I need to write up some terms and conditions for my site and company. Was wondering if there were any resources you found helpful on the internet? I am going to seek some local legal advice, but I want to get something basic down first to try and save me some money as lawyers aren't the cheapest of men to hire.

My company deals with website design, programming & print work.

Cheers,
~Jordan

Well, you could consult local legal advice. However, I'm sure you could come up with something suitable enough on the internet if you do enough research on it.



For the web design terms and conditions, you could write something like this:

• Explain/define the terms and conditions (e.g. how you want to be protected, an outline of your terms which you will describe specifically below, etc.)
• Describe the scope (e.g. what it applies to/for)
• Describe your payment methods (e.g. pay 50% upfront, 50% upon completion)
• Explain your liability (e.g. if this happens, we're not responsible)
• Tell your copyright (what's copyrighted and what's not)
• Describe your delivery process (e.g. how you deliver your digital goods)
• Explain your guarantee (e.g. for how long and what you guarantee)
• Describe your refunds (e.g. what percentage of a refund, if any, you receive)
• Tell about your acceptance of conditions (e.g. once you order what both you and the customer are legally binded into)
• Explain the law (e.g. the legal binding, only what local laws it covers/is covered under; kind of ties in with above bullet point)
• Describe the severability (e.g. what will happen in the event the terms and conditions are breeched, something illegal happens, etc.)

Or, another way you could approach creating a terms and conditions for a website design company is this http://www.cocoavillagepublishing.com/serv...e_design/terms/.

I cannot find anything on programming terms and conditions.

Lastly, refer to here for print work terms and conditions http://www.marathonpress.com/default.php/c...85c64a6cffe121f.

Thanks I will read into it more tomorrow.

While I probably could skip the legal advice, I think it's best not to cut corners when it comes to legal matters.

No problem, and I fully agree that you should not cut corners when it comes to legal matters.

Terms and conditions: For your website, I would only think you need a disclaimer to disclaim the information / content, as there are no discussion forums etc etc. A privacy policy is a must: I went to a meeting last week with a lawyer to discuss website requirements, and there was alot of importance on the privacy policy.

For your company: You would need a standards of service or something, for that I'd advise looking at what other people do, check out other designers and services.

Another important, related legal point, are you a registered company? If not, you should be careful about proclaiming yourself as a company (Im guessing you are not as there was no company details like a registered company number on your website nor your business card - companies house register was down at time of writing so I could not check for sure)

I would suggest using Sitepoint's forums for this topic. Do a search too, there have already been articles, blogs, and forum posts about this very subject.

I've used an online form-based contract builder thing. Cost me $15 USD for a week's worth of being able to download it (in Word, text, or PDF format) modify my selected requirements, and redownload it, etc... Not bad for a base price. I'll see if I can find the site again.

It's not illegal to call myself a company. Infact the only time I am the company and the company is me is when I am a sole trader. Also if you want to be technical the only real company is a PLC. Whoever doesn't make that bracket becomes an LTD and then everyone else are sole traders.



Thanks I will take a look

I didnt say it was illegal, I just said to be careful.

Mainly because it could be seen as being dishonest to your clients, something which I personally dislike, I am registered self-emplyed (sole trader) and I wouldnt refer to myself as a company until I register as a limited company. There also are some issues relating to domain names - if you claim to be a company when ordering a domain I believe (just from my research)

If you want to refer to yourself as a company then that is fine - just I personally prefer the honest approach. I would also be interested to know how a LTD company, is not a company, HRMC seem to think differently. Also, if you claim to be a company on legal documents - you may find yourself in trouble.

Any way back to terms and conditions. I remembered some more from my meeting last week (was rather sleepy when I posted)

Aside from the privacy policy I mentioned (which is really really important) if you are selling things online that can be bought (i.e. autofocus) you would need seperate terms and conditions - I'm not 100% sure on what they entail, as I am awaiting an email from the lawyer to provide more information. Ill add more information on that when I get it.

PLC, LTD and sole traders are completely different. A PLC is a public company that trades on the stock market, an LTD is a private company that only sells shares to those it invites.

The difference between LTD and sole trader is that ltd's have limited liability personally if something goes wrong (hence the name 'limited'), whereas sole traders have unlimited liability. For the sort of stuff you're working with, I would suggest registering yourself as a limited company. That way, if you get sued down the line somewhere, only your company assets are up for grabs, not your own.

If you are a sole trader and you open up a bank account you will see it says on your cheques 'Name trading as Company Name', therefore you are entitled to call yourself by your company name. As for lying about it, I don't think a client really minds if you are a sole trader or an LTD, it doesn't make much difference to them.



Yes thanks Rikki, I have done A Level BS. We were discussing this in one of our classes. Theoretically a true company is one that has it's share available to anyone over the stock market (a PLC). If your company isn't big enough for that then you become a LTD and sell your shares to privately. If you still aren't big enough for that then you become a sole trader, and yes the main difference between an LTD and a Sole Trader is the limited liability.

For me the cost and the extras aren't worth me becoming an LTD at the time being. I don't know how expensive it is to become a registered LTD over in England but in Guernsey it is fairly expensive. Plus you terms and conditions can protect you from most of the chances you will get sued and have to owe loads of money (which for me will probably/hopefully be the only time I will ever owe any company), and therefore if you don't owe anything then having unlimited liability won't be a problem.

Yes, I know a business is permitted to trade under a name - something I requested on my business banking application form and my CWF1 form for HMRC. However, I'd advise you to seek legal advise on this matter too. When I filled in my CWF1 form, I placed a trading name, which was not permitted to contain the words LTD, Limited etc etc. I am certainly not a company, but I am permitted to trade as Think Systems Internet, however, legalities require that I state my name, and registered business address on all business documents.



A client may not mind, but they may mind about being lied to. I wouldnt trust a supplier that lied to me about their status.

Terms and conditions cannot however protect you if an organisation was to sue you for placing a logo on one of your websites with out permission, breaking copyright

Aside from my ramblings on company status, you should read the rest of my posts, they do contain some valueble information

Generally (in my experience) when someone's called a company, you think they are actually a company. Also, in my Business Studies GCSE we got told never to refer to a business as a company if they aren't LTD or PLC. If you're intending to setup a reputable business, you shouldn't really be cutting corners on the legal advice just because of cost..

Well I suppose a company means different things to different people. I will make note to clarify that fact in the future.



I did say that myself

You can find my attempt at http://www.coredesigns.co.uk/termsandconditions.pdf

Sorry if offended anyone in this topic. I use the term 'company' too lightly, and was probably getting mixed up with 'business' and such.

Looks pretty good - I might use those for inspiration when writing ones for my business website, annoyingly my legal terms and conditions from the lawyers are just with regards to accessing the website and forum behaviour. I see some inspiration there came from James Mathias' ToS

They look pretty good Jordan!

Yeah i chose a selection of sites and merged them together to make a super ToS

You'd love New Zealand. The total cost of registering a company over here is $60. Past that, you're on your own of course in terms of tax and whatnot.

It's actually not very expensive here either, however I think there are some additional NI contributions and something else I cannot remember