Terms of Service

1. Who we are and agreeing to these Terms

These Terms of Service ("Terms") are a binding agreement between you and Scotell ("Scotell", "we", "us"), based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. They cover scotell.com, Scotell research reports, Scotelligence, the Telli assistant and any related service (together, the "Service"). By creating an account, buying anything, or using the Service, you agree to these Terms, our Privacy Policy, our Refund Policy and our Cookie Policy. If you use the Service for a business, you confirm you are allowed to accept these Terms for that business. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.

2. What the Service is

Scotell is an AI-powered business research tool. It produces startup reports on a business idea (competitors, market, regulations, launch budget and financial projections), Scotelligence monitoring for an existing business, and Telli, a chat assistant that answers questions about your report or business and can draft documents such as emails and plans. Reports are put together by AI models and by data from third-party sources, including business directories, mapping services, government websites and web search.

3. Where the Service is available

Scotell is not yet available to residents of Quebec. We plan to offer the Service in Quebec once our agreements and the Service are available in French. By accepting these Terms you confirm that you are not a resident of Quebec, and we may decline or close an account that is. You can still research a business located in Quebec from anywhere the Service is available.

4. Eligibility and your account

You must be at least 18 and able to enter a binding contract. You agree to:

• Give accurate information and keep it current.
• Keep your login secure, and tell us at info@scotell.com right away if you think someone else has used it.
• Keep to one account per person, and not share your account with others.
• Take responsibility for everything done through your account.

5. AI-generated content

Reports and Telli answers are produced by large language models and third-party data. You understand and accept that:

• AI output can be wrong, incomplete, out of date, or made up, even when it cites a source.
• Scores, rankings, cost estimates and projections are estimates, not promises.
• Competitor and market data comes from public sources and will not be complete.
• You are responsible for checking anything before you act on it.

6. Telli

Telli is a business assistant. It is not a source of medical, mental-health, legal or financial help. If you are in crisis or thinking about suicide, call or text 9-8-8 in Canada, or your local emergency number. Drafts Telli prepares (emails, plans, documents) are suggestions: review them before you send or use them. Telli never sends anything on your behalf unless a feature clearly says so and you confirm. Usage limits for each Telli tier are shown before you buy and may be enforced automatically.

• Every message you send to Telli is checked automatically against our safety rules before Telli answers, and a message that breaks them is not answered.
• Some messages, such as ones that mention self-harm, abuse, trafficking or a threat to someone's safety, get a fixed safety message with helplines for your region instead of a Telli answer. These messages are general information, not professional or emergency help.
• Messages that match a safety rule may be reviewed by authorized Scotell staff, who can take the actions in section 12.

7. Acceptable use

Use the Service only for lawful purposes. You must not:

• Use it to plan or promote anything illegal, fraudulent, deceptive or harmful.
• Submit content you have no right to submit, or that infringes anyone else's rights.
• Scrape, copy at scale, resell or redistribute the Service or its reports, other than sharing your own reports through the share features we provide.
• Reverse-engineer the Service, test its security without our written permission, or get around usage limits or access controls.
• Use bots or automation to access the Service, except through an interface we provide for that purpose.
• Impersonate anyone, or monitor a business you have no legitimate reason to monitor.
• Use the Service to build a competing product, or to train an AI model on its outputs.
• Use Telli to threaten or harass anyone, plan violence, or get help with weapons, explosives or other serious harm.
• Use Telli to commit or plan fraud, scams, money laundering or tax evasion, or to find, expose or track a private person (doxxing).
• Send hateful content that attacks people for who they are, or any content that sexualizes minors. We report child sexual abuse material to the authorities.
• Try to make Telli ignore its instructions or safety rules (jailbreaking), or use it to get around these Terms.

8. Purchases, prices and taxes

Some features are free and some are paid. Regarding purchases:

• Prices are shown on our Pricing page and at checkout, with applicable taxes (GST/HST, PST or QST depending on where you are) shown before you pay.
• What each purchase includes (for example a report, a pack of report credits, a refresh, or a Telli Pro pass) is described at the point of purchase.
• Payments are processed by our payment provider. We do not see or store your full card number.
• We email you a receipt and a link to these Terms after each purchase.
• If we offer a recurring plan, you will see the price and billing period before you subscribe, you can cancel online from Settings at any time, and cancellation takes effect at the end of the current period. We give at least 30 days' notice of any price change, and you can cancel before it applies.
• Refunds follow our Refund Policy at /refunds. Nothing in these Terms limits any refund or cancellation right you have under consumer protection law.

9. Ownership and licences

You keep ownership of what you submit (ideas, business details, files and messages). You give us a limited licence to host, process and transmit it only to run, secure and improve the Service for you. We do not use your report inputs or Telli conversations to train AI models without your separate, express consent. You may use the reports you generate for your own business purposes, including sharing them with partners, lenders or investors; third-party material inside a report (maps, listings, quoted text) stays subject to its owner's rights. The Scotell software, design, the names Scotell, Scotelligence and Telli, our methods and aggregated data belong to us or our licensors. If you send us feedback, we may use it without owing you anything.

10. Shared links and third-party services

If you create a share link for a report, anyone with the link can view the shared parts of that report until the link expires or you revoke it, so share it only with people you trust. The Service relies on third-party providers listed in our Privacy Policy. Map data is provided by Google, and your use of it is also subject to the Google Maps Terms of Service. We are not responsible for third-party websites or content we link to.

11. Privacy

Your use of the Service is subject to our Privacy Policy, which explains what we collect, who we share it with and your rights. It is part of these Terms.

12. Suspension and termination

You can delete your account at any time from Settings. Deleting your account removes your reports and data as described in the Privacy Policy, and unused credits are lost unless the Refund Policy says otherwise. We may suspend your account for a set time, or ban it permanently, if you seriously or repeatedly break these Terms (including the acceptable-use rules in section 7), if the law requires it, or to protect the Service or other users. While an account is suspended or banned you cannot sign in or use the Service. Where reasonable we will tell you first and give you a chance to fix the problem, but we may act at once for serious safety violations. We keep the records behind a suspension or ban, including the messages involved, as described in the Privacy Policy. If you think we made a mistake, email us and a person will review it. If we close your account without cause, we refund any prepaid, unused credits or time.

13. Disclaimers

To the extent the law allows, the Service is provided "as is" and "as available". We do not promise that it will be uninterrupted or error-free, or that any report will be accurate, complete or suitable for a particular decision. Where consumer protection law does not allow a warranty to be excluded, these exclusions apply only as far as the law permits.

14. Limitation of liability

To the extent the law allows, we are not liable for indirect, incidental, special or consequential losses, or for lost profits, revenue, data or business opportunities, including losses from decisions you make based on a report. Our total liability for all claims relating to the Service is limited to the greater of (a) what you paid us in the 12 months before the claim and (b) one hundred Canadian dollars (CAD $100). Nothing in these Terms limits liability that cannot legally be limited, or your rights as a consumer under applicable law.

15. Indemnity

If you use the Service for a business and a third party brings a claim against us because of your content or because you broke these Terms, you agree to cover our reasonable losses and costs from that claim. This does not apply to consumers where the law does not allow it.

16. Changes to the Service and these Terms

We may change the Service over time. If we make a material change to these Terms, we will post the new version with a new date and ask you to accept it the next time you sign in, and where practicable we will email account holders before it takes effect. If you do not agree, you can stop using the Service and close your account; if the change materially reduces what you paid for, we refund prepaid, unused credits.

17. Governing law and disputes

These Terms are governed by the laws of the Province of Ontario and the federal laws of Canada that apply there. The courts of Ontario, sitting in Toronto, have jurisdiction, except where consumer protection law gives you the right to bring a claim where you live. Before starting a claim, please contact us at info@scotell.com so we can try to resolve it; we reply within 10 business days.

18. General

These Terms, with the policies they refer to, are the whole agreement between you and us about the Service. If any part is found unenforceable, the rest still applies. If we do not enforce a right right away, we can still enforce it later. You may not transfer these Terms without our consent; we may transfer them as part of a merger, acquisition or sale of assets and will tell you if that happens.