Website Terms of Use
These Terms of Website Use (“Terms of Use”) (together with the documents referred to on it) tell you the Terms of Use on which you may access and/or make use of our website located at www.blueoctopus.co.uk (“our website”), whether as a guest or a registered user. Please read these Terms of Use carefully before you start to use our website. By using our website, you indicate that you accept these Terms of Use and that you agree to abide by them. If you do not agree to these Terms of Use, please refrain from using our website.
We may alter these Terms of Use from time to time and post the new version on our website. You must check these Terms of Use on our website regularly to take notice of any changes we make, as they are legally binding on you. Some of the provisions contained in these Terms of Use may also be superseded by provisions or notices published elsewhere on our website.
In addition to these Terms of Use our Data Protection Privacy Policy and Complaints Policy apply in respect of all use of our website and the services supplied through it.
Information About Us
Our website is owned and operated by Blue Octopus Recruitment Limited (“our”, “we”, or “us”), Company Number 7088452. Our registered address is Blue Octopus Recruitment Ltd, Octo House, 2 Station Road, Otley, West Yorkshire, LS21 3HX.
Accessing Our Site
Access to our website is permitted on a temporary basis, and we reserve the right to withdraw or amend the service we provide on our website without notice. We will not be liable if for any reason our website or the service is unavailable at any time or for any period.
From time to time, we may restrict access to some parts of our website, or the whole of our website, to users who have registered with us.
If you choose, or you are provided with, a user identification code, password or any other piece of information as part of our security procedures, you must treat such information as confidential, and you must not disclose it to any third party. We have the right to disable any user identification code or password, whether chosen by you or allocated by us, at any time, if in our opinion you have failed to comply with any of the provisions of these Terms of Use.
When using our website, you must comply with these Terms of Use and in particular our Acceptable Use statement detailed below.
You are responsible for making all arrangements necessary for you to have access to our website. You are also responsible for ensuring that all persons who access our website through your internet connection are aware of these Terms of Use, and that they comply with them.
Children Under Age 13
Use of the website is not permitted for children under the age of 13.
Intellectual Property Rights
We are the owner or the licensee of all intellectual property rights in our website, and in the material published on it. Those works are protected by copyright laws and treaties around the world. All such rights are reserved.
You may print off one copy, and may download extracts, of any page(s) from our website for your personal reference and you may draw the attention of others within your organisation to material posted on our website.
You must not modify the paper or digital copies of any materials you have printed off or downloaded in any way, and you must not use any illustrations, photographs, video or audio sequences or any graphics separately from any accompanying text.
Our status (and that of any identified contributors) as the authors of material on our website must always be acknowledged.
You must not use any part of the materials on our website for commercial purposes without obtaining a licence to do so from us or our licensors.
If you print off, copy or download any part of our website in breach of these Terms of Use your right to use our website and services will cease immediately and you must, at our option, return or destroy any copies of the materials you have made.
Reliance on Information Posted
Commentary, advertising, entries and other materials posted on our website are not intended to amount to advice on which reliance should be placed. We therefore disclaim all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on such materials by any visitor to our website, or by anyone who may be informed of any of its contents.
You agree that you must evaluate, and bear all risks associated with, the use of any content on our website, including any reliance on the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of such content. You acknowledge that you may not rely on any content posted on our website which have been created by us, submitted to us, or posted by users or other third parties (including without limitation: commentary, advertising, entries and any other materials and information).
The views and opinions of authors expressed on our website do not necessarily state or reflect those of Blue Octopus and they may not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes.
Our Website Changes Regularly
We aim to update our website regularly, and may change the content at any time. If the need arises, we may suspend access to our site, or close it indefinitely. Any of the material on our website may be out of date at any given time, and we are under no obligation to update such material.
Our Liability
The material displayed on our website is provided without any guarantees, conditions or warranties as to its accuracy, quality of information, completeness or usefulness. We do not endorse or recommend any commercial products, processes or services. To the extent permitted by law, we, other members of our group of companies and third parties connected to us hereby expressly exclude:
All conditions, warranties and other terms which might otherwise be implied by statute, common law or the law of equity.
Any liability for any direct, indirect or consequential loss or damage incurred by any user in connection with our website or in connection with the use, inability to use, or results of the use of our website, any websites linked to it and any materials posted on it, including, without limitation any liability for:
- loss of income or revenue;
- loss of business;
- loss of profits or contracts;
- loss of anticipated savings;
- loss of data;
- loss of goodwill;
- wasted management or office time; and
- for any other loss or damage of any kind, however arising and whether caused by tort (including negligence), breach of contract or otherwise, even if foreseeable.
This does not affect our liability for death or personal injury arising from our negligence, nor our liability for fraudulent misrepresentation or misrepresentation as to a fundamental matter, nor any other liability which cannot be excluded or limited under applicable law.
Uploading Material to Our Website
Whenever you make use of a feature that allows you to upload material to our website, or to make contact with other users of our website, you must comply with our content standards set out below. You warrant that any such contribution does comply with those standards, and you indemnify us for any breach of that warranty.
We will not be responsible, or liable to any third party, for the content or accuracy of any materials posted by you or any other user of our website.
We have the right to remove any material or posting you make on our website if, in our opinion, such material does not comply with the content standards set out below.
Viruses, Hacking and Other Offences
You must not misuse our website by knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material which is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to our website, the server on which our website is stored or any server, computer or database connected to our website. You must not attack our website 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. We will report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and we will co-operate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them. In the event of such a breach, your right to use our website will cease immediately.
We will not be liable for any loss or damage caused by a distributed denial-of-service attack, viruses or other technologically harmful material that may infect your computer equipment, computer programs, data or other proprietary material due to your use of our website or to your downloading of any material posted on it, or on any website linked to it.
Linking To Our Site
With our written consent you may link to our website, provided you do so in a way that is fair and legal and does not damage our reputation or take advantage of it, but you must not establish a link in such a way as to suggest any form of association, approval or endorsement on our part where none exists.
You must not establish a link from any website that is not owned by you.
Our website or any part thereof must not be copied and/or framed on any other site. We reserve the right to withdraw linking permission without notice. The website from which you are linking must comply in all respects with the content standards set out below.
If you wish to make any use of material on our website other than that set out above, please address your request to [email protected].
Links From Our Site
Where our website contains links to other sites and resources provided by third parties or users, these links are provided for your information only. We have no control over the contents of those sites or resources, and accept no responsibility for them or for any loss or damage that may arise from your use of them.
Acceptable Use
You may use our website only for lawful purposes. You may not use our website:
- In any way that breaches any applicable local, national or international law or regulation.
- In any way that is unlawful or fraudulent, or has any unlawful or fraudulent purpose or effect.
- For the purpose of harming or attempting to harm minors in any way.
- To send, knowingly receive, upload, download, use or re-use any material which does not comply with our content standards set out below.
- To transmit, or procure the sending of, any unsolicited or unauthorised advertising or promotional material or any other form of similar solicitation (spam).
- To knowingly transmit any data, send or upload any material that contains viruses, Trojan horses, worms, time-bombs, keystroke loggers, spyware, adware or any other harmful programs or similar computer code designed to adversely affect the operation of any computer software or hardware.
You also agree:
- Not to reproduce, duplicate, copy or re-sell any part of our website in contravention of the
- provisions of these Terms of Use.
- Not to access without authority, interfere with, damage or disrupt:
- any part of our website;
- any equipment or network on which our website is stored;
- any software used in the provision of our website; or
- any equipment or network or software owned or used by any third party.
Content Standards
These content standards apply to any and all material which you contribute to our website (contributions), and to any interactive services associated with it.
You must comply with the spirit of the following standards as well as the letter. The standards apply to each part of any contribution as well as to its whole.
Contributions must:
- Be accurate (where they state facts).
- Be genuinely held (where they state opinions).
- Comply with applicable law in the UK and in any country from which they are posted.
- Contributions must not:
- Contain any material which is defamatory of any person.
- Contain any material which is obscene, offensive, hateful or inflammatory.
- Promote sexually explicit material.
- Promote violence.
- Promote discrimination based on race, sex, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age.
- Infringe any copyright, database right or trade mark of any other person.
- Be likely to deceive any person.
- Be made in breach of any legal duty owed to a third party, such as a contractual duty or a duty of confidence.
- Promote any illegal activity.
- Be threatening, abuse or invade another´s privacy, or cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety.
- Be likely to harass, upset, embarrass, alarm or annoy any other person.
- Be used to impersonate any person, or to misrepresent your identity or affiliation with any person.
- Give the impression that they emanate from us, if this is not the case.
- Advocate, promote or assist any unlawful act such as (by way of example only) copyright infringement or computer misuse.
Suspension and Termination
We will determine, in our discretion, whether there has been a breach of these Terms of Use through your use of our website. When a breach has occurred, we may take such action as we deem appropriate.
Failure to comply our Acceptable Use Policy and content standards (set out above) constitutes a material breach of the Terms of Use upon which you are permitted to use our website, and may result in our taking all or any of the following actions:
- Immediate, temporary or permanent withdrawal of your right to use our website.
- Immediate, temporary or permanent removal of any posting or material uploaded by you to our website.
- Issue of a warning to you.
- Legal proceedings against you for reimbursement of all costs on an indemnity basis (including, but not limited to, reasonable administrative and legal costs) resulting from the breach.
- Further legal action against you.
- Disclosure of such information to law enforcement authorities as we reasonably feel is necessary.
We exclude liability for actions taken in response to breaches of these Terms of Use. The responses described above are not limited, and we may take any other action we reasonably deem appropriate.
Jurisdiction and Applicable Law
The English courts will have exclusive jurisdiction over any claim arising from, or related to, a visit to our website although we retain the right to bring proceedings against you for breach of these Terms of Use in your country of residence or any other relevant country.
These Terms of Use and any dispute or claim arising out of or in connection with them or their subject matter or formation (including non-contractual disputes or claims) shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the law of England and Wales.
Monitoring and Review of the Policy
This policy is reviewed annually by our board of directors to ensure it is achieving its stated objectives. Changes are updated to this policy will be noted on the Blue Octopus website.
Complaints Policy
None of us likes to be the subject of a complaint, but if Blue Octopus is truly committed to providing a quality service to clients and candidates, Blue Octopus needs to pick up on any dissatisfaction when it does arise and address it as best they can. Blue Octopus therefore operates a complaints handling process that seeks to ensure that it:
- knows about client or candidate dissatisfaction if and when it does arise;
- takes all reasonable steps to ensure that the dissatisfaction is addressed and resolved wherever possible;
- reassures all clients or candidates who do complain that the practice will address their concerns without delay and that it takes all complaints seriously;
- learns from experience to lessen the risk of complaints in the future.
As required by our complaints policy we will consider any complaint received in as objective a manner as possible and seek to resolve the dissatisfaction. In particular we will offer to meet with the complainant when possible and suggest appropriate redress.
This Complaints Handling Procedure tells you how we will deal with your complaint and how long it is likely to take. It also provides important information about what you can do if you are not happy with the way in which we are dealing with your complaint, or about our final decision. Our Complaints Policy contains further information about what you can expect from us when you make a complaint.
Designated Complaints Handler
If you have any concerns about our service, our work, or our charges and you wish to make a complaint, please contact our Designated Complaints Handler, Kelly Laurenson.
You can write to Kelly Laurenson at Blue Octopus Recruitment Ltd, Octo House, 2 Station Road, Otley, West Yorkshire, LS21 3HX. If the complaint relates to work that has been carried out by Kelly Laurenson, she will ask another manager at the same level to undertake the investigation.
Step One: Acknowledging your Complaint
Within five working days of receiving your complaint, your complaint will be recorded in our Complaints Register and a separate file will be opened in which we will store any correspondence and other documents relating to your complaint. Within two working days we will also send you a letter acknowledging your complaint.
Step Two: Investigating your Complaint
Within ten working days of receiving your complaint, we will review your file and any other relevant documentation and send you a letter telling you how we propose to deal with your complaint. Examples of what we might say in this letter are as follows:
- If your complaint is straightforward we might make suggestions as to how we can put things right or we may offer you some form of redress;
- If your complaint is more complicated we might ask you to confirm, explain or clarify any issues;
- We may ask to meet with you to discuss things face-to-face and we would hope to be in a position to meet with you no longer than fourteen working days after first receiving your complaint. If you would prefer not to meet, or if we cannot arrange this within an agreeable timescale, we will write to you fully setting out our views on the situation and making suggestions as to how we can put things right, or asking you to confirm, explain or clarify any issues. Within three working days of any meeting, we will write to you again to confirm what took place and to confirm any offer of redress that we have made.
- Whichever form our investigation takes, we will aim to give you our decision within six weeks of receiving your complaint (or sooner if possible).
Step Three: Appealing against our Decision
If you are not satisfied with our decision, please let us know and we will review our decision again. We will let you know the result of any appeal; our final decision, within five working days of receiving your appeal.
Step Four: Employment Agencies Standards Office and/or The Recruitment and Employment Confederation
If you are still not satisfied, you can then contact the Employment Agencies Standards Office at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS). You also have the option to contact The Recruitment & Employment Confederation, the trade association for the recruitment industry. You should write to the following addresses:
Department for Business, Enterprise & Regulatory Reform (BERR)
Employment Agency Standards (4140)
1 Victoria Street
London
SW1H 0ET
Professional Standards Manager
The Recruitment & Employment Confederation
Dorset House
First Floor 27-45 Stamford Street
London
SE1 9NT
Complaints Review
Blue Octopus will maintain records of all complaints received and action taken on them. The Designated Complaints Handler is also responsible for conducting a review of all complaints records each year to enable her to report to the company on any trends. It is essential that all personnel learn from their experience and address any underlying problems. In this way Blue Octopus can use its complaints data to help to prevent future difficulties.
Monitoring and Review of the Policy
This policy is reviewed annually by our board of directors to ensure it is achieving its stated objectives. Changes are updated to this policy will be noted on the Blue Octopus website.