Using Customer Photographs and Names

Two separate questions

Who owns the image. If you took it, you generally do.

Whether you may publish what it shows. A different question entirely, governed by privacy expectations and by what the customer agreed to when they let you onto their property.

Businesses conflate these and conclude that because they took the photograph they can use it however they like. That holds for a close-up of a pipe fitting. It holds much less well for a recognisable house, a family's living room, or anyone's face.

What actually needs permission

How to ask

One line on the job sheet or the work agreement, signed at the start along with everything else.

Something along the lines of: we sometimes photograph completed work for our website and marketing. Please tick if you would prefer we did not, or discuss it with us.

That framing works better than asking at the end, for two reasons. It is asked before anyone is invested, so a refusal costs nothing. And it is documented, which is what you actually need if the question arises later.

For anything more prominent than a gallery image, such as a full case study or a quote attributed to them, ask separately and specifically. Blanket consent obtained at the start does not comfortably cover a page about their renovation with their first name on it.

Names and testimonials

A review left publicly on a platform is public, and quoting it with the displayed name is generally accepted, subject to the platform's own terms.

A testimonial given to you privately is different. Ask how they would like to be identified, and offer options: full name, first name and initial, first name and area, or anonymous with the job type. Most people choose something in the middle when asked, and something is considerably more credible than nothing.

What not to do is upgrade the attribution afterwards. Someone who agreed to first name only has not agreed to their full name appearing later.

Withdrawal

People change their minds, and handling it well costs almost nothing.

If a customer asks you to remove a photograph or a quote, remove it, promptly, without asking why. The goodwill cost of arguing exceeds any value the image had, and a customer who feels ignored on this point has a specific grievance to write about.

Practically that means being able to find where an image was used, which is one reason a simple record of what came from which job is worth keeping.

Children and vulnerable settings

A higher bar, and worth treating as such.

Any identifiable child needs consent from a parent or guardian, obtained explicitly rather than assumed from a general clause. The same care applies to work in care homes, medical settings, schools, and anywhere occupants may not be in a position to object.

The safe default in those settings is to photograph the work with nobody in frame, which is usually possible and removes the question entirely.

Commercial clients

Different considerations from residential.

Many businesses are happy to be named and some contracts prohibit it. Confidentiality clauses in commercial agreements sometimes cover the existence of the relationship, not just its contents, which means naming them as a client is the breach rather than describing the work.

Ask, get it in writing, and where a client agrees to be named, that is worth considerably more than an anonymous case study, so it is worth asking properly rather than assuming the answer is no.

The practical setup

• A line on the job sheet, ticked or signed at the start.
• A note of the answer against the job, so it can be checked later.
• A separate ask for anything featuring a customer prominently.
• Crop rather than ask where the identifying detail is incidental.
• Remove on request, without discussion.

That is five minutes of process, once, and it removes an entire category of awkward conversation. It sits alongside the ownership question covered in copyright and the images on your website, which is the other half of the same problem.

Frequently asked questions

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.