Research service terms

How an engagement is agreed

The work is done by Northline, operating as Northline Economics. An inquiry or a proposal is not a contract, and no work or fee is agreed until you accept an order on your private order page, or both of us sign a statement of work. Nothing is charged before you accept a written scope and fee. If the statement of work and these terms disagree, the statement of work applies.

Scope and changes

The statement of work names the question, the deliverables, the method and the timeline. A change of scope is priced and agreed in writing before the work on it starts. Dates depend on your inputs arriving when agreed and on when data publishers release their figures.

Fees and payment

Fees are fixed per project, in Canadian dollars, plus GST/HST only if Northline is registered to charge it, in which case the invoice shows the tax and our registration number. A deposit of 50% is due on acceptance, and research starts once it is received. The balance of 50% is due on delivery, by the date on its invoice, which the proposal sets. You receive an invoice and a receipt when each payment is recorded. Your order page or statement of work says how to pay.

Delivery, revisions and acceptance

A person reviews the work before delivery. The fee includes one round of revisions and a call to walk through the findings. Send your comments within 10 business days of delivery. If you send none in that time, the work is accepted. Further rounds are a change of scope.

Cancellation

If you cancel before research starts, we return the deposit less any costs already incurred for you. If you cancel after research starts, the deposit is not refunded, and you pay for the work done up to that date, up to the agreed fee; we then deliver what exists. If we cancel, we return any fees paid for work we have not delivered.

Your inputs

You confirm that you may share what you give us. Confidential client data is outside the scope of an engagement unless the statement of work says otherwise. Please do not send personal information unless it is needed and we have agreed to receive it.

Confidentiality

Each of us keeps the other's confidential information private and uses it only for the engagement. This does not cover information that is public, was already known, or must be disclosed by law. We do not publish your work or name you as a client without your written consent. We may reuse our general methods and what we learn about public data.

AI assistance

Northline uses AI tools to help prepare research, for example in writing text and code and in checking work. They do not replace a person: a named person reviews the work before delivery, and every figure comes from a named source. Your confidential information is not put into an AI service unless the statement of work allows it.

Data sources and licences

Northline works from published third-party data, each under its publisher's licence. Each deliverable names its sources, retrieval dates and licence notes. Redistribution of the data files follows those licences. Each row of a data file carries its attribution and any conditions, and you must keep them.

Not all data may be redistributed commercially. Only sources whose licence permits it are included in what we deliver. Others are cited by link. The following can be read on the free site but are left out of paid work until their terms for paid use are settled, and a deliverable says when a measure was left out for this reason:

• Average rents (Statistics Canada table 34-10-0133-01), which originate with the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC).
• Rental vacancy rates (Statistics Canada table 34-10-0130-01), which originate with the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC).
• Housing starts, completions and units under construction (Statistics Canada tables 34-10-0154-01 and 34-10-0158-01), which also originate with CMHC.
• World Bank indicators that originate with the International Monetary Fund, the International Labour Organization or the International Comparison Program.
• European Central Bank series, because the terms found do not address automated retrieval.

Intellectual property

Once the fee is paid, you may use the deliverables for your internal business purposes and quote them with attribution. You may not resell them, publish them as your own, or suggest that Northline endorses a decision, unless a separate written agreement with Northline allows it: a research partnership may let a firm use a deliverable in its own client work, under its own name, on the terms that agreement sets out. Northline keeps its methods, code and templates, and third-party data stays under its own licence in every case, including in white-label work.

Not advice

Descriptive economic research. It is not investment, financial, legal, tax or real estate advice, and it is not a forecast or a recommendation to buy or sell anything. Scenarios depend on the assumptions stated with them. Northline does not forecast the revenue or costs of an individual business. Decisions remain yours.

Liability

To the extent the law allows, our total liability is limited to the fees you paid for the specific project giving rise to the claim, and we are not liable for indirect, consequential or special loss, or for lost profits, revenue or opportunity. Nothing here limits liability that cannot be limited by law.

Governing law

These terms and each statement of work are governed by the laws of Alberta and the federal laws of Canada that apply there, and disputes go to the courts of Alberta. To ask about these terms, write to contact@canadianeconomicatlas.com.