Terms and Conditions - Nova Opinions: Expert Network

Terms & Conditions

EXPERT NETWORK Terms & Conditions

Effective Date: November 2024

Expert Network is an expert-driven specialist market research panel owned and operated by Walr Group Ltd.

By or responding to an Invitation that we have sent to you and/or participating in any of our online Surveys or other activities, you are confirming your acceptance of our General Terms and Conditions and your inclusion as a member of our Panel.

We reserve the right, at our sole discretion, to alter, change, modify, add or delete portions of these General Terms and Conditions at any time without notifying you in advance.

We further reserve the right to refuse to provide the Survey options to any person, for any reason, and/or to discontinue the Survey in whole or in part, at any time, with or without prior notice.

If we make changes in respect of the General Terms and Conditions we will clarify the edits and date that any such changes were made on this page.

If you continue to use the Expert Network offering after any such changes, you will be deemed to have accepted the latest version of the General Terms and Conditions.

Specific or additional terms and conditions may apply to certain Surveys and services that we make available to you. Where necessary, you will be required to accept such specific terms prior to completing these Surveys,

The Surveys and our website access are offered to users aged 18 and older. Expert Network may require proof of identity and age of a Participant. Failure to provide the required proof of identity shall result in a Survey offer being immediately terminated by us. By using Expert Network, you confirm that you meet the legal age to enter a contract (these Terms and Conditions) with us.

Definitions – In these General Terms and Conditions the following definitions apply:

“Client” means our end-clients that commission market data research Surveys requesting expert views and opinions such as your own;
“Incentives” means the non-transferable financial incentives, points, or rewards offered to you via third party rewards platform in consideration of your Survey participation;
“Invitation” or “Invite(d)” means an email offer sent by Expert Network containing an invite to participate in a market research Survey, along with a link to the Expert Network’s terms and conditions, our privacy policy and the option to unsubscribe from further Invitations;
“Participant” means an expert individual who is Invited to participate in an Expert Network Survey and is subsequently considered a member of our Panel;
“Panel” means the database of Participants curated by Expert Network and Invited to participate in Surveys;
“Expert Network” means Expert Network which is a trading name of Walr Group Ltd (company number 12963180) whose registered office is The Sea Building First Floor, 127-131 Great Suffolk Street, London, United Kingdom, SE1 1PP;
“Survey(s)” means the anonymised specialist expert online questionnaire initiated by Expert Network that potential Participants are Invited to complete;
“We”, “Us” or “Our” means Expert Network;
“Website” means the website found at https://experts.nova-opinions.com/; and
“You” or “Your” means the Participant or recipient of an Invitation.

1) Description of the Surveys

a) We Invite leading market experts such as yourself to participate in confidential and proprietary Surveys specific to our Client requirements. In consideration for such participation, Participants generally will receive an Incentive for each valid and complete Survey submitted.

a) Participants are required to Opt-In to each Survey via an Invitation that the Expert Network will send to them. In order to participate, you will need to consent to participating in each specific Survey and expressly accept these Expert Network Terms and Conditions.

2) Participant recruitment

a) We obtain your contact information to issue Invitations and recruit in two ways:

i) Through partnership with third-party databases who have gained your express consent to share your personal details (including your name, title, contact information) with third parties such as ourselves, Expert Network, in order for you to Participate in market research activities relevant to your expertise; and

ii) Via social media sites and applications that you use, and via websites where a Survey opportunity will be made available to you by Us as a paid advert.

b) If you respond to an Invitation and participate in a Survey, we will

i) deem that you have provided your express consent to be contacted for future Survey opportunities; and

ii) deem you to be a Participant in our Panel network.

3) Survey opportunities and our Panel

a) If you receive an initial Invitation to participate in a Survey you are not obliged to respond to us. If you do not wish to receive details of future opportunities from Expert Network or future Invitations, you can click on the unsubscribe link within the Invitation or at any time in the future.

b) In order to receive an Incentive you simply need to complete the Survey that you have been Invited to join…

a) We collate and retain contact details, including without limitation your name, email address and your Survey responses in order to build a profile of you as a Participant and ensure that we match you with appropriate opportunities that become available to our Panel. This data is collected solely for the purpose of managing your ongoing participation in Surveys and to ensure you receive any applicable Incentives that you are eligible for.

c) In completing a Survey, you warrant that the information you provide within it is true, accurate, current and complete at the time of participation. All personal data is held confidentially and securely, in accordance with law and per our Privacy Policy. You agree that you will update your information if any changes occur and confirm that you accept our Privacy Policy which can be found at https://experts.nova-opinions.com/privacy-policy.

d) The offer of Expert Network to provide a Survey and your completion of the Survey does not create a contract of employment between Us and You. There is no obligation upon you to participate in any Surveys and there is no obligation upon us to provide Surveys or Incentives.

e) You may unsubscribe from Invitations and close your Expert Network Account at any time by clicking the unsubscribe link in any Invitation received or contacting support@nova-opinions.com and following the steps under clause 17, Termination below.

4) Survey Opt-In Requirements

a) To participate in a specific Survey, you will need to initially click on a link within the Invitation, and expressly:

i) Opt-In and agree to participate in the specific Survey that you are being Invited to complete; and

ii) Agree to:

(1) The capture and usage of any Survey responses you make and any contact data you share with Us (where it may be necessary in order for us to facilitate your Incentive payment by a third party Incentive provider); and

(2) our Expert Network terms and conditions.

This is known as providing Expert Network with your informed consent regarding the Survey and the sharing of your opinions with us.

5) Confidentiality

a) Your Survey opinions and feedback will remain anonymous when shared with our Clients, who will not have access to any personally identifiable information.

b) As a market research Participant, a Survey may ask for your personal view or perspective. Sometimes you will be asked to review retail products, packaging or new concepts in their early stages of brand development. You may come in contact with, be allowed to see or use or otherwise have access to, certain non-public, confidential, proprietary, and trade secret information or materials that are the sole and exclusive property of our Clients. For the avoidance of doubt this includes, without limitation, product information, product/pack illustrations, product names, technology, potential information with respect to the Client or sponsor’s commercial and retail products and all other concepts and ideas shared with you within this research survey (collectively, “Confidential Information“). You must not copy, print, store, forward, share or disclose to anyone by any means the Confidential Information you will have access to, and you must not use the Confidential Information for any other purpose than the purpose for which it was disclosed to you, namely to provide feedback in a Survey (your “Confidentiality Obligations”). You are required to strictly adhere to your Confidentiality Obligations for the duration that you remain a Participant in the Expert Network Panel and until any such Confidential Material moves into the public domain (and as such is no longer deemed to be confidential).

c) If it is determined that you have breached these Confidentiality Obligations, Expert Network reserves the right to (i) remove any Incentive you may have received in respect of the Survey and not pay any futures Incentives due to you; (ii) remove your name/listing as a current and future Participant and no longer send you Invitations; and (iii) if requested by our Client, share your contact details with them solely in order for them to be able to contact you directly to remedy any Confidential Information breach initiated by you. In the event of any such confidentiality breach by yourself, you hereby consent to the secure onward sharing of such personal data solely for such remedy purpose.

6) Incentives

a) Our Clients may choose to provide a reward or Incentive to you to participate in a Survey. You acknowledge and agree that Expert Network has no independent obligation to provide any Incentives to you in connection with your participation in Survey.

b) Expert Network will not be liable for your failure to redeem an Incentive, failure of delivery of an Incentive due to incorrect information provided by you, or for any defects in your use of an Incentive.

c) Expert Network will use a third-party Incentive provider which will use commercially reasonable efforts to distribute Incentives to Participants within five to ten business days of your Survey completion.

d) You acknowledge and agree that you will forfeit some or all of any Incentive offered in connection with a Survey offered if:

i) you violate any of these Terms and Conditions (as determined by Expert Network in its sole discretion);

ii) you do not satisfactorily complete the Survey, or your answers (in Our sole opinion) are inadequate, insufficient, non-compliant or do not correctly answer the Survey or the questions posed within it; or

iii) you unsubscribe from the Panel prior to receiving or redeeming the Incentive.

e) You are solely responsible for understanding and evaluating any potential tax liability related to any Incentives, and for determining any potential income reporting pursuant to the requirements of applicable laws.

7) Prize Draws

a) Expert Network (the “Promoter”) may enter you into a prize draw to receive a cash prize as part or full incentive for your participation in a Survey (the “Prize”). Any prize draw entered into will be subject to Survey specific terms and conditions (stating, for example, a closing date for entry), in addition to these Terms and Conditions, which shall be displayed on the Expert Network Website and at the point of participation.

b) All incentive Surveys and Prize draws are run by the Walr Group Limited (trading as Expert Network) and We reserve the right to void, cancel, suspend or amend the Prize draw where we deem it necessary to do so. These terms and conditions and this promotion are governed by English law.

8) Website Access and Content

a) We will use all commercially reasonable endeavours to make the Expert Network Website available to you. However, you acknowledge and accept that by its nature internet-based technology is insecure and an uninterrupted service cannot be guaranteed. You further acknowledge and accept that from time to time it will be necessary for us to carry out necessary maintenance in respect of the Website resulting in occasional periods of downtime. Although we will use reasonable endeavours to minimise such downtime periods we make no representations or warranties to you in respect of the availability of the Website and/or Surveys.

b) The information provided by us on the Website or contained in our Surveys is not in any way an invitation or recommendation to buy any products or services featured.

c) We assume no responsibility in respect of and make no warranties, representations or undertakings about the contents of any other websites to which the Website has links to or makes reference to or websites of advertisers advertising on the Website or which are the subject of our Surveys. We do not endorse or approve the content of such third-party websites.

9) Complaints

If you experience problems in respect of the Website and/or Surveys you should refer your complaint to support@nova-opinions.com who will use reasonable endeavours to resolve the problem as soon as possible.

10) Intellectual Property

a) In consideration of agreeing to your use of the Website, you acknowledge that ownership in any intellectual property rights in the Website and all trade marks, logos and Survey content (including but not limited to the material contained in the Website, together with the Website design, text and graphics, and their selection and arrangement, and all software compilations, underlying source code and software (including applets) belongs to the Expert Network, its group of companies or our Clients where they have provided information or their intellectual property for a Survey. No part of the Website may be used, transferred, copied or reproduced in whole or in part in any manner.

b) You shall retain ownership of all copyright in data you submit to the Website. Subject to the terms of our Privacy Policy, you grant us a world-wide exclusive, royalty-free, non-terminable licence to use, copy, distribute, publish and transmit such data in any manner as we may in our sole discretion deem fit.

c) We may aggregate and use data derived from your use of Website to operate, improve, analyse and support our offering, for distribution in general benchmarking data and industry reports, and for other lawful business purposes, provided that the data:

I. is combined with similar data from the Expert Network’s other users,

II. does not directly or indirectly identify any Client or Participant and

III. does not include any Confidential Information.

d) Expert Network may solicit, and users or Participants may provide to Expert Network, suggestions, ideas, enhancement requests, feedback, recommendations or other information relating to our Surveys (excluding any Confidential Information contained therein, “Feedback”).

11) Users Obligations

When you sign up as a Participant, you agree to the following rules:

a) You will use the Website only for lawful purposes and not in any way that will violate or infringe upon the use or rights of any third party;

b) You represent and warrant to the Expert Network that you will at all times conduct yourself in a professional manner and in compliance with all applicable laws;

c) You agree that each Invite you receive is specifically designated for you and should not be onward shared;

d) You will not upload, share, post, distribute or otherwise partake in any behaviour that is unlawful, threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, libelous, deceptive, fraudulent, or otherwise violates law or the Expert Network’s rules or policies; and

e) You will not use any robots, spiders, or similar data mining, data gathering or extraction tools or manual processes to collect, gather or copy any content or data on or related to the Surveys. You may not engage in practices of “screen scraping,” “database scraping” or any other practice or activity where the purpose is to obtain lists of users of the Website, portions of a database, or other lists or information in any manner not expressly authorised by the Expert Network in writing.

12) Waiver of Liability

You hereby release the Expert Network and its officers, directors, employees, agents, affiliates from any claims or damages of any kind or nature, relating to your participation in any Survey. The Expert Network disclaims all liability arising from any reliance placed on any information obtained by you from the Website.

13) Limitation of Liability and Indemnity

a) In no event shall Expert Network be liable to you or any third party for any form of any loss whatsoever (including but not limited to loss of opportunity or data), damage, injury, costs or expenses of any kind arising from your use of the Website and/or the Surveys, including but not limited to direct, indirect, consequential, special and incidental damages. You agree that this limitation of liability is reasonable in all the circumstances.

b) In no event shall the total liability of Expert Network to you for any and all damages, losses, and causes of action (whether in contract or tort, including, but not limited to, negligence or otherwise) arising from your use of the Website exceed, in the aggregate, an amount equal to the Incentives paid to you during the immediately preceding three-month period to any claim.

c) You agree to defend, indemnify, and hold the Expert Network harmless from and against any and all liabilities, claims, damages, costs, and expenses, including reasonable legal fees, that arise from or relate to any of the following: i) Your use or misuse of the Website; ii) Your violation of these Expert Network Terms and Conditions including breach of the confidentiality undertakings contained herein; and iii) Any breach of any representation or warranty you have made to us.

14) Waiver of Liability

You hereby release the Expert Network and its officers, directors, employees, agents, affiliates from any claims or damages of any kind or nature, relating to your participation in any Survey . The Expert Network disclaims all liability arising from any reliance placed on any information obtained by you from participating in the Surveys. ‍

15) Use of Your Data and Privacy Policy

b) The UK’s Data Protection Act 2018 is designed to protect individuals about whom information is entered and stored on computers and other systems. Accordingly, it lays down strict standards of accuracy, relevance and care of such data including how it may be divulged. In the unlikely event that any personal data is required to be included in the Surveys or is provided to us by yourself, it will be subject to the protections and provisions of the Data Protection Act 2018. You are responsible for its accuracy and relevance. You must have the authority to disclose it and you subsequently authorise us to utilise such personal data for the purposes of any transaction concluded for or by you through the Website. If you are in doubt about any data please feel free to email our support team at support@nova-opinions.com with details of the problem first.

c) We will collate the information which you give to us when responding within the Survey. In your acceptance of the Invitation and your provision of Survey responses, you consent to the Expert Network’s processing of the information. It may be necessary to forward such information to certain third parties in order for us to provide our service and by accepting these General terms and conditions you are giving us your approval to do so.

d) If you unsubscribe from the Panel or notify us in writing that you do not wish to receive further Invitations from us then we shall ensure that we do not do so but we cannot guarantee that third parties (such as the Incentive provider) with whom you may share your contact details will not do so. It is your responsibility to advise them directly if you wish to stop any such emailing activity.

e) Please click on www.expert-network.com/privacy-policy/ to view our full Privacy Policy.

16) Termination

a) We reserve the right to permanently take down the Website and withdraw the Surveys upon providing you with five (5) days’ notice.

b) We reserve the right to block your participation if you are not providing Surveys responses of adequate quality e.g. speeding through surveys, bad language on free text answers or submitting poor written answer quality. We may remove your participation immediately if you are in breach of any of these General terms and conditions.

c) We reserve the right to remove you from our Panel should we suspect your activity as suspicious or fraudulent . This can be linked to sign-up details, identity, survey completion.

d) All disclaimers, indemnities and exclusions in these General Terms and Conditions shall survive termination of the agreement between us for any reason.

17) ‍General

a) We shall not be liable for any delay or failure in providing the Website and/or Surveys which results directly or indirectly from acts of God, acts of nature, forces or causes beyond our reasonable control including but not limited to technology failures, power failures, strikes, labour disputes, riots, terrorism, insurrections, civil disturbances, vandalism, fires, floods, storms, explosions, war, governmental actions or orders of court.

b) If any provision of these General terms and conditions is held to be unlawful, invalid or unenforceable, that provision shall be deemed severed and the validity and enforceability of the remaining provisions of these General terms and conditions shall not be affected.

c) Any reference to the singular includes the plural and vice versa and reference to a gender includes the other genders unless the context requires otherwise. Reference to a “person” includes any individual, firm, unincorporated association or body corporate.

d) The headings in these General terms and conditions are for convenience only and shall not effect its interpretation.

e) A person who is not a party to this agreement shall have no right under the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999 to enforce any term hereunder. This clause does not affect any right or remedy of any person who exists or is available otherwise than pursuant to that Act.

f) These General terms and conditions shall be governed by and construed in accordance with English law. The parties submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the English courts.