TERMS AND CONDITIONS

Welcome to the online NS&I Research Community

NS&I has commissioned Explain Research to host and manage the NS&I Research Community on their behalf.

By using the online NS&I Research Community, which is being managed by Explain Research, you agree to the following terms and conditions of use set out below, which together with the NS&I Research Community Privacy Notice, form NS&I’s relationship with you in relation to this Community.

If you are not happy with any part of these terms and conditions, you can unsubscribe from the NS&I Research Community or delete your user account at any time by clicking here and selecting ‘Leave the community’.

Definitions

“We”, “us” and “our” refers to NS&I and Explain Research.

“Content” means everything contained in, or accessible from, the online Community which has been produced by or on behalf of NS&I. “Content” does not include Postings made by members.

“Postings” means all information, data, artwork, text, photographs, videos, messages and any other material which you or any other member posts on or uploads to the NS&I Research Community.

“NS&I Sub-contractors” means any sub-contractor or agency that has been formally tendered to NS&I and NS&I’s partnership company.

“Website” means the website which hosts the Community. These terms and conditions only apply to the website which hosts the Community.

 “You”, “your” and “yours” refers to you, the person using the NS&I Research Community.

“Warrant” or “warranty” refers to an official agreement or guarantee.

“Indemnify” refers to a promise by an NS&I Research Community Member to compensate Explain for any loss suffered because of something that the NS&I Research Community Member in question has done.

“Infringement” refers to the action of breaking the terms of a law or agreement.

Changes to Terms

From time to time we may make changes to these terms; this will be done without any specific notice.

If the terms and conditions do change, the next time you login you will be presented with the revision and asked to agree to the revised terms before proceeding to use the NS&I Research Community.

Explain may suspend or withdraw Explain’s site

Explain’s site is made available free of charge.

Explain does not guarantee that Explain’s site, or any content on it, will always be available or be uninterrupted. Explain may suspend or withdraw or restrict the availability of all of any part of Explain’s site for business and operational reasons.

Terms of use

Content

This Community contains Content which is owned by or licensed to us. This Content includes, but is not limited to, the design, layout, look, appearance and graphics.

Reproduction of the Content is prohibited other than in accordance with the copyright notice, which forms part of these terms and conditions.

All trademarks reproduced in this Community, which are not the property of, or licensed to Explain or NS&I, are acknowledged on the website.

Neither we nor any third parties provide any warranty or guarantee as to the accuracy, timeliness, or completeness of the Content, nor its suitability for any particular purpose.

The experiences, ideas and opinions posted on the NS&I Research Community are those of individual members. Explain or NS&I cannot guarantee the accuracy of information posted. People who work at NS&I will participate in conversations and provide accurate information and answers to questions as needed. Whilst we try to ensure that all of our Content is accurate, we advise that you check further before you rely upon it. Any advice given by NS&I on the NS&I Research Community will be of a general nature. Specific enquiries made by NS&I Research Community members in regards to their own account or service will be removed from the NS&I Research Community and, with the member’s permission, passed onto the NS&I Team who will respond as they are able. Please do not put anything on the Community about account queries, if you have a query about your account please contact NS&I directly.

Personal information

Explain and NS&I treat your personal information with great care, and each have an extensive data protection compliance programme. Explain’s Privacy Notice explains in more detail how Explain handles your personal information. NS&I’s Privacy Notice explains in more detail how NS&I handles your personal information.

In order to keep your personal information safe, please do not include any personal information, whether about yourself or someone else, in your Postings. You need to be aware that, if you include any personal information in your Postings, it may not be private. If you include personal information about other people please keep the information to a minimum and gain permission from each individual as you may be liable yourself and may also do something which makes us liable.

You agree to indemnify Explain and any relevant third party against any claim or proceeding which is related to any personal information in your Postings. When selecting your member username and profile picture, be mindful that these can be seen by all other members in the NS&I Research Community. Please try to avoid using a username or picture that is personally identifiable. You are responsible for any third party personal information, and/or intellectual property, in your Posting and may be liable if any third party complains about such content, particularly if you have not obtained their permission before posting

Postings

You are welcome to upload your Postings as you wish, subject to these terms and conditions, and to the guidance in the NS&I Community guidelines which includes a request that you do not use the Community for advertising or any commercial purposes. You warrant that any such Posting complies with those guidelines, and you will be liable to Explain and indemnify Explain for any breach of that warrant. This means you may be responsible for any loss or damage suffered as a result of your breach.

You are responsible for all your Postings. If you did not create your Postings yourself, you are responsible for obtaining the owner’s consent to use it on the Website [or in connection with the NS&I Research Community].

Your Postings will be visible by all members of the NS&I Community. In order to share in full and make the NS&I Research Community a success, Explain need your permission to make your Postings available to all users. By using the website you agree to grant Explain a worldwide, royalty-free licence to use your Postings – as outlined in the NS&I Research Community Privacy Notice.

This licence allows Explain and NS&I to share content with other people, for example, other site users, or sub-contractors of NS&I.

If you would like to share a text link to the NS&I Research Community from your own, you do not need any permission for this. However, Explain reserves the right to require you to remove any such link if Explain does not feel that it is appropriate.

We cannot, in any circumstances, accept responsibility for errors or omissions in any of the member’s Postings on the website, or for any action or decisions based on the member’s Posting. Neither can we be responsible for the consequences of reliance on any member’s Postings no matter how it is presented.

If anything in your Postings is found to have infringed another party’s intellectual property rights, and we suffer any losses or damages as a result, you agree to indemnify Explain against all claims and proceedings arising from such infringement.

While Explain host the NS&I Research Community Explain are not responsible for the content of the Postings, which are provided by site users. You may be liable for any losses or damage which are in any way related to the content of your Postings.

If anyone notifies Explain that a Posting does not meet the NS&I Research Community guidelines or has infringed intellectual property rights, Explain may withdraw any, or all, of your Postings immediately, in order to investigate such claims.

How we may use your Postings

We have the right to download and copy anonymous Postings for:

• content analysis and customer research purposes; and
• documenting the findings from the discussions, surveys and polls that take place on the NS&I Research Community to be included in publicly available NS&I communications, media publications and marketing.

Prior to using any individual Postings in publicly available communications or marketing:

• Prior to using any individual Postings in publicly available communications or marketing all member details, including username, will be removed. Please note however, that it may be possible for other users of the NS&I Research Community to link such Postings back to your username in this community.
• If we wish to use any personal details, such as your name, you will receive a request from the Explain moderators via an email to the email address registered on the Community. If Explain does not receive a reply or a ‘no’ from you, Explain will recognise this as you do not want Explain to share your individual Posting.

Moderation and member conduct

You are responsible for how you behave towards other users of the Website. Explain will act as site moderator, and will monitor any disputes between individual users, and Explain cannot be responsible for resolving them.

Members can only have one account registered on the Research Community. If Explain identifies a member with multiple accounts, the member in question will be contacted and any multiple accounts may be deleted.

Unauthorised use of this Website may give rise to a claim for damages and/or be a criminal offence.

Further considerations

Your use of this community and any dispute arising out of such use of the website is subject to the laws of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.

Explain reserve the right to suspend or withdraw the Website and/or the NS&I Research Community at any time without notice. Equally Explain reserve the right to suspend or terminate your individual registration at any time. While Explain would try to explain reasons for doing so, it may not always be possible to provide such an explanation at the same time as the suspension or termination.

In addition to these terms and conditions there are also NS&I Research Community guidelines which we ask all members of the NS&I Research Community to adhere to.

Viruses

Explain maintains the security and performance of the Explain website, however Explain does not guarantee that Explain’s site will be secure from bugs or viruses.

You are responsible for configuring your information technology, computer programmes and platform to access Explain’s site. You should use your own virus protection software.

You must not misuse Explain’s site by knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material that is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to Explain’s site, the server on which Explain’s site is stored or any server, computer or database connected to Explain’s site. You must not attack Explain’s site via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of service attack. By breaching this provision, you would commit a criminal offence under the Computer Misuse Act 1990. Explain will report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and Explain will co-operate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them. In the event of such a breach, your right to use Explain’s site will cease immediately.

Communications and email alerts

By creating an account on the NS&I Research Community, you are giving consent to receiving communication emails from the Community. The receipt of these emails is important to help you keep up to date on the Community and its content, these emails will contain information relevant to the NS&I Research Community, such as updates and reminders on new Community Postings and member interactions and Incentive announcements.

Community moderators may also email you in relation to any user account queries or issues, such as infringements of the NS&I Research Community guidelines.

If you do not wish to receive emails alerts from the Community you will not be able to participate in the Community because we need to be able to communicate with you via email to notify you of new content.

Third party links

On occasion we include links to third parties on this Website. Where we provide a link it does not mean that we are responsible for any third party websites or their content, and it does not mean that we endorse or approve that site’s policy towards visitor privacy. You should review their Privacy Notice before sending them any personal data.

Where NS&I wish you to take part in any research which is not moderated by Explain, and a link to such research appears in the NS&I Research Community, this will be made clear.

Prize Incentives

Contribution in the NS&I Research Community may enter members into a prize draw for the Research Community and further information is available on the 'Prize Incentives' page.

Contact

If you are unclear about anything in these terms, or have any queries about anything relating to the NS&I Research Community, please contact Explain Market Research by emailing nsandi@explainonline.co.uk