Terms of Service

These Terms are an agreement between you and Guelph Grad Photos Inc. (“Guelph Grad Photos”, “we”, “us”), an Ontario corporation (Ontario Corporation Number 1001764558) and an independent photography business based in Guelph, Ontario, Canada. We are independent: not affiliated with, endorsed by or authorized by the University of Guelph (see section 15). Reach us at [email protected] or (226) 332-0225.

From 1 October 2026, Guelph Grad Photos is run by Guelph Grad Photos Inc. If you booked before then, nothing changes for you: your booking, your price and your gallery carry on as agreed.

When it starts

It starts when you tick the box on our booking page and pay your deposit. If someone else booked for you, the parts of these Terms about your gallery, your account, your photos, the day of the session and privacy apply to you when you open a gallery we made for you, join a group session or make an account.

Your booking confirmation, these Terms, our Delivery Policy and any written quote or agreement we send you for your booking make up our agreement (section 24 says which comes first if they differ), and our Privacy Policy explains how we handle your information. Ontario’s Consumer Protection Act, 2002 gives you rights that no contract can take away, and nothing in these Terms tries to.

Age

You must be 18 or older to book, or a parent or guardian booking for someone younger. Anyone under 18 at the session needs a parent or guardian’s permission to be photographed.

We are a small team: the photographer who founded the business and, for larger groups, a second photographer who works with us. We tell you before your session who will photograph it.

If the photographer you expected cannot come, we tell you as soon as we know and offer you a photographer from our team, a new date, or a full refund. The choice is yours.

Within our business, only the owner and, for the sessions they work, the second photographer see your photos and details. The services and tools that help us run the business are listed in our Privacy Policy.

Booking

Our website describes what each package includes (see our FAQ). You book on our booking page, which shows your package, the package price and the deposit before you pay. We then email your confirmation, with a private link to manage your booking. Keep it, together with a copy of these Terms (use Print or Save in your browser on this page).

If our booking page shows a wrong price, or a time that was not really free, we tell you as soon as we notice and you choose: the correct price or another time, or a full refund.

The deposit

The deposit holds your date and time, and we turn other clients away for it. It also pays for preparing your session, and it comes off your balance. If you cancel or do not come, we keep it, except where these Terms or the law say otherwise. If we cancel, you get it back (section 6).

Anything paid toward the balance before your session, by you or anyone in your group, is refunded in full to whoever paid it if you cancel, if we cancel, or if a session is ended for conduct (section 16): in those cases only the deposit is kept. A missed session is different (section 5): the full balance is owed. Any tip comes back if you ask (section 20). We send any refund we owe within 15 days, to the card it was paid with or another way we agree with you.

The balance

The rest of the package price is due on the day of your session: by card online through your account once your gallery is set up there, by e-transfer, or in cash or by card in person. The balance shown online may not yet include money you paid in person. If it does not match what you have paid, tell us before paying, and if you ever pay more than you owe, we refund the extra.

If your balance is still unpaid after your session, we send you two written reminders. If it is still unpaid 7 days after your session, we charge the card saved at booking for what is owed (section 4). If you need more time, tell us before that day: we can set up instalments so you pay your balance over time, and while you keep to them we do not charge your card for the rest. We may also hold back the gallery until the balance is paid, and we may recover what is owed through Small Claims Court. For a group, the balance belongs to the booking and the saved card is the organizer’s, so we always talk to the organizer first.

A promotion code is checked when you book, one per booking. It comes off the balance unless the offer says otherwise, and has no cash value.

When you pay the deposit, Stripe, our payment processor, saves your card. We never see the full number. By booking, you agree that we may charge that card in these cases, and only these:

• At booking, for the deposit and any tip you choose.
• An unpaid balance. If your balance is still unpaid 7 days after your session, we charge the card for what is owed, after two written reminders (section 3).
• A missed session you did not cancel. We charge the card for the unpaid balance of your package 2 hours after your start time, without further notice (section 5).
• A late cancellation. If you cancel with less than 7 days’ notice, we charge the card the late-cancellation fee in section 5: $100 for each hour you booked, at the moment you cancel.
• When you ask us to.

We never charge it for anything else, and never for a cancellation made with 7 days’ notice or more. Paying your balance online from your account is a separate payment on a secure Stripe page, where you enter a card; that card is not saved. Once your balance is paid, ask and we will remove your saved card.

Moving your session

Use the manage link in your confirmation email to move your session once, to any open time at least 48 hours from when you make the change and no more than 30 days after your original date. You can do this until 7 days before your session starts. Your deposit moves with you and nothing else is charged. A move we make for you (for example, for a storm warning) does not count as your move.

A second move, or a move inside the last 7 days

Ask us from the same link and tell us the date you would like. We will do what we can, but a second move, or a move inside the last 7 days before your session, is not guaranteed, because by then we have turned other clients away for your time.

Changing your package or group size

Message us. A different group size. If someone leaves your group, or someone joins it, we adjust the price to the new size, tell you the new price before we make the change, and email you an updated confirmation. Your booking and your deposit stay as they are. A bigger package. Moving up, for example from Signature to Premium, works the same way: the new price is confirmed with you first, and your booking and deposit stay. A smaller package. Moving down, for example from Premium to Signature, counts as cancelling: we keep the deposit, as under What cancelling costs below, and you book the package you want as a new booking with a new deposit.

Cancelling

Use the same link to cancel, at any time before your session starts. Pick the reason that fits best, add a note if you like, and confirm. You can also tell us by email, message or phone, and the same rules apply.

An example. Your session is on a Saturday at 3 pm, for 90 minutes. You can move it online once, until the Saturday before at 3 pm, to a date up to 30 days after it. After that you can still cancel online, but a cancellation from that Saturday at 3 pm onward is a late cancellation: we keep the deposit and charge your saved card $150.

What cancelling costs

With 7 days’ notice or more, we keep the deposit and nothing else: no fee, and your saved card is not charged. With less than 7 days’ notice, we keep the deposit and charge your saved card a late-cancellation fee of $100 for each hour you booked, worked out to the minute, at the moment you cancel: a 60-minute session is $100 and a 90-minute session is $150. If you booked with less than 7 days to go, this applies from the moment you book. If the charge fails, the fee is still owed and we contact you. Any tip you added is refunded if you ask (section 20).

A missed session. If you do not come and did not cancel first, the full balance of your package is owed. We keep the deposit and charge your saved card for the unpaid balance 2 hours after your start time, without further notice (section 4).

If something serious happens, like an illness, an injury or a death in the family, tell us. We may refund your deposit or move your session. It is our call, but we look at every case with care.

If we have to cancel, or if the photographer is ill or cannot come, you choose: another photographer from our team (if the photographer cannot come), a new date, or a full refund of everything you paid, deposit and tip included. Weather is handled differently, as set out next.

Weather. Our sessions are outdoors, and they go ahead in rain, cloud, cold and snow. We bring umbrellas for everyone in your session, we protect our own equipment from water, and we plan the route for the conditions, so we are well prepared for a wet day. We watch the forecast for every session. We call a session off for weather only when heavy rain or dangerous conditions are expected at your session time: heavy rain, a severe storm warning for Guelph, or conditions such as lightning or ice. When that happens we reach out to you as early as we can and move your session to a new date at no charge, within two months of the original date. A session moved for weather is rescheduled, not refunded. Light rain or wind is not a reason to move or cancel a session that is going ahead: the times in section 5 still apply, and if you do not come, it is a missed session (section 5). At busy times of year the next open date may be several weeks away. This weather rule applies to every session held on or after 8 October 2026, whenever it was booked (section 23). We do not move indoors unless permission to use the space is confirmed.

Your session ends at its booked time, so the next client is not kept waiting. If you arrive late, we make the most of the time left, so message us as soon as you can. If we are late, you still get your full booked time, or a new date for the time you missed, your choice.

If nobody from your booking has arrived or contacted us 30 minutes after the start, we may treat it as a missed session. If you had not cancelled, the full balance of your package is owed and your saved card is charged for it 2 hours after the start time (section 5).

Need breaks, a step-free route, a quieter route or a support person? Tell us by email, text, Instagram, our contact page or a reply to your confirmation email. Before the day is best, so we can plan your session time around them, but you can tell us on the day too. Breaks are part of your booked time and never cost extra. If a disability or health condition means you need more time than your package allows, tell us before the day and we plan a longer or split session with you, at no extra charge. If you would simply like a longer session, ask us about a bigger package. A support person comes at no charge and does not have to be in any photo. Service animals are welcome, and so are mobility and hearing devices, in the frame or out of it, your choice. See accessible sessions.

• The organizer. The person who books is our contact for the group, and confirms that everyone in it has agreed to be photographed. Moving or cancelling goes through the organizer.
• Seats. Once the group’s gallery is set up, each member can take their own seat with their own account, using Join my group, and see the group’s price, what has been paid and the balance.
• Paying. Any seat can pay toward the balance online. If payments together come to more than the balance, we refund the extra.
• On the day. Whatever is still owing is the organizer’s to settle. How the group shares the cost is up to its members.
• The gallery. Everyone in a group session sees the group’s gallery, including solo and couple shots taken during it. If there is a photo you want kept out of the group gallery, tell us before we deliver, or book a session of your own.

• Timing. A sneak peek within 48 hours of your session and your full gallery within 7 days. These are targets, not guarantees. During our peak season (April, June, September and October) your gallery may take longer than usual to arrive: our team is working hard to give every client the best edits we can. We appreciate your patience, and we kindly ask that you avoid sending messages to check on your delivery, because we email you the moment your gallery is ready. See the Delivery Policy.
• How many. The number of edited photos, and of any unedited ones, is as described for your package on our website when you book (see our FAQ). Your gallery has no download limit: you can download every photo in it, as often as you like, in full resolution, whatever package you booked.
• Our choices. We choose which frames to deliver and how to edit them, in the style on our website. We do our best to get the shots you ask for, but cannot promise a particular photo, pose, person or place.
• Extras you did not get to. Some packages include extras such as a LinkedIn headshot, Polaroid prints or a champagne pop. They are offered during your session, and it is up to you and your group to ask for them while there is time. If your session runs its full booked length and an extra was not used, no refund, credit or other compensation is owed. If we cut your session short and that is why an extra was missed, we will make it right with a return visit for that extra or a credit; tell us within 7 days of your session. This applies to bookings made on or after 23 October 2026 (section 23).
• The champagne pop. The bottle we bring for the Premium champagne pop is a non-alcoholic sparkling drink in a glass bottle with a sealed cork, opened and sprayed on camera. It is for the photo, not for drinking. We use it because the University of Guelph does not allow open alcohol on campus and because a sealed glass bottle pops safely. How much it sprays depends on the shake and the pop; we show you how on the day, and the pop is complete once the bottle has been opened on camera.
• Re-edits. If an edited photo needs a small fix, use its Re-edit button in your gallery’s Highlights, or message us, within 14 days of delivery. We retouch; we never invent a person, a place or regalia, and we do not reshape a body or face unless you ask.
• Signature edits. If your gallery shows signature edits, you choose the photos from All Images and we give each one our full signature edit. Your gallery shows how many you have left.
• RAW files (the camera’s unprocessed originals) are not provided unless we agree it in writing before your session.
• Screens and prints. Colours vary between screens and print labs. We are not responsible for prints ordered elsewhere.

Getting in

Your gallery at Your Photos is private, and it opens only while you are signed in to your account. You get an access code with your delivery: sign in, enter it once, and your account is connected to your gallery for good; the code is then spent. Search engines are told not to list galleries. After several wrong codes, codes from that internet connection are paused for about 15 minutes, even if the next one is right. Wait, or message us.

Your keys

Keeping your photos private is our job, and we are committed to keeping your data safe. Your account password and your booking’s manage link are the keys to your photos and your session, so keep them as private as a house key. Anyone who signs in as you can see and download your photos, and can see your booking’s price, what has been paid and the balance. That includes your group’s photos. A session ends after 20 minutes without activity; a countdown warns you first. Your gallery link on its own opens nothing; it only leads to the sign-in page. With the manage link, someone can move or cancel your booking.

Once you, or someone you shared with, passes keys or photos on, we cannot control what happens next, and we are not responsible for it. If you think your password has got out, change it on your account’s Security page, which can also sign out every other device, or tell us and we will do it with you, usually the same day. If an unused access code has got out, tell us and we replace it; if an account you do not recognise is connected to your gallery, we disconnect it and issue you a new code. The link that manages your booking cannot be replaced, so if it gets out, tell us and we will keep watch on your booking and undo any change you did not make, wherever we can. Nothing here limits our own responsibility to keep our systems secure.

How long it stays online

At least until the date shown in your gallery, or two months from delivery if none is shown. After that we may take it down. We may email you a reminder first, but please do not count on it: download your photos as soon as they arrive. We cannot promise to keep a copy, and our gallery is a convenience, not your backup. If a balance is unpaid, we may hold back a gallery (section 3).

Your account

One account per person; keep your password private. We may suspend an account that is misused. From your account page you can download a copy of your account information, close the account, or delete it for good. Closing ends sign-in, removes your sign-in methods, gallery connections and settings, and turns off the marketing choice saved in your account. To stop all marketing email from us, use the unsubscribe link in any of our emails, or tell us and we will add you to our do-not-email list.

After you close your account we keep your account record, profile, the scrambled form of your password, your activity log, and your booking and payment records. Deleting your account removes your account record, sign-in methods, profile, password, gallery connections, settings and activity log for good; we keep your booking and payment records, as the law requires, and your gallery and its activity as our record of what we delivered. Neither closing nor deleting removes the gallery itself; ask and we delete what the law does not require us to keep. If you want a new account connected to your gallery later, ask us.

The copyright in your photos stays with us and the photographers who took them, as Canadian law provides. You get a licence, meaning permission to use them for personal, non-commercial purposes: print them, post them, share them, and use them on your own profiles, including professional ones such as LinkedIn or a résumé. Canadian copyright law also gives this right to a client who commissions and pays for photos for personal purposes.

Using a photo of yourself to introduce yourself, on your own website, portfolio or profile, is fine. Using our photos in an advertisement, on a company’s or organization’s page, or to promote a business, club, brand or product needs our written permission, and so does selling or licensing them. If a photo shows a University of Guelph sign, crest or logo, commercial use may also need the University’s permission.

Crop them and use normal filters as you like. Please do not pass off an edited or AI-changed version as our work, or use our photos to train AI. A credit or tag is appreciated, never required.

Your gallery is private and delivered to you. By booking, you also agree that we may use photos from your session in our marketing:

• our website and guide pages;
• our own Instagram, Facebook and TikTok posts;
• our promotions, including paid advertising.

This is how most grads find us. It is your choice, though: if you would rather your photos were not used, tell us by email or message at any time, before or after your session, and we will not use them. Say no to all of it, to one channel, or for particular photos. Saying no never changes your price or your service.

If a photo of you is already in use, tell us and we take it down from everything we control as soon as we can. We cannot recall prints already made or posts other people have shared.

• Under 18. We use a photo of anyone under 18 only with a parent or guardian’s written yes, and never in paid advertising.
• Group photos. Anyone in a group photo can ask us not to use it, or to take it down, and we do; where we can, we crop to the people who are happy to be in it instead.
• The University. We never use a photo to suggest that the University of Guelph endorses us.

Whenever you booked, this section applies, and so does your right to say no.

Photos can include other people: your group, family and friends, and people passing by. Please make sure everyone you bring knows they will be photographed and is happy to be. We keep passers-by out of the frame where we can, and leave out or blur anyone who asks. When you share a photo, please respect the people in it. Anyone in a photo we have published can ask us to take it down, and we take down what we control as soon as we can.

Work for an organization, such as a club, a faculty or department, a company or an event, is covered by a separate written agreement with it. The organization tells the people being photographed and chooses whether the gallery is public. Where that agreement is silent, these Terms apply.

Working for a club, a student group or a University department does not make us part of the University or endorsed by it. The organization confirms that we may show its name and logo, and we take either down if it asks.

Our Clubs and Faculty galleries are public and free to download by design. Visitors may use those photos personally; commercial use needs our written permission. If you are in one and would rather not be, email us and it comes down as soon as we can.

Headshots and other sessions follow these Terms unless a written agreement says otherwise.

Guelph Grad Photos Inc. is an independent business run by a University of Guelph graduate. We are not part of the University of Guelph, and we are not affiliated with, endorsed by, sponsored by or authorized by it. We are not the University’s convocation photographer: the University has its own photographer for convocation. We use the name of the University and its buildings only to describe where our sessions take place.

We are guests on the University’s grounds, and we act like it:

• We follow the University’s rules for its grounds. We are bringing our locations guide into line with the Arboretum’s guidance for photographers, and we stay out of the areas it asks us to avoid.
• For groups of ten or more, we use the Arboretum only with its approval. Without it, we choose another spot.
• Sessions are outdoors. We do not take sessions into classrooms, labs, library study areas, research greenhouses or offices, and we go inside any other building only when permission is confirmed. No drones.
• Ceremonies, classes, exams, memorials and University events come first. On convocation days we stay clear of the ceremony venues, the Convocation Tea and the shuttle stops while ceremonies are on. We may move spots on the day if a space is in use or we are asked, and if University staff ask us to pause or leave, we do so at once.
• On campus itself we never sell: no cards, flyers, posters, signs or chalk, and we never approach anyone there to offer a session. Every session is booked ahead.

The campus is not ours, so we cannot promise that any particular spot will be open on your day. If a spot is closed, we choose another nearby. If your session has to stop part way through for a reason outside anyone’s control, such as a closure, a University event or a request from University staff, you choose: the unfinished part on a new date at no charge, or a refund of the share of the package price for the time you did not get.

The University is not a party to these Terms (it has no part in this agreement) and is not responsible for our sessions. You can read how we work on campus on Our Mission.

The University’s rules for its grounds, and our own care for the places we photograph, mean a few things for everyone at your session. You make sure everyone who comes with you follows them.

• Follow the photographer’s safety directions. Do not climb or sit on statues, signs, fountains, walls, the cannon or the Portico, and stay on paths and lawns, out of garden beds.
• No alcohol, confetti, glitter, balloons, candles, open flames, smoke devices, or anything that could mark a surface or be left behind. Do not paint or touch fresh paint on the cannon.
• Keep doors, ramps, fire lanes and bike paths clear, and be quiet and respectful at memorials and the Arboretum’s Indigenous plantings.
• Sessions are outdoors, on paths, grass and steps. Wear shoes you can walk in, go at your own pace, and say no to any pose or spot you are not comfortable with.
• You look after your belongings during the session, and any regalia or props we lend you: return them as you got them, normal wear excepted. Your party is responsible for damage it causes.
• Pets are welcome by arrangement, where the grounds allow them: ask first, keep them on a leash, and bring someone to handle them.
• We may end a session if anyone in your party is abusive or harassing, or puts people or property at risk. If that happens, we keep the deposit, refund anything already paid toward the balance, and nothing else is owed. If you would like the photos already taken, pay the balance instead and we deliver them.

Liability means being legally responsible for a loss.

Our part

We take reasonable care with your files. If photos are still lost through equipment failure, you choose: a free reshoot, or a refund. If all your photos are lost, the refund is everything you paid; if only some are lost, it is a fair share of the package price for what was lost.

If anything else goes wrong that is our fault, the most we owe you is what you paid us for that booking. We are not responsible for indirect losses (knock-on costs such as travel or missed plans), or for what other people, or the owners of the places we photograph, do.

Nothing here limits what the law does not let us limit. That includes the promise Ontario’s Consumer Protection Act, 2002 makes for you that our service will be of reasonably acceptable quality, and our responsibility for our own gross negligence (serious carelessness) or for injury we cause.

Your part

If you use our photos in a way these Terms do not allow, or tell us everyone in your group agreed to be photographed when they had not, and someone makes a claim against us because of it, you are responsible for that claim and its reasonable costs. The legal word for this is an indemnity.

Sometimes things happen that nobody can control: the photographer’s own illness or emergency, a public health order, a University closure or event, construction, or a power or network failure. The legal term is force majeure. If one of these stops us from holding your session, neither of us has broken this agreement, and you choose: a new date at no charge, or a full refund of what you paid. If a session has to stop part way through, section 15 applies. Weather is covered by section 6, and your own illness or emergency by section 5.

How we collect, use, keep and protect your information and photos is in our Privacy Policy, including how we use AI. In short: a person chooses and checks every photo, and AI never decides a booking, refund, price, gallery release or complaint.

Tips are optional. The deposit page starts on a suggested tip, and you can change it to any of the choices, including none, before you pay. Tips go to the photographer. If we cancel, your tip comes back with your deposit. If your session does not go ahead for another reason, ask and we refund it.

Tax. Prices are in Canadian dollars. The package price shown when you book is the total for your package. Nothing is added later unless you change your booking (section 5) or choose to add a tip. If sales tax ever applies, it is shown before you pay.

We try to get every answer right, but a reply by message, email or chat can be wrong. What your booking includes and costs is what the booking page and your confirmation email say, or, for a session booked another way, what is in a written quote or agreement we send you. If a reply from us got something wrong and you relied on it, tell us: we will either honour it or let you cancel with a full refund of what you paid.

Please talk to us first. Email [email protected] and we will reply within 14 days and try to put it right.

These Terms are governed by the law of Ontario and the federal law of Canada that applies there. Either of us can take a dispute to the courts of Ontario, and Small Claims Court, the simpler court for smaller claims, fits most disputes. There is no arbitration clause (a rule that forces a dispute into a private process instead of a court), so you keep your right to go to court. If you live outside Ontario, you also keep any consumer rights the law where you live gives you.

When we change these Terms, we post the new version on this page with a new date. A change applies to bookings made after that date. Your booking keeps the Terms in place when you booked, and changing them for an existing booking needs your agreement, with two exceptions: a change that only helps you applies to your booking straight away, and the weather rule in section 6 applies to every session held on or after 8 October 2026, whenever it was booked.

If you booked before 27 September 2026, the card rules you accepted when you booked still apply to you: your saved card is charged only if you ask us to, and a missed session costs the deposit only. Everything else in these Terms applies wherever it is better for you than the version you accepted, except the weather rule in section 6, which applies to every session, and section 12 decides how we use your photos.

We keep earlier versions of these Terms. Ask and we will send you the version that was on this page on the day you booked.

Your booking confirmation, these Terms, our Delivery Policy and any written quote or agreement we send you for your booking make up our agreement. If they differ, the written quote or agreement for your booking comes first, then your confirmation, then these Terms, then the Delivery Policy. Our Privacy Policy explains how we handle your information.

If a court finds one part cannot be enforced, the rest still applies (lawyers call this severability). If we do not enforce a term straight away, we have not given it up.

Questions about these Terms, a change to your booking, a link that has got out, or a photo you want taken down: email [email protected], call or text (226) 332-0225, or use our contact page.