Terms and Conditions of Business

Our Terms of Engagement contained herein explain the basis on which ACT Acoustics Ltd. will carry out all monitoring and consultancy work.

Fixed fee additional costs

The costs provided in our quotations to you will apply until the quote expires. The expiry date of the quote is given at the top of any quote we provide to you.

Fixed-fee basis

We work on a fixed-fee basis. The fee for your project is set out in our quotation and agreed with you before any work begins.

We do not charge on an hourly or time basis unless expressly agreed with you in advance by prior arrangement. Where time-based work is agreed in advance, the applicable rates will be confirmed and agreed with you in writing before that work is carried out.

Where additional work is required that falls outside the scope of your fixed-fee quotation, we will provide a separate fixed-fee quotation for that work before it is undertaken.

Other relevant fees:

  • In-person and virtual meeting attendance is quoted separately where it falls outside the agreed scope of your project.
  • As a courtesy to our clients, we do not charge for phone calls.

Client Responsibilities for On-Site Monitoring Equipment

Where ACT Acoustics Ltd installs and leaves monitoring equipment on site (including but not limited to noise, vibration, dust, or weather monitoring equipment), the Client shall be responsible for the care, security, and safekeeping of such equipment for the duration of its presence on site.

The Client shall:

  • Provide a safe, suitable, and agreed location for the installation of the equipment, free from foreseeable risk of damage, interference, obstruction, or tampering;
  • Take all reasonable steps to protect the equipment from theft, vandalism, accidental damage, adverse site activities, and unauthorised access, including ensuring that site personnel and contractors are made aware of its presence and purpose;
  • Ensure that the equipment is not moved, adjusted, powered down, interfered with, or otherwise tampered with without the prior written consent of ACT Acoustics Ltd;
  • Promptly notify ACT Acoustics Ltd of any incident, damage, malfunction, loss, or suspected interference affecting the equipment;
  • Provide reasonable access to the site for ACT Acoustics Ltd’s personnel to install, inspect, maintain, service, or remove the equipment as required.

The Client acknowledges that the equipment remains the property of ACT Acoustics Ltd at all times. The Client shall be liable for the full cost of repair or replacement (at current replacement value), together with any associated data loss, hire costs, calibration costs, or reasonable administrative costs, arising from loss of, theft of, or damage to the equipment while on site, except where such loss or damage is caused by ACT Acoustics Ltd’s negligence.

ACT Acoustics Ltd accepts no responsibility for monitoring data that is lost, corrupted, or rendered invalid as a result of interference with the equipment, site power failure, site conditions, or acts or omissions of the Client, its employees, contractors, or third parties.

Payment Terms

  • We accept all major credit cards.
  • Payment is required within 30 days from invoice date.
  • Invoices will not be raised until we issue our draft report.

Note that any variation or alteration to the conditions and specifications may increase the quoted price. Please also note that we reserve the right to charge interest on overdue invoices at an annual rate of 8% plus the Bank of England base rate on all overdue invoices. For noise surveys, we require a minimum 48 hours notice for cancellation. Cancellation on shorter notice may incur an additional fee.

Disbursements and expenses

Generally, we will include disbursements and expenses in your quote. However, if additional work is required that is not covered by the scope of your quotation, you will be liable to pay any disbursements and expenses that are required to carry out your instructions (e.g. travel costs and accommodation as needed). You will be notified of these charges before work is undertaken unless otherwise agreed. Additional fees may also be charged for additional administration requirements that are not covered by the scope of the project. These may include fees for filling out new supplier forms.

Communication Between You and Us / Complaints

We are confident of providing you with the high quality service you expect. However, if you have any concerns, however small, please raise them with us as soon as possible so that we can do everything we can to put the situation right.

Speed of Response

Speed of response can be critical, particularly in matters related to planning applications. We therefore aim to provide you with a response to your queries as quickly as possible. However, there may be times when delays occur. If this is likely to be the case, we will always keep you advised of progress. We aim to deal with correspondence within 2 working days and ideally within 24 hours. If you do not receive an immediate response to an urgent or important message we recommend that you contact our office directly on 01392 248111 for an immediate response. Unfortunately, we cannot accept liability for any email which fails to reach us for whatever reason.

Bank Details

Due to the increased incidence of email fraud, it is important to check that you are sending funds to the correct bank account. We will never notify you by phone or email that our client account details have changed.

If you are asked to send money to a new bank account, please contact us by telephone on 01392 248111 and speak to the person dealing with your matter. We cannot accept any liability in relation to monies sent to an incorrect bank account. Our bank details for future payments are:

  • Bank: Starling Bank
  • Account no: 44649019
  • Sort code: 608371
  • IBAN: GB54SRLG60837144649019
  • SWIFT/BIC: SRLGGB2L

Cheques should be made payable to ACT Acoustics Ltd. We also accept payment by debit or credit card if required.

How You Can Help Us

You can help us by;

  • promptly providing all relevant architectural drawings, details and any other information that may be useful;
  • providing prompt replies to request for further information; and
  • ensuring that other professionals act quickly.

Quotations

We provide a fixed-fee quotation for your project at the outset, based on the scope agreed with you. That fixed fee is what you pay for the agreed scope; it will not change unless the scope of the work itself changes.

If the scope changes, or additional work is required that falls outside the agreed scope, we will agree a further fixed fee with you in writing before that work is undertaken. We will always notify you in advance of any change to the agreed fee.

You may wish to set a limit on the charges and expenses to be incurred. If would like to do this, please ensure that this request is completed in writing.

Budgeting

We will deliver bills to you when we provide key project deliverables, such as a written report. For larger projects, we will typically provide more regular bills which will typically be every month.

Interest on Outstanding Accounts

Our invoices are provided on strict 30 day terms. Overdue accounts will be charged interest on the balance outstanding at an annual rate of 8% plus the Bank of England base rate for each month the account is overdue (or such other rate as may be notified to reflect the rate currently allowed by the Court).

Termination of Instructions by us

In the event of payment not being made, we reserve the right to decline to act for you further, and will charge the full amount of work done up to that date.

Professional Indemnity

In the interest of our clients we maintain professional indemnity insurance to the level of £5,000,000.00.

Letters of Reliance

Our reports are prepared for the sole use of the client who commissioned them and for the specific purpose stated in the report. No other party may rely on our reports unless we have expressly agreed to this in writing by issuing a Letter of Reliance.

Where a third party (for example a purchaser, funder, lender or incoming tenant) wishes to rely on a report we have prepared, we can extend reliance to that party by issuing a Letter of Reliance. Because a Letter of Reliance extends our duty of care and professional liability to a party with whom we did not originally contract, it is chargeable.

Our fee for a Letter of Reliance is the greater of £250+VAT or 10% of the original project fee, per relying party, unless reliance was expressly included in our original quotation. We will confirm the fee with you before the letter is issued.

Each Letter of Reliance:

  • is issued to a named party only and is not transferable or assignable;
  • is given in respect of the report as issued at its date, and creates no obligation to update, revise or reissue the report to reflect subsequent events, information, or changes in guidance;
  • is subject to the same limitations and exclusions that applied to our original appointment, and adds no new scope of work or duty beyond that report; and
  • is limited in liability to the fees paid for the original report and, in any event, to the limit of our professional indemnity insurance (see Professional Indemnity above).

Conclusion

These terms of business apply to any and all future instructions you give us. By providing continuing instructions you agree that you accept to be bound by these Terms and Conditions of business.

If you have any questions about the above, please contact us on

ACT Acoustics Ltd. is registered as a company in England and Wales. No. 10569267. Registered company address Vivian House, Newham Rd, Truro TR1 2DP. VAT No.: 267852854.