Terms and conditions

Terms and conditions for
translation, editing and proofreading works

The present general terms of business for commissioned translation, editing and proofreading services are intended to frame the contractual relations between:

Muriel Muller, owner and representative of the company Catwalk Translation (EI – Entreprise individuelle), whose registered office is located at 4, rue de le Thor – 68130 Altkirch (France), holder of the Siren number 825 207 822, hereinafter referred to as “the Translator” on the one hand,

and

any company or individual wishing to use the Translator’s services, hereinafter referred to as “the Customer” on the other hand.

1. APPLICATION OF THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS – ENFORCEABILITY

Any order placed by the Customer implies the Customer’s full acceptance of these terms and conditions.

No other terms and conditions shall be in effect and enforceable against the Translator, unless otherwise agreed in writing by the Translator on the order form.

Any service provided by the Translator implies the Customer’s full acceptance of these terms and conditions, and the waiver of any of his purchasing terms and conditions. Any contrary condition, unless expressly agreed to by the Translator, will be unenforceable against the Translator, regardless of the time it has been brought to her attention.

The fact that the Translator does not avail herself at any time of any of the present terms and conditions of service provision cannot be interpreted as a waiver of the right to avail herself of any of the said conditions at a later date.

2. ORDERS AND QUOTATIONS

Each Customer’s order is usually preceded by a free quotation drawn up by the Translator, on the basis of the documents provided or information communicated by the Customer. The quotation sent by the Translator to the Customer, either by post or e-mail, shall specifiy in particular:

The number of pages or words to be translated;
The source and target languages;
How the price of the translation, editing or proofreading work has been determined. The work shall be billed either on the basis of a flat fee, on the basis of time spent (per hour) or on the basis of the Translator’s current rates, including her rate per source word (i.e. number of words contained in the text to be translated) or per target word (i.e. number of words contained in the translated text) according to a specified word count tool (MS Word or any other tool commonly agreed), on a per-line or per-page basis;
A delivery date or estimated period necessary to perform the task;
The format of the documents to be delivered and any specific requirement;
Any additional charge due to urgency, terminology research or any other request outside the usual services provided by the Translator (week-end or night work).

In order to confirm his/her order in a firm and definitive manner, the Customer must return the quotation to the Translator without any modification, signed with the mention “agreed and signed” either by post or e-mail or send an e-mail with the expression of the Customer’s consent. If the quotation has not been formally accepted, the Translator reserves the right not to start working on the Customer’s project. If the quotation has not been accepted before the end of its validity period, or by default, within two (2) months from the date of the quotation, it shall be deemed null and void. Any employee or associate confirming an order/a quotation in the name of the said company/organisation shall be considered without restriction as having received prior authorisation from his/her hierarchy. Except as otherwise provided, the billing address will be the address indicated by the Customer when asking for the quotation. The Translator reserves the right, after having informed the Client, to increase the quoted price and/or to change the delivery date appearing on the Customer’s initial order confirmation, in the following cases:

- 1. If the Customer adds or modifies the documents to be translated after the Translator has sent the quotation, in which case the Translator reserves the right to adjust her price or rate according to the additional work required.
  2. If the Translator prepared the initial quotation on the basis of the Customer’s description of the task (without having seen all the source material and received firm instructions: if the quotation is based on an approximate number of words and/or an extract of the source document(s)).

Without the Customer’s agreement to these new delivery and/or billing conditions, the Translator reserves the right not to begin her work. Unless otherwise agreed in the quote, the costs incurred in the performance of the service (travel expenses, express mail, etc.) shall be borne by the Customer. Any decision to offer a discount, reduce or apply sliding scale rates, based on a percentage or a flat rate (per page, per line or per hour), shall be at the sole discretion of the Translator and limited to the services included in the quotation. No discount or rebate granted to the Customer shall be considered an acquired right for future orders. In the event that the Translator has not sent a prior quotation to the Customer, orders are placed by simple exchange of e-mails and translation services are invoiced in accordance with the basic rate usually applied by the Translator or any other rate agreed between the Translator and the Customer in their latest correspondence. Any validation by the Customer of a deadline communicated by the Translator shall be considered as a confirmation of an order.

3. PROOF OF ACCEPTANCE

For the purpose of proving the acceptance of a quotation, the Customer agrees to consider as equivalent to the original and as perfect proof, a fax, an e-mail or an electronic copy of the signed quotation.

4. DEPOSIT

Any order which amount excluding taxes exceeds five hundred (500) euros may require a deposit, the percentage of which will be specified on the quotation. In this case, the work requested will only begin after the deposit has been received.

5. DELIVERY

Subject to the receipt by the Translator of all the documents and information required to proceed, the delivery date specified in the quotation is given for information and applicable only if the Customer confirms his order as specified in the above mentioned article 2 within 3 (three) business days as from receipt of the quotation. After this time, the delivery date may be revised according to the workload of the Translator.

Any quotation received after 5:00 p.m. (CET) will be considered as received on the following day. If the following days is a non-working day, the date to be taken into account shall be that of the first business day that follows.

6. RESPONSIBILITY OF THE TRANSLATOR

The Translator shall carry out its task using reasonable skill and care, being as faithfull as possible to the original text and pursuant to practices in the business. He makes every effort to take into account and integrate all the information provided from the Customer (glossaries, plans, drawings, abbreviations, etc.). The Translator declines all responsibilityin the event of any inconsistency or ambiguity in the original text, the verification of the technical consistency of the final text being the sole responsibility of the Customer.

7. RESPONSIBILITY OF THE CUSTOMER

The Customer shall provide to the Translator all the content to be translated, edited or proofread, any technical information necessary for their understanding and, where appropriate, the specific terminology required. If the Customer fails to inform the Translator, the Translator shall not be held responsible for any non-compliance or failure to meet deadlines.

The Customer has 10 (ten) working days from receipt of the translated or proofread documents to express in writing any concern relating to the quality of the service. After this period, the service shall be deemed to have been duly executed and no complaint will be admitted. To this end, the Customer agrees to consider as proof of delivery any acknowledgement of receipt by post, fax or e-mail.

8. CONFIDENTIALITY

The Translator undertakes to respect the confidentiality of all information brought to her knowledge before, during or after delivering her service. All original documents will be sent back to the Customer upon written request.

The Translator cannot be held liable for any interception or diversion of information during data transfer, La responsabilité du Prestataire ne peut être engagée en raison d’une interception ou d’un détournement des informations lors du transfert des données, in particular by Internet. Therefore, it is the responsibility of the Customer to inform the Translator, before or when placing the order, of any means of transfer he wants to implement in order to ensure the confidentiality of any sensitive information.

9. PERSONAL DATA PROTECTION

The personal data of the Customer are subject to computer processing by the Translator and are necessary to process his request (quote or order). This information is necessary to comply with legal and regulatory obligations. It will be kept as long as necessary for the execution of the translation work and any guarantees that may apply after delivery, within the limit of the legal document retention period.

The person responsible for data processing and protection, or data controller, is Ms Muriel Muller – 4, rue de le Thor, 68130 Altkirch (France) – e-mail: contact@catwalktranslation.com

Access to personal data will be strictly limited to her. The information collected may possibly be communicated to third parties linked to the company by contract for execution of sub-contracted tasks, without the need to request the Customer’s authorization.

In accordance to the French law n° 78-17 dated January 6, 1978 relating to data processing, data files and liberties, as modified by law n° 2004-801 dated August 6, 2004 and by the European Regulation n° 2016/679, the Customer has a right of access, rectification, deletion and portability of the data concerning him/her, as well as the right to oppose the processing for legitimate reasons, rights that he/she may exercise by contacting the data controller at the postal or e-mail address mentioned above, enclosing a valid proof of identity.

For more information and in the event of a complaint, the Customer may contact the Commission Nationale de l’Informatique et des Libertés (CNIL).

10. FORMAT

The translation is delivered by e-mail in the format of the source text (as received from customer). Any other means of transfer or format must be expressly agreed between the parties and may be subject to additional charges. Upon request and at extra cost to be agreed, it may be delivered in hard copy and sent by post.

11. LIABILITY

The liability of the Translator on any grounds whatosever shall be limited to the total value of the contract.

The Translator shall not be held liable for any claims based on stylistic nuances or alterations made to her translation by third parties without her consent.

Delivery deadlines shall not be of the essence, unless specifically agreed in writing. Their non-observance cannot, in principle, lead to penalties for delay. Whatever the case, the Translator cannot be held liable for any direct or indirect damage caused to the Customer or to third parties due to a delay in the delivery, particularly due to a force majeure, or a possible delivery problem.

12. EDITING AND PROOFREADING

In the event of the Customer not being entirely satisfied with the Translator’s work, notification of the specific issues found in the translation must be received no later than ten (10) calendar days from the date of delivery and no claim shall be considered after this date.

The Translator reserves the right to edit her own work in cooperation with the Customer.

If the Translation is to be printed, the Translator must receive the revised document for proofreading.

Unless otherwise agreed in writing, any correction or proofreading shall be charged to the Customer based on the Translator’s current rate.

13. PAYMENT TERMS

Unless agreed otherwise on the quotation, invoices use net prices, without deduction and are due on receipt of the invoice.

All wire transfer fees and other charges incurred in remitting payment (including intermediary and correspondent bank charges) are payable by the Customer. The Customer reserves the right to invoice the Customer for any bank charges deducted from payment.

The translation remains the property of the Translator until full payment is received.

Regarding the business customers, in case of payment delays, the current orders are unilaterally interrupted until the full payment is received and the Customer is liable to pay, without any prior notice, in accordance with Article D.441-5 of the French Commercial Code, an interest calculated at the rate applied by the European central bank compensation to its most recent main refinancing operation carried out, increased by ten percentage points, applied to the amount of the invoice, as well as € 40.- for collection costs.

The Translator shall not accept any new order from the Customer before having received full payment of past due contracts.

14. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

Before submitting a document to the Translator, the Customer warrants to the Translator he has the full right, power and autority to have the material translated, and that the translation of the material by the Translator will not result in the infringement of any existing copyright. The Customer must be the author of the original document or must have received the prior written authorisation from the copyright holder.

Failing that, the Translator cannot be held liable if all or a portion of the documents should infringe the intellectual property rights or any other right of any third party or any applicable regulation. If case arises, the Customer agrees to indemnify and save harmless the Translator against any claim, loss, damage and financial consequences as a result of any breach of this warranty.

Additionally, should the material to be translated be protected by copyright, the Customer acknowledges that the translation produced by the Translator is a new document, the copyrights of which are jointly held by the author of the original document and by the Translator. Consequently, in the case of a translation work considered of literary or artistic nature, and without prejudice to the Translator’s economic rights over her work, the Translator reserves the right to require that her name be mentioned on any copy of publication of her service, in accordance with article L132-11 of the French Intellectual Property Code.

15. CANCELLATION

If, for any reason, the Customer wishes to cancel an order or a task, the Translator should be notified in writing as soon as reasonably practical. If the order is cancelled while the contract is being performed, the Customer will pay 100% (one hundred percent) of the agreed rate to the Translator for the work already performed and 50% (fifty percent) of the remaining work to be carried out.

16. AMICABLE SETTLEMENT OF DISPUTE

Both Parties are willing to conciliate and settle amicably any dispute that will arise from the interpretation or enforcement of these terms of business before taking anny legal action.

To this end, as soon as a dispute arises, the Translator and the Customer undertake to jointly refer to the SFT Arbitration Committee, according to which procedure the parties agree to negotiate in good faith and make their best efforts to settle promptly and amicably the dispute to mutual satisfaction, without resort to any legal process for 4 (four) months.

If the dispute is not resolved amicably, it shall be resolved as provided for below.

17. APPLICABLE LAW- JURISDICTION

These general terms of business shall be construed in accordance with French law. If a dispute cannot be resolved amicably beetween the parties according to above article 16, or if either party refuses to accept arbitration, the parties grant exclusive jurisdiction to the French courts to settle any dispute relating to the provision of service and these general conditions.