Terms and Conditions

1. Who this agreement is with

These terms are an agreement between Conduct Science Inc. ("ConductScience", "we", "us") and the lab, facility, company or institution that uses ConductColony ("you"). If you use ConductColony for yourself, "you" means you. ConductColony is the colony management service at conductcolony.com, including its phone app.

If you create an account or accept these terms for an organization, you confirm that you are allowed to do so. Everyone you invite to your organization uses ConductColony under these terms.

By creating an account or using ConductColony, you agree to these terms. If you do not agree, do not use the service.

2. Signed agreements and purchase orders

If you and ConductScience sign a separate agreement for ConductColony, or ConductScience accepts your institution's purchase order terms in writing, that document governs wherever it conflicts with these terms. These terms apply to everything that document does not cover.

Terms printed on a purchase order, or sent with one, apply only where ConductScience has accepted them in writing. A quote from ConductScience that you accept sets your plan, price and term.

3. Accounts and eligibility

You sign in to ConductColony with a ConductScience account. You must be at least 18 years old and able to enter into this agreement.

Give accurate information when you sign up and keep it up to date. Keep your sign-in details private, do not use another person's account, and tell us at once if you think someone has used yours without permission.

You are responsible for what happens in your organization's account, including the people you invite and the roles you give them.

4. Plans, billing and renewal

The pricing page lists the current plans, their prices and their limits, such as the number of cages. Your plan is the one you choose there, or the one in your quote.

Plans paid by card

A plan that shows a price on the pricing page can be paid by card for a term of one month, one year or three years. A yearly plan is charged once a year. A 3-year plan is charged once, in advance, for the three years. Stripe processes card payments for us, and Stripe's own terms apply to the payment.

A card plan renews automatically at the end of each term, for a term of the same length, until you cancel. By buying a card plan you authorize us to charge your payment method, through Stripe, at the start of each term. If the amount will change at renewal, we will tell you the new amount and the date before we charge it, and you can cancel before that date.

You can cancel a card plan at any time from Settings. When you cancel, the plan stays active until the end of the term you have paid for. Your organization then moves to the Free plan and keeps its records.

Fees you have paid are not refundable, unless a signed agreement with us says otherwise or the law requires a refund.

Plans sold by quote

Institution and Enterprise / CRO plans are sold by quote, and you can ask for a quote for any paid plan. We invoice against your purchase order. The quote sets the price, the term, when payment is due and whether the plan renews.

Late payment

If a card payment fails or an invoice is not paid when it is due, we may move your organization to the Free plan until it is paid. Your records are kept.

5. The Free plan and the Starter trial

The Free plan costs nothing and needs no card. Its limits are shown on the pricing page.

Every new organization starts with a 30-day trial of the Starter plan. The trial needs no card. When it ends, your organization moves to the Free plan by itself, nothing is charged, and your records are kept. Each organization gets one trial.

Records that need a paid plan, such as breeding pairs, litters and genotypes, stay in your account when a trial or a paid plan ends. You can work with them again on a plan that includes them.

6. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

• use ConductColony to break the law or anyone's rights;
• open, or try to open, another organization's records, or get around access controls or plan limits;
• disrupt the service or place an unreasonable load on it;
• upload viruses or other harmful code;
• reverse engineer, copy, resell, rent or sublicense the service, except where the law allows it despite this term;
• collect content from the service with automated tools, other than exporting your own records or using the API where your plan includes it;
• store information that you have no right to store.

ConductColony is made for animal colony records. Do not use it to store patient records or other health information about people.

7. Your data

Your records belong to you. They include the animals, cages, lines, breeding records, genotypes, protocols, photos and files that you and your members put into ConductColony.

We store and use your records to provide, secure and support ConductColony for you, and as the law requires. We do not sell your records or share them with advertisers.

The Security page describes how we protect your records and lists every service that handles data for us. Our staff can open your account read-only to help you, and each time is logged.

You can export your animal records as CSV at any time, and billing statements and reports in core facilities. If you decide to leave ConductColony, ask us and we will export all of your organization's records in a standard, portable format.

If you ask us to delete your account, we permanently remove your organization's records and user accounts within 30 days, including from our backups.

You are responsible for your records: that you have the right to store them, and that they are accurate.

ConductScience's Privacy Policy explains how we handle personal information, such as your members' names and email addresses.

8. Confidentiality

Each of us may learn things about the other that are not public. Yours include your records and research plans. Ours include security documents, quotes and features that are not yet released.

The one who receives such information will use it only for this agreement, protect it with reasonable care, and share it only with staff and service providers who need it and must keep it confidential.

This does not apply to information that is public, or becomes public through no fault of the receiver, that the receiver already had or works out independently, or that it lawfully gets from someone else.

Either of us may disclose information when the law requires it, including under public records laws that apply to public institutions. Where the law allows, the one disclosing will tell the other first.

9. Third-party services

ConductColony runs on services from other companies, which the Security page lists. Card payments are also subject to Stripe's terms.

ConductColony may link to, or work with, sites and services that we do not control. We are not responsible for them, and their own terms apply to your use of them.

10. Availability and support

We work to keep ConductColony available, but we do not promise any level of uptime. The service may be unavailable for maintenance or because of a fault, including a fault at a service we rely on.

An uptime or support commitment applies only where a signed agreement between you and ConductScience sets one.

We may add, change or remove features. When a change takes away something your plan includes, we will give notice on the site, in the app or by email.

Support is by email at support@conductscience.com.

11. Our service

ConductScience owns ConductColony: its software, design and documentation, and the ConductColony and ConductScience names and logos. These terms let you use the service while you have an account. They do not transfer ownership of any of it.

Parts of ConductColony are patent pending. The Patents page lists the applications.

If you send us suggestions about ConductColony, we may use them without owing you anything.

12. Warranty disclaimer

ConductColony is a record-keeping tool. It does not replace your institution's animal care and use committee, your veterinary staff or your own judgment, and it does not give veterinary or regulatory advice. You remain responsible for the care and use of your animals, for checking that your records are correct, and for meeting the laws, protocols and policies that apply to you.

Suggestions from AI-assisted features, such as column mappings during import, are suggestions. Check them before you rely on them.

13. Limitation of liability

14. Termination

You can stop using ConductColony at any time. Cancel a card plan from Settings. To close your account and have your records deleted, write to support@conductscience.com.

We may suspend or end your access if you break these terms, if an amount you owe is overdue, or if we must do so to protect the service or other customers.

Whoever ends it, you can ask us for an export of your organization's records, as described under Your data.

The sections on your data, confidentiality, the warranty disclaimer, the limitation of liability and governing law continue to apply after your access ends.

15. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms. We will post the new version on this page with a new date, and we will give notice of important changes on the site, in the app or by email. If you keep using ConductColony after a change takes effect, you accept the new terms.

A signed agreement changes only in the way that agreement allows.

16. Governing law

These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Illinois, including its conflicts of law rules, and the laws of the United States of America. Disputes about these terms or ConductColony will be heard in the state and federal courts of Cook County, Illinois.

17. General

These terms, together with any signed agreement or accepted purchase order terms described above and the pages these terms point to, are the whole agreement between you and us about ConductColony.

If a court finds part of these terms unenforceable, the rest stays in effect. If we do not enforce a term, we have not given it up.

You may not transfer this agreement without our written consent. We may transfer it, for example to a company that takes over ConductColony.

We are not liable for a failure caused by events beyond our reasonable control, such as an outage at a network or hosting provider.

Nothing in these terms makes either of us the other's agent, partner or employee.

We send notices to the email address on your account or show them in the app. Send notices to us at the address below.

18. Contact

Questions about these terms: support@conductscience.com.

Conduct Science Inc., 5250 Old Orchard Road, Suite 300, Skokie, IL 60077, USA.