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Terms and Conditions
Tekla Design’s Terms and Conditions are as follows:
A customer who signs up with Tekla Design is referred herein as “the client”.
Site Building Process & Conditions
PAY-FIRST POLICY
Tekla Design has a payment first policy, payment must be received before an appointment can be scheduled for an initial consultation between a client and one of the design project managers at Tekla Design.
THE APPLICATION PROCESS
The client agrees to provide us with everything that we need to complete the project including some form of base text, images and other information as and when we need it, and in the format requested. The graphics which will be used in the actual site design are excluded from the agreement as they will be customized for the website itself. Certain types of graphics (such as logos) can be designed if the project manager so opts to allow at an additional cost of $75 – $150. For more information on our rates, visit the pricing page.
You agree to review our work, provide feedback and sign-off approval in a timely manner. Both Tekla Design and the client are bound by any mutually determined appointments. Tekla Design strives for accuracy in communications with our clients and will reasonably provide all services promised verbally and in writing within the offered deadlines. We are not responsible for delays in development caused by client action.
THE DESIGN PROJECT
This project will include PHP, XHTML, HTML markup, CSS and possibly some JavaScript. We will test all our markup and CSS in current versions of all major browsers. We will also test to ensure that pages will display visually in a similar, albeit not necessarily identical manner. Tekla Design makes no guarantees of visual consistency with obsolete browsers, and unless otherwise specified, will make no effort to design sites for obsolete browsers.
We reserve the right to display and link to a version of client’s completed project as part of our portfolio, while preserving all client rights as detailed in the privacy policy.
DESIGN PROCESS
The design process is laid out as follows:
The design process begins with a design consultation between a client and one of the design project managers at Tekla Design. During the consultation the client and the design project manager will work out a basic layout and structure of a site. Upon completion of the consultation, Tekla Design will provide the client with a copy of the agreed web site design project.
After a choice of basic layout– determined after the initial consultation with the design project manager– is approved, by the client, Tekla Design will then begin the process of completing the preliminary design of the web site. From the time of content submission, each preliminary design takes approximately 7 – 10 business days before being ready for client review.
Tekla Design requires that all client content and information be readily available for site development to commence. Any delay in the completion of the project due to actions or negligence of client, will result in an extended project time completion.
REDESIGN
Under preliminary development
A redesign is a second attempt at a preliminary custom website design for a site in the development phase. If a client orders a redesign, Tekla Design will have the appointed design project manager consult with the client and a new design order will be taken. The client will receive a copy of the redesign order taken after their consultation. Redesigning a site takes approximately 7 – 10 business days before being ready for client review. During the design process the first design created by Tekla Design will be deleted off of the development site, this allows for the redesign to be developed on the site.
If after the second design, the client is still unsatisfied, Tekla Design will be paid in full for all of the work produced until that point and you may either cancel this contract or continue to commission us to make further alterations to the design, at the discretion of the project manager, at the monthly rate set out originally. Customers who pay on an annual basis are governed by the refund policy below (see “Refund Policy”). This redesign policy is exclusive to sites which are hosted on a Tekla Design server and have not gone live yet. After a design has been signed off and the content is completed, a clients site will go live.
Post Published
If a client decides to have yet another custom design after their site has gone live for any amount of time, a redesign fee will be charged for the new design.
REVISION
A revision is when a client informs Tekla Design of minor changes they would like made to their site. While a site is in the development phase, revisions of the site are limited to two tickets per week. Each revision is expected to take 2 – 3 business days to complete. All revisions must be specified by the client, Tekla Design will, in turn, notify the client upon the completion of any revisions that are made.
DESIGN SPECIFICATIONS
Tekla Design will supply up to 10 stock photos if the client can not supply photos. We will also create custom graphics used for the slider and site advertisement, these custom graphics are limited to 5 images. We will also edit and crop the photos featured on pages or blog entries.
Clients must have ownership of photos displayed onto a gallery page. We will not supply the photo editing of the photos in a photo gallery.
While we do occasionally create Flash elements for clients, we will not create an entirely Flash-based site. As a note, we want to make clear that Flash is not guaranteed to function on all systems, nor mobile phones. Placement of Flash elements are placed on sites by client request and are not necessarily advised by Tekla Design.
Media files as stated in the following refers to video and/or music files. Tekla Design requires that clients must either directly own the rights to any media files placed on their site, or have purchased a commercial license for site placement. Tekla Design will not supply, nor purchase any media files for clients.
Tekla Design is not responsible for editing videos and or music placed on a clients site. All media files that are given to Tekla Design will be placed on the clients’ site intact and without alteration.
Client Information for Building an Online Store
THIRD PARTY CODES
Tekla Design will work with third-party companies to add functions, buttons or helpful codes. We do not grant administrative privileges to third-party companies, we will place all codes on the site for the clients and test the site to verify that the codes work and cause no malfunction to the site.
THIRD PARTY PLUGINS DISCLAIMER & POLICY
Certain website functions offered by Tekla Design, such as the photo galleries, audio & video pages may require specific additional third-party software (called ‘plugins’). You may have such software already installed onto your website. Tekla Design does not use any plugins that are not available FREE OF CHARGE. However because some software companies or developers also offer versions of their plugins that require payment, a client may choose to license paid-for software from a third party. Any such purchase will not be paid for by Tekla Design, neither do we guarantee the compatibility and functionality of such a plugin. Any paid plugins hosted by Tekla Design must be accompanied with a verifiable license and installed by a Tekla Design project manager.
Although Tekla Design uses third-party plugins in order to provide the best possible web service, we do not guarantee that the third-party plugins will be updated by the third-party companies, nor do we have the right to change alter or customize third-party software. If for any reason a plugin stops functioning, Tekla Design will replace the plugin with an alternative third-party plugin.
MOBILE PHONE DISCLAIMER
Tekla Design will build a responsive/mobile-friendly site. These sites are not APPS, further Tekla Design makes no claims of designing and or building mobile APPS nor entirely mobile sites.
SEO – PAGE RANKING DISCLAIMER & POLICY
Tekla Design makes absolutely no guarantee, expressed or implied that when a client has their site SEO optimized by Tekla Design that the client will make any money or improve current profits, increase page rank or increase search engine rankings. Tekla Design does its best to assist with online business website strategies, search engine strategies and other business website advice that, regardless of our results and experience, may not produce the same results (or any guarantee of increased results) for the client.
Tekla Design does not use nor will we assist clients in black hat SEO techniques, we will only supply legal and ethical SEO activities for our clients. Black hat SEO is a great disadvantage of the SEO services and uses unethical activities while promoting a business on the internet, it can also cause the other companies and businesses which we serve great harm. These methods include and are not limited to: Hidden text, IP delivery, Throw Away Domains, Cloaking, Keyword stuffing, Automatically generated keyword pages, Duplicate content on multiple domains, Invisible links, Multiple Domain Names, Different content for search engines than users, etc.
PUBLISHING
Tekla Design hosts client sites on a development server while they are under development. Tekla Design will not transfer a clients development site to its own domain until the site is considered complete by the client. Upon the clients’ approval, Tekla Design will transfer the development site to its own domain. After the transfer of a clients development site to its own domain, the client waves the right to continue design revisions. Additional redesigns will incur a redesign fee.
Tekla Design will consider any further revisions of the site to be under the terms of site management and monthly maintenance.
Under the circumstance that the client does not reply to correspondence after the site has been provisionally completed and is awaiting approval to go live, Tekla Design reserves the right to place such site onto its own domain after 3 months of hosting on the Tekla Design development server.
SITE MANAGEMENT/MAINTENANCE & UPDATES
Tekla Design will manage the clients’ site with an allowed monthly update of blogs, coupons or pages. Tekla Design also offers the client the opportunity to be tutored on the site functions and how to add content to their site. We offer one hour of technical support time a month, during which our clients can be trained in various site maintenance or the clients can opt to inform Tekla Design of updates they would like to add to their site and in turn, Tekla Design would make those changes. Monthly site maintenance excludes the continuation of changes made to a clients design and focuses on the building and development of the content of a site.
Each update can take an expected 2 – 3 business days to complete. All updates must be specified by the client, Tekla Design will, in turn, notify the client upon the completion of any updates that are made.
CONTRACT DESIGNS
Tekla Design offers contract designs which are separately drawn agreements between Tekla Design and clients. These sites are purchased and designed to be hosted, owned and maintained by the clients. Tekla Design will include 3 months of support time at no extra cost, any additional support time must be purchased by the client.
EXTERNAL SITE MAINTENANCE
Managing External Sites: Managing and updating sites that are owned by clients and are not hosted on Tekla Design servers. Pricing is determined by site size and work hours needed monthly. An agreed monthly fee is determined by the size of the site and the amount of work needed. Clients can opt to purchase a year’s service with a discount of two months free. The fee is the same monthly and does not include hosting, emails, site redesign or the purchase of any templates or plugins.
Restrictions & Payment
RESTRICTIONS
Tekla Design’s primary focus is on business and non-profit sites. Accordingly, we restrict the use of our services to clients over the age of 18. For the sake of our existing business partnerships, we do not accept applications for websites related to adult entertainment, online gambling, controlled substances, nor businesses which can be considered “high-risk”, immoral, dangerous or against the interests of Tekla Design’s internal business relationships. Such applications will be immediately rejected, and if accidentally approved, and they will be refunded and removed upon discovery.
PAYMENT
The initial payment can be made by debit/credit card. Irrespective of any offers or specials stated by Tekla Design is collected within 24 hours of ascent to the creation of a website and related service of hosting and subsequently collected on the same date each billing period, determined at the outset of the agreement. For monthly billing purposes, Tekla Design may charge the client within 72 hours before or after the regular billing date for accounting purposes for monthly billing accounts. Annual accounts are charged on the first of the month in which they became a client. In the event of the cancellation of an account, the service is maintained throughout the term of the billing period.
NON PAYMENT
Monthly Billing
Monthly clients are charged every month on their due date for services. If payments are delayed, clients can make payment arrangements to continue their service interrupted. Outstanding balance is not to exceed more than 30 days.
If Tekla Design can not process the payment, the site will be redirected to parking after 7 days of missed payments and scheduled for permanent deletion after 30 days. An additional fee of $49.00 may be applied for site reactivation.
Billing
All yearly and quarterly payments are charged on the 1st of the month, if Tekla Design can not process the payment, the site will be redirected to parking after 3 days of missed payments and scheduled for permanent deletion after 30 days. An additional fee of $49.00 may be applied for site reactivation.
Tekla Design uses automatic billing and will notify clients before their quarterly or annual renewal billing due date.
REFUND POLICY
Tekla Design ensures customer satisfaction from the beginning of the preliminary design to completion. For annual customers that wish to cancel service after the preliminary design, Tekla Design will do everything possible to assure customer satisfaction. For those that cancel service before the preliminary design is completed, they will be entitled to a partial refund comprised of one month’s worth of service. For clients that have paid for a year who cancel service before the preliminary design is completed, a refund will be issued deducting 10% of the total, as Tekla Design, under normal circumstances, prorates the yearly billing at 10 of the 12 calendar months, for the purpose of recovery of fees and time spent in development. After either (a) revisions have been made to the preliminary design to customer specifications or (b) the expiration of 30 calendar days (whichever comes first), all fees paid to Tekla Design are non-refundable.
Termination & Cancellation
TERMINATION
Clients who sign up with Tekla Design are “at-will” clients: all charges and services are detailed in the confirmation email they received when they originally signed up, and cannot be changed without the express agreement of both parties. These Terms of Service apply to all clients and take effect upon sign up. Either party may terminate this Agreement for any reason at any time. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, Tekla Design may immediately terminate this Agreement, or limit your access to the Services or the Web Site, if you (a) fail to comply with any term or condition of this Agreement, (b) use or attempt to use the services in a manner that violates any Policy, (c) transfer, distribute, or disclose the Services (including, without limitation, your user ID or password) to a third party, or (d) attempt to modify the services (except as permitted by Tekla Design for you to make use of the services). All relevant and surviving parts of this agreement shall survive the expiration or termination of this Agreement for any reason.
CANCELLATION
Clients can cancel at any time.
Payments received for services rendered up until the time of cancellation are non-refundable.
Chargebacks of payments made through auto-billing is considered a cancellation of services and the site will be immediately redirected to parking and scheduled for permanent deletion.
All cancellations at the client’s request, are effective immediately. Once a client notifies us of cancellation, they will receive a confirmation email.
After this confirmation, all of the hosted websites, sub-folders, and databases are subject to prompt deletion from our servers.
YEARLY SUBSCRIPTIONS – CANCELLATION
Cancellations must be made before the new billing period. Cancellations made after the billing has been run, are subject to a late termination fee.
Refunds are applied only to yearly billed clients. All refunds requested after payments have been made will take 30 days.
Month-to-month, quarterly or bi-annual billing customers are entitled to immediate cancellation, but there are no refunds.
Technical Terms
TECHNICAL SUPPORT
Our professional business package includes the industry standard of 60 minutes of phone support time or email updates per month within the defined rate. On the possibility that additional support is needed by the client, additional phone support may be purchased at a rate mutually determined by the client and project manager. Technical support is limited to the development and maintenance of the website and does not include technical support for unrelated issues (e.g. client hardware issues). Customers can either contact us for support-related issues by the phone at 888-898-0105 or by email at webdesign@tekladesign.net.
EMAIL POLICY
If the client’s domain is purchased and held by Tekla Design, a standard maximum of 10 email accounts (deviations from standard to be determined by management) will be created for the client. However, if the client chooses to retain ownership of the said domain, our standard policy is to create one email account if possible. If it is not possible, Tekla Design will act to ensure within reason that the client’s current domain-based email communications will remain uninterrupted.
Tekla Design provides email services under its own mail services. We assist clients in provisioning their emails accordingly. We do not provide assistance to companies which run mail services on the clients’ behalf. If a client has a need for provisioning their office servers internally we can recommend independent vendors who can provide such services accordingly. Tekla Design makes no guarantees or promises on behalf of independent vendors.
COPYRIGHTS
With the exception of any Third-Party Materials and Backend Technology, Clients owns the client content. Client content means all content or information (including, without limitation, any text, music, sound, photographs, video or graphics), in any medium, provided by the client to Tekla Design.
“Third-Party Materials” means any content, software, photos, media or other computer programming material that is owned by an entity other than Tekla Design, and licensed by Tekla Design or generally available to the public, including client, under published licensing terms, and that Tekla Design will use to display or run a Web site.
Tekla Design owns the rights to the design of the web site, if a customer stops paying the monthly fee for the web site upon cancellation the customer is not entitled to use the web site, custom graphics or products licensed to Tekla Design any longer.
“Backend Technology” refers to databases, programming, code, scripts or operating instructions developed by or for Tekla Design and used to host or operate the Website or a Web server in connection with a Web site. Such technology includes, but is not limited to, any files necessary to make forms, buttons, checkboxes, and similar functions and underlying technology or components, such as style sheets, animations, templates, interface programs that link multimedia and other programs, customized graphics, manipulation engines, and menu utilities. Backend design does not include any client content.
Clients do not have, nor will they at any time be granted FTP access to hosted folders or files, nor may they duplicate or distribute any of the underlying technology to any third party without the prior written consent of Tekla Design. Without limiting the foregoing, the client agrees not to reverse-engineer, reverse-assemble, decompile or otherwise attempt to derive any source code of the back-end design, except as allowed by law.
DATA SECURITY
To prevent unauthorized access to your personally identifiable information, maintain data accuracy, and ensure the correct use of such information, we have put in place appropriate physical, electronic, and managerial procedures to safeguard and secure the information we collect. However, no safeguards or security procedures are 100% effective. All clients will receive editor privileges with their username and password, we urge you to take all reasonable precautions to protect your personal data, which should include never sharing your username and password with anyone. Tekla Design limits employee access to personally identifiable information from this web site to only those employees who need access to perform a specific job. Administrative privileges are only granted to the site project managers, this is done to ensure the security and integrity of the site. We also recommend taking the time to read our Privacy Policy.
NON-COMPETE
Tekla Design prohibits a client from assigning an editor to work on their site who is an employee (or is self-employed) for a competing company. Tekla Design might ask such a potential editor to sign a non – competition agreement as a condition of becoming a possible editor. At no point will a competing company and or contractor be granted administrative privileges.
LEGAL
Tekla Design will make every good-faith effort to design a website without errors and will do everything in its power to ensure customer satisfaction. Tekla Design cannot be held liable for damages including lost profits, lost savings, or other incidental damages arising out of the operation of or inability to operate this web site and any other web pages.
If any provision of this agreement shall be unlawful, void, or for any reason is unenforceable, then that provision shall be deemed severable from this agreement and shall not affect the validity and enforceability of any remaining provisions. All rights to the back-end technology not expressly granted to the client in the aforementioned are retained by Tekla Design.