Legal content disclaimer

The information presented on this Website constitutes general guidance on the law and related matters in South Africa and certain other jurisdictions. The information presented may be editorialised or simplified for the sake of brevity and readability and may at times represent opinion rather than legal or other fact (despite appearing to be factual). It may therefore contain inaccuracies and certainly may not be considered to constitute legal advice. Such information has not been tailored to meet any unique circumstances or requirements of any specific person or entity. We urge you to obtain specific tailored legal advice to address your unique circumstances. You are welcome to contact us at [email protected] to arrange a consultation or to elicit written legal advice.

Any legal templates available for download on this Website are approved by experienced and registered legal practitioners in the fields of Intellectual Property, commercial and other law. Such templates and associated information is not intended to constitute legal advice or amount to legal services but are rather intended to provide useful documentation, links and information. If you are unsure of the meaning or implications of any of the information contained therein or how it applies to your specific circumstances, then you should consult us or another legal practitioner. You are welcome to contact us at [email protected] to arrange a consultation or to elicit written legal advice.

Although we endeavour to keep the information provided on this Website up-to-date and of the highest quality, it is important to remember that the law is constantly changing and evolving. We cannot guarantee that the information will be updated and/or be without errors or omissions at the time of use. Resultantly, we (including our employees, independent contractors, associates, affiliates or other third parties) will under no circumstances be liable for any omissions or negligent actions that may result in any harm or liability flowing from the use of or the inability to use such information.

Search disclaimer

THE SEARCH IS PROVIDED FREE-OF-CHARGE FOR NON-COMMERCIAL, PERSONAL USE ONLY. If you wish to make use of the search for commercial use and/or for the benefit of your organisation, contact us for an authorised license at [email protected].

The records (the ‘Records’) and search results (the ‘Results’) accessible through the instant brand search tool available on the Website (the ‘Search’) are not provided by us. The Search connects to a third party system in order to query these Results and therefore the Results and Records are obtained from and controlled by third party. To our knowledge, the Records and Results are regularly and continuously collated from outdated, publicly accessible monthly advertisements of trade mark applications issued in the South African patent journal and/or from ​from previously conducted and, by now, outdated professional searches and search results accessed by and pooled together by various authorised users and customers of authorised third party providers and/or the South African Trade Marks Register.

Accordingly, we make no warranty as to whether these search Results and Records are correct, complete, accurate and/or current (up-to-date) and can not be held liable for any shortcomings – in fact, because Results are not ‘Live’ and only show some of the details, the Records and Results will therefore necessarily be outdated and incomplete to some degree and we therefore strongly urge you to instruct us (or other trade mark specialists) to conduct an expert professional search of the Official South African Trade Marks Register (the ‘Register) or to otherwise directly obtain the most recent Records directly from the Register. If you would like assistance in this regard please contact us through our contact page, our chat tool or other contact options, or email us at [email protected]. 

We reserve the right to change the terms of access of the Search, Results and Records at any time, at will or on an ad-hoc basis, and restricting, revoking or removing access without notice to you. We provide no warranties and accept no liabilities whatsoever in relation to the Search, Results and Records.

Competitors

If you are in the business of offering trade mark advice, searches or registrations or creating and/or selling documents or templates to others (whether individuals or entities) then you may be in direct competition with us and are expressly excluded and prohibited from using or accessing our Website and the Search or using our Services to obtain search Results or Records for commercial purposes or to download or otherwise obtain any templates or information or to obtain any of the aforementioned through a third party.

If you breach this term you are, and we may hold you, liable for damages incurred by us including (but not limited to) lost sales equal to your gross income resulting from such prohibited and improper use, creation or sale in addition to any other loss that we may sustain. We further reserve the right to revoke and prohibit your continued access of our Website and related services and any of the documents, templates and information contained therein.

Prices and payment

Please note that the prices displayed on the Website and in our marketing materials may change or fluctuate from time to time (with changes in costs of agents, official fees and forex and our own increases). We cannot and do not warrant and guarantee that the prices shown are the prices that are most current and/or applicable. Please contact us at [email protected] to confirm the applicable prices and to obtain a quote or an invoice reflecting the valid costs before relying upon or acting upon such prices.

Prices on the Website are predominately quoted in South African Rand which is the currency in which payment is usually accepted. If you do not hold South African Rand you may pay by debit or credit card, or any other method we may introduce from time to time, and your bank, card or payment provider may exchange the amount charged to the currency of your country at their current rate. 

If you wish to pay in United States Dollars (USD), Euros (EUR), British Pounds (GBP) or another major currency we (without guarantee) may be able to facilitate direct payment to a suitable payment service – thereby potentially saving you additional costs of foreign exchange and administrative charges added by the relevant banking or payment providers. Please contact us at [email protected] for assistance in this regard.

Our invoices reflect payment options in EUR (Euro), USD (United States Dollar) and ZAR (South African Rand).

We reserve the absolute right to amend the pricing of our Services from time to time, at will or on an ad-hoc basis, and to to accept or refuse any payment made in any form. Payment may be made by credit card, debit card or any other such method as we may introduce at our absolute discretion.

We do not hold any credit card or debit card information – such information is managed and held by third party payment providers. Your card company may also do security check to confirm your identity when making a payment.

Your statutory rights are unaffected by these Terms.

Account

Upon creating an account on this Website and/or with us, you must provide us with information that is accurate, complete, and current at all times. Failure to do so constitutes a breach of these Terms, which may result in immediate termination or suspension of your account, the use of this Website and/or our Services.

You are responsible for safeguarding the password that you use to access the Website and Services (whether your password is with our Services or a third-party service) and any activities or actions done with the use of your account details and password may reasonably to be assumed to have been done by you (unless proven otherwise). You agree not to disclose your password to any third party. You must notify us immediately upon becoming aware of any breach of security or unauthorised use of your account by sending an email to: [email protected]

Intellectual Property

This Website presents various content (the “Content”) such as:

• text, articles, blog posts, layout, documents, images, photographs, video, audio, software Such Content amounts to copyrighted works including (but not limited to) literary works, artistic works, sound recordings and cinematographic films, and these are owned by the owners of such copyrighted works, including Brandlaw and other third party owners;
• trade marks, trade names, service marks, logos, style names, trading names and any slogans (collectively ‘Trade Marks’) which are owned by Brandlaw, its associates or third party entities, as the case may be.

All rights in and to the Copyright and the Trade Marks in the Content are protected by trade mark and copyright laws in South Africa and/or Worldwide and the rights therein are reserved by Brandlaw, its associates or third party entities, as the case may be.

You may not copy, download, publish, intentionally store, reproduce, modify, adapt or in any way distribute or accumulate (‘use’) the Content available on this website without our prior written consent. The unauthorised use of the Trade Marks, in the course of trade, for purposes other than those expressly authorised by us, constitutes infringement of the Trade Marks and rights related thereto.

Should prior written consent have been granted (after being sought by you) any or all Content from this Website may only be presented (regardless of format) with the appropriate copyright and trade mark notices, as provided on the Website. In reproducing Trade Marks, you shall reproduce these exactly and accurately as these appear on the Website. 

You may certainly not use or reproduce the Content and/or Trade Marks appearing on this Website in a manner which would in any way damage, injure or impair the reputation of Brandlaw, Viollier Attorneys, our associates and any third parties with rights in and to the Content or Trade Marks.

Reserved Rights

We entirely and exclusively reserve:

• rights of any kind in respect of this Website and the Content which are not expressly granted in these Terms; 
• the right to revoke all rights in these Terms without notice, at any time, and for any or no reason; and
• the right to stop you from accessing and using the Website and reproducing, downloading and using the Content, upon breach of any Terms set out herein, and to make any claims or institute legal action or take any steps that we deem appropriate to address such breach and to protect and enforce our rights or those of our associates.

Website Availability

We do not warrant that access to and use of the Website and the Content will meet your requirements, and cannot guarantee that the Content will be free of any errors and mistakes or inaccuracies, or that there will be no interruptions in service while you are using the Website.

If you detect any errors and mistakes or inaccuracies, or experiences an interruption in service while using the Website, you undertake to kindly report these to us promptly at [email protected] or another of the contact options.

Your access to the Website may from time to time be restricted to allow for repairs, maintenance and the introduction of new functionality. In such event, we will attempt to restore service as soon as reasonably possible.

Personal Information 

You may submit certain information to us using the Website interface or by other means. In doing so, you undertake to:

• provide accurate, current and complete information;
• maintain the security of your password and login credentials; and
• maintain and promptly update the information you provide during this process, so as to keep it accurate, current and complete.

You undertake to read and, by continuing to use the Website and our Services (as defined in the Privacy Policy), you consent to our Privacy Policy setting out additional terms of conditions relating to privacy and use of personal information in relation to the use of this Website and our Services (as defined in the Privacy Policy).

Use of Your Information 

You agree to read our Privacy Policy accessible at www.brandlaw.co.za/privacy for the full terms relating to your privacy and use of your personal information in relation to the use of this Website and our Services.

We are, amongst other things, entitled to use your information to monitor your access to the Website, respond to enquiries or request and/or to send you information about news items or information relating to the Content, from time to time (though you may withdraw your consent as set out in our Privacy Policy). Your information will not be used for any purpose not provided for in our Privacy Policy.

You have the right to access information held about you and we shall provide a copy of the your information in accordance with the terms of our Privacy Policy upon your request by e-mail to: [email protected]

Information you submit

You warrant that information submitted or uploaded via the Website:

• does not infringe any third party’s rights (including without limitation Intellectual Property Rights, reputational rights, rights of confidence and rights of privacy);
• does not violate any law, statute, ordinance, regulation or legally binding code in any jurisdiction;
• is not offensive, threatening, abusive, harassing, menacing or contrary to the principles of internet etiquette;
• is not intended and/or likely to cause harm to our computer systems including that which contains any viruses, Trojan horses, worms, time bombs or other computer programming routines that are intended to damage, detrimentally interfere with, intercept or expropriate any system, data or personal information.

No warranty

This Website and/or the Content are provided by us “AS IS” to you without warranty or representation of any kind, whether expressed or implied, to the fullest extent permitted by applicable law. We make no warranties, nor shall we be liable, for any claims related to or arising from your (or anyone else’s) use of the Content and/or the Website. We accordingly expressly exclude any warranties pertaining to:

• the completeness, veracity, accuracy, availability or currency of the Website or the Content or the reliability of information displayed at or otherwise made available through the Website, nor do we commit to ensuring that the Site remains available or that the Content is kept up-to-date.
• malicious code: we make no representations or warranties that the Website does not contain a malicious code. You acknowledge and accepts the responsibility to operate your own anti-virus protection and other processes to ensure that you are adequately protected.
• secure communications: this Website is accessible via the Internet, and communications transmitted via the Internet are susceptible to monitoring and interception. You are urged to exercise restraint and caution in all communications, and to apply industry-standard protection measures to your communication systems.

Liability and indemnity

Although great care has been exercised to ensure the correctness and completeness of the information provided on this Website, we do not accept any liability for the accuracy thereof – and none of the information shall be deemed to constitute legal advice. 

We will not be liable for any direct or indirect loss or damage or claims arising under these Terms or in connection with the Website, the information provided therein, or the Content, whether arising in delict, tort, contract, or otherwise.

Without limiting the generality of the exclusion of liability above, we will not be liable for any loss of profit, contracts, business, goodwill, data, income, revenue or anticipated savings arising under these Terms or in connection with the Website or the Content, whether direct or indirect, nor will we be liable for any loss or damage arising out of any event that is beyond our reasonable control.

You hereby indemnify and hold us harmless from and against any claims, costs, damages, expenses, and liabilities (including, but not limited to, reasonable attorneys’ fees) arising out of the Website or the Content; or your use of the Website or any Content; or your violation of these Terms.

Links to other websites

This Website may contain links to third party websites for your convenience. We have no control over such websites, and the inclusion of a link to a third party website does not imply a warranty, representation or endorsement by us or the providers of that third party website or its content, or any products or services offered through that website. If you are directed through to a third party website, you will leave the Website, and visit those other websites at your own risk and subject to its terms and conditions.

These Terms  and our Privacy Policy do not extend to any third party websites. 

Severability

If any term or condition of these Terms is determined to be invalid or unenforceable by a court of competent jurisdiction, such provision shall be enforced to the maximum extent possible so as to give effect to the intent of these Terms, and the remainder of these Terms shall continue in full force and effect.

Breach of these Terms

Without prejudice to our other rights under these Terms, if you breach any of these Terms in any way, or if we reasonably suspects that you have breached any of these Terms in any way, we may (but are not obliged to) do any or all of the following:

• send you one or more formal warnings;
• suspend your access to the Website;
• delete your information from our records;
• permanently prohibit you from using the Website;
• block computers using your IP address from accessing the Website;
• contact your internet service provider and request that they block your access to the Website; and/or
• bring court proceeding against you for breach of contract or otherwise.

Where we suspend or prohibit or block your access to the Website, or a part thereof, you shall not take any action to circumvent such suspension or prohibition or block (including without limitation by submitting or using different information).

Non-waiver and/or relaxation

No relaxation by us of any of the Terms will be binding for any purpose unless we express it in writing and sign it. Any such relaxation will be effective only in the specific instance and for the purpose given.

No indulgence granted by us shall constitute a waiver or abandonment of any of our rights in terms of these Terms. We shall not be precluded, as a consequence of having granted that indulgence, from exercising any rights against you which may have arisen in the past or which may arise in the future.

Jurisdiction

These Terms are subject to the laws of the Republic of South Africa. By agreeing to these Terms, you submit to the jurisdiction of the High Court of South Africa for all matters relating to these Terms.

Alternative Dispute Resolution

Any dispute regarding the access to or use of this Website, the Content, and these Terms:

1. shall first be attempted to be resolved in good faith by way of informal negotiation between the parties within seven (7) days of the dispute having been raised in writing;
2. if either party provides written notification to the other in writing that such attempt has failed the parties shall, within ten (10) days attempt to agree to on the appointment of a suitably qualified mediator;
3. if no agreement has been reached as to the appointment of a mediator within ten (10) days after either party has called for such appointment, or where such mediator is not able to mediate a resolution within thirty (30) days after such appointment, then either party may give written notice referring the matter for expedited arbitration in terms of the rules of the Arbitration Foundation of South Africa, to be heard in Cape Town, in English.

This clause shall not preclude either party from obtaining urgent interim relief from a court of competent jurisdiction pending the decision of the arbitrator. 

Changes to our Terms.

If we decide to change our Terms and conditions, we will post those changes on this page. We recommend that you refer back to it regularly.

Privacy Policy

Please also view our Privacy Policy accessible at www.brandlaw.co.za/privacy on this site establishing our policies relating to privacy and personal information collected as a result of the use of our Website and Services (as defined in the Privacy Policy).