Terms & Conditions
The Design Frontier {us, our, we}
The Client {you, your, them}
1. The Brief
If you are familiar with briefing for creative production it is accepted that in many cases a verbal brief is sufficient for us to provide you with a cost estimate for work. On larger projects a detailed brief, in writing via email, will help us to provide an accurate estimate and act as a reference for both parties throughout the production process. Our estimate will outline the scope of the project based on our understanding of the brief.
If you are not familiar with providing a brief, then you can contact us to discuss your design needs, invariably we will have questions for clarification, or we might ask you to complete our simple brief template.
2. Schedules and Timeline
Deadlines:
You must make us aware in the original brief of any deadlines that must be adhered to. If there is no prescribed deadline, then we will agree an appropriate schedule with you before we start work.
Authors corrections:
Where projects run over the agreed time schedule you will not be charged extra, unless it is deemed that the over-run is due to excessive alterations to content or changes to the original brief, made by the client - these are referred to as Author’s Corrections. Wherever possible we will try to give advanced warning before an agreed budget is breached and a route to completion or additional costs will have to be agreed before proceeding further.
3. The Estimate
All work will be estimated based on its complexity and size. Estimates will be clearly itemised and any additional costs, such as commission of photography, purchasing of domain names etc. will also be clearly itemised as part of the estimate. If additional costs occur after the original estimate, i.e. purchasing new fonts as part of the design development, or additional features are incorporated into your project, you will be consulted and provided with an revised estimate for your approval. All estimates are valid for 30 days.
4. Before We Begin
Once you are happy with your estimate we require written permission to begin work. This can be in the form of an email or a letter, but must be in writing. It is important that if you have any queries or wish to change anything about your original brief that you do this before you send written permission to begin work. Any alterations after this point may require a revised estimate.
5. Proofing
A digital PDF or online proof will be supplied for you to check the direction of the project. All estimates allow for up to three digital proof stages. In most cases this will be the entire document. Printed laser or high resolution Matchprint proofs are available on request and are charged extra - prices on request. Amendments requested after sight of the third digital proof will be made as long as we feel they are reasonable and still fall within the original scope, as detailed in the briefing document. This work will be completed as part of the original estimate at no extra cost, and further digital proofs (PDF) will be provided for ‘within reason’ amendment stages.
(Within reason: in-line with the original brief and within the original budget constraints).
If the amendments requested are deemed to be in contrast to the original brief and estimate, we will discuss these issues with you, and any additional work may be charged at the standard hourly rate as detailed in the original estimate. Digital PDF or online proofs will be included but additional printed proofs, if required, will be chargeable.
6. Final Proof and Sign-off
Print:
Once we are satisfied we have completed your amendments, you will be provided with a final printed or digital proof to sign-off. Once we have received your final sign-off you will be provided with either digital files, or final production prints. Once we have received final sign-off we will consider our side of the contract to have been fulfilled. At this point you will also receive an invoice for the balance of the invoice. You will have 28 days to process this final invoice.
Web:
Where hosting has been purchased from The Design Frontier and you are happy to go live with your web project, you will also receive an invoice for the balance of the invoice. You will have 14 days to process this final invoice. Where hosting has been purchased from a third party, the balance of the invoice will need to be cleared before transfer of files takes place. Web hosting must be paid in full for the year in advance; if you cancel within the term paid for, no re-imbursements for web hosting can be made. Ownership of all files remains that of The Design Frontier until the full balance has been cleared.
7. Credit & Payment
For new client’s first commissions we require the total estimate paid in advance before we start work on the project. A ‘small project’ does not constitute a first commission - only projects with an estimated production time of more than 8 hours will qualify. Depending on what other services are included in any one particular project, we may require an incremental payment at predetermined point – mid project, for example.
The final balance of the estimate will be expected within 28 days of completion of the project. In accordance with ‘The Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998’, any invoice not paid within 30 days of the invoice date will be considered ‘late’. The Design Frontier will claim interest on overdue payments at 8% above the prevailing Bank of England base rate.
Dormant projects:
A project is deemed ‘dormant’ when there has been no progress made, on the client’s part, for more than 28 days through neglect or other. The Design Frontier reserve the right to invoice work-to-date and will see the dormant project through to completion when the client chooses to resurrect it.
Small projects:
A project with a total estimated production time of 8 hours or less. We allow a maximum 28 day credit term on small projects (excluding print lead times) and reserve the right to invoice the full amount upon the 28th day from submission of first visual/proof.
Minimum charge:
Any single project or commission that’s accumulative production time is less than 30 minutes, will be charged at our ‘Minimum Charge’ rate of £35.
8. Additional Services
Print:
For large or specialised print orders payment is required in full before the print order can be placed and printer’s proofs are approved.
Web Hosting:
We offer a range of hosting packages, which will be discussed at the beginning of a web-based project. Where we purchase hosting on your behalf we will keep a record of your account details. Any server downtime or loss of business due to hosting issues are covered by the third party host’s terms and conditions, not those of The Design Frontier. You are not required to purchase hosting from us but hosting purchased by the client must be suitable to handle our methods of website development, so please contact us first for the required hosting specification. All account user details and passwords remain the responsibility of the client and you will be required to provide us with your account details for Domain Registration and DNS management, Control Panel access for email accounts etc. and FTP details for server access.
Photography:
If original photography work is needed for a specific project, the cost of this will clearly be detailed in your quote. Where photography is not requested, but we feel it is needed, this work will be detailed in the quote, but the work will not be commissioned without your sign-off.
Stock Imagery:
Stock imagery will be used where specified or deemed appropriate, but proofs will be provided using free, watermarked, low-resolution files. We will not purchase any stock imagery without your permission.
Fonts:
Where a typeface is required which is not already licensed on our system, we will not purchase these typefaces without your prior permission. We are not licensed to distribute fonts, please don’t ask us to provide them
9. File archive and file retrieval
Your files will be archived unless otherwise requested. This means that any updates to artwork can be commissioned, with only the additional work charged for and not the cost of complete re-origination. Please be aware, unless requested in the original brief, and agreed in the quote, you will not be provided with original artwork files in an editable format. If you do require these files a fee will be charged subject to the size and complexity of the project.
Please note any font sets used in the origination of the artwork will not be supplied with the packaged artwork files.
10. Copyright
All artwork will remain the copyright of The Design Frontier, excluding photography, graphic imagery or branding supplied by The Client. If you wish to purchase the copyright for any work, this will be subject to a cost depending on the size of the project. We reserve the right to use all artwork to promote ourselves whether in print or online. On websites we reserve the right to use the tagline and link ‘Another friend of The Design Frontier’or ‘Design/Development by The Design Frontier’ in the footer, without compromising the overall design.
11. Customer Service
Regardless of the size and complexity of your project we always try to ensure that you have the same contact throughout the design and production process, and this contact will be involved in the process as close to it’s heart as possible. We value repeat business and work hard to establish loyal relationships with all of our clients. If there is anything you do not understand – ask, we will try to help where we can and will listen to feedback to improve our service where possible.
