Gannet Marketing Terms and Conditions
Geoffrey Neill is the owner of this website and of Gannet Marketing, website developers and SEO consultants.
Gannet Marketing intends to operate in a fair and reasonable manner at all times and it is one of our values to ensure that we maintain a great relationship with our customers. Nevertheless it is important to have certain contractual aspects agreed in order to protect both parties.
In the absence of a specific contract for your Web Site Design, Development or Search Engine Optimisation project, this contract will apply.
By contracting with Gannet Marketing and/or Geoffrey Neill (hereafter called “Gannet Marketing”), you (hereafter called “the customer”) are agreeing to the following terms and conditions.
1. General
These Terms and Conditions together with any quotation and website specification given to the customer form the contract between Gannet Marketing and the customer. These terms supersede any prior verbal agreement. Only those services mentioned will be provided by Gannet Marketing. Any deviation from these terms must be agreed in writing on the order form.
Gannet Marketing will act as the prime contractor for the development of the customer’s website, search engine optimisation (SEO) and any other services as agreed by the parties. No partnership, joint venture or employee/employer relationship is intended or implied.
The customer agrees that Gannet Marketing can use the customer’s company name in its own portfolio. If the customer does not wish to appear on the Gannet Marketing portfolio, Gannet Marketing will remove them at the customer’s request.
The customer agrees to credit Gannet Marketing in the footer of every page of their site by displaying a text hyperlink back to the Gannet Marketing website.
The agreement assumes goodwill from both parties regarding what can reasonably be achieved in a given timeframe and making the best use of resources to achieve the most effective outcomes.
2. Acceptance of Work
The customer’s order represents an offer to Gannet Marketing to purchase the website or supply of services. No contract for the supply of services exists between the customer and Gannet Marketing until Gannet Marketing sends an invoice to the customer for payment. The invoice equals acceptance by Gannet Marketing (or third party supplier) of the customer’s offer to purchase services from Gannet Marketing.
Gannet Marketing reserves the right to withdraw from contract at any time prior to acceptance.
3. Variations
The customer may at any time request variations to the website or service specification by written notice to Gannet Marketing.
Within 5 working days of receipt of a request for variation or such other period as may be agreed Gannet Marketing shall indicate by notice in writing to the customer the terms upon which Gannet Marketing will perform the requested variation, including the effect of the variation on the price payable by the customer. The customer shall within 5 working days of the date of Gannet Marketing’s written notice elect by written notice to Gannet Marketing whether or not it wishes the variation to proceed. In the absence of a customer’s notice Gannet Marketing shall assume the variation is not to proceed.
4. Charges and Payment Terms
Quotations are valid for 30 days from the date of issue.
For web development, 40% of the total project cost will be invoiced on commencement of the project. The final 60% will be invoiced when the project is handed over.
For SEO and marketing services the customer will be invoiced in accordance with the timetable.
The customer will be invoiced as agreed in your purchase order. All accounts are payable within 14 days of invoice.
The customer will remain liable for all fees during any period when services have been discontinued or suspended due to a failure on the customer’s part to comply with these terms and conditions.
An order placed by the customer is an intent to buy and cannot rescind solely because of a change in mind.
The customer is liable to pay overdue interest at 5% /week on any amounts not paid within 14 days of invoice, 10% /week in case of web hosting. All intellectual property rights remain with Gannet Marketing until full payment is made.
All fees quoted are in New Zealand Dollars and are exclusive of GST. GST is payable by New Zealand residents but this cost does not apply to international orders.
5. Limitation of Liability
Gannet Marketing provides the customer’s website and the contents thereof on an “as is” basis and makes no warranties with regard to the site and its contents, or fitness of services offered for a particular purpose. Gannet Marketing cannot guarantee the functionality or operations of the website or that it will be uninterrupted or error free, nor does it warrant that the contents are current, accurate or complete.
The customer acknowledges that websites cannot be guaranteed to be 100% error free in construction and/or 100% secure, and acknowledge that the existence of errors falling short of a complete failure of consideration in the site shall not constitute a reason to terminate this agreement.
The customer agrees that Gannet Marketing is not liable to the customer for any loss or damage directly or indirectly arising out of or in connection with any delay in delivery or for absence of service as a result of illness, injury or holiday. The customer agrees that Gannet Marketing is not liable for any failure to perform its obligations under the agreement for reasons beyond its control including but not limited to acts of God, telecommunication problems, software failure, hardware failure, third party interference, Government, emergency or any social disturbance of extreme nature such as industrial strike, riot, terrorism and war or any act or omission of any third party services.
The customer agrees to defend, indemnify and hold Gannet Marketing harmless from and against any and all claims, losses, liabilities and expenses (including attorneys’ fees) related to or arising out of the services provided by Gannet Marketing to the customer under the agreement, including without limitation claims made by third parties (including customers of Gannet Marketing’s customer) related to any false advertising claims, liability claims for products or services sold by the customer, claims for patent, copyright or trademark infringement, claims due to disruption or malfunction of services provided hereunder (including malfunction of website/software or internet), or for any content submitted by you for publication by us.
Gannet Marketing is not responsible for the performance of third party services that are introduced to the customer.
Gannet Marketing endeavours to create pages that are search engine friendly, however Gannet Marketing gives no guarantee that the site will become listed with search engines or of certain search results. In no event shall Gannet Marketing be held liable for any changes in search engine rankings as a result of using Gannet Marketing’s website development, SEO or marketing services.
6. Suspension of Services
Gannet Marketing reserves the right to suspend services in any case where the customer fails to perform its obligations under this agreement. If payment for services is not received within the terms of payment stipulated by Gannet Marketing websites may be taken down until payment is confirmed.
Gannet Marketing may from time to time and without notice or liability to the customer suspend any of the services if the reason for doing same is an event beyond the reasonable control of Gannet Marketing.
Gannet Marketing may discontinue services if an amount payable to Gannet Marketing is overdue or take down a website permanently in any case where an amount payable is overdue by more than 14 days. In any such event the customer remains liable for the total cost of the contract including all disbursements unless otherwise agreed between the parties.
7. Content of Web Pages
The customer will be solely responsible for the content of its web page/undertakings. Gannet Marketing is not responsible for proofreading any content unless specifically agreed.
Gannet Marketing makes no representations to the customer concerning the content or functionality of its website. This is the customer’s responsibility to ensure that the website meets its requirements.
The customer warrants that all media and content made available to Gannet Marketing for use in the project are either owned by the customer, used with full permission of the original authors, or do not infringe the rights of third parties. The customer agrees to hold harmless, protect and defend Geoffrey Neill and Gannet Marketing from any claim or suit that may arise as a result of using the supplied media and content.
Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, the customer agrees not to infringe the copyright trademark, privacy or personal or proprietary rights of third parties, supply libelous, abusive, obscene material or disparage the products or services of any third party.
Gannet Marketing for its part hereby undertakes not to knowingly infringe the rights of third parties in activities conducted on your behalf.
The customer is solely responsible for dealing with persons who access its data or webpage and warrant that it will not refer complaints or inquiries in relation to such data to Gannet Marketing.
8. Projects
Gannet Marketing cannot always guarantee to start work immediately on a project but will arrange a date with the customer as to when work can commence.
The customer agrees to provide any needed information and content required by Gannet Marketing in good time to enable Gannet Marketing to complete a design or website work or SEO service as part of an agreed project.
The customer agrees that a web page may not exactly match the original design because of the difference between the rendering of HTML code by internet browser software. Gannet Marketing agrees to try and match the design as closely as is possible.
Upon completion of an agreed design the customer is asked to confirm in writing by email, fax or postal mail that the design is signed off as complete and agree that any further design alterations are chargeable.
All orders for supply of services and alterations are to be requested in writing either by email, fax or postal mail by the customer. Gannet Marketing reserves the right to request payment be received for further services and alterations before continuing work.
If an error or issue with the design or code arises during the project which does not allow the design or code to match the original specification, then the customer agrees that Gannet Marketing can apply a nearest available alternative solution.
Gannet Marketing provides on-going website maintenance and update services to the customer by arrangement. However the customer or a third party of their choosing may wish to edit their website code themselves to make updates. However, the customer agrees that in so doing they assume full responsibility for any issues which occur as a result of changing the code themselves. If this results in functionality errors or the page displaying incorrectly, then Gannet Marketing reserves the right to quote for work to repair the website.
Gannet Marketing reserves the right to assign subcontractors in whole or as part of a project to ensure on-time competion of the project and that the terms of this agreement are met.
All communications between Gannet Marketing and the customer shall be by telephone, email, Skype, fax or postal mail, except where agreed at Gannet Marketing’s discretion.
9. Domain Names and Website Hosting
Gannet Marketing will provide in-house hosting services, with or without additional services, as part of the website development package unless otherwise agreed between the parties.
Web hosting is done in-house for all material developed by Gannet Marketing only. Gannet Marketing is not liable for set-up costs involved with code running on servers that are not controlled by Gannet Marketing. Any customer requesting hosting on another server will be charged a fee for the time taken to transition the website to the preferred hosting provider.
Gannet Marketing does not support code and websites that are migrated to a third party hosting provider server. Any code and website released and migrated is the responsibility of the new server owner.
Gannet Marketing reserves the right to refuse handling of material which may be deemed offensive, illegal or controversial. In this instance, hosting services may be terminated.
While 99.9% hosting uptime is provided by Gannet Marketing, it cannot guarantee the availability or continuity of the hosting service and cannot accept liability for loss of revenue caused by the unavailability, malfunction or interuption of the hosting service.
Gannet Marketing accepts no responsibility for delays or down time, breakdowns or data loss caused by Internet Service Providers.
The customer agrees to pass on FTP details and any other access details relating to their domain name and hosting account which Gannet Marketing requires to upload the web site if required as part of a project.
Gannet Marketing reserves the right without notice to refuse work with domain names or hosting and email services without reason for such rejection or refusal.
The customer agrees to take all legal responsibility for use of third party domain name, hosting and email services and hereby agrees to indemnify and hold harmless Gannet Marketing from any claim resulting from the customer’s publication of material and use of the domain name, hosting and email services. Any support or payment due relating to the domain name, hosting and email services not provided by Gannet Marketing are to be made between the customer and the third party service.
The contract for the registration of domains is between the customer and the appropriate Naming Authority. Gannet Marketing cannot guarantee that the customer will be able to register any requested name and until the customer has been given specific confirmation of registration it cannot assume that registration has been affected.
Gannet Marketing may register domain names on behalf of the customer if required. The responsibility for ensuring that the customer’s choice of domain name does not infringe the rights of a third party lies with the customer. The customer agrees to defend, indemnify and hold harmless Gannet Marketing against liabilities arising in respect of any such infringements.
10. Search Engine Optimisation
Gannet Marketing provides full service SEO and website optimisation for the customer upon receipt of order in writing.
The customer agrees not to target on single keywords or generic words. Gannet Marketing shall only optimize the customer’s website for multiple word keywords.
The customer agrees that Gannet Marketing cannot be held responsible for unsatisfactory search engine ranking results, and makes no claims or guarantees regarding the customer’s number of visitors, or sales the website may generate. SEO work is governed by many factors which are outside the direct control of Gannet Marketing and indeed, any other SEO company. Therefore no reputable SEO company can guarantee particular results. Gannet Marketing however guarantees improvement provided in a client’s website organic search engine results provided all of Gannet Marketing’s advice is followed.
The customer agrees that Gannet Marketing shall not be responsible for URLs dropped or excluded by a search engine for any reason.
The customer’s website’s ranking with a particular search term will rely on both the relevancy of that term on the customer’s pages, and the popularity of that term on other websites. If the website is not hosted by Gannet Marketing but hosted by a third party provider, both SEO set up and updates will require FTP access to the website and its content management system or a contact email address for someone who will upload changes as requested. This may not be necessary for off-page SEO/SEM work.
Gannet Marketing does not promote websites that contain unlawful, illegal, or infringing information of any kind. Gannet Marketing reserves the right to refuse providing any services to the customer by refunding prepaid money.
11. Termination of Agreement
The agreement may be terminated at any time by the customer, provided such termination is notified in writing. The customer will agree to pay within 14 days all amounts due under the terms of the agreement up to the date on which notification is received, with pro-rata payment for dates which fall between scheduled payment stages. On receipt of payment, Gannet Marketing will deliver to the customer all material produced to date.
The agreement may be terminated at any time by Gannet Marketing with 30 days written notice. The customer will agree to pay within 14 days all amounts due under the terms of the agreement up to the agreed termination date, with pro-rata payment for dates which fall between scheduled payment stages. On receipt of payment, Gannet Marketing will deliver to the customer all material and software produced to date.
12. Complaints Proceedure
The customer and Gannet Marketing agree to make a good-faith effort to resolve any disagreement arising out of, or in connection with, the agreement through negotiation.
The customer experiencing problems with a web service provided by Gannet Marketing should contact its assigned Project Manager. The customer should supply the URL of the problem and clearly outline the issue in question. Gannet Marketing will contact the individual responsible for the material in question with a view to resolving the matter satisfactorily.
A formal complaints procedure is in place should the customer feel that the nature of the complaint is too serious to be dealt with informally, or where a satisfactory conclusion has not been reached after following the informal procedure above.
A formal complaint should be made in writing to Gannet Marketing who will acknowledge receipt and ensure that the matter is examined within 2 business days. An initial response will be issued within 7 days of receiving the formal complaint and a full and considered response will be issued within 30 days. Any required action will be implemented with minimal delay.