Built Proper Terms of Service

1. The service

BuiltProper designs, hosts and maintains a website for you on a monthly subscription, and — on the Website + automation plan — sets up automations such as lead capture, automatic replies, bookings and reminders. The exact deliverables depend on the plan you sign up for (Website, or Website + automation). By subscribing you agree to these terms.

We supply this service to businesses. If you acquire the service for personal, domestic or household use, you are a consumer under the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 and nothing in these terms limits your rights under that Act.

2. Your rights under New Zealand law

Our services come with guarantees that cannot be excluded under the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 and the Fair Trading Act 1986 — including that our work will be carried out with reasonable care and skill, be fit for purpose, and be completed within a reasonable time.

• If we fail to meet a guarantee, you are entitled to a remedy — repair, re-performance, a price reduction, or a refund where the failure is substantial — regardless of anything else in these terms.
• Where you acquire the service in trade for business purposes, sections 43 and 43A of the Consumer Guarantees Act allow those guarantees to be contracted out of, and you agree they are contracted out of to the extent it is fair and reasonable to do so. This does not affect your Fair Trading Act rights.
• Nothing in these terms is intended to mislead you about your legal rights.

3. Billing

• Subscriptions are billed monthly in advance in NZD, GST exclusive.
• The first month is paid before we begin design and build.
• There are no setup fees.
• We do not generally refund payments for a month already started, because hosting and support are supplied for that whole period. This does not limit your right to a refund where we have failed to meet a guarantee under the Consumer Guarantees Act, or where the law otherwise requires one.
• Prices for new sign-ups may change at any time. Existing subscribers' rates will not increase for as long as their subscription remains continuously active. If we ever need to change that, we will give you at least 30 days' written notice and you may cancel free of charge before the change takes effect.

4. Late or failed payment

If a scheduled payment fails, we will contact you and work through it with you before taking any action:

• We email you promptly, and then weekly, letting you know the payment is overdue and what happens next.
• After 30 days of unresolved non-payment we send a final notice giving you a further 30 days and stating the date your site would be suspended.
• If the balance is still unpaid after that second 30-day period, we may suspend your site and end the subscription. We will give you at least 7 days' notice before your site goes offline so you can arrange alternatives.
• You remain liable only for unpaid subscription months actually supplied, plus our reasonable, actual costs of recovering the debt. We do not charge a fixed penalty on top of that.

We may charge default interest on overdue amounts at a reasonable commercial rate, and reasonable collection costs actually incurred. We will always tell you before referring a debt to a collections agency.

5. Cancellation

You can cancel any time by emailing us. Your subscription ends at the end of the billing period you have already paid for, and your site is taken offline at that point because hosting, maintenance and updates are bundled into the subscription. We will give you notice before it goes offline and, on request, provide a copy of your own content.

Early cancellation. The first months of your subscription are priced below the cost of the design and build work, which we recover over time. If you cancel within the first 6 months, a one-time build-recovery charge equal to 2× your plan's monthly rate applies (Website $298, Website + automation $498, based on the plan's from-price; the charge is calculated on your actual monthly rate). This is a genuine pre-estimate of our unrecovered build cost, not a penalty, and it is disclosed to you before you sign up. After month 6 you can cancel at any time at no charge.

No early cancellation charge applies if you cancel because we have breached these terms or failed to meet a consumer guarantee.

Our cancellation. We may end the subscription on 30 days' written notice, or immediately for serious breach (such as unlawful content). If we end it for convenience, we refund any prepaid period you have not used.

Ownership after 12 months. While you are subscribed, the website remains hosted and managed by BuiltProper. After 12 continuous months of subscription you may request ownership of the website: we provide a one-time transfer of the site's source code and content so you can self-host it. This does not include our build tooling, proprietary components, hosting configuration, or third-party platforms that are separately licensed. Once transferred, you are responsible for all ongoing hosting and platform costs. If you cancel before 12 continuous months, the website is taken offline and ownership does not transfer, unless we agree otherwise in writing.

6. Intellectual property & ownership

• Your content (text, logos, photos, brand assets you supply) remains yours. You grant us a licence to use it solely to deliver the service.
• Our work (design files, code, components, templates, tooling, build pipeline) remains the property of BuiltProper while you are subscribed. You receive a non-exclusive licence to use the live site during your subscription.
• Reusable frameworks, libraries, design systems and internal tooling we develop remain ours and may be reused on other projects.
• Third-party assets (fonts, stock imagery, plugins) are licensed under their respective terms and are not transferred to you.
• Any domain name registered by BuiltProper on your behalf is yours. We will transfer it to you on request at any time, including after cancellation, and will not withhold it over a billing dispute. You are responsible for renewal costs once the subscription ends.
• We may show your site in our portfolio. Tell us if you'd prefer we didn't and we'll remove it.

7. Your responsibilities

• Provide accurate content and confirm you have the rights to use it.
• Keep your billing details current.
• Use the site lawfully — no illegal, infringing, defamatory or harmful content.
• You indemnify BuiltProper against claims, losses and costs arising from content you provide or your unlawful use of the site. This indemnity does not apply to the extent the loss was caused by our own breach, negligence or failure to meet a consumer guarantee.

8. Acceptable use

We may refuse or remove content, or suspend the service, if it breaches any law; contains adult, hateful, or violent material; promotes scams, malware or phishing; infringes third-party rights; or places unreasonable load on our infrastructure. Except where the issue is urgent or unlawful, we will tell you first and give you a reasonable chance to fix it.

9. Revisions & turnaround

Each plan specifies the number of included revisions and the typical turnaround, as set out on our pricing page or in your written quote. Out-of-scope work is quoted separately and is not started until you approve the quote in writing, so you are never charged for work you didn't agree to.

Quoted turnaround times assume you provide content, feedback and approvals in a timely manner.

10. Sign-off

Once you approve the site in writing (including by email) or it goes live at your direction, the delivered work is accepted and further changes are treated as new revision requests. Sign-off does not waive your rights if the work later turns out not to meet a consumer guarantee.

11. Third-party services

The service relies on third-party providers (hosting, domain registrars, email, analytics, payment processors). We are not responsible for outages, pricing changes, policy changes or data loss caused by those providers, except to the extent our own lack of reasonable care contributed to the problem.

12. SEO, performance & results

We follow current best practices for performance, accessibility and on-page SEO, but we do not guarantee any specific search ranking, traffic level, conversion rate, or business outcome. Search engine algorithms and market conditions are outside our control.

13. Uptime

We aim for high availability through our hosting provider but do not guarantee 100% uptime. If your site is down for an extended period due to something within our control, contact us and we will credit the affected portion of your monthly fee.

14. Force majeure

Neither party is liable for delays or failures caused by events outside reasonable control, including natural disasters, war, civil unrest, pandemics, large-scale internet or provider outages, or government action. If such an event continues for more than 30 days, either party may cancel and we will refund any prepaid, unused period.

15. Privacy & confidentiality

We keep any non-public information you share with us confidential and only use it to deliver the service. Personal information is handled in line with our Privacy Policy and the New Zealand Privacy Act 2020.

16. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms from time to time. When we do:

• We email you the proposed changes at least 30 days before they take effect, with a plain-language summary of what is changing.
• If a change is more than minor and disadvantages you, you may cancel before it takes effect at no charge — including no early cancellation charge — and we refund any prepaid, unused period.
• If you tell us you disagree, we will work with you in good faith to reach a written agreement before the new terms apply to you.
• Changes never apply retrospectively to work already delivered or fees already paid.

17. Limitation of liability

Subject to section 2, and to the maximum extent permitted by law, our total liability in connection with the service is capped at the fees you paid us in the 12 months preceding the claim, and we are not liable for indirect or consequential loss or loss of profit. Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot lawfully be limited, including liability under the Fair Trading Act 1986, for fraud, or for personal injury.

18. Disputes

Talk to us first — most things are sorted with an email or a call. If a dispute isn't resolved within 30 days of written notice, either party may refer it to mediation in New Zealand. Nothing here prevents you from taking a claim to the Disputes Tribunal or a court, or from complaining to the Commerce Commission.

19. Governing law

These terms are governed by the laws of New Zealand and are subject to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the New Zealand courts.

20. Severability & entire agreement

If any clause of these terms is found unenforceable, the remaining clauses continue in force. These terms, together with your selected plan and any written quotes, form the entire agreement between you and BuiltProper.

21. Contact

Questions? Email thisbuiltproper@gmail.com.