1. The Specialists are Gregory and Lisa McCarthy. We also work alongside our colleague, Natalie Beniston.  We are all self-employed workers, responsible for our own tax and National Insurance payments to HMRC. When booking you undertake a contract for services with us. You agree that both you and your employer recognise our employment and tax status and will abide by our T & C’s. You also agree to pay our fees in full and without deductions by cash, cheque or BACS transfer to our account in our own names of Mr G. and/or Mrs L. McCarthy.

2. Quoted costs are for the service itself, delivered according to our own T & C’s. The service is typically delivered by one Specialist unless agreed otherwise. The standard single daily rate quoted typically covers delivery by one workshop facilitator between the hours of a standard school day – 9am-3.00pm. For local bookings where two Specialists are required to present, you agree to pay the special “double” rate quoted. This typically covers delivery by one Specialist between the hours of a standard school day – 9am-3.00pm and for the second facilitator to attend and deliver sessions after the introduction and up until the conclusion of the day. In the extremely rare case of late arrival due to traffic issues, bookings will still go ahead and will still be chargeable at the full daily rate.

3. As self employed workers we have the right to sub-contract (as in the case of Natalie delivering for you). Your contract for services will be with one of The Specialists and invoices will be payable to the individual named on the invoice.  We work interchangeably, so if you have booked Gregory to deliver a Tudor Day as King Henry VIII, it may be that (in the case of illness) Lisa actually visits you as Catherine Parr. Alternatively, upon expecting Lisa as Cleopatra you may find that Gregory or Natalie cover as an Egyptian Scribe. We all deliver the visits to an exceptional standard and this method of covering in the rare case of illness is usually preferable to cancellation for most teachers. In the case of the above-mentioned “double” bookings, we reserve the right to deliver the sessions single-handed if needs be at our standard single daily rate – eg. in the case of unexpected illness. In such cases, we will try to give as much notice as possible and endeavour to fulfil the booking. We will always do our utmost to re-arrange any cancellations but, upon booking, you recognise that it is not always possible for us to re-schedule due to other commitments.

4. Confirmation of a  booking creates a contract for services in a client-contractor relationship with everything that implies. Be assured, visits almost always go ahead smoothly. However, in extreme circumstances, a booking can be cancelled by either party without defaulting or breaching contract. These include but are not limited to: illness; caring for our own children in the case of their illness; extreme weather conditions and hazardous or insurmountable travel issues. Visits can be cancelled by the school in such circumstances up to the day before without defaulting. Therefore, if your school is struck by Coronavirus and cannot open for instance, you have the right to cancel the service up until the end of school hours on the day before the booking without defaulting. If your school remains open you agree that planned visits should go ahead unless agreed otherwise. In the case of extreme weather eg. snow, causing school closure, you agree to inform The Specialists of any impact on visits on the day before the planned visit. We will also generally undertake to inform you of any illness the day before a planned visit but cannot always forecast our own or our children’s illness as they can fall ill very quickly. So, whilst cancellation by the Specialists can (very rarely) occur for this reason on the day of the booking, cancellation by the school on the day of the booking for any reason will incur the full cost of the planned visit.

5. For typical school visits we can cater for large numbers, eg. up to 90 and suggest children are grouped for sessions into typical class sizes of around thirty pupils. The structure of our visits usually accommodates all children at the start and end of the day as one whole group. If you have a particularly large group of children that we need to cater for then the service can be adapted. Please call/email to discuss this.

6. We do not generally charge a booking fee but, where requested, advance invoices will be generated as quickly as possible.  The main invoicing of the visit is usually dealt with after the event with The Specialists bringing the paper invoice on the day itself. This is payable not later than four weeks after the invoice date. Payments made are non-refundable but we will always attempt to accommodate date changes where necessary.  If your school is likely to cancel a booking, we encourage you to gather funds before booking.  We cannot fill dates with little or no notice of cancellation and would prefer to offer a reduced or half day visit rather than completely cancelling the service. 

7. Whilst still photography is encouraged, we cannot allow any forms of video recording during our sessions unless this is agreed upon in advance with ourselves.  Please appreciate the research and development which has gone in to the presentations.  Videoing of children marching, for instance, will always be allowed but please do not use Ipads to film chunks of our delivery.

8. Lisa and Gregory have Enhanced DBS disclosures and subscribe to the update service which you are welcome to check.  Natalie has a basic DBS check.  We all have public liability insurance of up to £10 million each.  Details of this are available on request.

9. Travel expenses are charged at 60p a mile, calculated as a return journey from our base at CV13 0DZ to your chosen venue. Any further costs encountered in travel to your chosen location (eg. motorway tolls) will also be chargeable. Double bookings usually require two cars and thus double the relevant mileage.

10. We ask that you keep to agreed schedules as far as possible as we may have other work and family commitments on the day of our booking. We are appreciative of clients warning us where car parks may be locked or movement of vehicles is restricted.  For bookings with home schoolers, you are politely requested not to provide food or drink during workshops and wherever possible to encourage the children to focus on The Specialists.

11. Our address for correspondence is 14 Newbold Road, Barlestone, Nuneaton, Warwickshire. CV13 0DZ

12. We want everybody to enjoy their time with The Specialists. However children’s safety is paramount to us. All our activities are fully risk assessed and we will never knowingly initiate activities that will put anybody in danger. We also create an environment where children can interact and engage in activities in a safe way building their confidence and self esteem.

13. The Qualified Teacher (class or supply teacher, or parents, in the case of home schoolers) agrees to remain in the room with their class, unless agreed otherwise in advance of the booking. Whilst some teachers may choose to use the visit for assessment purposes, you are politely requested not to use our sessions to mark work. Additional adults are most welcome to sit in on the presentation, but please adhere to the minimum legal requirement. For our safety we ask that we are not in a position where we are left with children – thank you for your cooperation with this.

14. The school agrees to provide appropriate parking for the Specialist(s) to park as close to the most convenient entrance as possible.  This is in order to transport a range of heavy resources in and out of school throughout the day to enable the delivery of the service.  We are especially grateful where teachers take it upon themselves to reserve parking spots by use of cones etc.

15. For schools where it is the local authority’s (or school’s) policy to charge for parking on site, you agree to the following.  Any parking charges applicable to The Specialists will be divulged in advance.  These fees will also be charged back to the school as an extra charge on our invoice and that our charge will be at a higher rate than that charged by the school. This is because, as self employed workers, extra charges on our invoices will be counted by HMRC as earnings, so to recoup our losses after tax, we will have to increase the original fee. In the instance that parking charges are not divulged in advance and/or where schools refuse to provide appropriate parking to allow the visit to be manageable, the booking may have to be abandoned and will still be chargeable.

16. Our Privacy Policy is as follows: Your privacy is important to us. You may have heard of the so-called “Cookie Law.” Recent changes in European law necessitate The Specialists website to update our privacy policy. We use cookies (tracking of clicks by bits of code) on our website. It is nothing sinister and we do not use any information gleaned to aggressively market to schools or anyone else. We don’t need to as we are busy enough! Obviously, we are a small business so we use the tracking solely to analyze and improve the effectiveness of our website and we want to abide by all relevant legislation. We do not attempt to personally identify website users. We do not share personal information with third parties nor do we store any information about your visit to the website other than to analyze and optimize it through the use of cookies. If you do not wish to allow tracking of your use of our website you can turn off the use of cookies on your computer at anytime by changing your specific browser settings. Standard use of our website without altering settings assumes consent to the above-mentioned anonymous tracking. We claim full ownership of our website content and ask that it is not republished without our consent. However, we are not responsible for republished content from this website on other blogs or websites without our permission. This privacy policy is subject to change without notice and was last updated on 13th January 2024. If you have any questions or should you require that we delete any information held, please feel free to contact us directly here: lisa@getthespecialists.co.uk .

17. Lastly, we want you and the children in your care to have as much fun as we will do working for you. If you have any concerns, please call or e-mail.