Terms and conditions of use

Merseyside BioBank receives data from a variety of sources, from large organisations to amateur naturalists. With Merseyside BioBank operating as custodians, these individuals and groups, who provide their records free of charge, retain copyright on their data.

All data passed to a third party (users) by Merseyside BioBank are subject to these access terms and conditions. Non-adherence to these terms and conditions will be viewed as a breach of contract, which may result in legal redress being sought.

1.    Users agree that data released by Merseyside BioBank, in any format and on any media, will only be used for the purpose for which it was originally requested and for any time period originally agreed upon (See note 3 below).

2.    Users agree that data released by Merseyside BioBank will not be added to any permanent database system (electronic or paper based) unless by written agreement with Merseyside BioBank.

3.    Users understand that following the end of the agreed time period, or 12 months from the enquiry date, the received data must be deleted from any electronic system (See note 2 above). Use of the data beyond this period must be preceded by a further request to Merseyside BioBank.

4.    Users agree that data retrieved from Merseyside BioBank will not be passed on to or communicated with third parties except as aggregated data within reports, or as anonymised data in the form of maps etc., which constitute a part of the agreed reason for the original enquiry.

5.    Merseyside BioBank disclaims any responsibility for the accuracy of the information within its reports and accepts no liability for any result of using these data.

6.    Any biological record is specific to the date of the recording and does not necessarily imply the continuance of the species at that site.

7.    The lack of species and/or habitat information for a geographically defined area does not necessarily imply a low biodiversity value for that area. It may simply be unrecorded.

8.    While the information from Merseyside BioBank in itself will remain free, Merseyside BioBank reserves the right to charge a reasonable fee to cover administration and a proportion of overheads as detailed in our charging policy.

9.    A copy of any report, or other product, produced using the data from Merseyside BioBank would be gratefully received if provided without cost.

10. Merseyside BioBank must be acknowledged within any report, or other product produced, using data provided by Merseyside BioBank.