Terms of Service

Last updated: 10 July 2026 · Placeholder draft, pending legal review

This is a template Terms of Service based on common industry practice for online software and subscription services. It is provided as a working starting point, not legal advice, and should be reviewed by a qualified Australian lawyer before this business relies on it — particularly the fees, refunds, and liability sections, which need to be checked against the Australian Consumer Law and the specific services actually being sold.

1. Who these terms are with

These Terms of Service ("Terms") are an agreement between you and Ebono Intelligence Pty Ltd (ACN 699 020 392, ABN 71 699 020 392), trading as The Ebono Institute ("we", "us", "our"), governing your use of our websites, applications, and services (the "Services"), including any free, one-off purchase, or subscription offerings made available at ebono.au and its associated subdomains.

By creating an account, making a purchase, or otherwise using the Services, you agree to these Terms. If you don't agree, please don't use the Services.

2. Accounts

Some Services require an account. You agree to provide accurate information, keep your login details secure, and notify us promptly of any unauthorised use of your account. You're responsible for activity that occurs under your account.

You must be at least 18 years old, or the age of legal majority in your jurisdiction, to create an account.

3. Fees, billing, and payment

3.1 Free and freemium tiers

Certain features may be offered free of charge or as part of a free tier with usage limits. We may change what's included in free tiers, or discontinue them, on reasonable notice.

3.2 One-off purchases

Some features or services are available for a single, one-off fee. Unless otherwise stated, one-off fees grant access to the specific feature or output purchased and do not entitle you to future updates or additional services beyond what was described at the time of purchase.

3.3 Subscriptions

Subscription plans are billed in advance on a recurring basis (e.g. monthly or annually) until cancelled. By starting a subscription, you authorise us to charge your chosen payment method automatically at the start of each billing period. You can cancel at any time; your access continues until the end of the current billing period, and we don't provide partial-period refunds except where required by law.

3.4 Payment processing

Payments are processed by Stripe, a third-party payment processor. We do not store your full payment card details on our own servers. Your use of Stripe's payment services is also subject to Stripe's terms.

3.5 Price changes

We may change our fees from time to time. For subscriptions, we'll give you reasonable notice before a price change takes effect on your next billing cycle.

3.6 Refunds

Refunds are considered on a case-by-case basis and in accordance with the Australian Consumer Law, which provides consumer guarantees that can't be excluded, restricted, or modified by these Terms. Nothing in this section limits any right or remedy you have under that law.

4. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

Use the Services for any unlawful purpose or in violation of any applicable law;
Attempt to gain unauthorised access to our systems or another user's account;
Reverse-engineer, decompile, or attempt to extract the source code of the Services, except as permitted by law;
Interfere with or disrupt the integrity or performance of the Services;
Use the Services to build a competing product using data or outputs obtained through the Services in a way that breaches these Terms.

5. Your content

You retain ownership of any content, data, or documents you upload or submit to the Services ("Your Content"). You grant us a limited licence to host, process, and display Your Content solely as needed to provide the Services to you. We don't claim ownership of Your Content, and we don't use it to train third-party models except where you've been separately and explicitly informed and have agreed.

You're responsible for ensuring you have the necessary rights to upload Your Content and that it doesn't infringe anyone else's rights.

6. Our intellectual property

The Services, including our software, branding, documentation, and underlying methodology, are owned by or licensed to us and are protected by intellectual property laws. These Terms don't grant you any rights to our intellectual property except the limited right to use the Services as intended.

7. Disclaimers

The Services are provided "as is" and "as available". To the maximum extent permitted by law, we make no warranties, express or implied, about the reliability, accuracy, or fitness for a particular purpose of the Services, beyond the consumer guarantees that apply under the Australian Consumer Law and cannot be excluded.

Where the Services involve AI-assisted or automated processing, outputs may contain errors or omissions. The Services are a tool to support your work, not a substitute for your own professional or research judgement.

8. Limitation of liability

To the maximum extent permitted by law, and subject to any consumer guarantees that cannot be excluded, our total liability to you arising out of or in connection with the Services is limited to the amount you paid us for the Services in the 12 months before the claim arose. We are not liable for indirect, incidental, or consequential loss.

9. Suspension and termination

We may suspend or terminate your access to the Services if you breach these Terms, or for security or legal reasons, with notice where reasonably practicable. You may stop using the Services, or cancel a subscription, at any time.

10. Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. We'll post the updated Terms with a new "last updated" date, and for material changes we'll make reasonable efforts to notify active account holders.

11. Governing law

These Terms are governed by the laws of Queensland, Australia, and you submit to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of its courts.

12. Contact

Questions about these Terms can be sent via our support page or to info@ebono.au.