Terms & Conditions
of Service

United Kingdom: Consumer Rights Act 2015; Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013; UK GDPR; Data Protection Act 2018; Computer Misuse Act 1990; Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988; Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002.

Canada: PIPEDA; CASL; Copyright Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. C-42); Consumer Protection Act 2002 (Ontario); Business Practices and Consumer Protection Act (BC); Consumer Protection Act (Quebec, including Law 25 / Law 64); provincial Electronic Commerce Acts.

United States: FTC Act; CAN-SPAM Act; COPPA; CFAA; DMCA; E-SIGN Act; and all applicable state and territorial consumer protection, data privacy, and e-commerce statutes.

Unless separately quoted and agreed in writing, the following are not included:

• Full e-commerce functionality (online product sales with integrated payment processing)
• Logo design or complete corporate identity / branding packages
• Professional content writing, copywriting, or translation services
• Third-party software licences, API subscription fees, or premium stock imagery

You agree to provide all necessary content — text, photographs, business details, branding assets, and any login credentials required for third-party services — within 7 calendar days of the Agreement start date. Delays in providing materials will naturally extend the delivery timeline, and Aeto Studio shall bear no liability for such delays.

We commit to delivering the first fully functional website draft within 7 business days of receiving all required materials (Essential, Pro, and Premium tiers). For Custom Quotation projects, timelines are specified in the SOW.

Aeto Studio is not liable for delays caused by the Client. If we do not receive a response from you for 14 consecutive calendar days, your project will be paused. To restart, a rescheduling fee of up to 10% of the remaining project fee may apply, reflecting the administrative and scheduling work required to re-slot your project.

Essential, Pro & Premium Tiers: A non-refundable deposit of 50% of the total project fee is due before work commences. This deposit secures your place in our production schedule. The remaining 50% is due when we present your fully functional website for final review — before it is connected to a live domain or source files are released.

Custom Quotation Projects: Payment schedule is defined in the SOW. Default: 50% deposit at signing, 25% at agreed midpoint milestone, 25% upon final delivery and written approval.

Hosting and management services are billed monthly or yearly in advance according to your selected billing cycle. The first month's hosting fee is included in your project fee for Essential, Pro, and Premium tiers; subsequent billing periods are charged at your selected tier's rate.

Hosting auto-renews on your chosen billing cycle unless you provide 15 calendar days' written notice to cancel before your next billing date. If a hosting payment remains unpaid for more than 14 calendar days, Aeto Studio reserves the right to suspend hosting services.

• Deposits: Non-refundable once work has commenced.
• Mid-Project Cancellation: Aeto Studio will invoice for all work completed to that point, calculated at our standard rate of 25 USD per hour (or equivalent). Any deposit funds in excess of the amount owed will be refunded within 30 calendar days.
• Hosting Fees: No refunds for unused partial months or partial years of hosting.
• Statutory Rights: Nothing in this clause overrides any refund rights you may hold under applicable UK, Canadian, or US consumer protection legislation.

Upon full and final payment of all project fees and outstanding invoices, you receive full legal and beneficial ownership of the specific Deliverables created for your project — including the custom design, source code, content structure, page layouts, and all assets developed exclusively for you — subject to the Background IP provisions in Section 4.2.

Aeto Studio retains full copyright and all intellectual property rights in all pre-existing code, libraries, frameworks, templates, design systems, tools, and methodologies; all third-party materials and open-source components; and our proprietary processes and technical know-how ("Background IP").

Where Background IP is incorporated into your Deliverables, we grant you a perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive licence to use that Background IP solely as an integral part of your website. This licence cannot be transferred or sublicensed separately from the Deliverables themselves.

Aeto Studio asserts its moral rights and copyright in all work produced under applicable law — including the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, the Canadian Copyright Act, and the US Copyright Act of 1976. You agree not to reproduce, resell, or redistribute any elements of our Background IP independently of your Deliverables, and to retain any copyright notices unless prior written consent for removal is obtained.

If you wish to migrate your website to another hosting provider, Aeto Studio will provide a complete backup of all website files and database upon request, conditional on all outstanding invoices being paid in full. Reasonable migration assistance is available at our standard hourly rate.

Aeto Studio reserves the right to display your completed website in our portfolio, on our own website, and in marketing and promotional materials. We will not publicly share any of your confidential business information or internal data without prior written consent.

Where we incorporate third-party materials — open-source libraries, licensed fonts, stock imagery, or plugin frameworks — you agree to comply with the applicable third-party licence terms, copies of which we will make available upon request.

Aeto Studio complies with all applicable data protection and privacy legislation, including the UK GDPR, Data Protection Act 2018, Canada's PIPEDA, CASL, and applicable US privacy statutes including the FTC Act and state-level laws.

For personal data you provide directly to us (e.g., your billing details), Aeto Studio acts as a Data Controller. For personal data your website collects from its end-users, we act as a Data Processor, processing that data only on your documented instructions.

We collect only the minimum personal data necessary to deliver the Services — solely for the purposes of delivering and maintaining your website, communicating regarding your project, issuing and collecting invoices, and fulfilling our legal obligations.

Your data is stored on secure servers. We implement appropriate technical and organisational security measures to protect personal data. You are responsible for ensuring your own website complies with applicable data protection laws, including maintaining a valid privacy policy and implementing appropriate cookie consent mechanisms.

In the event of a personal data breach, Aeto Studio will notify the relevant supervisory authority within the legally required timeframe, and will notify affected Clients without undue delay.

Aeto Studio targets 99.9% server uptime for all hosted websites. This target excludes scheduled maintenance windows (of which we will give reasonable advance notice) and outages caused by Force Majeure Events.

You agree not to use our hosting infrastructure or any Aeto Studio service for any purpose that is:

• Unlawful under the laws of England & Wales, any Canadian province, any US state, or your own local jurisdiction
• Defamatory, obscene, harassing, fraudulent, or constituting hate speech
• Infringing the intellectual property rights of any third party
• Involving the transmission of malware, ransomware, viruses, phishing content, spam, or harmful code
• Targeting individuals under the age of 13 without compliance with COPPA or applicable Canadian and UK child protection laws

Aeto Studio reserves the right to suspend or terminate hosting services immediately and without notice in the event of a breach of this Acceptable Use Policy.

We perform regular server-side backups for disaster recovery purposes. However, you are strongly advised to maintain your own independent backups of all website content and data. Aeto Studio shall not be liable for data loss caused by third-party hacking, plugin failures, accidental deletion, or any event beyond our reasonable control.

Domain names remain the Client's responsibility and property unless we have agreed in writing to purchase and manage them on your behalf. We strongly recommend that you maintain direct control of your domain registration and renewal to avoid any risk of lapse.

To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, Aeto Studio's total aggregate liability for any and all claims arising out of or in connection with these Terms or the Services shall not exceed the total amount paid by the Client in the 12 calendar months immediately preceding the event giving rise to the claim.

To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, Aeto Studio shall not be liable for any indirect, consequential, incidental, special, exemplary, or punitive damages, including: loss of anticipated revenue; loss of actual or anticipated profit; loss of business opportunity; loss of goodwill or reputation; loss of data; or business interruption — even where Aeto Studio has been advised of the possibility of such damages.

Nothing in these Terms operates to exclude or limit our liability for: death or personal injury caused by Aeto Studio's negligence; fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation; or any other liability that cannot be excluded or limited under the applicable law of your jurisdiction — including, for UK consumers, rights under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, and for US consumers, rights under applicable state consumer protection statutes.

The fees charged by Aeto Studio reflect the allocation of commercial risk reflected in this clause. These limitations are commercially reasonable given the nature of the Services and the price at which they are offered, and both parties acknowledge this allocation as fair and appropriate.

The initial consultation is a structured working session — not a sales call. Its purpose is to ensure that both you and Aeto Studio are fully aligned on scope, expectations, and mutual obligations before any project work begins.

Initial consultations are designed to last 45–60 minutes. Following each meeting, Aeto Studio will send a concise written summary covering decisions made, action items, and agreed deadlines. Please review this summary and confirm its accuracy within 3 business days. Absence of objection within that window constitutes your confirmation that the summary accurately reflects the discussion.

You may terminate your hosting and ongoing management services at any time by providing 30 calendar days' written notice to Aeto Studio. No refunds will be issued for unused portions of the current billing period.

Aeto Studio may terminate this Agreement with immediate effect, without notice, in the following circumstances:

• The Client fails to settle any amount due within 14 calendar days of the due date
• The Client commits a breach of the Acceptable Use Policy set out in Section 6.2
• The Client becomes insolvent, enters voluntary or compulsory liquidation, or makes a voluntary arrangement with creditors
• The Client commits a material breach of any other provision of these Terms and fails to remedy that breach within 14 calendar days of receiving written notice

Upon termination for any reason, all outstanding fees become immediately due and payable. Completed Deliverables will be provided to the Client once all outstanding amounts have been paid in full.

To protect both parties and establish clear legal venues, the following exclusive jurisdictions apply to any litigation arising from this Agreement:

• United States: The parties irrevocably submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the federal or state courts located in New York, New York.
• Canada: The parties irrevocably submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of Toronto, Ontario.
• United Kingdom: The parties irrevocably submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of London, England.

(Note: By selecting specific local courts above, Aeto Studio ensures that clients must bring legal action in your designated jurisdiction, preventing costly cross-border litigation.)

To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, any dispute resolution proceedings arising under or in connection with this Agreement shall be conducted exclusively on an individual basis and shall not be consolidated with or joined to the claims of any other person or entity, whether by way of class action, representative action, collective action, or otherwise.

These Terms, together with the Project Proposal, any Statement of Work, and any written quotation issued by Aeto Studio, constitute the entire agreement between the parties. They supersede all prior negotiations, representations, communications, and agreements, whether written or oral.

If any provision is found by a court to be invalid, unlawful, or unenforceable, that provision shall be deemed severed from the remainder of these Terms. The remaining provisions shall continue in full force and effect.

No failure or delay by either party in exercising any right, power, or remedy under these Terms shall operate as a waiver thereof. The Client may not assign, novate, subcontract, or otherwise transfer any of their rights or obligations under this Agreement to any third party without the prior written consent of Aeto Studio.

All notices under this Agreement must be in writing and sent to the email addresses specified in the relevant Project Proposal. Notices are deemed received on the next business day following transmission, provided no delivery failure notification is received by the sender.

Nothing in this Agreement is intended to create any partnership, joint venture, agency, or employment relationship between Aeto Studio and the Client. Each party operates as an independent contractor.

When you visit our website, inquire about our services, or become a client, we may collect the following data:

• Identity & Contact Data: Name, email address, phone number, business name, and billing address.
• Financial Data: Payment details (processed securely via our third-party payment gateways like Stripe or PayPal; we do not store full credit card numbers).
• Project Data: Passwords, hosting credentials, and media files you provide to us to build your website.
• Technical Data: IP address, browser type, device info, and basic usage metrics via analytics tools.

We process your personal information only where we have a lawful basis to do so, primarily to:

• Fulfill our contract with you (designing, building, and hosting your website).
• Process your payments and issue invoices.
• Provide ongoing customer support and technical maintenance.
• Comply with legal and accounting obligations.

We never sell your personal data. We only share data with trusted third-party service providers required to operate our business, such as:

• Cloud hosting providers (e.g., AWS, Vercel, DigitalOcean).
• Payment processors (e.g., Stripe).
• Project management and CRM tools (e.g., Notion, Slack).

All third-party providers are vetted for compliance with global data protection standards.

Depending on whether you are located in the UK, Canada, or the US, you have specific legal rights over your personal data. These generally include:

• The right to access the personal data we hold about you.
• The right to request correction of inaccurate data.
• The right to request erasure ("right to be forgotten") of your data, subject to legal retention requirements.
• The right to opt-out of marketing communications at any time.

To exercise any of these rights, please email us at privacy@aetostudio.com.

We retain personal data only as long as necessary for the purposes outlined in this policy, typically for the duration of our business relationship plus applicable legal and tax retention periods (e.g., 7 years for financial records).

As an agency operating across the US, Canada, and the UK, your data may be transferred, stored, or processed across these borders. We ensure all cross-border data transfers comply with applicable data protection laws by utilizing standard contractual clauses or equivalent legal security mechanisms.

Cookies are small text files placed on your computer or mobile device when you visit a website. They allow the website to recognize your device and store some information about your preferences or past actions.

• Strictly Necessary Cookies: These are required for the operation of our website (e.g., basic site routing, security features, or saving your cookie consent preferences). They do not require user consent.
• Analytical / Performance Cookies: These allow us to recognize and count the number of visitors and see how visitors move around our website. We use tools like Google Analytics to improve the way our website works. These cookies are only placed if you grant explicit consent.

Upon your first visit to our site, you will be presented with a Cookie Consent Banner allowing you to accept or decline non-essential cookies. You can also configure your web browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when websites set or access cookies. If you disable or refuse strictly necessary cookies, please note that some parts of this website may become inaccessible or not function properly.

You have the right to withdraw your cookie consent at any time. You can do this by clearing your browser cookies, or by utilizing the cookie management settings directly within your browser software.