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TERMS & CONDITIONS

General Terms and Conditions
By placing an order with HOT9 WEB DESIGN, you confirm that you are in agreement with and bound by the terms and conditions below.
Definitions:
The Client:
The company or individual requesting the services of HOT9 WEB DESIGN.
HOT9 WEB DESIGN:
Primary designer/site owner. Not including representatives but including employees.

HOT9 WEB DESIGN will carry out work only where an agreement is provided either by email, telephone, mail or fax using ONLY the contact methods shown on our 'Contact' page. Verbal agreements with any of our representatives will not constitute an agreement between the client and HOT9 WEB DESIGN. HOT9 WEB DESIGN will carry out work only for clients who are 18 years of age or above. An 'order' is deemed to be a written or verbal contract between HOT9 WEB DESIGN and the client, this includes telephone and email agreements to our office only.

Website Design
Whilst every endeavor will be made to ensure that the website and any scripts or programs are free of errors, HOT9 WEB DESIGN cannot accept responsibility for any losses incurred due to malfunction, the website or any part of it
The website, graphics and any programming code remain the property of HOT9 WEB DESIGN until all outstanding accounts are paid in full. Any scripts, cgi applications, php scripts, or software (unless specifically agreed) written by HOT9 WEB DESIGN remain the copyright of HOT9 WEB DESIGN and may only be commercially reproduced or resold with the permission of HOT9 WEB DESIGN.
HOT9 WEB DESIGN cannot take responsibility for any copyright infringements caused by materials submitted by the client or used by the client in the future on their website. We reserve the right to refuse any material of a copyrighted nature unless adequate proof is given of permission to use such material.
Any coding additions to website briefs provided will be carried out at the discretion of HOT9 WEB DESIGN and may carry an additional cost. Where no charge is made by HOT9 WEB DESIGN for such additions, HOT9 WEB DESIGN accept no responsibility to ensure such additions are error free and reserve the right to charge an according amount for any correction to these or further additions. The client agrees to make available as soon as is reasonably possible to HOT9 WEB DESIGN all materials required to complete the site to the agreed standard and within the set deadline. HOT9 WEB DESIGN will not be liable for costs incurred, compensation or loss of earnings due to the failure to meet agreed deadlines.
HOT9 WEB DESIGN will not be liable or become involved in any disputes between the site owner and their clients and cannot be held responsible for any wrongdoing on the part of a site owner. eg. Any disputes re content/images that have been provided to us for inclusion on the site.
HOT9 WEB DESIGN will not be liable for any costs incurred, compensation or loss of earnings due to the work carried out on behalf of the client or any of the clients appointed agents.
HOT9 WEB DESIGN will not be liable for any costs incurred, compensation or loss of earnings due to the unavailability of the site, its servers, software or any material provided by its agents.
In no event shall HOT9 WEB DESIGN be liable for any direct, indirect, consequential, special and exemplary damages, or any damages whatsoever, stemming from the use or performance of a client website or from any information, products and services provided through client sites, even if this website has been advised of the possibility of such damages.

  • In the absence of any negligence or other breach of duty by us, your use of our client websites is entirely at your own risk.
  • If we are in breach of the arrangements under this agreement, we will not be responsible for any losses that you suffer as a result.
  • We do not have any liability of any sort (including liability for negligence) for the acts or omissions of providers of telecommunication services or for faults in or failures of their networks and equipment.

A non-refundable deposit of 50% is required with all of our projects before any design work will be carried out.

Once a website has been designed and completed the final balance of payment is then due in accordance with our payment terms. There are no exceptions to this, i.e If the client decides they no longer want the site, as they have commissioned the work and paid a deposit they are still obliged to pay for the work that has been done. Non payment will result in legal action being taken if necessary. Once full payment is received for a website, it is assumed that the project has been completed to the clients satisfaction and no refunds can be offered. We do offer free updates for 14 days after completion to allow for any final amendments that may be required.

Database, Application and E-Commerce Development
HOT9 WEB DESIGN cannot take responsibility for any losses incurred by the use of any software created for the client. Whilst every care has been taken to ensure products are problem free and accurate, the ultimate responsibility lies with the client in ensuring that all software is functioning correctly before use.
Any scripts, applications or software (unless specifically agreed) written by HOT9 WEB DESIGN remain the copyright of HOT9 WEB DESIGN and may only be commercially reproduced or resold with the permission of HOT9 WEB DESIGN.
Where applications or sites are developed on servers not recommended by HOT9 WEB DESIGN, the client is expected to provide or seek any information,additional software,support or co-operation pertaining to the server required in order for the application to be correctly developed. Where large applications are to be developed, it is the clients responsibility to provide a suitable testing environment which is identical to the final production environment.
The client is expected to test fully any application or programming relating to a site developed by HOT9 WEB DESIGN before being made generally available for use. Where "bugs", errors or other issues are found after the site is live, HOT9 WEB DESIGN will endeavor (but is not obliged to) to correct these issues to meet the standards of function outlined in the brief.

Compatibility
HOT9 WEB DESIGN will endeavor to ensure that any developed/designed site or application will function correctly on the server it is initially installed in and that it will function correctly when viewed with the web browsing software Microsoft Internet Explorer and to an acceptable level with Mozilla browsers, such as Firefox. HOT9 WEB DESIGN can offer no guarantees of correct function with all browser software as they constantly change.

Website Hosting
Whilst HOT9 WEB DESIGN recommends hosting companies to host websites, no guarantees can be made as to the availability or interruption of this service by HOT9 WEB DESIGN cannot accept liability for losses caused by the unavailability, malfunction or interruption of this service, or for loss of turnover, sales, revenue, profits or indirect, consequential or special loss.
HOT9 WEB DESIGN reserve the right to refuse to handle in any way, material which may be deemed offensive, illegal or in any way controversial, and also to terminate the free hosting service should the necessity arise.

Website Optimisation (SEO services)
Due to external factors, such as changes to the way search engines rank websites, we cannot offer any guarantees regarding the position we will achieve for websites. The process of optimizing websites itself will bring in more traffic and hits and you'll see visits increase to your site naturally. We cannot accept liablility for any change in rankings, or drop off in the position of your website due to changes in the algorithms of the search engines or the factors that they use to rank websites.
We use 'white hat techniques' when optimizing websites and always aim to achieve a top ten ranking for your website within six months of undertaking the optimization process. Due to the work involved payment is generally required in advance and we are unable to offer a refund of any monies to clients in relation to this type of work.
HOT9 WEB DESIGN reserve the right to refuse to handle in any way, material which may be deemed offensive, illegal or in any way controversial.

Client Cessations, transfers, buyouts or continuations of service
Business Transfers and Takeovers
1. DOMAIN NAME TRANSFER COSTS
If HOT9 WEB DESIGN purchased any domain names for the business there will be a minor change of name fee. These vary and we charge at cost. 2016/2017 transfer fees currently stand at £11.25 per domain name from Nominet.
2. MONTHLY FEES FOR EDITS, SEO, HOSTING
For clients who wish to continue with our monthly services there will be no change in the monthly contractual fee. A new Standing Order Mandate will be supplied once all business transfers are complete.
For clients who do not wish to continue with our monthly contractual fee our client cessation fees are 6 months of the monthly contractual fee, payable in either continued instalments or as a one off payment. This covers our monthly time to check on SEO optimisation to delete the work that had been carried on by us. It takes this amount of time to analyse the situation monthly. The fee also covers backups of all files, scripts and graphics produced by us. These files are held on our server for six months after the takeover date. After six months all files are permanently delelted by us.
3. PURCHASE OF FILES
During the period of transfer and the six month overlap period when all files are backed up, we can offer these files to new business owners for a nominal fee. The fee will depend on the quantity of time that has been dedicated by our team to produce said files.
Files in the following formats are offered as the 'Graphics Package':
.avi, .mp4, .mp3, .png, .gif, .jpg, .jpeg, .tiff, .psd.
Files in the follwing formats are offered as our 'Content Package'
.htm, .html, .php, .js, .asp, .css. This package will also include copies of any database driven MYSQL backups, WP plugins and WP content if appliacable.

Payment of Accounts
A deposit is required from any new client before any work is carried out. It is the HOT9 WEB DESIGN policy that any outstanding accounts for work carried out by HOT9 WEB DESIGN or its affiliates are required to be paid in full prior to putting your site live on the Internet. All sites are temporarily uploaded into our site where you can see its progress and verify your satisfaction prior to installation.
If payments are made to our sales representatives it is the clients' responsibility to make sure said payments reach HOT9 WEB DESIGN by emailing us. We will then issue a full invoice for all works and deposits, sent in the post. Once a deposit is paid and work completed you are obliged to pay the balance of payment in full. We will contact clients via email and telephone to remind them of such payments if they are not received when due.
If accounts are not settled or HOT9 WEB DESIGN have not been contacted regarding the delay, access to the related website may be denied and web pages removed. If the balance is not received after 14 days of the site going live we will PERMANENTLY delete the site and all related files until payment is made in full. We will then pass such cases to the Small Claims Court to pursue payment, non payment can result in county court judgements (ccj's) being added to the clients credit rating.
Following consistent non payment of an invoice our Solicitors will contact the client in question, with a view to taking the matter further and if need be to seek payment through legal procedures, and if necessary court summons.

Your Privacy
We do not share or sell any of your details with third party companies, without your express permission and we will only email you or contact you about work related matters.