Vigil Assessments

Commission terms

Revised 7 November 2026

These terms govern a commissioned Vigil Assessment: a research document prepared by Vigil Consilium ("Vigil") in answer to one agreed question. They apply from the moment you accept a written scope. Submitting an inquiry is not acceptance of anything, and reading Vigil's public research needs no agreement at all.

1. 1. What an assessment is
2. 2. Inquiry and scope
3. 3. Price and payment
4. 4. Delivery
5. 5. Cancellation, withdrawal and refunds
6. 6. What the document is, and is not
7. 7. Using the document
8. 8. Intellectual property
9. 9. Confidentiality
10. 10. Corrections and limitations
11. 11. What a commission does not buy
12. 12. Your data
13. 13. Changes to these terms
14. 14. Contact and interpretation

1. What an assessment is

A Vigil Assessment is a written research document, delivered as a PDF, that answers one research question within a scope agreed in writing. It is prepared from Vigil's maintained public research and from public primary, institutional and reporting sources, under the standards set out on Vigil's methodology page. It is a one-time deliverable: not a subscription, not a retainer, not a monitoring service, and not an undertaking to update the document after delivery.

2. Inquiry and scope

You begin by submitting a question through the request form or by email. An inquiry creates no obligation on you to buy anything and no obligation on Vigil to accept the work. Vigil will reply to the address you give, normally within three working days, either with a written scope or with a reason it cannot take the question — for example because the question cannot be answered from defensible evidence, falls outside Vigil's coverage, or asks for a conclusion rather than an answer.

A written scope states: the question as Vigil understands it; what the answer will cover and what it will not; the approximate form and length of the document; the price and currency; a delivery window; and any assumption the work depends on. Vigil may ask you questions before proposing a scope. The commission exists only when you accept the written scope in writing (an email reply is sufficient). Work does not begin before acceptance.

If, during the work, Vigil finds that the question cannot be answered within the agreed scope — because the evidence does not exist, or runs the other way — it will tell you, propose a narrower or different scope, and not charge for work you did not agree to.

3. Price and payment

The price is the one stated on the written scope you accepted. Vigil publishes an introductory price on the Assessments page for a narrowly defined question, as two fixed figures — one in euros, one in US dollars — for the same commission; the currency you chose on your request is the currency of the written scope and of the payment link you receive. A broader or deeper commission is quoted individually, in that currency. If the figure on the page and the figure on your written scope ever differ, the written scope governs, and you should raise the difference before accepting it rather than assume.

Payment is a single payment, made after you accept the scope and before work begins, through a private PayPal payment link that Vigil sends to the address you gave once your written acceptance has been received. No payment link is sent before acceptance. At PayPal's checkout you enter the amount stated on the written scope and your request reference (VA-XXXXXX), and PayPal collects the payment on its own pages, in the currency stated on the scope, by PayPal balance or the card methods PayPal offers there; Vigil does not hold card or bank details and never sees them. Vigil confirms the payment in its own PayPal account — the amount, the currency and the reference — before work begins. A payment that does not match the amount and currency on the accepted scope is not settlement of the commission: Vigil will write to you to resolve the difference (a shortfall to be paid, an excess to be refunded, a misdirected payment returned), and work begins once the agreed amount is confirmed. The written scope states the final amount payable, including any tax that applies to it. Vigil does not charge anything at inquiry, and does not start a recurring payment of any kind.

The steps are distinct and each is recorded: the written scope is a quotation; your written acceptance forms the commission; the PayPal payment settles it; Vigil's confirmation of that payment starts the work; and any receipt, invoice or other accounting or tax document that Vigil is required to issue for the commission is issued separately, to the address you gave. PayPal's own confirmation is a record of the payment, not that document.

Vigil may, at its discretion and stated on the scope, agree different payment terms for an institution — for instance payment on delivery against an invoice. Where it does, the scope states those terms, the document is delivered on the agreed date and payment is due as the scope says.

4. Delivery

The document is delivered as a PDF to the email address given at inquiry (or another address you confirm in writing), within the delivery window on the written scope. The window is a commitment Vigil makes on the information it has at acceptance; if an event in the subject area makes the answer unreliable before delivery, Vigil will tell you and agree a short extension or a revised scope rather than deliver a document it would not stand behind.

Delivery is complete when the PDF is sent. Vigil keeps a copy of the delivered document for the retention period in the privacy notice, so that a correction or a dispute can be answered from it.

5. Cancellation, withdrawal and refunds

Before you accept a scope there is nothing to cancel: an inquiry may be withdrawn at any time, and Vigil may decline it.

After acceptance and before work begins, you may cancel by email and any payment made is refunded in full.

Once work has begun, the document is being made to your specification, and a refund of the full price is no longer available as of right. If you cancel, Vigil will either deliver what has been completed to that point, or refund the part of the price that corresponds to work not yet done, as it judges fairer in the circumstances, and will say which.

If you are a consumer — commissioning the document for purposes outside your trade, business or profession — you may have a statutory right to withdraw from the contract within fourteen days of accepting the scope. Because an assessment is a document made to your individual specification, by accepting the scope you request that Vigil begin work within that period and acknowledge that, once the document has been delivered in full, the right of withdrawal no longer applies. If you withdraw before delivery, Vigil may charge for the work done up to that point. Nothing in these terms limits a right you have under the consumer law that applies to you.

If Vigil cannot deliver — because it cannot answer the question to its own standard, or for any reason of its own — it will say so and refund the price in full.

6. What the document is, and is not

An assessment is an independent analytical judgment, reached from public evidence and stated with its confidence, its limits and the developments that would change it. It is not: legal, financial, investment, insurance, medical or engineering advice; a security plan; a prediction with certainty attached; a verification of any party's conduct beyond what the cited evidence establishes; or a statement about any individual. It draws on no classified, proprietary or privileged information and makes no claim to.

Vigil does not guarantee that the document's judgment will prove correct, that it covers every relevant fact, or that it will suit a purpose you did not state in the scope. What Vigil does guarantee is the method: every substantial claim traceable to a cited source, evidence kept apart from inference, uncertainty stated, dates stated, and a separate factual check before delivery. Decisions you take on the basis of the document are yours.

7. Using the document

The document is prepared for you. You may use it, copy it and share it inside your organisation, quote from it with attribution to Vigil Consilium, and cite it as a source. You may not publish it in full, sell it, offer it as your own work, remove the dates, the citations or the confidence statements from any extract, or present an extract in a way that misstates its conclusion. If you want to publish the whole document, ask; Vigil will usually agree, and may ask that the publication carry the document's own date and disclosures.

A demonstration assessment on the Assessments page is published by Vigil and may be read, downloaded and shared freely with attribution; each says on its pages that it was not commissioned by a client.

8. Intellectual property

Vigil retains copyright in the document and in the research behind it, and grants you the licence in section 7, which is perpetual and does not depend on these terms continuing. The underlying facts are not owned by anybody. Vigil's canonical research records remain Vigil's and remain public; a commission does not transfer them, restrict them, or take them out of the public record.

9. Confidentiality

Vigil treats your identity, your question, your intended use and the delivered document as confidential. It does not publish them, name you, list you as a client, or use your commission in its marketing without your written consent. Vigil may, after delivery, use theresearch behind a commission — facts, sources, analytical findings — in its public work, in a form that does not identify you or reveal that the question was asked. If your commission requires that even its subject not be used publicly for a period, say so at the scope stage and it will be stated there.

Vigil is independent and does not receive or hold confidential information from you beyond what the commission needs. Please do not send classified, privileged or otherwise restricted material; Vigil will not use it, and a question that depends on it is one Vigil will decline.

10. Corrections and limitations

If a material factual error in a delivered document comes to light — from you or from Vigil's own review — Vigil will correct it and send you a corrected copy, with the change dated and described, at no charge. Vigil applies the same standard to its public record on the corrections log. A change in the world after the assessed-as-of date is not an error; the document is dated for that reason, and an update is a new commission.

Vigil's liability to you in connection with a commission is limited to the price you paid for it. Vigil is not liable for indirect or consequential loss, or for decisions taken on the basis of the document. Nothing in these terms excludes liability that cannot lawfully be excluded.

11. What a commission does not buy

A commission buys Vigil's work on a question. It does not buy a conclusion, a particular framing, the omission of inconvenient evidence, or any influence over what Vigil publishes elsewhere. Vigil will decline a commission whose purpose is a predetermined answer, and will say so. The judgment in a delivered document is Vigil's own, and the same document would be written the same way for any other customer asking the same question.

12. Your data

What Vigil holds about an inquiry and a commission, where it is held, what is emailed and to whom, and for how long, is described in the privacy notice, which is written from the code and the procedure that handle it. In short: what you typed into the form, the correspondence that follows, the agreed scope and the delivered document — and nothing collected behind your back.

13. Changes to these terms

Vigil may revise these terms; the revision date at the top is the record of it. A commission is governed by the terms in force when you accepted its scope, which Vigil will send you on request. A revision does not change the price, scope or delivery of a commission already accepted.

14. Contact and interpretation

Questions about these terms, about a scope or about a delivered document go to contact@vigilconsilium.com. If any clause is found unenforceable the rest stand. These terms are written in English, and the English text governs. The law and courts that apply are those of Vigil's place of establishment, except where the consumer law of your own country gives you protection that cannot be excluded.

How the commission is handled step by step is described on the Assessments page under how it works; how Vigil's research is produced and reviewed is described on the editorial process page.