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• Terms & conditions

We have written our Terms & conditions in plain English. Our Privacy & cookie policy forms part of the Terms & conditions, so please read that too. If anything is not clear, please contact us and we’ll do our best to explain.

If you use our services you must agree to these conditions. If you do not agree with them, you must not use our services.

LAST UPDATED: January 26, 2015 (company name change)

What this covers: These Terms & conditions explain how you can use this website and our blogs, mobile apps and any other services we offer. 

Who we are: This service is owned and run by Findmypast Newspaper Archive Limited, in partnership with the British Library. Click here for our full company details.

USING THE SERVICE

What you can use the service for: You can use the website for personal, academic or non-commercial purposes, subject to these Terms & conditions.

Provide a reference if you use any material from the site: If you use any content from the website, whether online or offline, you must make it clear where you have found the material by including a reference to the British Newspaper Archive (www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk); The British Library Board and also the copyright statement that appears on the page you are on. If you’re using material from a newspaper, you can find the copyright reference below the title and date of the publication (above the newspaper page image in the viewer). If you’re quoting general site content, you can find a copyright statement at the bottom of each page.

Using site content for commercial purposes: Please contact us if you want to reproduce or share any of the content on the site (including images of newspapers) for commercial purposes. This includes commercial publishing or sharing in any media format now known, or invented in the future. In many cases, we can make a commercial licence available to you, but you will need to agree this with the copyright owners who licence material to us. You're free to use and share the content on the site for non-commercial use as long as you provide a reference and copyright statement.

Intellectual property rights (including copyright): All intellectual property rights in the website and the content in it belongs to us or has been licensed to us. You can only use it for the purposes described in these Terms & conditions. All other rights are reserved. Find out more about copyright in this government guide.

PERSONAL INFORMATION

Personal data and payment security: Please read our Privacy & cookie policy to find out how we store and protect your personal data and credit/debit card information.

Registering on the site: You have to register and be signed in to use some features of the website.  If you are over 12, you can register and use the services that we make available for free.  However, if you want to pay for a service, you must be over 18 or have permission from your legal guardian (usually a parent).

Keep your personal information safe, and up to date: Keep your sign in details private at all times, do not share them with anybody, and let us know if you think somebody else has access to them. Do not use the “remember me” feature to keep yourself signed in unless you are using your own personal computer. You must keep your personal information accurate and up to date, especially your email address.

PAYING FOR ACCESS

Paying for services: Searching the site is free, but to view the newspapers, you have to pay a fee: the different packages are described on our payment page but generally include Pay As You Go and subscription packages. No contract between us exists until we send you a confirmation email, after receiving your order and accepting your payment.

Continuous membership on subscriptions: If you buy a subscription, it is on a continuous membership basis, meaning that it will continue until you cancel it. You can cancel the subscription at any time via the ‘my account’ area (you will need to sign in) and your subscription will end at the end of your current billing cycle (depending on whether you pay for your subscription monthly or yearly).   

Please be aware that you must cancel your subscription more than two days before your next billing date, or your subscription will continue automatically.

Please note, if using a discount code with your purchase, after the initial period, your subscription will be automatically renewed at the normal price unless you un-tick the ‘auto-renew my subscription’ box in the My Account section of the site.

PayAsYouGo: If you buy a PayAsYouGo package from us, it is a one-off payment and once it has run out, we will not take another payment unless you ask us to.

Time limit on PayAsYouGo packages: There is a time limit on PayAsYouGo packages: this is explained on the payment page. Once this time limit has passed, you will not be able to use your PayAsYouGo package and must buy another. 

Cancellation and your right to a refund: If you buy a subscription or a PayAsYouGo package, you can contact us and cancel within 14 days (starting on the day after you receive our confirmation email) and we will give you a full refund as long as you have not viewed any newspaper images during that period. If you have used the service to view images, we cannot offer a refund.  We do not provide refunds if you cancel after this 14 day period. 

Fair Usage: We have a fair usage policy which is designed purely for the (very rare) cases where people might abuse the service, for example by allowing multiple people to use the same account or if we detect high-levels of use that indicate automatic downloading of material from the site.

You can view up to 6000 pages per month. If you go over this limit, we’ll contact you to discuss your usage, but reserve the right to terminate your access if you continue to go over this limit after we’ve been in contact, or if we can’t get in contact with you. Please note that this limit also applies to pages made available through our “Free to View” service.

You cannot share your account: Each account can only be used by a single person at one time. If you are part of an organisation that wants to provide access to several people at one time, contact us to find out about our Community Edition which is suitable for schools, libraries and anyone else who needs several people to have access at the same time.

YOUR CONTENT 

Content created by users: On some parts of the website, you can publish your own content, including tags and comments. If you publish content, make comments or participate in forums, you must not:

a. publish something that you do not own the copyright in (or have permission to publish it from the copyright owner);
b. include anything we consider offensive, inappropriate or defamatory (this is at our discretion);
c. break the law, for example by saying something libellous, or by posting something which results in a criminal offence;
d. share the personal information of living people without their permission;
e. impersonate another person;
f. collect or use any information from this website with the intent to harm, discredit, harass or prejudice any other person;  or
g. do anything which impacts the service or performance of the website.

You are responsible for managing any content you create, including using any privacy settings we make available. We reserve the right to remove content that you create, at our discretion. Any content we decide to remove will be done in accordance with our Takedown policy.

How we use content created by users: You keep the copyright in any content that you create or publish on the website, but by publishing it you give us permission (a non-exclusive, perpetual, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide licence) to use it (including editing, adapting or modifying it as we wish) for any purpose and in any media now known or invented in the future.   Please be aware that we may not credit you as the author of the material.

If we use any of your personal information (for example your name) in connection with it, we will ask your permission first.

Examples of how we may use your content are that we may make it available to other users of the website, to users of websites that are either part of our company group or with whom we have a partnership, and by internet search engines. 

Monitoring content created by users: We do not monitor content published by our users and take no responsibility for things that you or others publish.

CONTENT COMPLAINTS & TAKEDOWN

Recognising copyright owners: If you believe that you own the copyright in any of the content on the website, and we have not recognised you as the copyright owner, please contact us and we will take down the content and investigate quickly.

Offensive, defamatory or inappropriate content: If you believe that any content on the website is offensive, defamatory or otherwise inappropriate, please contact us and we will investigate quickly.

Takedown policy: While we investigate reports of inappropriate content or copyright questions, we may temporarily remove the content in question. If we agree that you are the copyright owner or that the content is inappropriate, we will work with you to find a solution that you agree with, or we will take the relevant content off the website.

LIMITATIONS

Availability of the service: We do not guarantee or promise that our services will always be available or fully functional. We will not be liable to you for any losses you might suffer from lack of availability.

Changes to the service: Our services are provided on an “as is” basis and are subject to change. We reserve the right to withdraw elements of the service or any content within it at any time and will not be liable to you for any losses you might suffer.  However where we remove content from your subscription, we will try to replace any content you have paid for with a comparable substitute.

Things beyond our control: We will not be liable to you for any loss you may suffer during any period where we cannot provide a service as a result of circumstances beyond our control. This includes circumstances such as Acts of God, strikes, equipment failure and anything else we cannot reasonably be expected to have control over. We will always try to notify you about such problems.

Some legal bits: 

Liability: The only warranties or promises we give are set out in this document. We can’t accept liability for any indirect or consequential losses, loss of data or any unwanted use of your content you suffer from using the website, although we never limit liability for personal injury or death caused by our negligence, fraud or breach of statutory duty. For any other loss you suffer that is caused by us, we limit the liability we have to you to the total money you spent on the website in the 12 calendar months before the event giving rise to the claim. Your statutory rights are not affected.

Content Providers: If you violate the copyright of any copyright owner who licences content on the website to us, they can also take action against you directly.

Assignment: These Terms & conditions and our Privacy & cookie policy are personal to you, and you are not allowed to transfer your rights under this agreement to anyone else. 

Severance: If any part of these Terms & conditions, or the Privacy & cookie policy no longer applies or is no longer legally enforceable, it will be removed and the rest will continue to apply.

The law: These Terms are made under English law, and any arguments about them will only be heard in English courts.

Changes to this agreement: Any changes we make to this agreement will be made on this page and dated.  If they are material changes (as opposed to minor typographical, stylistic changes or those that will not affect the service provided to you) and you are not happy with these changes, please let us know.  If you do not agree to the new Terms & conditions, we will (at our discretion) cancel your subscription or other payment package and provide you with a pro-rata refund. 

When we might stop you using the website: If you break these Terms & conditions, regularly break the fair usage limit, or we cannot take a payment for a subscription when it is due, we reserve the right to stop you using the website and to terminate our agreement. In all these cases you will have no right to a refund.

Customer support and complaints: We always aim to fix problems where we can. If you have a question, suggestion or complaint about the website or any of the content featured on the website please let us know and we’ll do our best to sort it out.

We hope that’s clear (and fair). If you feel it isn’t or you have another question that isn’t covered, please get in touch.