Terms of service

These terms apply when you take a Cinacode plan. We confirm the specifics of your plan, fees, and start date in writing before any work begins. If anything here conflicts with what we agree in writing with you, the written agreement wins.

What you get

Each plan covers the design and build of your website, then ongoing hosting and care for as long as you are with us. That care includes a monthly allowance of changes, uptime monitoring, SSL, backups, and a monthly report. The exact inclusions and limits for Basic, Plus, and Managed Business are listed on our plans page and confirmed when you sign up.

Fees and billing

• Setup fee: a once-off fee covers the initial design and build. It is shown for each plan and confirmed before we start. Work begins once it is paid.
• Monthly fee: billed monthly in advance in South African Rand. It covers hosting, the domain, email, monitoring, and your change allowance.
• What is included: the .co.za domain, email, and hosting are part of the monthly fee. There is no separate domain or hosting renewal bill.

Late or missed payment

If a monthly payment is missed, we will get in touch. If an account stays unpaid after a reasonable notice period, we may pause new change work until it is settled. We will not take a working site offline without first letting you know and giving you a chance to put it right.

Your change allowance

Each plan includes a set number of hours of changes a month. Small overflow we usually absorb. For larger pieces of work we quote up front at a fair rate before doing it, or suggest moving you to a higher plan if it happens often. Unused hours do not roll over. We track time against your allowance and tell you before anything goes over.

Fair use

Plans are built for normal small-business websites. They are not for sites that send bulk unsolicited mail, host unlawful content, or place an unreasonable load on shared resources. If usage is well outside the norm, we will talk to you about the right setup.

Your domain

Your domain belongs to you. We register or transfer it on your behalf and manage it as part of your plan, so you never deal with a registrar. If you leave, we help you move the domain to a registrar or provider of your choice.

Your content and our work

• You own your content, your brand, and the material you give us, and you confirm you have the right to use it.
• You own the final website content and design produced for you.
• We keep ownership of our underlying tools, components, and code libraries that we reuse across clients, and grant you the right to use them as part of your site.

Your responsibilities

To keep things moving, we ask that you give us the content, access, and approvals we need in reasonable time, and that the material you provide is lawful and yours to use. Delays in getting these to us can move timelines.

Hosting, backups, and uptime

We host your site on monitored infrastructure, renew SSL automatically, and keep regular backups. We work to keep your site online and fast, and we respond promptly when something needs attention. We cannot promise a network is never interrupted, and we are not liable for outages outside our control, such as upstream provider or domain-registry issues.

Cancellation and what happens to your data

Plans are month to month. Give us one calendar month's notice to cancel. When you leave, we export your content, images, and any form or booking data and hand it over, help move your domain, and then remove your data from our systems after a short grace period. Setup and monthly fees already paid are not refundable, but you keep service to the end of the paid month.

Liability

We take real care with your site and your data. To the extent the law allows, our liability for any claim connected to the service is limited to the fees you paid us in the three months before the claim. We are not liable for indirect or consequential losses, such as lost profit.

Changes to these terms

If we update these terms, we will post the new version here and move the date at the top. For changes that materially affect your plan, we will let you know directly before they take effect.

Getting in touch

Questions about these terms, your plan, or your account? Email hello@cinacode.co.za and we reply within one business day.

See also our privacy policy for how we handle personal information.