Terms And Conditions

Please read these terms and conditions in full as they provide important information on what I will do for you and what you must do under the contract. In particular I draw your attention to clauses 6 (Refunds), 7 (Cancellations), 10 (Insurance and Liability) and 16 (Your obligations in relation to your work).

Who l am

You can find everything you need to know about me, Rebecca Mascull (trading as Becca Novelista), and the goods and services that I offer on this website. This website provides information about me and the goods and services that I offer. I do not conclude contracts through this website.

Who you are

2.1 I offer services to businesses and consumers.

(a) You are a business if you are acting for purposes relating to your trade, business, craft or profession. This means if you are a published author (whether independently or traditionally published) earning royalties from your book(s) then you are acting as a business.

(b) You are a consumer if you are acting outside of your trade, business, craft or profession. This means that if you are coming to me as a student or because you’ve written a novel in your spare time you are acting as a consumer.

2.2 I do not provide services to anyone under the age of 18 or anyone who fulfils the UK legal definition of ‘vulnerable adults’. Please ensure you do not fall within these categories if you wish to purchase services from me. It is your responsibility to inform me of your age and designation in this case and, if so, you will not be permitted to purchase my services.

These terms apply

By accessing this site and any of the services I provide from this site, you agree to be bound by these Terms and Conditions, as well as all relevant regulations and laws. By accessing or using this site or contacting me to purchase books or services from me, you agree to these Terms and Conditions. If you do not agree to any part of these Terms and Conditions, you do not have my permission to access or use this site or to purchase books or services from me. If you breach anything contained in these Terms and Conditions, I reserve the right to cancel any service with immediate effect, whether or not you have paid.

How I form contracts

I do not form contracts online. If you wish to purchase my services, please contact me via the contact form on this website with details of the services you require. For enquiries about mentoring services, please include the first five (5) pages of your manuscript (these should be A4 and sent in Word) as a sample.

On receipt of your enquiry I will respond and let you know my fees for the services and the timescales within which I estimate I will be able to deliver them. The contract between us is formed when you confirm in writing that you wish to proceed and you have paid the appropriate fee.

Prices and Payment

5.1 The prices quoted on my website for mentoring services are provided as guidelines only. After I’ve received the sample of your work, I will email you with the price for providing the services to you which will be determined by taking into account the amount of time that will be involved in providing the mentoring service. You can then decide if you wish to proceed with the mentoring services or not.

5.2 Payment for books and services must be paid to me up-front before the work is carried out or the book is posted.

5.3 After we have agreed a booking for any service on this site, I will invoice you for payment in full. Payment terms are 7 days from the date of invoice unless the service is due to commence/occur within 7 days of the date of invoice in which case the invoice must be paid on receipt. For mentoring and academic writing tutoring your booking will be held for 7 days only. When I have received the payment, I will carry out the services agreed according to these Terms and Conditions and the agreed timescales. I will enter into no discussion on reducing or otherwise changing the fees stated on this website. My fees are not subject to VAT.

5.4 Invoices must be paid by bank transfer via BACS to the account set out on the invoice. Please note that I will enter into no discussion on any other method of payment.

5.5 Please note that if you do not pay the invoice within 7 days, I reserve the right to reallocate the timeslot I’d set aside to deliver the services to you. Late payment may therefore result in a delay in the services being provided. I will notify you as soon as I receive payment of the new timeslot for delivering the services to you.

Refunds

6.1 Where you are contracting for my services as a business, I offer no refunds for any services for which we have formed a contract and which you have paid for. I will enter into no discussions about refunds.

6.2 Where you are contracting for my services as a consumer, please be aware that I only offer refunds in exceptional circumstances. Please see clause 7.2 which set out the only circumstances in which a refund will be given.

Cancellations

7.1 Where you are contracting for my services as a business, you can only cancel a service before payment has been made. If a booking has been made by you, this can, by written agreement be postponed to a later date by either you or by me, but once you have paid for the service no refunds will be given even if you decide to cancel or otherwise not to take up the services you have paid for. As specified in clause 6.1 above, no refunds are given.

7.2 Where you are contracting for my services as a consumer, there may be circumstances where you wish to cancel the services you have purchased from me. In the first event I will look to reschedule the services to a later date and will ask you to confirm in writing that you agree to such later date. However, if that is not possible, cancellation charges will apply. This is because cancellations cost me money as I have allocated time to carry out the services for you and it is difficult for me to find services for other customers to fill that timeslot especially if the cancellation occurs on short notice.

In the event of a cancellation I will endeavour to obtain another booking for the time I had allocated to carry out the services for you. If I am able to do this I will waive some or all of the cancellation charges. The amounts set out below are provided as a guide to the likely level of cancellation charges:

Date of Cancellation	Cancellation charge paid by you
More than three months before the start of the time allocated to provide the services to you	An administrative fee of £50 to cover my time and expenses in relation to the booking.
Between three months and one month before the start of the time allocated to provide the services to you.	25% of the total sum for the services as stated on the invoice.
Between one month and two weeks before the start of the time allocated to provide the services to you.	50% of the total sum for the services as stated on the invoice.
Less than two weeks before the start of the time allocated to provide the services to you.	75% of the total sum for the services as stated on the invoice.

My cancellation charges are a genuine pre-estimate of our losses in the event of cancellation but if my actual costs are less than the sums set out in the table above I will only invoice for or retain the sum necessary to meet my reasonable loss of earnings.

Timescales

8.1 I will provide you with a timescale within which I expect to carry out the services. Please note that timescales are estimates only and although I will always endeavour to meet these deadlines, there may be unforeseen circumstances – one example being me suffering from the effects of any illness – where the service may, without notice, be delayed and postponed. I will inform you of this delay as soon as I can and provide you with the expected alternative date by which I will have completed the service. Time shall not be of the essence in the delivery of the services.

8.2 In the case of video sessions, I reserve the right to postpone these due to unforeseen circumstances. I will always try to give you as much notice as possible if I need to postpone but in the event of an emergency (e.g. a power cut, family emergency or sudden onset of illness) that may not be possible. If it is necessary to postpone I will agree with you a mutually acceptable date and time to reschedule the video session to.

Links to third party websites

This site may contain hyperlinks to sites operated by third parties. I am in no way responsible for any of the contents found on these third party websites, or the actions and practices of these other websites or any outcome for you of using these third party websites. Also, any third party practitioners mentioned on this site (e.g. any editors recommended by this site) are not part of these Terms and Conditions. I am not liable for any relationship you enter into with these third party practitioners. They will have their own Terms and Conditions and it is your responsibility to seek these out from those third party practitioners. I have no liability for any actions of any third party practitioners, services or sites.

Insurance and liability

10.1 I have public liability insurance.

10.2 I am not responsible for losses you suffer caused by me breaking this contract if the loss is:

Unexpected. It was not obvious that it would happen and nothing you said to me before I accepted your order meant I should have expected it (so, in the law, the loss was unforeseeable).
Caused by a delaying event outside our control. As long as I have taken the steps set out in clause 23.
Something you could have avoided by taking reasonable action.

10.3 I am not responsible or liable in any way for how you use the advice or opinions I give during the supply of the services. All the work I do with you and the advice given will be based on my experience and my own opinions and it is your responsibility how you then use that afterwards. I do not guarantee that my advice will lead to any particular outcome (e.g. a publication deal). I will not enter into any discussion if you are unhappy with my opinions or advice given.

10.4 If you are a business then save in respect of any liability which cannot legally be limited, our total liability to you for all losses arising under or in connection with any contract between us, whether in contract, tort (including negligence), breach of statutory duty, or otherwise, shall be limited to what you paid for the service and all claims for loss of profit or indirect or consequential loss are wholly excluded.

Expectations

11.1 I will carry out the services:

(a) using reasonable skill and care,

(b) according to this contract; and

11.2 Please note that I will not enter into any discussion regarding your expectations of the work I carry out beyond this.

Professional Behaviour

12.1 I will treat you with professional respect and courtesy and I expect the same in return. If you behave in a manner which is deemed by me to show a lack of professional respect and courtesy to me, I reserve the right to terminate our professional working agreements with immediate effect and no refund will be given. I also reserve the right to refuse any request for the services without having to provide you with an explanation.

12.2 I reserve the right to immediately end any video event if I deem the situation or behaviour of any participants to be offensive or otherwise unacceptable. No refunds will be given if this is the case.

Offensive and/or unoriginal work

13.1 You promise to me that:

(a) your work does not include excessively sexual content or pornography, excessive violence or excessively extreme political views;

(b) that the work is fully your original work only and no part, however small, is plagiarized; and

13.2 If your work is not original, has been generated by AI or I deem your work to be excessively offensive, I reserve the right to refuse to provide you with the services. If you are a business, I will not provide any refund once the service has been started. If you are a consumer, I will issue a partial refund after deducting a reasonable sum for the work completed by me before the content of the work or its plagiarised state became apparent.

Contact

You must respect the boundaries of me and my services and must not attempt to contact me unnecessarily via email or any other method outside of what is deemed necessary for the services I provide.

Your obligations in relation to your work

15.1 For mentoring services and video calls I require a sample of your work (i.e. five (5) pages of A4). This is to ensure that I am the right person to provide the services to you and that I believe my approach will work for you.

15.2 I will not share your work with any third party without your consent in writing.

15.3 If you share with me any writing that you claim is your own work, you bear full and absolute responsibility for the following:

(a) the content and usage of any of your work by you;

(b) any changes you decide to make based on suggestions I’ve given;

(d) that you retain an original copy of all your work in email records or saved on any devices you yourself use; and

(e) any errors or omissions arising because you have not communicated your requirements clearly

Academic Writing Tutor terms

16.1 In addition to the above, the following clause 16 applies when I am providing academic writing tutoring.

16.2 I do not read any of your writing outside of the video sessions. All of our work on your writing will take place during the allotted session. During one hour, we should be able to work through around 2500 words of academic writing, depending on how much work is needed (i.e. more time may be needed than 1 hour depending on the work provided). However, it is useful for me and you that I have any documents you want to work on during the session emailed to me before the session begins, to avoid wasting your session time in emailing. Thus, please email any relevant documents for our session (e.g. assignment details, essay plans, rough draft) to me before our session begins, so that I have them ready and I can share them on screen during our session.

16.3 I do not comment on the content of your writing (i.e. I am not an academic in your subject and cannot give you advice on mark schemes, what kind of marks you might get or anything related to your choice of what content to include in your work etc.) This is the role of your university tutors. My role is to help you with your written expression and the structure of your ideas i.e. to help you convey your chosen content with the most clarity.

16.4 The use of AI to create original prose is not acceptable. I reserve the right to cease to provide the services if you continue to use AI for your academic writing.

Postage and packing

17.1 Postage will be the cheapest method via Royal Mail. If you wish me to use a more expensive method e.g. Signed For, you will need to pay in full for this extra expense, agreed in writing AND paid for in full before I send the package. I will send you a photo of the package franked with the correct postage as evidence it has been paid by me.

17.2 I am not liable for any loss or damage for books I have posted to you, once I have paid for delivery of the package and I have handed the package to the Post Office employee. Please contact Royal Mail about any loss or damage incurred.

Recording of video sessions & use of camera for writing mentor, academic writing tutor or for author virtual visits

I do not record my video sessions with you either via audio or audio-visually. I do not give my permission for you or anyone to record these video sessions either via audio or audio-visually. Also, please ensure that you have a working camera for all video sessions with me, as I do not provide video sessions to clients without working cameras.

Technical difficulties during author virtual visits and writing mentor meetings

I use Google Meets for all of my video meetings which is generally recognised as being user-friendly and straightforward to use. Please acquaint yourself with how Google Meets works before we meet, especially if you’re running a reading or writing group and ensure all group members attending are also familiar with the functionality of Google Meets. I am not responsible for technical issues beyond my control with your experience of using Google Meets (e.g. your WiFi connection, your hardware or software on your own systems etc.) I will always try to resolve any technical glitches but if systems fail for you or me or both, it may be necessary to postpone and retry another time.

Length of written reports as writing mentor

20.1 The length of the report will be dependent on how much advice I feel your writing needs. Reports tend to be:

for the opening 10,000 words, around 2 sides of A4 (i.e. approximately 1000 words). I will go into more detail on the opening chapters as these are key to the development of the rest of the novel and crucial for submissions to other professionals;
for the full novel, around 4 sides of A4 (i.e. approximately 2000 words). The points raised will have a broader focus.

This information is provided as a guideline only. Reports may be longer or shorter depending on the stage the work is at.

20.2 Please note that I do not mark up your manuscript with comments and suggested amendments.

20.3 Please note that as a writing mentor I will not be correcting spelling and grammatical errors in your manuscript. I will mention that such errors exist and recommend that you employ the services of a proofreader.

Length of time taken by me to read your work and provide the report as writing mentor

21.2 I allocate one week from the date I begin reading your work per 10k words of your work for my reading time. Thus, it could take up to 10 weeks to read and write a report on a novel of 100k words. This is an estimate only and the services may take longer if your work needs more attention. However, it will usually be less than the timescales stated. If you need my feedback before a certain date, let me know in writing and I will do my best to achieve that date if I am able.

21.2 If you send me 10k words to read and write a report on, I estimate that I will deliver the report to you within one month of agreeing to read the work, once payment has been made, though this will depend on my other responsibilities.

Intellectual Property

22.1 Everything on this website is the intellectual property of Rebecca Mascull, owner and sole-proprietor and is copyrighted 2025 onwards. Nothing from this site should be used elsewhere for any purpose without my written permission and I retain the right to refuse that permission for any reason at any time.

22.2 I do not permit text and data mining of this website.

22.3 The intellectual property rights in the report that I provide to you are owned by me. You agree not to share my report with any third party without my written permission.

I’m not responsible for delays outside of my control

If my supply of your service is delayed by an event outside my control, I will contact you as soon as possible to let you know and do what I can to reduce the delay. As long as I do this, I won’t compensate you for the delay, but if the delay is likely to be substantial (i.e. in excess of 90 days) you can contact me to end the contract and receive a refund for any services you have paid for in advance, but not received.

Other important terms

24.1 I will not transfer my contract with you to a different organisation. You may not transfer your contract with me to anyone else.

24.2 This contract is between me and you. Nobody else can enforce it and neither of us will need to ask anybody else to sign-off on ending or changing it.

24.3 If a court or other authority decides that some of these terms are unlawful, the rest will continue to apply.

24.4 Even if I delay in enforcing this contract, I can still enforce it later. I might not immediately chase you for not doing something (like paying) or for doing something you’re not allowed to, but that doesn’t mean I can’t do it later.

24.5 These terms are governed by English law and wherever you live you can bring claims against us in the English courts. If you live in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, you can also bring claims against us in the courts of the country you live in. We can claim against you in the courts of the country you live in.

Changes to website and Terms of Service

I retain the right to make changes to this website and to these terms and conditions at any time.

Rebecca Mascull 2025

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