may request in writing from The Content Cottage, the necessary permission to use materials (for which The Content Cottage holds the copyright) in forms other than for which it
was originally supplied, and The Content Cottage may, at its discretion, grant this. Such permission must be obtained in writing before it will allow any of the aforesaid artwork, images, text, or other data to be used. By supplying images, text, or any other data to The Content Cottage, the customer grants The Content Cottage permission to use this material freely in the pursuit of the design. Should The Content Cottage, or the customer supply an image, text, audio clip or any other file for use in a
website, multimedia presentation, print item, exhibition, advertisement or any other medium
believing it to be copyright and royalty free, which subsequently emerges to have such copyright or royalty usage limitations, the customer will agree to allow The Content Cottage to remove and/or replace the file on the site. The customer agrees to fully indemnify and hold The Content Cottage free from harm in any and all claims resulting from the customer in not having obtained all the required copyright, and/or any other necessary permissions.

Alterations
The customer agrees that changes required over and above the estimated work or required to be carried out after acceptance of the draft design will be liable to a separate charge. The customer also agrees that The Content Cottage holds no responsibility for any amendments made by any third
party, before or after a design is published.

Licensing
Any design, copywriting, drawing, idea or code created for the customer by The Content Cottage or any of its contractors, is licensed for use by the client on a one-time only basis and may not be modified, re-used, or re-distributed in any way or form without the express written consent of The Content Cottage and any of its relevant sub-contractors.
All design work – where there is a risk that another party make a claim, should be registered by the client with the appropriate authorities prior to publishing or first use or searches and legal advice sought as to its use. The Content Cottage will not be held responsible for any and all damages
resulting from such claims. The Content Cottage is not responsible for any loss, or consequential loss, non-delivery of products or services, of whatever cause. The customer agrees not to hold The Content Cottage responsible for any such loss or damage. Any claim against The Content Cottage shall be limited to the relevant fee(s) paid by the customer.

Data Formats
The client agrees to The Content Cottage definition of acceptable means of supplying data to the company. Text is to be supplied to The Content Cottage in electronic format as standard text (.txt),
MS Word (.doc) on USB, HDD, or via e-mail / FTP. Images which are supplied in an electronic format are to be provided in a format as prescribed by The Content Cottage via e-mail. Images must be of a quality suitable for use without any subsequent image processing, and The Content Cottage will not be held responsible for any image quality which the client later deems to be unacceptable. The Content Cottage cannot be held responsible for the quality of any images which the client wishes to be scanned from printed materials. Additional expenses may be incurred for any necessary action, including, but not limited to, photography and art direction, photography searches, media conversion, digital image processing, or data entry services, colour correction and alteration of images.

Design Project Duration
Any indication given by The Content Cottage of a design project’s duration is to be considered by the customer to be an estimation. The Content Cottage cannot be held responsible for any project overruns, whatever the cause. Estimated project duration should be deemed to be from the date that cleared funds are received by The Content Cottage for the initial payment or by date confirmed in writing by The Content Cottage.

Rights of Access for Website Construction
The client agrees to allow The Content Cottage all necessary access to computer systems and other locations, as required, in order to complete a website project and until all due funds are cleared, including the necessary read/write permissions, usernames and passwords. The customer also agrees to allow The Content Cottage access to any computer systems, usernames and passwords required to remove data and/or sites for failure to comply with these Terms and Conditions. The
customer agrees to supply The Content Cottage with all necessary materials, electronic, or otherwise, required to create and complete the project, and to supply them in a timely manner.

Design Project Completion
The Content Cottage considers the design project complete upon receipt of the customer’s signed Approval form. Other services such as printing, display panel production, film work, website uploading, publishing etc either contracted on the clients behalf constitute a separate project and
can be treated as a separate charge.

Website Design Only
The Content Cottage require that a template is approved by the customer before coding of a site commences. Once the template(s) for the web site are approved by the customer, coding will commence; any changes to navigation items, colours, structure or content that require changes to
the template will incur an additional charge.
Once web design is complete, The Content Cottage will provide the customer with the opportunity to review the resulting work. The Content Cottage will make one set of minor changes at no extra cost
within 14 days of the start of the review period. Minor changes include small textual changes and small adjustments to placement of items on the page. It does not include changes to images, colour schemes or any navigation features. Any minor changes can be notified to The Content Cottage by e-mail or telephone and confirmed by post.
The Content Cottage will consider that the client has accepted the original draft, if no notification of changes is received in writing from the customer, within 14 days of the start of the review period.

Domain Registration
The Content Cottage cannot guarantee the availability of any domain name. Where The Content Cottage is to register a domain name on behalf of a client it will endeavour to do so but the client should not assume a successful registration.

Search Engine Submission
Due to the infinite number of considerations that search engines use when determining a site’s ranking, The Content Cottage cannot guarantee any particular placement. Acceptance by any search engine cannot be guaranteed and when a site is accepted, the time it takes to appear in search results varies from one search engine to another. Rankings will also vary as new sites are added.
The Content Cottage recommend that customers use a professional SEO company and are happy to provide details of such companies, but accept no responsibility for their services.

Design Credits
The customer agrees to allow The Content Cottage to place a small credit on printed material exhibition displays, advertisements and/or a link to The Content Cottage own website on the customer’s website. This will usually be in the form of a small logo or line of text placed towards
the bottom of the page. The customer also agrees to allow The Content COttage to place websites and other designs, along with a link to the client’s site on The Content Cottage own website for
demonstration purposes and to use any designs in its own publicity and portfolios.

Rights of Refusal
The Content Cottage will not include in its designs, any text, images or other data which it deems to be immoral, offensive, obscene or illegal. All advertising material must conform to all standards laid down by all relevant advertising standards authorities. The Content Cott also reserves the right to refuse to include submitted material without giving reason. In the situation where any images and/or data that The Content Cottage does include in all good faith, and subsequently discovers is in contravention to such Terms and Conditions, the customer is obliged to allow The Content Cottage to remove the contravention without hindrance, or penalty. The Content Cottage is to be held in no way responsible for any such data being included.

Cancellation
Cancellation of orders may be made initially by telephone contact, or e-mail, however, following this, The Content Cottage will need formal notification in writing via Email. The client will then be invoiced for all work completed over and above the non-refundable deposit that
will have been made at the time of first ordering. The balance of monies due must be paid within 30 days. Please note: any cancellation which is not formally confirmed in writing and received by The Content Cottage within 14 days of such instruction being issued, will be liable for the full quoted cost of the project.

Disclaimer
The Content Cottage makes no warranties of any kind, express or implied, for any and all products and/or services that it supplies. The Content Cottage will not be held responsible for any and all damages resulting from products and/or services it supplies. The Content Cottage is not responsible for any loss, or consequential loss of data, or non-delivery of products or services, of whatever cause. While we take reasonable steps to investigate the materials we recommend, we accept no
responsibility for the performance or quality of materials or any consequential loss arising from their failure. The customer agrees not to hold The Content Cottage responsible for any such loss or
damage. Any claim against The Content Cottage shall be limited to the relevant fee(s) paid by the customer.
The Content Cottage reserves the right to use the services of sub-contractors, agents and suppliers and any work, content, services and usage is bound by their Terms and Conditions. The Content Cottage will not knowingly perform any actions to contravene these and the client also agrees to be so bound.
The Content Cottage and its clients agree to comply with Printers Terms and Conditions which include disclaimers for non-completion on time and the flexibility to supply quantities within 10% of the total ordered. The Content Cottage recommend that if an exact quantity is required, then 10% extra is added to the quantity and extra time made available should the job be delayed.

General
These Terms and Conditions supersede any previous Terms and Conditions distributed in any form. The Content Cottage reserves the right to change any rates and any of the Terms and Conditions
at any time and without prior notice.

Acceptance of Terms and Conditions and Quotation
The placement of an order for design and/or any other services offered by The Content Cottage, by email, verbally or in writing, is deemed to be acceptance of these terms and conditions.
An estimate validated by the customer’s signature on the estimate or quotation form, constitutes acceptance of the estimate or quotation and agreement to comply fully with all the Terms and
Conditions and forms a Contract for Business between the signatory and The Content Cottage.