Terms of service

These terms cover two things: reading bumfuzzledjane.com, which is free and asks nothing of you, and hiring the practice, which does. Most of what follows is the second kind, and none of it is designed to surprise you later.

Accepting these terms

Using this site means accepting these terms, the privacy policy and the disclaimer. Articles in the journal are general information rather than advice about your building. You may read, print and share pages for personal use; you may not scrape the site, republish articles in substantial part, or train a commercial model on them without written permission.

Engaging us also means accepting the written scope issued for your project. Where the scope and this page disagree, the scope wins, because it was written for your house and this page was not.

Who you are contracting with

Bumfuzzled Jane is the trading name of Jane Halloway, a sole proprietor in Portland, Oregon, practicing as an independent interior design consultant since 2014. No engagement creates an agency, partnership or joint venture: we cannot sign contracts, approve payments, accept deliveries or instruct trades on your behalf. More is on the about page.

The consulting relationship

We are consultants. We work out what should happen, write it down in a form a trade can build from, and set the order to do it in. We do not build, install, order, receive, store, deliver or return goods, and we are not your general contractor. Every engagement begins with a written scope naming the rooms covered, the deliverables, the revision rounds, the flat fee and deposit and the expected dates. Work begins when that scope is accepted and the deposit clears.

What is included, and what is not

Unless your scope says otherwise, no engagement includes:

• construction, installation, painting, carpentry or labor of any kind
• purchasing, ordering, expediting, receiving, storing or returning goods
• stamped drawings, permit applications, engineering calculations or as-built surveys
• site supervision, safety inspection or quality control of another party’s work
• warranty administration, or pursuing claims against a contractor or vendor for you
• anything not written in the scope, however reasonable it sounds in an email

Fees, deposits and payment

• Flat quoting. Every engagement is quoted as a fixed number in writing before it begins. It moves only if you change what you asked for, and then we re-quote and wait for a yes.
• Direction calls are paid in full at booking, which is what holds the slot. Room plans and whole-home concepts take a 50% deposit, with the balance due on delivery of the final files. Retainers are invoiced monthly in advance.
• Payment is by card or bank transfer through our invoicing provider, due within 7 days. No payment is taken on bumfuzzledjane.com, and we never ask for card details by email or phone.
• Late balances accrue 1.5% a month after 30 days; final files are released when the balance clears.
• Fees exclude anything you buy for your home, and travel outside the Portland metro.
• No commission. Our fee is the entire income from your project — no trade markup, affiliate margin or referral fee, for the reasons on the about page.

Refunds, cancellation and rescheduling

• Direction calls cancelled more than 48 hours ahead are refunded in full. Inside 48 hours, or a no-show, the fee is retained, though one reschedule is offered where something genuinely went wrong.
• Wrong service. If in the first fifteen minutes we agree this is not the help you need, we stop and refund the whole fee.
• Deposits are refundable less a $150 administration charge until work starts. Once drawing has begun they are non-refundable: they bought calendar weeks turned down elsewhere.
• Retainers end on 14 days written notice; the current month is worked out rather than refunded.
• Delivered work is not refundable on the basis of taste. If a plan does not do what the scope said, tell us and we will fix it.
• Rescheduling is free once with 48 hours notice, then $75. If we move something you get first pick; if we cancel you are refunded in full. Paused projects are held 90 days, then archived, and refunds return to the original method within 10 business days.

Revisions and scope changes

A room plan includes two rounds, a round being one consolidated set of comments. Further revisions and out-of-scope requests are billed at $185 an hour, agreed in writing first. Changing the room, the budget bracket or the brief after work has started is a new scope rather than a revision.

Intellectual property

Copyright in everything we produce — drawings, elevations, schedules, palettes and recaps — remains with Jane Halloway. On full payment you receive a perpetual, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to use those materials to build, furnish and maintain the single property named in your scope, and to share them with any trade working on that house. The license does not cover a second property, a rental portfolio, a spec build or multiple units; reselling or publishing the documents; or handing them to another designer to reissue as their own. Ask and those uses can be licensed separately. If you sell the home the license can pass to the buyer, provided you tell us in writing.

You keep copyright in what you send us and grant us permission to use it to do your work. We reserve the right to photograph completed work for a portfolio, but in practice we always ask first: no photograph, address or identifiable detail of your home appears on bumfuzzledjane.com or on social media without your written permission, which can be withdrawn later.

Your responsibilities

By hiring us you agree to:

• Give us accurate information. Measurements, ceiling heights, window sizes, existing conditions. A plan is only as true as the numbers it was drawn from, and measuring properly takes twenty minutes.
• Verify on site before you buy or cut. Every dimension, doorway and delivery path, even when the plan looks certain.
• Hire your own licensed trades directly. In Oregon that means checking the CCB license, insurance and bond; elsewhere, your state equivalent.
• Obtain permits and approvals, and comply with HOA, condominium, historic district and landlord rules. Tell us early: they change what is worth specifying.
• Disclose known hazards. Pre-1978 homes may contain lead paint and any home may contain asbestos. Testing and abatement are yours to arrange with certified professionals, under the EPA Renovation, Repair and Painting rule.
• Respond in reasonable time. No response for 30 days pauses a project; 90 days archives it.
• Make your own final decisions. We recommend; you decide, you buy, and you sign the construction contract.

Products, vendors and third parties

Prices, finishes and lead times in a schedule are accurate on the day it is issued and go stale quickly. Any purchase is between you and the seller: warranties, returns, damage in transit and backorders are theirs to resolve, and we are not a party to it, though we will help you argue the case. Contractors we name are suggestions, not endorsements. Get three bids, check the license, insurance and references yourself, and read what the quotes tend to hide first. We receive nothing for the introduction.

No guaranteed outcome

Design is judgment applied to constraints that will never repeat. We cannot guarantee that a room will photograph the way a reference image did, that a paint color will read identically under your light, that a contractor will hold their bid, or that a renovation returns a particular figure at resale. What we stand behind: the advice is independent, the plan is priced, and the reasoning is written down, so you can disagree with it on paper before spending money.

Limitation of liability

To the maximum extent permitted by Oregon law:

• our total liability for any claim arising out of an engagement is limited to the fees you actually paid us for it;
• we are not liable for indirect, incidental or consequential losses, including construction delays, cost overruns, lost rent, lost profit, or redoing work carried out by somebody else;
• we are not liable for the acts, workmanship, pricing or scheduling of any contractor, trade, vendor or supplier, whether or not we suggested them;
• we are not liable for outcomes produced by a plan that was not followed, or by measurements we were given that turned out to be wrong.

Nothing here limits liability for fraud, willful misconduct, gross negligence or anything that cannot lawfully be limited. Some states do not allow certain exclusions, so parts of this section may not apply to you.

Indemnity

You agree to indemnify and hold harmless Jane Halloway and Bumfuzzled Jane against claims, damages and reasonable legal costs arising from work carried out on your property by anyone other than us, a required permit you did not obtain, information you gave us that was inaccurate, or use of our documents outside the license above.

Governing law and disputes

Oregon law governs these terms, without regard to conflict-of-law rules, and the venue for any proceeding is the state or federal courts in Multnomah County. Before either of us files anything, we both work through this order:

1. Write to the other describing the problem and what would resolve it, with twenty-one days to respond.
2. If that does not settle it, one session of mediation in Portland or by video, with a mediator we both agree on, costs split evenly.
3. Only then, court.

Small claims are carved out: inside the limit, either of us may go straight there. Claims are brought individually; no class actions.

Ending an engagement

Either side may end an engagement in writing at any time. You pay for work completed and for non-refundable commitments already made on your behalf; we hand over everything produced and issue a final invoice or refund, whichever way the balance falls. We may also end one ourselves, refunding unearned fees, if a client is abusive to us or to their trades, asks us to mislead a contractor, insurer or buyer, or asks us to specify something we believe unsafe.

Changes to these terms

We may update this page, and the date at the top changes when we do. Updates are not retroactive: the version in force on the day your scope was accepted governs your engagement. Continuing to use the site means accepting the current version, and if a clause is found unenforceable the rest stands.

How to reach us

Questions are welcome before you hire us rather than after, and every message reaches Jane Halloway directly. Fees are on the services page, data in the privacy policy, licensing and safety boundaries in the disclaimer, and the contact page has the form.