General Terms and Conditions (GT&C)
of
hjk multilingual communication partners
hereinafter referred to as
“HJK“
1. Introductory stipulations
These General Terms & Conditions (GT&C) shall apply to all business activities between HJK and their clients for all projects without exception and shall constitute the basic framework for any offer, order, execution, or any other activity pertaining to a project. Clients therefore irrevocably confirm that they have read and understood these GT&C in their entirety and explicitly accept the contractual validity of these stipulations. As a rule, projects delivered by HJK will be carried out by freelancers in their home offices. However, in the event of a project requiring the physical presence of one or several HJK team members, such projects will be carried out at HJK’s headquarters in Cologne, Germany.
2. Project execution
HJK will accept inquiries and orders from Clients exclusively via email. To enable HJK to carry out a project, Clients will provide HJK with all already existing relevant material, such as texts in all available languages or terminology databases or listings in Word, PDF or Excel formats. Other formats are negotiable. Clients will inform HJK about particular terminology wishes in advance. Furthermore, Clients will inform HJK regarding the intended use and the addressees and target groups of the material to ensure that the best possible style and tonality of the product delivered is accomplished.
Delivery of the product will be carried out via email in Word or PDF. HJK shall not be responsible for delays, obstructions, or deficiencies in project execution caused by incomprehensible, vague, ambiguous, faulty, or any other insufficient information given by the Client.
3. Third party contracting
HJK reserves the right of contracting other experts for project execution in the event that such experts will improve the ultimate project quality.
4. Pricing, delivery deadlines, and conditions of payment
Payments to HJK shall be made without deductions within 30 days after invoicing to the bank account given in the invoice. Invoices will be dispatched via email only. Noncompliance with the 30-day deadline will result in further costs to be paid by the Client.
Delivery deadlines will be given to the best of HJK’s knowledge. Any delivery shall be deemed to be executed when the project material in its entirety or agreed upon parts thereof have been sent out to the Client. Clients shall inform HJK immediately as soon as the material has been received.
5. Hindrances on account of force majeure, network or server failure, and viruses
HJK shall not be held responsible for damages caused by obstructions such as force majeure, network, or server failure, viruses, incomplete or illegible data transfer, or any other hindrance beyond HJK’s control.
6. Liability and termination
HJK shall only be held liable in cases of gross negligence or malice and only to the maximum net value of the project without VAT and other cost. Clients shall be obligated to inform HJK by email of any criticism or desired remedy within a maximum period of 7 days after receipt of the product, precisely specifying the reasons of such criticism and/or wishes for remedy. In the event that HJK will accept such criticism, HJK will be granted an appropriate period of time to remedy such deficiencies. Any project termination on the part of the Client shall only be effective if there exists an important and valid reason for such termination and if HJK has received such notice of termination in writing. Project parts already executed by HJK shall then be paid for immediately after such termination. At the same time, the Client shall immediately compensate HJK for project parts not delivered but ordered to the amount of 50% of the remaining project value agreed upon.
7. Reservation of ownership
All proprietary rights shall remain in the possession of HJK until the project agreed upon has been fully paid for. Any use of the project in its entirety of parts thereof shall be explicitly prohibited.
8. Delivery format
Deliveries are carried out exclusively via email, unless some other form of delivery has been explicitly agreed upon in writing.
9. Discretion
All information made available to HJK by Clients will not be disclosed in any manner and to any person, company, organization, or any other entity whatsoever to the best of HJK’s knowledge..
10. Applicable law, place of jurisdiction, and severability clause
Any deviation from these GT&C shall only be valid and applicable if such deviation is legally binding and has been agreed upon ex ante and in writing.
For any contractual agreement between HJK and Client, German law shall be exclusively valid and applicable. Place of jurisdiction for all Contracting Parties shall exclusively be Cologne, Germany. In the event that one or several stipulations of these GT&C or any Agreement or parts thereof turns out to be legally invalid or inapplicable, this shall not affect the remainder of these GT&C or any other Agreement in any manner whatsoever and for all cases of legal dispute.