Below are the main terms for all services we provide. The more detailed terms of service will be included into the contract and also into the proposal if you require one.
Responsibilities of Dusk Owl
- provide high quality work within the timeline specified in the contract unless circumstances beyond our control cause delays
- provide professional, responsive customer service
- stay in close contact with you during the entire design or development process
- warn you ahead of time about delays and additional expenses that could not be foreseen at the time of signing the contract
- only use collected information about you to complete the project and provide necessary training and support; we do not sell, trade, or rent your personal or business information to others
- guarantee that all software used for your project was obtained legally and used in compliance with the manufacturers’ licenses
- guarantee in good faith that the deliverables are original and have not been previously published, or that permission to use has been obtained from the copyright owner
Responsibilities of Our Clients
- for anything more than a very simple small project, provide very specific details to help us identify your goals and needs
- provide timely feedback and necessary information about your company, hosting setup, and software or service that you’ve chosen to be a part of your project
- guarantee that all materials you provide to us (text content, images, fonts, etc.) are either licensed to you or created by you and that you are authorized to use and display those materials; you are solely responsible for claims of valid copyright, trademarks, and ownership
- proofread text copy and check all materials supplied to us for errors, especially if the final design will be sent to a printing service
- keeping copy
Estimates and Contracts
All estimates and contracts provided to prospective and existing clients are valid for 30 days after being sent. A new estimate or contract will be provided upon request after that.
Payments
In most cases, a 50% retainer is required before we start on your project. Small projects (under $1000) must be fully prepaid. You will be invoiced for the remaining balance before receiving the printed materials or before your web site goes live. Payment schedules for large, complicated projects are determined individually. We only invoice for the actual time spent on your project. If the final cost is lower than we estimated, the difference will be refunded to you.
All additional costs that may arise as we work on your project will be discussed with you first and only added to the final invoice after your approval.
We accept payments via PayPal, checks, and money orders. You will receive an invoice from Dusk Owl Design and Development for every payment requested. All Invoices are payable within 15 days upon receipt.
Cancellation
You can cancel your project for any reason with a 15 days prior written notice. Upon cancellation, you must pay any outstanding amounts for work already done, stock images purchased for your project, and so on. If the amount you’ve paid already is greater than the cost of our work and purchases we’ve made for the project, we will refund you the difference.
Changes and Additions
At every milestone, we will make up to 3 rounds of revisions at no additional cost to you. A round of revisions is a group of changes requested at the same time. Changes include small modifications of text, placement of design elements, and the existing functionality. These changes can’t significantly alter the design or functionality of the deliverables. All changes shall be made before you accept the deliverables or sign off on a milestone.
You will be responsible for making additional payments for any further changes requested after the acceptance of the deliverables, approval of the milestone, or for additions to the approved scope of the project.
Communication
We use emails as a primary way of communication. This helps both you and us keep track of what was said, when, and by whom, and what were the circumstances of every decision made during the project. Usually you will hear from us within the same business day, and small questions or concerns are answered within hours. If you are having an emergency your problem and communication about it will be given the higher priority than our regular tasks. We do recognize the importance of phone calls and face to face meetings, so if you feel that an issue absolutely can’t be resolved by email, we will make alternative arrangements depending on your location.
Phone calls and meetings must be scheduled first, preferably during our work hours. After hours consultations are available for a higher fee.
Progress Reports
We will contact you regularly to report about tasks competed, problems encountered, and recommended changes related to the project. We will inform you promptly upon discovery of any event or problem that may delay the progress of the project.
Testing and Acceptance Procedure
We make every good faith effort to test all deliverables thoroughly and make necessary corrections as a result of such testing before handing over the deliverables to you. Upon receiving of the deliverables, you should either accept them or give us a written notice of any corrections that should be made and a desirable date for completion. We will consider deliverables accepted if you don’t provide any requests for changes in writing within 14 days of receiving them.
There will be a single designated person from both you and Dusk Owl who will be the only one to send and accept all deliverables and make all decisions during the project. Neither you or us will have any obligation to consider input from anyone except the designated persons.
Maintenance and Updates
If you contract us to design and develop a web site, additional payments will need to be made for updates to any scripts used for the site if they are required due to security issues or technology progress. Popular content management systems like WordPress, CMS Made Simple, and others require regular updates which are necessary to ensure the web site stays secure. We will not be responsible for hacks of outdated versions of scripts if you take no action upon our advise to update them.
Confidential Information
We treat information such as source materials, technical and marketing plans, or other sensitive business information that you provide to us during the project as confidential. It will not be disclosed to anybody else without your explicit permission.
Return of Source Information
After you accept of the final set of deliverables or after the project was canceled, we will return all copies and originals of the source materials that you provided to us or destroy them if requested.
Copyright Transfer
All rights or licensing rights to the deliverables as defined in the contract will be transferred to you after you make the final payment. We reserve all rights not expressly granted to you.
Alterations
Any alteration that creates additional art (color shift, mirroring, combination cut and paste, deletion, resizing, etc.) of original graphics which is not transferred to you for exclusive rights, is prohibited without our expressed permission.
Performance Liability
We will not charge you any additional fee for the repair of flaws in the final deliverables or of any failure of the web site to conform to the final specifications. We will not be liable for any other remedy than to make needed repairs. The entire risk as to the quality and performance of the web site or functioning of any features provided by a third party is with you. In no event will Dusk Owl be liable to you or any third party for any damages, including lost profits, lost savings or other damages arising out of the operation of or inability to properly operate the web site or use graphic materials, or follow our advice.