Terms and Conditions

These terms govern every engagement between Kristine Knaub, trading as True North Strategy, [STRASSE + HAUSNUMMER], [PLZ + ORT], Germany (“I”, “me”) and the client (“you”).

I contract with businesses only. By applying you confirm that you are acting in the exercise of a trade, business, craft or profession, and not as a consumer. If you apply on behalf of an organisation, you confirm you are authorised to bind it.

I may decline any application without giving reasons. Nothing on my website is an offer capable of acceptance.

The engagement is for a defined work product, not for my time and not for a period of availability. The work product is: the Audit, one written document containing the Un-Copyable Advantage, Prestige Leaks and Digital Prestige Innovation™; and the Executive Briefing, one private recorded video walkthrough.

Execution Architecture is a separate work product, commissioned separately, consisting of one written sequencing document as described on my website at the time of commission.

The work product is complete when both items have been delivered to the email address you provide. Delivery is the point of performance.

I build nothing. No code, no pages, no design files, no implementation, and no supervision of anyone else’s implementation. That is outside scope and cannot be added to this engagement.

There are no calls, no discovery sessions and no meetings. This is a feature of the method, not an omission.

You submit a written application. I reply in writing within two working days, either declining or confirming that I am willing to be commissioned.

If I confirm, I send you a written brief setting out the scope, the fee and the delivery window, together with an invoice.

The contract is formed when payment is received in full in my account. Not on application, not on my confirmation, and not on your instruction to your bank.

The written brief sets out, separately and prominently, that the fee is payable in full before work begins and that it is not refundable once the work product has been delivered. I ask you to confirm those two points by reply in writing before the invoice is issued. Payment without that confirmation is also acceptance.

The fee is stated in the written brief and quoted in euro.

Payment is due in full before work begins. There is no instalment option and no deposit option.

The delivery period begins on the first working day after cleared funds are received.

Bank charges, currency conversion costs and payment provider fees on your side are yours. The full invoiced amount must arrive in my account.

If you are a business established in the EU outside Germany, you must provide a valid VAT identification number before the invoice is issued. Where the reverse charge applies, you account for VAT in your own country.

Any tax, duty or withholding imposed in your country is yours to bear. If your local law requires you to withhold, you must gross up so that the full invoiced amount is received.

Delivery is ten working days from the start of the delivery period, unless the written brief states otherwise. Working days are Monday to Friday excluding public holidays at my place of business.

I need nothing from you during the work. Everything I use is already published or already written.

If I am prevented from delivering by illness, bereavement or an event outside my reasonable control, I will tell you promptly and the delivery date extends by the length of the interruption. If the interruption exceeds thirty days, either of us may terminate and I will refund the fee in proportion to work not yet performed.

The document and the recorded briefing are yours to keep and yours to forward to whoever builds for you.

I answer questions about the work product in writing, without limit. There is no time cap and no question cap. This covers what I have written; it is not further consultancy, not a review of work you commission from others, and not an extension of scope.

There is no revision round and no meeting to defend the findings. If you disagree with a conclusion, you have a document that traces that conclusion to specific material of your own, and you are free to reject it.

You may terminate at any time before delivery. If you do, I remain entitled to the agreed fee less any expenses I save as a result, in accordance with § 648 BGB.

Once the work product has been delivered, the fee is not refundable. Delivery of a completed work product is full performance.

One exception, and it is binding on me: if I find no Un-Copyable Advantage, you receive a short document saying so with the evidence for it, and I refund the fee in full.

On receipt of the full fee you receive a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive licence to use, copy and internally distribute the work product within your organisation, and to share it with suppliers engaged to act on it.

You may not publish the work product, sell it, license it onward, or make it publicly available.

I retain all rights in my methods, frameworks, research approach and underlying materials. Digital Prestige Innovation™ and True North Strategy are mine.

I may refer to the fact of our engagement and to anonymised, non-identifying observations from it. I will not name you, quote you, or describe you identifiably without your written consent.

Each of us will keep the other’s non-public information confidential and use it only for this engagement.

This does not apply to information that is public, was already lawfully held, or must be disclosed by law.

These obligations survive the end of the engagement.

I use established business software to do this work, including hosting, email, payment and research tools. Each is bound by a data processing agreement where one is required. A current list is published in my Privacy Policy.

AI tools form part of my research, in the same way as search engines and databases. I use business-tier tools whose terms provide that inputs are not used to train the provider’s models. I do not enter material you have given me in confidence, or personal data about your staff or clients, into any such tool. Every finding is verified against a primary source and the work product is written and signed off by me. If you would prefer that no AI tool is used at any stage, tell me in writing before you commission and I will work without them.

The work product is analysis and recommendation. It is not a guarantee of any commercial outcome, revenue figure, conversion rate or ranking.

It is not legal, tax, financial, regulatory or medical advice and must not be relied on as any of those.

Decisions about whether and how to act on it are yours.

I am liable without limit for damage arising from intent or gross negligence, for injury to life, body or health, and wherever liability is mandatory by law.

For slight negligence I am liable only for breach of an obligation whose fulfilment is essential to the proper performance of this contract and on which you may reasonably rely. In that case liability is limited to the foreseeable damage typical for this type of contract.

Any other liability is excluded.

Where liability is limited under 11.2, it is capped at the fee you paid for the engagement in question.

I am not liable for loss of profit, loss of anticipated savings, or indirect or consequential loss, except where 11.1 applies.

German law applies, excluding the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods.

The exclusive place of jurisdiction for all disputes is [COURT CITY], Germany, provided you are a merchant, a legal person under public law, or have no general place of jurisdiction in Germany.

I am neither willing nor obliged to participate in dispute resolution proceedings before a consumer arbitration board.

Changes to these terms or to an agreed brief must be in writing. Email is sufficient.

If any provision is or becomes invalid, the rest remains in force.

These terms apply to the exclusion of your own purchase terms or supplier conditions, whether or not I have objected to them.

The version in force at the moment your payment is received governs the engagement.