Terms and Conditions
Consultation
We provide a free initial consultation with you about the work and research you would like us to undertake. We will usually carry out a quick, initial assessment to check that the relevant records are likely to be available. If we feel that the records are not available or that the research is not within our area of expertise we will advise you at this stage.
Commission
Following the free consultation, we will confirm by email our belief that the work can be carried out successfully, based on the initial information that you have provided. We will then ask for your formal instruction to proceed, a deposit, and acceptance of our Terms & Conditions.
Payment
Once the decision is made to go ahead with the project, we will ask for a deposit of 25% of the agreed price, (with a minimum payment of £20), before we continue with further work. We will send you an invoice and include details of how to pay. We accept payment by Paypal or bank transfer. We will advise you when the research is complete and ask for payment of all remaining money outstanding before despatching your finished project.
Additional Charges
Our work is charged according to the rates published on our website, to include time carrying out research and its subsequent analysis, writing up of results and the production of reports and family trees. Any costs incurred for items such as ordering of copies of original documents or for photography permits will be invoiced in addition to the agreed charge. We will seek your agreement to these costs before they are incurred.
Family Story UK will not go beyond agreed financial limits or incur additional costs without your prior permission.
Timescales
We would normally expect to complete the work within 4 to 6 weeks of receiving your commission, although this may be longer for larger projects, or if particular records need to be ordered or accessed. We will agree a target timescale with you at the start of the work.
Completion and Delivery of Research
We will try to complete the work and produce our report according to the timescale agreed, and keep you informed of any delays. We will prepare documentation according to the options you have chosen and paid for. Upon payment of cleared funds for all outstanding fees this will be delivered to you by a secure and signed for mail service, or by email, depending on your instruction.
Communication.
We will keep you informed via email of our progress during the course of the project.
Errors, Omissions and Research Findings
We use the information provided by you as a basis for our research and will work with you to ensure that this initial information is as accurate as possible. It would be helpful if you could provide as much information as possible on known family members, so that we don’t use research time to establish facts you already have. However, Family Story UK cannot be held responsible for any errors arising from inaccuracies in the information originally supplied to us.
Please be aware that there are sometimes occasions when, for a variety of reasons, further research on a project fails to produce the expected results: not every birth was registered, not every age was recorded accurately, records are sometimes lost or destroyed or impossible to interpret, and sometimes our ancestors are not always completely truthful about their personal information. There is no guarantee that Family Story UK will be successful in the stated aims of any commissioned research despite our best efforts. We do our best to make every effort to verify the findings of the research and provide information on sources. If you believe there is a mistake in any of our research then please contact us so that we can rectify it.
If it is not possible to complete a project as originally agreed, or where the lack or quality of information available is so fundamental as to undermine the prospects for success for the project as a whole, we will stop work and ask for your instruction on how to proceed. This could either be to change the project brief, or to end the project. If the latter, you would only be charged for the research that had taken place up to that point.
Family Story UK will always be open and honest with you about our findings. On occasion, we may discover an unexpected fact and, although we will do our utmost to deal with unanticipated results sensitively, we do not accept liability for any resulting material or emotional loss, damage or inconvenience.
Cancellation
You have the right to change your mind. If you decide not to proceed with your research project please advise us in writing, at which point we will calculate the cost of research hours completed and expenses (such as the cost of purchasing certificates) and refund any difference to you. If the balance exceeds the amount you have paid us in your deposit, we will invoice you with the remaining balance.
Gift Vouchers
The purchaser of Family Story UK Gift Voucher is entitled to a 14-day 'cooling off' period from the date of purchase with a full refund, less any printing and postage costs already incurred, provided that the Gift Voucher has not been committed to pay for research work already commenced. If you wish to request the cancellation of a Gift Certificate please email mike@familystoryuk.com
The Voucher can be redeemed against services provided by Family Story UK, within 2 years of the date of issue.
The Gift Voucher balance cannot be exchanged for cash, or redeemed against the purchase of another Voucher.
Family Story UK are not responsible if a Gift Voucher is used without permission and no replacement or refund will be provided. If a Voucher is lost, destroyed or stolen, and details of it can be matched against an unused certificate in our records then it will, of course, be honoured. When ordering a Gift Voucher to be emailed, you should ensure that the recipient’s email address is correct to reduce the risk of loss.
A Family Story UK Gift Voucher can be applied to commissioned research work currently in progress but cannot be used retrospectively as a refund against work already completed and paid for.
A Gift Voucher cannot be sold to any third party without our express written consent. If we do give our consent, such consent may be subject to any conditions which we stipulate.
Copyright and Ownership
Copies of any original documents remain the property of Family Story UK until the final payment has been made.
Family Story UK provides reports for a client's personal use and will retain the copyright on any and all reports provided. Research notes and plans remain the property of Family Story UK.
Some of the images contained in a Family Story UK report may be procured from online sources in accordance with copyright and licence regulations. Those images are supplied for your personal use and should not be published or distributed for any other purpose without express permission.
(Revised January 2023).