AOI Membership Terms

AOI Membership Terms

These are the terms which set out the contractual relationship you have with the Association of Illustrators (‘the AOI’, ‘we’, ‘us’, ‘our’) when you become a member. Please read these terms carefully and print them out for your reference.

They will be binding on you as long as you are a member of the AOI. We will occasionally make changes to these terms. If we do, we will notify you in writing (which includes e-mail) of these changes. If you do not object to these changes in writing (in this case you have to send us an e-mail or letter to our office address clearly expressing your objection to the new terms) within two calendar weeks of the date of the notice, you are deemed to have accepted the new terms. If you object to the new terms, we will regard this as a resignation of your membership at the earliest date at which this is possible (see below under ‘Termination’). In this case, the previous membership terms will apply to you until your membership is terminated.

You become a member when we give you online access to our members only resources – usually within one working day after payment of your membership fee in full or first monthly instalment if you have chosen to pay in monthly instalments.

As a member, you have certain benefits which we will publish from time to time on our website. The level of benefits you receive will depend on your membership status.

We may change benefits available to you or replace a membership status with another or withdraw a membership status altogether from our offer to members. These are deemed changes to our Membership Terms. Consequently, the same procedure of implementation applies as to the change of terms explained above.

The UK Government has introduced sanctions against Russia and Belarus as set out in The Russia (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulation 2019 as amended and The Republic of Belarus (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 as amended.  

The due diligence required to comply with the sanctions places a significant and unacceptable administrative burden on us. To minimise the risk we have therefore taken the difficult decision to exclude from our membership and folios any Russian or Belarusian nationals or any persons ordinarily resident in Russia or living in one of the territories in Ukraine occupied by Russia. 

As a result, the AOI will not offer membership / folios to Russian or Belarusian nationals and/or illustrators based in Russia or agencies established in Russia as well as any persons/agencies currently based or established in Belarus or in one of the territories in Ukraine occupied by Russia.

Conduct

  1. As a member of the AOI we expect you to abide by the Code of Conduct for illustrators / Agents

Payments

  1. We charge an annual membership fee, which you will pay online in full as a lump sum or in monthly instalments via Direct Debit.
  2. If you pay your membership fee in monthly instalments by Direct Debit you must not cancel your Direct Debit until you have paid all instalments until the annual membership fee is paid in full. If you do cancel your Direct Debit early you will still owe us the outstanding amount.

Termination of your membership

  1. Your membership runs for an initial period of twelve calendar months from the date you become a member of the AOI (‘the Initial Period’).
  2. If you do not notify us at least 28 days prior to the end of the Initial Period your membership will continue for another full calendar year.
  3. You can terminate your membership any time during the year but not later than 28 days prior to each anniversary of the Initial Period (i.e. the anniversary of the end date of the initial 12-month period of your membership) if you want your membership to end at the forthcoming anniversary of the Initial Period). If you terminate your membership later than 28 days prior to the anniversary of the Initial Period your membership will terminate at the end of the following anniversary of the Initial Period (i.e. the next anniversary of the end date of the initial 12-month period).
  4. It will be at our discretion to terminate your membership early if you miss the 28 days’ notice period.

Copyright

  1. Should you upload your artwork on AOI Folios (https://theaoi.com/folios/) or share your artwork via social media channels controlled by us (such as Twitter, Instagram, Facebook etc.) you give us permission to share your artwork solely for the purpose of promoting your work and practice as an illustrator/animator – across all our social media channels and on our website.
  2. You warrant that all artwork you upload on AOI Folios or share on our social media channels shall not be defamatory and shall not infringe the copyright or other intellectual property rights or any other rights (including rights of privacy and confidentiality) of any third party anywhere in the world.
  3. You indemnify the AOI against all costs, expenses, damages and losses, including any interest, fines, legal and other professional fees and expenses awarded against or incurred or paid by the AOI as a result of or in connection with any claim brought against the AOI for actual or alleged infringement of a third party’s intellectual property rights arising out of, or in connection with, the receipt or use of your artwork.

Advice and Support

  1. The AOI empowers and supports members with their career and professional development. To that end we provide instructions, guidance, advice and support to our members generally including pricing advice in line with our Pricing policy.
  2. Our staff and advisers are not legally trained and therefore, we cannot and do not provide legal advice. We work with legally qualified professionals to provide appropriate, practical and accurate guidance but recommend in every case that you take independent legal advice before you rely on our advice and guidance or use our document templates. If you decide to rely on our advice or guidance or use our templates without taking professional legal advice, you do so entirely at your own risk.
  3. We cannot guarantee an increase in commission or income as a result of your membership.
  4. We shall not be liable to you to the extent permitted by law, whether in contract, tort (including negligence), breach of statutory duty, or otherwise, for any loss of profit, or any indirect or consequential loss arising under or in connection with your relying on our advice and support including pricing advice via our membership helpline or otherwise, and/or using our online resources including contract template(s).
  5. Should the AOI be found liable under clause 14, we limit our liability to £2 million.

Data sharing

  1. We process and share your personal data with third parties in line with our Privacy Policy and recommend that you read this policy, and AOI Data Protection Policy revised June 2021 carefully to understand your rights in relation to our processing of your personal data.
  2. If you are a member of the AOI and have subscribed to the AOI Folio as part of our Membership plus Folio plan we will normally share your name and contact details with the Directory of Illustration (‘the DOI’) who will send you information about a reciprocal offer of promotion through their online directory, which we believe is of interest to you. As the DOI is based in the USA your data will be processed outside of the EEA. cannot guarantee that your data will be processed and protected to the same standard as under the EU or UK data protection laws. If you do not want us to share your data with the DOI or want the DOI to stop processing your data please email [email protected] asap and we will not share your data with the DOI or ask them to delete your data from their systems.

Dated: 25 January 2023

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