Terms and conditions for a pond and water feature installer

A pond installer needs terms that deal with the things that actually cause arguments: the excavation that hits a spring, the liner that develops a leak in year three, the pump that runs dry, and the customer who blames you when the koi die in August. I draft customer terms around how your business really works, for a fixed fee of £995, delivered in five working days.

Who this is for

Pond builders, koi and wildlife pond specialists, fountain and water feature installers, rill and reflecting pool contractors and pond maintenance businesses in England and Wales. Most of your customers will be homeowners, who have statutory protections you cannot draft away. Some will be businesses: hotels, garden centres, care homes, developers and landscape contractors. One set of terms can serve both if it is written for both.

What matters in a pond installer's terms

Ground conditions, water table and excavation

Nobody knows what is under a lawn until the digger is in it. Rock, buried rubble, old foundations, land drains and a water table that fills the hole overnight all change the price and the method. Your terms should price the excavation on stated assumptions, allow a written variation when the ground proves different, and put the customer on record as responsible for telling you where pipes, cables and drains run. If you cart spoil away you need to be registered with the Environment Agency as a waste carrier, and the terms should say who is disposing of what.

Liners, pumps, filtration and what you guarantee

A leak is the classic pond dispute, and it is rarely obvious whether the cause is the liner, the workmanship, ground movement or a heron's claw. Your terms should separate the manufacturer's product warranty from your own workmanship guarantee, state how long each runs, and say that finding and draining down to investigate is chargeable where the fault turns out not to be yours. Where you supply pumps, filters and UV units to a homeowner, the Consumer Rights Act 2015 requires them to be of satisfactory quality and fit for purpose, so do not draft around that: draft around how a claim is reported and investigated.

Water quality, fish and other livestock

Fish are the largest financial risk on a koi job and the one least within your control. Water chemistry, overfeeding, disease brought in with new stock, predation and a hot still week can all kill fish long after you have gone. Unless you are being paid to maintain the system, the terms should make the customer responsible for stocking, feeding, testing and running the filtration, exclude liability for livestock losses that do not result from your negligence, and make clear that a new filter takes time to mature. Say it before the job, not after the netting comes off.

Electrics, safety and handover

Pumps, lighting and heaters near water bring electrical work that may need to be certified or notified under the Building Regulations, and your terms should say who is doing that and who is issuing the certificate. Deep water in a domestic garden also raises a supervision and fencing question. The terms should record what safety measures were specified, what the customer declined, and that responsibility for supervising children and visitors sits with the occupier after handover. The Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 prevents you excluding liability for death or personal injury caused by your negligence, so allocate the rest clearly instead.

Deposits, stage payments and getting paid

Formal water features tie up money early: bespoke stonework, fibreglass or stainless shells, large liners and filtration are ordered for one garden and cannot be resold. Take a deposit that reflects that, stage the payments against excavation, lining, commissioning and planting, and make the balance due on commissioning rather than on the customer being satisfied with the water clarity. Where the customer is a business, the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 lets you claim interest and fixed compensation. For homeowners the interest rate has to be modest and set out clearly in the terms.

Homeowners and the fourteen-day cancellation right

A pond is nearly always agreed in the customer's garden or by email, which brings it within the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013 and gives the customer fourteen days to cancel. Start digging inside that period without the customer's express written request and you may not be paid for the work. Fail to give the cancellation information and the period can extend by up to twelve months, which is an unhappy discovery when the liner is already welded in. The terms and your quotation paperwork need to handle this together, which is what the incorporation guidance covers.

What it costs

Customer or supplier terms and conditions, £995. One set of terms, customer-facing or supplier-facing, drafted around your business. Five working days.

Review of your existing terms, £495. You already have terms and want to know how much of a problem they are. Returned marked up with my amendments and an explanation of the changes. Three working days.

Buying online forms the engagement on payment. The scope is what the terms and conditions drafting page describes, you accept the Terms of Service at checkout, and I email you within four working hours to get started. If you would rather ask something first, email me.

What you get

• A full set of terms drafted around your business, not a template with your name inserted
• A covering note in plain English explaining every commercial choice I made and why, so you can defend the terms in a negotiation without ringing me
• Liability, payment, termination and IP provisions set at a level that will survive a procurement review
• Consumer-facing wording drafted to be enforceable where you sell to consumers
• Guidance on how to incorporate the terms properly, which is where most businesses actually fail
• One round of amendments after you have read them

What is not included

• Negotiating your terms with individual customers
• Sector-specific regulatory compliance beyond the contract terms themselves
• Website privacy notice and cookie compliance, which I quote separately
• Terms governed by the law of another country

Questions I am often asked

A customer wants me to work on a pond somebody else built. How do I protect myself?

Deal with it expressly. Terms for remedial and upgrade work should record that you did not build the existing structure, that you are not responsible for its design or condition, that any diagnosis is based on what is visible without full drain-down, and that further defects found during the work are a variation to be priced and agreed in writing.

Who is responsible for topping up, cleaning and winterising after handover?

The customer, unless you sell them a maintenance visit. The terms should set out the handover position clearly: what you have commissioned, what the customer must do weekly and seasonally, and that your workmanship guarantee assumes the system has been run and maintained as instructed. Maintenance visits sit better as a separate priced schedule than as an implied obligation.

Do I need different terms for commercial water features?

One set can cover both if it has a clearly separated consumer section. Commercial clients such as hotels and developers will push back on liability caps, ask for evidence of public liability cover and sometimes want retention. The covering note I send with the drafting explains where each figure came from, so you can hold your position in that conversation.

Related guidance and services

• Terms and conditions drafting, £995, the service this page describes
• Contract review, £495
• Ask Caesar, £495 a month
• Terms and conditions for a landscaping business
• Terms and conditions for an electrician

This page is general guidance for businesses in England and Wales, not advice on your own circumstances. Last reviewed: September 2026. Email geoffrey@caesar.co.uk.