Terms & Conditions
These terms explain how NOLA Media & Design (“we,” “us,” or “our”) handles projects, support, payments, and third-party services. Please review them before requesting services or submitting payment. If you have questions, contact team@nolamediadesign.com.
Your approved proposal or service agreement describes the scope, deliverables, and pricing for your project. Review it together with these terms.
1. Services & Communication
We provide design and marketing services remotely using content supplied by the client.
Submit all support requests by email. Requests are generally addressed in the order received during studio hours:
- Monday–Thursday: 8:00 AM–4:00 PM
- Friday: 8:00 AM–3:00 PM
2. Project Scope & Design Phase
Your approved proposal identifies the services and content changes included in your project.
After approving a design sample, you have 30 days to provide the remaining content and revision requests so we can complete the website and migrate it from our staging server to the designated hosting server.
Requests outside the approved scope or beyond the design phase are billed at our standard hourly rate or through a Prepaid Reduced-Rate Plan. Delays in supplying content or feedback may affect completion and launch dates.
Projects that remain on our servers beyond the design phase require continued system maintenance. Time spent on that maintenance is billable.
Pending or inactive projects will be removed from our staging servers after 12 months of inactivity. Continued staging for an inactive project is available on request for $99 per year. Staging fees do not include billable maintenance work.
3. Payments & Deposits
A minimum 50% deposit is required before work begins on a website or design project. Refer to your proposal or invoice for the remaining payment schedule.
Marketing and social media campaigns are scheduled to begin on the 1st of each month, with payment required before launch. Unpaid campaign services may be interrupted after the 5th. A campaign cannot launch until the required payment is received.
See our payment options for accepted payment methods.
Overdue Payments
Invoices overdue by 30 days or more may result in suspension of services or deactivation of unpaid products. Outstanding balances may incur a late fee of 1.5% per month, subject to applicable law.
Third-party products must be renewed before their expiration dates. The 30-day invoice threshold does not extend a vendor’s renewal deadline.
Reactivation of third-party services may involve fees starting at $79, as well as applicable vendor charges and billable support time. Recovery is not guaranteed.
4. Website Maintenance & Security
Websites without an active Maintenance Plan are not monitored by us for software updates, security, performance, or uptime. If you do not enroll in a plan, you are responsible for arranging ongoing website maintenance and security.
Outdated software, compromised credentials, vulnerable third-party tools, and hosting issues can cause malware infections, downtime, data loss, and website failures. Delayed maintenance or incident response can increase these risks.
We are not responsible for maintaining a website outside the scope of an active service agreement. To the extent permitted by applicable law, we are not liable for losses caused by a client’s failure to maintain the website, renew required services, protect credentials, or authorize necessary remediation.
A Maintenance Plan does not guarantee that a website will never experience a security incident or interruption. The services included depend on the plan purchased.
Emergency Security Remediation
A compromised website may put visitors, search visibility, and hosting infrastructure at risk. Prompt action may be needed to contain the incident.
For clients with an active Maintenance Plan, we may take immediate containment measures without prior approval as authorized by the plan. For clients without a Maintenance Plan, we require written approval before beginning remediation.
Remediation may include:
- Removing malware, injected code, spam pages, and unauthorized links.
- Updating website software, plugins, and themes.
- Isolating or disabling vulnerable components.
- Applying initial security hardening measures.
Remediation time is billed at our standard hourly rate unless covered by an active maintenance or prepaid support plan. We will notify you as soon as reasonably possible after an intervention and provide a summary of the work and associated charges.
Delayed approval or action may lead to hosting suspension, continued unauthorized access, malware distribution, or damage to search visibility and domain reputation.
Read more about Website Security, Maintenance & Liability.
5. Client Content, Design Rights & Attribution
You retain ownership of the text, images, and other materials you provide. You are responsible for ensuring you have permission to use those materials.
Unless otherwise agreed in writing, NOLA Media & Design retains rights in the original design work we create, subject to any third-party rights. Ownership and permitted use of project deliverables should be specified in your written project agreement.
Our original design work may not be duplicated, reused for another website, or represented as another designer’s work without our written permission. This restriction does not transfer ownership of your supplied content to us.
We include a “Website Designed by NOLA Media & Design” credit in the footer of websites we design. You may request its removal. Another designer or agency may not replace that credit in a way that falsely attributes our original work to them.
6. Third-Party Products & Platform Support
Our design and marketing services do not require a long-term contract. Third-party products have separate terms, fees, and renewal requirements.
These products may include hosting, email hosting, domain names, SSL certificates, and premium themes, plugins, or software. Many require annual renewal and are billed separately from our services. We do not control vendor pricing, policies, availability, or product changes.
If we purchase, configure, or manage a third-party product on your behalf, our time is billable. This includes purchasing, renewals, vendor communication, configuration, and troubleshooting coordination.
Vendor-level technical support remains the responsibility of the vendor. We do not provide design, development, or technical support for Squarespace, Wix, Shopify, or Google Workspace, including Gmail.
Hosting & Backups
Hosting stores your website files and, where applicable, email data. It is an ongoing service and must remain active. Failure to renew may result in suspension or deletion of data under the hosting provider’s policies.
We do not provide ongoing storage of completed websites or client-supplied materials unless separately agreed. Keep your own copies of important content and project files.
We do not maintain off-server backups unless you purchase a backup service.
Our optional Annual Backup Service costs $69 per year and must be arranged before hosting expires. Backup copies are available on request and are retained by us for up to 30 days.
If the hosting provider deletes your data and no usable backup exists, we cannot restore it. Backup availability and restoration should not be assumed after hosting expires.
Domain Names
Domain registrations must be renewed by the registrar’s deadline. Expiration can interrupt your website, email, and other connected services.
An expired domain may incur redemption or restoration fees and may eventually become available to others. Renewal and recovery periods vary by registrar and domain extension. Do not rely on a grace period to preserve your domain.
SSL Certificates
SSL/TLS certificates enable HTTPS, which encrypts data transmitted between a website and its visitors. Certificates must remain valid, with renewal handled according to the hosting or certificate provider’s arrangements.
Renewals & Recovery
You are responsible for timely payment of renewal invoices and renewal of services you manage directly. After an initial notice or invoice, we are not obligated to send repeated reminders.
Expired services may incur vendor restoration fees, and some cannot be recovered. Our assistance with reinstatement is billable at the standard hourly rate.
To the extent permitted by applicable law, we are not responsible for interruption, data loss, or domain loss caused by non-renewal.
7. Results
We use design and marketing strategies intended to improve your online presence. We do not guarantee specific search rankings, traffic levels, leads, sales, revenue, or other business outcomes.
8. Questions
For questions about these terms, your project, or a support request, email team@nolamediadesign.com before approving work or submitting payment.