THINK MAD.
Terms & Conditions
The terms on which we provide our website, hosting, domain, SEO, digital marketing and social media services.
Effective date: 1 July 2026 Version: 2.1
Think Mad Ltd · 0151 316 0110 · projects@thinkmad.co.uk
26a Foundry House, Waterside Lane, Widnes WA8 8UD · Registered in England & Wales, Company no. 12636177 · VAT no. 478874811
These terms and conditions (the “Terms”) set out the basis on which Think Mad Ltd (“we“, “us“, “our“) provides its services to you, our client (the “Customer“, “you“, “your“). They apply to every Proposal and project unless we agree otherwise in writing. Our services are provided on a business-to-business basis, and these Terms do not affect any statutory rights that cannot be excluded by law.
Key terms at a glance
This summary is for convenience only — the numbered clauses below are what govern our agreement.
What you get: the website, marketing, hosting, domains and social work set out in your Proposal.
Prices: as per your Proposal, exclusive of VAT. Websites may be paid in stages (e.g. 65% to start, 35% on sign-off).
Minimum term: marketing Plans taken with a discounted website bundle run for 3 months, then roll monthly. Without a bundle discount, Plans are rolling monthly from the start.
Cancelling a Plan: 30 days’ written notice once any minimum term has passed.
Domains: registered in your name, managed by us, renewed yearly. No release or transfer fees, ever.
Annual price review: once a year we may raise Plan fees in line with inflation (typically 3–5%), with 30 days’ notice showing the exact new amount.
SEO: we can’t guarantee specific rankings, traffic or sales — search engines are outside our control.
Your data: where we handle personal data for you, the Data Processing Agreement in Annex A applies.
1. About these Terms and key definitions
By accepting a Proposal, paying a deposit or invoice, or asking us to begin work, you agree to these Terms.
“Proposal” means the proposal or quote we send you describing the Services and their prices.
“Services” means the work described in your Proposal (see clause 2).
“Plan” means any monthly marketing or support retainer set out in your Proposal.
“Working day” means a day other than a Saturday, Sunday or public holiday in England.
“Account in good standing” means your account with us where all invoices are paid and no fees are overdue.
If there is any conflict, a signed Proposal prevails over these Terms, which prevail over any other document. These Terms and your Proposal are the entire agreement between us and replace any earlier discussions or representations; you confirm you have not relied on any statement not set out in them. Nothing in this clause limits liability for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation.
2. Our services
The exact services we provide, and their prices, are those set out in your Proposal. In general we offer:
Website design and build — bespoke websites, built in WordPress with editable blocks (unless your Proposal states otherwise) so you can maintain your own pages.
Hosting — fast, secure hosting, included while your Plan is active or as set out in your Proposal.
Domains — we register and manage domain names in your name and handle the annual renewals for you.
SEO and digital marketing — keyword and search-intent research, on-page optimisation, content, rank tracking and reporting.
Social media management — content creation, scheduling, publishing and access to your own branded dashboard and unified inbox.
3. Quotes, prices and VAT
Your Proposal is valid for 30 days unless it says otherwise.
All prices are quoted excluding VAT. VAT is charged in addition at the prevailing rate, and every payment is fully VAT-invoiced.
Prices also exclude third-party costs (such as paid links, advertising spend, premium plugins, stock assets and domain registry fees), which are recharged to you or paid by you directly, as set out in clause 12.
Website builds may be split into stages (for example, a percentage to start the build and the balance on sign-off), as set out in your Proposal.
4. Payment, deposits and late payment
Plan fees are collected in advance by Direct Debit (via GoCardless) on the date set out in your Proposal. By setting up your Direct Debit you authorise us, through GoCardless (our regulated Direct Debit provider), to collect your Plan fees and any agreed one-off or annual charges, including amounts varied under clause 20, on the dates notified to you. You are protected by the Direct Debit Guarantee.
One-off and annual charges (such as website stages and domain renewals) are invoiced and payable by the due date shown.
Deposit. Website projects begin once you have accepted your Proposal and paid the deposit stated in it. The deposit is non-refundable to the extent it reflects work started, your reserved place in our schedule and third-party costs committed on your behalf.
If a website is paid in stages and you have not supplied your content and materials within 30 days of a stage payment, we may invoice the remaining balance for that stage, as we will already have incurred costs.
Late payment. If any sum is overdue we may (a) charge interest and reasonable recovery costs under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998, and (b) suspend Services, including hosting and social scheduling, until your account is in good standing. Restoring a suspended service may attract a reactivation fee of £100 + VAT.
You may not withhold or set off any payment because of a dispute. Where a chargeback or payment reversal is later found to be unjustified, the reversed amount remains payable and we may suspend Services until it is settled.
5. Website design and build
You agree to provide the content, images and information we need to build your site promptly, and to give feedback and approvals in good time so the project stays on schedule. We use Shutterstock and other licensed stock libraries for imagery, and credit sources where required.
We will send work to you for approval before it goes live. If we do not hear from you within 21 working days of sending a proof, we may treat it as approved and publish it so the project can progress.
Timescales in your Proposal are estimates, not fixed dates, and assume you provide content, approvals and access when we ask. If a project stalls waiting on you for more than 30 days, we may re-book it around other clients, invoice the stage reached, and treat the project as paused until you are ready.
6. Changes, revisions and additional work
Your Proposal includes a set number of revision rounds (typically two per page template unless stated otherwise). We are happy to make reasonable minor edits within the agreed design and scope.
Work beyond what your Proposal describes — new pages or features, redesigns, or repeated changes after you have approved something — is additional work. We will always tell you first, agree it in writing, and either quote it separately or charge it at our standard rate of £85 + VAT per hour. We are not obliged to start additional work until you have approved the cost. You can also buy time in advance as a Time Bundle; current Time Bundle rates apply to additional work and are available on request.
7. Your website and intellectual property
All intellectual property in the deliverables we create specifically for you remains ours until we receive full payment for them. Once your website fee is paid in full, we assign to you, with full title guarantee, the copyright in the bespoke deliverables. Going live does not transfer ownership if any balance remains.
This assignment does not include, and you receive a non-exclusive licence only to, (a) our pre-existing and proprietary materials, tools, code, systems and templates, which we may reuse across our work; and (b) third-party materials such as themes, premium plugins, fonts and stock assets, which remain subject to their own licence terms.
You grant us a non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to use, reproduce, modify and publish the materials and brand assets you supply, to the extent needed to provide the Services during the term.
Portfolio and credit. We may state that we have worked with you and show samples of the work in our portfolio and marketing, and we include a small “Website by Think Mad” credit in your footer — in each case unless you ask us in writing not to.
8. Domain names
We make domains simple: we buy and register them and manage the renewals for you, so you don’t have to think about it.
Ownership. Unless your Proposal states otherwise, domains are registered with you named as the legal registrant (owner), and Think Mad recorded as the administrative and technical contact to manage renewals and DNS on your behalf. You authorise us to act as your agent for this purpose.
You pay the annual renewal each year. As a guide this is typically £10 + VAT for a .co.uk and £30 + VAT for a .com. Exact prices are confirmed on request and invoiced each year.
We aim to ensure renewals are never missed, but we are not responsible for a domain lapsing where your fees for it are overdue.
No release or transfer fees. We never charge a fee to release or transfer your domain or website. On your written request, and once your account is in good standing, we will provide the authorisation code to transfer your domain at no charge.
If a domain you have asked for is unavailable, we will suggest a closely matching alternative and always ask your permission before registering it.
9. Hosting, maintenance, security and backups
Website hosting is included free while you are on a marketing Plan. Otherwise, hosting and support starts at £35 per month, which includes up to 30 minutes of business-critical website support each month (unused minutes do not roll over).
Our hosting runs on GURU cloud infrastructure, which provides a 100% uptime service-level guarantee and daily off-site backups that we can make available to you on request. We pass on the benefit of this, but cannot ourselves guarantee uninterrupted access, and you remain responsible for keeping your own copy of your content and data.
Hosting is for a normal business website. You must not use it for unlawful, infringing or offensive material, spam, or excessive server resources. If your site is affected by malware or hacking, or a plugin or theme you or a third party installed causes problems, we may temporarily suspend it to protect other clients and will work with you to resolve it; clean-up beyond routine support may be chargeable. Keeping plugins, themes and passwords updated and secure is a shared responsibility.
From time to time parts of our systems may be taken offline for maintenance. We give as much notice as is reasonably practicable. If your Plan ends, we will help you move your site to a host of your choice — with no release fee.
10. SEO and digital marketing
Our digital marketing work may include, where set out in your Proposal, search-intent and keyword research, on-page optimisation, structured-data (schema) markup, content, rank tracking of your target keywords, Google Analytics reporting, and competitor and backlink research.
No guarantee of results. SEO and marketing improve your visibility over time, but we cannot and do not guarantee any specific ranking, position, level of traffic, number of leads or sales. Search engines, AI search and social platforms are controlled by third parties and their rules and algorithms change frequently and without notice.
If you do not provide your target keywords or focus areas within 21 working days, we may select a set we reasonably consider appropriate for your business and location.
We present link and citation opportunities each month. Some are free and some are paid; you choose which to pursue and any paid placements or directory fees are paid for by you.
11. Social media management
Where your Plan includes social media, you are given access to your own branded dashboard, scheduling tools and unified inbox for as long as your Plan is active.
How many social profiles, channels and posts we manage each month is set out in your Proposal.
Content is produced up front and sent to you for approval before publishing. Prompt approval keeps the month on schedule; where approvals fall outside the allotted time, some items may move to the following month.
Social content we create for you is yours once the month it relates to is paid. On cancellation, access to the dashboard, unified inbox and any queued or scheduled posts ends, so please export anything you wish to keep before your Plan closes.
You are responsible for your own social media accounts, login security, and for complying with each platform’s own rules. We are not liable for changes, outages, restrictions, content removals or account suspensions imposed by third-party platforms.
12. Third-party platforms and costs
We work across platforms such as Google, Google Business Profile and Meta, and we are not responsible for changes those platforms make. Any third-party costs — paid links, citations, directory fees, advertising spend, sponsorships, premium plugins, stock assets or event tickets — are chosen and paid for by you. We advise; you decide. To deliver the Services we use trusted third-party tools and platforms — including WordPress, Elementor, Ubersuggest, GoCardless, and our hosting and social-scheduling providers — each of which is subject to its own terms.
13. Your responsibilities and warranties
You confirm and agree that:
you will provide approvals, access, logins and materials in good time so we can deliver on schedule;
any content, images, logos, fonts or text you supply or approve is either owned by you or properly licensed for us to use, is accurate and lawful, and does not infringe anyone else’s rights — we are not responsible for checking this and may refuse or remove material we reasonably believe is unlawful, infringing or offensive;
anything published complies with any professional, industry or regulatory advertising rules that apply to your business, including the UK Code of Non-broadcast Advertising (the CAP Code). If you are in a regulated sector (for example financial services, health, legal, gambling or alcohol), you will tell us and provide any required approvals or disclaimers before we publish; financial promotions must be approved by an FCA-authorised person where the law requires it; and
you will keep your usernames and passwords secure and tell us promptly if you think an account has been compromised.
Images and digital assets. you are responsible for ensuring we have permission to use any image, logo, graphic or other digital asset you supply or ask us to use — for example, assets taken from a supplier’s website. Please confirm that permission clearly in writing (by email) before we use it. You accept full responsibility and liability for any material we publish on your behalf, and it is your responsibility to check it. This applies wherever we publish for you — your website, social media, email marketing, and any traditional print or graphic-design work shared publicly.
14. Data protection and marketing consent
We handle personal data in line with UK data protection law (UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018). Where we process personal data on your behalf (for example running your social accounts, email lists or analytics), we act as your processor and the Data Processing Agreement in Annex A applies. Our own use of your data (such as billing and contact records) is covered by our privacy notice.
Marketing consent. Where we send email or SMS marketing on your behalf, you are the sender and remain responsible for ensuring every recipient has given valid consent under the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (or that the soft opt-in exemption applies to your business), and that a working unsubscribe and your identity are included. You warrant that any list you provide has been lawfully collected.
You are responsible for maintaining a compliant cookie-consent mechanism and privacy notice on your website. We can implement one on request; unless agreed, ongoing compliance is yours.
We may record calls for training and record-keeping under our legitimate interests; we will make you aware at the start of a recorded call, and recordings are not shared with third parties except where required by law.
15. Confidentiality
Each of us will keep the other’s confidential information (including our pricing and methods, and your business information) private and use it only to perform or receive the Services. This does not apply to information that is public, already known, independently developed, or required to be disclosed by law. These obligations continue for three years after our work together ends.
16. Term, renewal and cancellation
Marketing Plans taken with a discounted website bundle run for a minimum term of 3 months, and then continue on a rolling monthly basis.
Marketing Plans taken without a website bundle discount are rolling monthly agreements from the start, with no minimum term.
In both cases, once any minimum term has passed, either side may end the Plan by giving 30 days’ written notice. Where hosting is provided as part of your Plan, it ends when the Plan ends.
Standalone annual services, such as domains, renew each year unless you cancel in writing at least 14 days before the renewal date.
Cancellations must be made in writing (email is fine) — we cannot accept them verbally.
When your marketing Plan ends, to keep your website live you must either take a hosting and support plan with us or move your website files and domain to another host and register them there. Once no hosting, support or marketing plan is in place, we will not maintain or store your website or domain on our systems or servers.
17. Ending a website build early
If you cancel a website build after work has begun, your deposit is retained and you agree to pay for all work completed up to the cancellation date, plus any third-party costs we have already committed on your behalf, up to the full Proposal price. We will invoice this as a fair reflection of the stage reached, and any files or designs remain ours until that invoice is paid in full.
18. Suspension and termination for cause
Either party may end the agreement immediately by written notice if the other commits a material breach that is not put right within 30 days of being asked, or becomes insolvent, enters administration, has a receiver appointed, ceases trading or is unable to pay its debts.
On ending, (a) all sums owed become immediately due and any minimum-term fees remain payable; (b) any intellectual property that has not yet passed to you remains ours until paid for; (c) we will, on request and once your account is in good standing, help transfer your site, data and domain; and (d) hosting and dashboard access cease and each of us returns or deletes the other’s confidential information.
19. Our liability
We provide the Services with reasonable care and skill.
Non-excludable liability. Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits our liability for (a) death or personal injury caused by our negligence, (b) fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, or (c) anything else that cannot lawfully be excluded or limited.
Subject to that, we are not liable for any indirect or consequential loss, or for loss of profit, business, goodwill, anticipated savings or opportunity.
Subject to the above, our total liability arising out of or in connection with the Services, whether in contract, negligence or otherwise, is limited to the greater of (a) the total fees you have paid us for the relevant Services in the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim, or (b) £5,000. The price reflects this allocation of risk; you may ask us about arranging a higher liability limit.
Any claim must be brought within 12 months of the event giving rise to it.
20. Annual price review and changes to these Terms
Annual price review. Once a year we review our Plan fees and may increase your monthly fee in line with inflation. Any increase is based on the higher of the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) rate or 3%, is typically between 3% and 5%, and will not exceed 5% in any year unless we give you 60 days’ notice. If CPI ceases to be published, a comparable official index applies.
We will give you at least 30 days’ written notice by email before any annual increase takes effect, showing your new monthly amount in pounds and pence.
The revised amount is then collected automatically by Direct Debit from the date set out in that notice.
Domain renewals. Domain registration and renewal fees are invoiced each year and may also change in line with the registry’s own costs; the exact amount is confirmed on request and shown on your annual renewal invoice.
We may also update these Terms from time to time. For any change to recurring charges or Terms we will give at least 30 days’ written notice; if a change materially disadvantages you, you may end the affected Service without penalty by notice before it takes effect. No other variation is effective unless agreed in writing by both of us.
21. Events outside our control
We aim to keep Services available at all times but cannot guarantee uninterrupted access. We are not liable for delays or failures caused by events beyond our reasonable control, including power, internet or telecoms failures, third-party platform or supplier outages, cyber-attacks, strikes, epidemics, government action or natural disasters. We will take reasonable steps to reduce the impact, and if such an event continues for more than 30 days either party may end the affected Service by written notice.
22. Resolving disputes
If something goes wrong, we would always rather sort it out quickly. Before starting court proceedings, both of us will try in good faith to resolve any dispute by senior-level discussion within 14 days, and may agree to mediation. This does not stop either of us seeking urgent court protection where needed.
23. General
Consumer status. These Terms are intended for business customers, and you confirm you are entering into this agreement in the course of your business. If you are in fact a consumer (an individual contracting wholly or mainly outside your business), your statutory rights under the Consumer Rights Act 2015 and the Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013 apply and prevail over any conflicting term.
Non-solicitation. While we work together and for 12 months afterwards, please do not directly employ or engage any Think Mad team member or subcontractor who has worked on your account, without our written agreement. This does not stop you hiring someone who independently answers a public advertisement.
Notices. Notices must be in writing and sent to the postal or email address on the latest invoice or Proposal (for us, projects@thinkmad.co.uk). Email notice is treated as received when sent during business hours, otherwise the next working day.
We may assign or transfer these Terms to a successor of our business, and we remain responsible for the work of our subcontractors and reputable third-party tools. You may not resell, transfer or sub-let your account without our prior written agreement.
If any part of these Terms is found to be unenforceable it will be adjusted to the minimum extent necessary or removed, and the rest continues in force. A delay in enforcing a right is not a waiver of it. A person who is not a party to these Terms has no rights under the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999 to enforce them.
These Terms are governed by the law of England and Wales, and the courts of England and Wales have exclusive jurisdiction over any dispute (consumers may bring proceedings in their local courts).
24. How to contact us
Think Mad Ltd
26a Foundry House, Waterside Lane, Widnes WA8 8UD
Phone: 0151 316 0110 Email: projects@thinkmad.co.uk
Registered in England & Wales · Company no. 12636177 · VAT no. 478874811
Annex A — Data Processing Agreement
This Annex applies where we process personal data on your behalf in providing the Services. In it, you are the controller and Think Mad Ltd is the processor. It forms part of the Terms and reflects Article 28 of the UK GDPR.
1. Scope of processing
Subject matter and duration: processing for the duration of your Plan/Services and any wind-down period.
Nature and purpose: creating, scheduling and publishing content; managing social accounts and the unified inbox; email marketing; analytics and reporting; website and hosting administration.
Types of personal data: contact details, social media audience and follower data, email subscribers, and website/analytics data.
Categories of data subjects: your customers, prospects, subscribers, followers and website visitors.
2. Our obligations as processor
We process personal data only on your documented instructions (including these Terms), unless required by law, in which case we will tell you unless the law prevents it.
We ensure people authorised to process the data are under a duty of confidentiality.
We apply appropriate technical and organisational security measures (Article 32).
We will not engage a sub-processor without your general written authorisation; we will keep a list of sub-processors (such as our hosting provider, GoCardless, and our email and scheduling tools) available on request, give notice of intended changes, and impose equivalent data-protection obligations on them, remaining responsible for their performance.
We assist you, so far as reasonably possible, with data-subject rights requests, and with security, breach notification, data-protection impact assessments and prior consultation.
We notify you without undue delay on becoming aware of a personal data breach.
At the end of the Services we delete or return all personal data and delete existing copies, unless the law requires us to keep it.
We make available the information needed to demonstrate compliance and allow for and contribute to audits, including inspections, on reasonable notice.
We will immediately inform you if, in our opinion, an instruction infringes UK data protection law.
International transfers: we will not transfer personal data outside the UK without your authorisation and an appropriate safeguard (such as the UK IDTA or UK Addendum to the SCCs) in place.
3. Your obligations as controller
You confirm you have a lawful basis and any necessary consents for the processing you ask us to carry out, and that your instructions comply with UK data protection law.
0151 316 0110 · projects@thinkmad.co.uk