RONIN International Participant Terms
Last updated: 30th July 2024
Please read these Terms and Conditions (“Participant Terms”) carefully before taking part in market research studies with RONIN International Limited (“RONIN”, “us”, “we”, or “our”), an independent market research company and sole owner of RONIN Edge, our internal database of verified market research participants, and RONIN Studies, the participant-facing platform for the administration and fulfilment of market research Rewards, as defined herein. RONIN is a company incorporated and registered under the laws of England and Wales with company number 07109224 with its registered office at 47-51 Great Suffolk Street, SE1 0BS London, UK.
RONIN provides opportunities to business-to-business professionals, healthcare professionals, members of the public and various types of opinion formers to participate in market research studies such as, without limitation, online surveys, telephone consultations, video consultations, in-person consultations, participation in in-person or virtual focus groups and/or online communities (each a “Project”).
In these Terms, “Participant” means you. When you take part in a Project, you accept these Participant Terms as if you had signed them. You may not take part in a Project without accepting these Participant Terms.
We may update the Participant Terms by posting a new version to our website or updating the version of the Participant Terms that we link to when contacting you about a potential Project. If we update the Participant Terms, the latest version of the Participant Terms supersedes all prior versions of the Participant Terms previously in effect between you and us. Where a translation of these Participant Terms is provided, the English version shall control over any translations. We recommend you review these Participant Terms periodically, and before taking part in a new Project. The Participant Terms were last updated on the date displayed at the top of this document, and can always be found at https://roninstudies.com/participants/participant-terms-and-conditions.
RONIN is a member of several leading market research and insights trade associations, including the UK Market Research Society (MRS), ESOMAR, the British Healthcare Business Intelligence Association (BHBIA) the Interviewer Quality Control Scheme (IQCS) and the US Insights Association.
We are also certified to ISO 20252 (Market, opinion and social research, including insights and data analytics) and ISO 27001 (Information security, cybersecurity and privacy protection).
These Participant Terms, our website(s), and our communications to you may contain links to third-party websites (“Third-Party Sites”). We are not responsible or liable for the content or communications from Third-Party Sites and you are responsible for adhering to the applicable terms of user for Third-Party Sites.
1. GENERAL
1.1. In these terms and conditions, a reference to the singular includes plural and vice versa (unless the context otherwise requires) and the words and expressions “other”, “including” and “in particular” (or any similar word or expression) do not limit the generality of any preceding or succeeding words and shall be construed as if they were immediately followed by the words “without limitation”.
1.2. The headings in these Terms are inserted only for information and convenience only and shall not affect the construction or interpretation of these Terms.
2. PARTICIPATION IN PROJECTS
2.1. Any information we collect about you will be treated in the strictest confidence, unless you specifically agree otherwise on a specific Project that may, with your consent, include an element of disclosure, and in accordance with all applicable laws and regulations relating to the use and processing of personal data and your privacy, including those relating to the use of cookies and similar technologies. Our Participant Privacy Notice and Cookie Notice are an integral part of our Participant Terms.
2.2. Whenever we contact you about, or invite you to take part in, a Project, we will ask you a few qualification questions, sometimes referred to as a screener. These qualification questions are only intended to check whether you are eligible to take part in a Project, for example, by asking about your professional experience or about certain characteristics about you that are relevant to the Project.
2.3. When taking part in Projects, you agree at all times to act in good faith, with the intention of providing responses that are honest and reflective of your true opinions and experiences. You must ensure that all information you provide is accurate and truthful to the best of your knowledge, and you must not intentionally provide false or misleading information. By taking part in a Project, you acknowledge that providing inaccurate information about eligibility may result in disqualification from the Project, and, at our sole discretion, in your contact details being added to a permanent list of blocked contacts.
2.4. All of our Projects are for market research purposes only. In accordance with relevant codes of conduct, including those published by the MRS and ESOMAR, market research cannot be used as a vehicle for sales or marketing. If you ever become concerned with the nature of a Project, someone attempts to influence your decisions in any way, or someone is marketing products or services to you rather than conducting genuine market research, you can notify us immediately by emailing [email protected].
2.5. When you take part in Projects, you may come in contact with, be allowed to see, use or otherwise have access to certain non-public, confidential, proprietary, or sensitive information or material that are the sole and exclusive property of third parties, including, without limitation, information with respect to the third-party products and services (collectively, "Confidential Information"). You must not copy, print, store, forward or disclose to anyone by any means the Confidential Information you will have access to, and you must not use the Confidential Information for other purposes than for the purpose it was disclosed to you. Similarly, if you have access to Confidential Information not known to us, you agree not to disclose any such Confidential Information during the course of the Project, for example in the responses or opinions you share during a Project.
2.6. When taking part in any Project, you represent that you are permitted to do so. In particular, you must not be prohibited from, or limited in any way, from taking part in market research engagements by any contract or policy (including, without limitation, an employment or consulting contract, a confidentiality or non-disclosure agreements or any policies or codes of conduct that apply to you in any way). Where your ability to take part in such Projects is limited in any way, you represent that you have obtained all the necessary consents or waivers to take part in an individual Project. It is your responsibility to determine whether and the extent to which you are permitted to take part in Projects whenever you take part.
3. RONIN EDGE AND FUTURE PARTICIPATION
3.1. When we first contact you, or after taking part in your first Project with RONIN, we may ask you if you consent to taking part in future Projects with RONIN, as outlined in the statements used before, during or at the end of the Project to ask for your informed consent. This is not mandatory for taking in any Project.
3.2. If you agree, you will join RONIN Edge, our in-house platform for verified market research participants. From time to time, we will reach out via email, telephone, or other channels, including without limitation, professional networks, to invite you to take part in Projects we believe are relevant to you. There will never be any obligation for you to take part in Projects, and we will not always contact you with each new Project that may be relevant to you—we will always contact you in a proportionate and considerate manner.
3.3. Only one RONIN Studies account is permitted per unique email address.
3.3.1. We promise that:
· Strictly no marketing or sales activity will be directed at you as a result of your intended or actual participation in a Project with RONIN.
· The views and opinions you share in each Project will remain confidential and will only be used and reported on in the aggregate, unless you explicitly consent otherwise for an individual Project.
· Your will always have the right not to answer specific questions or not to take part in individual Projects without this decision having any consequences with regard to your membership.
· You can withdraw your consent to be contacted about Projects at any time. Please note that, where you have withdrawn your consent, we may still send you specific transactional emails, including, without limitation, where these relate to Rewards you have earned on RONIN Studies.
3.4. We reserve the right to unilaterally deny you from joining RONIN Studies, or to remove you from RONIN Studies and take steps to prevent you from rejoining in the future, without any requirement to justify such a denial or removal. Where we elect to remove you from RONIN Studies, clause 10 will apply.
3.5. Employees and associates of RONIN are not permitted to join RONIN Studies.
4. ACCEPTABLE USE
4.1. When participating in Projects or otherwise interacting with us through various channels, including, without limitation, in content you submit on your RONIN Studies profile, in online studies or via telephone, you agree not to upload, share, mention, or otherwise contribute content, material, or opinions that:
4.1.1. Are false, inaccurate, incorrect, incomplete, inexact, outdated or otherwise wrong;
4.1.2. Are illegal – including content or messages that promote or discuss illegal activities;
4.1.3. Are abusive, obscene, vulgar, or hateful – this includes words and images;
4.1.4. Are threatening, harassing, libellous or defamatory, either about us, our employees, our contractors or subcontractors, our clients, or other participants involved in similar Projects;
4.1.5. Incite discrimination, hate or violence
4.1.6. Are bigoted and/or racially, ethnically, sexually, or otherwise offensive;
4.1.7. Violate any applicable local, state, national or international law or regulation;
4.1.8. Are intended to advertise or market goods or services;
4.1.9. Contain your personal data, or the personal data of other individuals, unless we have specifically asked you to provide this in relation to your participation in a Project;
4.1.10. Is owned or under the copyright of a third part.
4.2. We will make reasonable efforts and implement technical and organisational controls to ensure you are invited to take part in each Project only once, and that you are prevented from completing the same Project more than once. Nevertheless, you are only permitted to take part in each Project once (unless the nature of the Project requires you to take part in repeat or successive stages, in which case this will be made clear when we contact you).
4.3. Only you may access or use your RONIN Studies account. The use of your account by anyone else than you may be grounds for immediate termination of your membership, as outlined in clause 10.
5. REWARDS
5.1. When we contact you to take part in a relevant Project, whether you are taking part in a Project for the first time or you already are a member of RONIN Studies, we will let you know if we will be offering you financial compensation, a donation to charity, or something else, such as a report (a “Reward”) for taking part in and successfully completing the entirety of a Project. Most Projects that we will contact you about will be associated with some form of Reward. We will always let you know what the value of the Reward is, if applicable, and how you can receive it, including any other conditions attached.
5.2. Where a set deadline applies to an individual Project, if we are looking for a set number of participants to take part in a Project, or if RONIN or one of its clients wishes to end a Project, we reserve the right to end the Project without collecting further responses or allowing you to complete the Project. In such a situation, we may offer you a reduced Reward or no Reward, depending on how much time and effort had already been dedicated by you to completing the Project or engaging with us about the Project.
5.3. Monetary Rewards can be fulfilled in multiple formats and currencies, depending on the country where you are based, the nature of the Project, any restrictions applicable to each Project, and the amount of time or level of effort required for you to take part in and complete the Project—unless otherwise communicated to you when we reach out to invite your participation in a Project. Typically, Rewards can be redeemed as PayPal payments, as vouchers from a broad selection of third-party retailers and partners in the country where you are based or can be donated on your behalf to select charities.
5.3.1. On some Projects, due to specific restrictions that may apply from time to time, we will be unable to offer you a monetary Reward and we will restrict your Reward options to donations to charity.
5.3.2. On other Projects, we may be able to offer a different type of non-monetary Reward, such as a report of the Project findings, subject to our client’s agreement that such a Reward can be offered.
5.4. Rewards are paid out at the end of the Project, subject to clause 6.
5.5. Whilst we will use our best endeavours to allow you to redeem your Reward using one of the payment options we mentioned when reaching out to you, factors outside of our control may prevent us from doing so, for example, if the third-party providers make changes to their applicable terms and conditions. We may also change payment options at our entire discretion and at any time, even after you have participated in a Project. Where this is the case, an alternative option of equivalent value will be made available.
5.6. When completing a Project, the Reward will be added to your account on RONIN Rewards automatically or added manually by our support team once our team confirms you successfully took part in and completed the Project. If you do not currently have a RONIN Rewards account, you will need to create one on RONIN Studies using the email address you provided us with when you took part in your first Project. If you experience any issues with the creation of your account, you can get in touch via ([email protected]), or our support team will reach out to you.
5.7. Once a Reward has been added to your account, our support team will be in touch via email with a unique link you can use to confirm the allocation of the Reward to your account. To ensure that you receive our emails, please add @roninstudies.com to your email client’s list of safe senders, to ensure our emails reach you in a timely manner and to avoid any delays. Once a Reward has been allocated, it will be available to be redeemed, and you will need to inform us of your preferred fulfilment option by logging in to your account. For monetary Rewards, this refers to the payment method and selecting a payment method or voucher type from the available options. For non-monetary Rewards, this may refer to the charity you would like to donate the value of our Reward to, or to download a copy of the report.
5.8. Rewards expire 1 year from the date on which it is first issued to you via email. You are responsible redeeming your Rewards before their expiry. If you do not redeem a Reward before the expiry date, it will no longer be redeemable. At our sole discretion, we may from time to time agree to pay out an expired Reward taking into relevant circumstances that prevented you from redeeming on time.
5.9. You are responsible for providing your choice of payment details on RONIN Studies and keeping such information up-to-date.
5.10. You must follow your employer’s policies, or any applicable policies, that may relate to you receive Rewards from RONIN, and you are also responsible for reporting any income or earnings from RONIN as appropriate to the relevant authority in your own tax jurisdiction.
6. QUALITY CONTROL
6.1. We reserve the right, at any time, to implement quality control and fraud prevention measures across all participant engagement checkpoints, including, without limitation, when we first contact you to take part in a Project, when we verify and validate the answers you provide at the study qualification stage, when you take part in the full study or interview (or another activity), and after you have taken part in a Project, including by looking at and comparing results from different Projects (the “QC Checks”).
6.2. The QC Checks will consider evidence across a range of factors, including, as applicable, the time you took to complete a Project, whether any responses provided are not truthful, invalid, or nonsensical, whether they are inconsistent with other information you have provided in the Project, and whether AI or related technologies may have been used to respond or participate in the Project.
6.3. As further described in our Participant Privacy Notice and Cookie Notice, QC Checks include technical controls that may rely on cookies and similar technologies, digital fingerprinting, and information capture technologies that may capture information about your device hardware designed to:
6.3.1. Ensure that any survey we send you is compatible with your device;
6.3.2. Assist you in completing Projects where you are experiencing any technical difficulties;
6.3.3. Achieve our quality control, validation, fraud prevention and fraud control purposes;
6.4. We reserve the right, at our sole discretion, to reject your responses and not to issue you with the Reward offered in relation to the Project where, in our reasonable opinion, your responses or your participation does not meet our QC Checks, or where we have other concerns in relation to your participation.
7. CHILDREN
7.1. We do not conduct market research with or involving children. You must be aged 18 and over to become a member of RONIN Studies, and we will not reach out to any individual likely to be under the age of 18.
7.2. If and when we conduct market research with members of the general public, including, without limitation, when we contact households, we will take steps to ensure that anyone under the age of 18 is unable to take part in a Project and ask to be referred to someone above the age of 18 before proceeding.
8. SEVERABILITY
8.1. If any provision of these Participant Terms is found to be invalid, illegal, or unenforceable for any reason by any court of competent jurisdiction, such provision shall be deemed to be severed and shall not affect the validity and enforceability of the remaining provisions of these Participant Terms.
9. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
9.1. We own and retain exclusive ownership of our trademarks, logos, copyrights, any content of our website(s) and other intellectual property rights ("RONIN IP"). You may not use or reproduce any of the RONIN IP without our prior written consent. Nothing in these Participant Terms shall be construed as granting you any license, right, title or interest in any RONIN IP, or any patent, trademark, copyright, know-how, or similar right now or hereafter owned or controlled by RONIN.
10. TERMINATION AND INACTIVITY
10.1. You may ask us to terminate your membership of RONIN Studies at any time. You can do this by contacting us on [email protected] or by following the relevant set of instructions in your RONIN Studies account. We will handle a request for your account to be terminated as withdrawal of your consent for us to process your data. Please note that you can choose to opt-out from our communications to you in relation to a specific Project, or opt-out from all Project communications, without terminating your account.
10.2. Please note that, due to the interdependence between our information technology systems, it may take up to thirty (30) days for us to fully process your request and remove your information from our systems and platforms. Until that process is complete, you may occasionally still hear from us.
10.3. If you ask us to terminate your membership, please make sure to first redeem any outstanding non-expired Rewards prior to submitting your request for termination, otherwise you will forfeit these Rewards and they will be no longer be redeemable on RONIN Studies or via our support team.
10.4. We may terminate your membership of RONIN Studies for any reason and at any time with thirty (30) days’ notice. We may also terminate your membership without any further notice, if you:
10.4.1. disqualification as described in clause 2.3;
10.4.2. any behaviour that is not consistent with the QC Checks;
10.4.3. any other violation or breach of these Participant Terms;
10.4.4. any violation of the Supplementary United States Tax Obligations;
10.4.5. any fraudulent use or behaviour involving RONIN Studies or an individual Project;
10.5. If we terminate your membership of RONIN Studies for reasons outlined in 10.4, this may result in the immediate forfeiture of any Rewards you have earned or accrued.
11. JURISDICTION
11.1. These Participant Terms are governed by the laws of England and Wales and the non-exclusive jurisdiction of English courts.
12. GETTING IN TOUCH
If you have any questions about these terms, RONIN, or your participation in market research, please contact our support team. You can reach them via email or by letter, using the following contact details:
Email: [email protected].
By letter:
Ref: RONIN Studies Support
RONIN International
47-51 Great Suffolk St
SE1 0BS London
United Kingdom
13. Supplementary United States Tax Obligations
13.1. If you are a US citizen or resident, we are legally required to report your income to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) when the value of Rewards you have received reaches or exceeds $600 in a given tax year which begins each year on January 1st and ends on December 31st. “Received” means that you have redeemed these Rewards—if they have not been claimed and are still available to be redeemed in your account, these will not count towards the $600 limit for the applicable year.
13.2. If the total value of Rewards that you have received in any given year reaches $500, we will ask you to submit a W-9 form, so we can file a copy of your 1099-Misc form with the IRS to comply with our legal obligations. Please note that this requirement will apply whether you are currently a resident of the US or not. You will also receive a copy of your 1099- Misc form as hard copy via postal mail, at your current US or overseas address, as applicable. You can find out more here: https://www.irs.gov/forms-pubs/about-form-1099-misc. You will be prevented from taking part in additional Projects until you have submitted your W-9 form. You will also be prevented from receiving any additional Rewards you have earned that would take the total value of Rewards you received that year to a total value of $600 or above. These Rewards will only become available for redemption after you provide us with your completed W-9 form.
13.3. Personal data you share with us to enable us to comply with our legal obligations will be held securely. It will only be shared with the IRS, our bookkeeping and accounting subcontractor in the US, and no other third parties, for disclosure purposes only. If you end up not earning any additional Rewards during the applicable year, the W-9 form will be discarded, and it will not be submitted to the IRS.
13.4. The applicable value shown on the 1099- Misc form will be based on the total value of Rewards that you redeemed during the applicable tax year, regardless of when you took part in the qualifying Project for which the Reward was awarded. This will include Rewards received for your own participation, as well as any Rewards earned by referring participants to use for them to take part in a Project, if applicable. You can view this from your RONIN Studies account.
13.5. If we are required to issue and file a 1099- Misc for you, the applicable deadline will be 31st January of following year. For example, 1099s for 2024 will need to be filed by 31st January 2025 and 2025 1099s will need to be filed by 31st January 2026. The last possible date by which you can submit a W-9 form will be 31st December of the applicable year for us to complete the process on time. However, this should be submitted as soon as practicable once you meet the relevant criteria during the year. Please note that failure to provide us with your W-9 form by 31st December of the applicable year may result in account termination in line with these Participant Terms.