GotAPal — Terms of Service (DRAFT)

Effective date: [to set on launch]

Operator: Towpath Digital Ltd, registered in England and Wales no. 16913912 ("Towpath", "we", "us").

Service: GotAPal — a directory and connection service for UK local businesses and consumers, accessible at gotapal.com and related domains.

This is a draft. Final version requires legal review. The structure is sound for a UK consumer-and-business directory; the specifics (limitation of liability caps, dispute resolution venue) need a UK lawyer's eyes before launch.

1. Who these terms apply to

GotAPal has two user types and these terms cover both:

Pals — businesses with a listing (whether claimed or not).
Customers — people browsing the directory or sending quote requests.

By using GotAPal you accept these terms. If you don't accept them, you can ask us to remove your listing (see clause 9) or simply not use the site.

2. Account creation and claiming

You can browse GotAPal without an account. To claim a listing as a Pal, or upgrade to a paid tier, you'll need an account.

When you claim a listing you confirm that:

You are an authorised representative of the business (owner, director, named officer in the Companies House register, or someone they've appointed).
The contact details you provide are accurate.
You're old enough to enter into a contract under UK law (18+).

We may suspend or remove an account that we reasonably believe is fraudulent, impersonating, or misusing the service.

3. The Pal tier — free forever

The free Pal tier is free. Forever. No surprise bills in year two. We will not silently move you to a paid tier. We may add new optional paid features over time, but your existing free Pal access stays free.

What "free forever" means in practice:

Your listing stays live as long as the business legally exists (or until you ask us to remove it).
Standard public features — description, contact, hours, photos, customer reviews, quote enquiry inbox — remain free.
We reserve the right to retire the free tier with at least 90 days' notice, in which case existing free Pals are grandfathered for life.

4. Paid tiers — Trusted Pal, Top Pal, Pal Boost

The Trusted Pal (£29/year), Top Pal (£15/month or £150/year), and Pal Boost (£5/£25/£75 one-off) tiers offer additional features as described on /pricing. By subscribing you authorise Stripe (our payment processor) to charge your provided card at the cadence shown.

Renewals: subscription tiers (Trusted, Top Pal) renew automatically at the end of each billing period. You can cancel any time before the next renewal via the customer portal — your access continues until the period ends.
Refunds: within 14 days of the *first* charge for a subscription tier, you can request a full refund — under the UK Consumer Contracts Regulations. Outside 14 days we don't generally refund part-used periods, but we'll look at cases case-by-case.
Pal Boost is a one-off purchase and is not refundable once the boost period starts, unless the boost failed to deliver due to our error.

5. The directory data — Companies House and original content

GotAPal's directory is seeded with information from the Companies House BasicCompanyData public register under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Listings include name, registered address, SIC codes and company number. We add our own categorisation, mapping, and (once claimed) profile content.

The CH-derived facts are Crown copyright with database rights — we republish under OGL v3.0 attribution.
Our additions (categorisation, content, reviews, photos when uploaded) are our or our users' intellectual property.
When you claim a listing and add your own content, you grant us a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to display that content on GotAPal and use it for the purpose of running the service. You retain ownership.

6. Reviews and user content

Reviews from customers should be:

Honest experiences of dealing with the business.
Free of personal attacks, false statements, profanity directed at people, or content that could amount to defamation.
About the *business*, not about individuals identifiable beyond the business owner.

We moderate reviews using a mix of automated checks and human review. We may remove a review that breaches these rules or appears to be fraudulent (e.g. a competitor leaving a bad review of a rival, or a business soliciting fake good reviews of itself).

A Pal can dispute a review by clicking "report" on it; we'll review within 7 working days.

7. Customer quote enquiries

When a customer sends a quote enquiry through GotAPal:

The enquiry is forwarded to the Pal by email and (if a phone number is on file) by SMS.
The Pal is responsible for responding to the customer directly. GotAPal is a connection service, not a party to the contract between Pal and customer.
We don't guarantee any minimum number of enquiries.

8. Acceptable use

You must not:

Misrepresent yourself or your business.
Scrape, copy, or republish GotAPal's directory data at scale (light use for research is fine; bulk redistribution is not).
Try to break, probe, or game the platform.
Use GotAPal to send spam, phishing, or any unlawful communication.
Solicit, exchange, or post fake reviews.

Breach of these rules can result in listing removal and account suspension. Serious breaches may be reported to police, Companies House, or relevant authorities.

9. Removing a listing

Any business listed on GotAPal can ask us to take down their listing, whether claimed or not.

Email help@gotapal.com from the email on the CH register, OR from an obviously-corporate domain matching the business.
Within 30 days of a verified request, we'll mark the listing inactive. The CH record remains in the public register — we just don't surface it on GotAPal.
A removed listing can be re-listed later if the business changes their mind.

10. Privacy and data

How we collect, use and protect data is covered in our Privacy Policy at /privacy. By using GotAPal you also accept that Privacy Policy.

11. Liability

Nothing in these terms limits our liability for:

Death or personal injury caused by our negligence.
Fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation.
Anything else we can't legally limit liability for.

Subject to the above:

We provide GotAPal "as is" without warranties. We're not the supplier of the trades, services, or goods you find through GotAPal — those contracts are between you and the Pal.
Our total liability to any one user in any 12-month period is limited to the greater of (a) £100 or (b) the total amount you paid us in that period.
We are not liable for indirect, consequential, or business loss.

If a customer engages a Pal through GotAPal and the work goes badly, that's between the customer and the Pal. We can help facilitate a complaint conversation but we are not the contracting party.

12. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms. We'll email registered Pals at least 30 days before material changes take effect. Continued use after the effective date constitutes acceptance.

13. Termination

We may terminate or suspend access if you breach these terms. You may terminate your account any time by emailing help@gotapal.com or via the customer portal. Termination of a paid subscription works as described in clause 4.

14. Governing law

These terms are governed by the laws of England and Wales. Disputes will be resolved in the courts of England and Wales, unless you have non-waivable consumer rights in your country of residence that say otherwise.

15. Contact

Email: help@gotapal.com
Operator: Towpath Digital Ltd, [registered office address]
Companies House no.: 16913912

*Draft for legal review. Reviewer to confirm: liability cap reasonable for UK consumer service; refund clause matches Consumer Rights Act 2015; PECR compliance for the cold-email pipeline.*