effant Seller Terms

DRAFT for legal review — not yet in effect. Items in [brackets] are open decisions or placeholders.

Version: 2026-10-23-draft

These terms are an agreement between you (the "Seller") and Effant LLC ("effant", "we"). They apply when you apply to sell, list software, or receive payments through effant.

1. What effant is

effant is a marketplace where vetted independent developers sell software to food service businesses ("Buyers"). effant provides discovery, vetting, checkout, the effant guarantee, and the handoff that connects a Buyer to your software. effant does not host, operate, or modify your software.

2. Becoming a Seller

• You must submit a developer application and be approved by effant. effant may approve or decline any application at its discretion.
• To receive payments you must complete identity and payout verification with Stripe through effant. Information you give effant and Stripe must be accurate and kept current.
• New Sellers start on probation. effant may move you to verified based on your track record, or suspend you under section 14.

3. Listings

• Every listing must accurately describe what your software does, its prices, setup requirements, the devices it works on, how it handles Buyer data, and how Buyers can export their data.
• effant reviews every listing before it goes live. Any change to a live listing's description or prices sends it back to review.
• effant keeps a copy of your listing as it appeared at the time of each purchase. That copy is used to resolve guarantee claims and disputes.
• You may not list software you do not have the right to sell.

4. The effant handoff (required)

Every listing must support the effant handoff, which effant documents in its developer guide:

• Your software must accept effant's signed handoff to sign Buyers in and receive the Buyer's business information and setup answers.
• You must verify effant's signatures and use the effant license API or webhooks to confirm a Buyer's purchase status.
• You must support staff access suitable for food service (for example shared kitchen devices) as described in your listing.
• You may use Buyer data received through the handoff only to provide your software to that Buyer.

5. Prices, fees, and taxes

• You set your prices: a price to own (one-time) and/or a monthly maintenance price.
• For every payment, effant charges a platform fee of 15% plus an amount equal to Stripe's payment processing fee, deducted automatically.
• Founding Sellers designated by effant pay a platform fee of 10% (plus Stripe's processing fee) for 12 months from designation. After that the standard rate applies to all payments, including renewals of existing maintenance subscriptions. effant will notify you before the change.
• Payments are processed as direct charges on your Stripe account. You are the merchant of record and are responsible for any sales, use, or similar taxes on your sales, and for complying with tax laws that apply to you.

6. Payouts and holds

• Payouts are made by Stripe to your bank account. effant may hold your payouts for up to 30 days after each payment (or longer where Stripe allows) to fund the effant guarantee, refunds, and disputes. effant sets the hold based on your status and track record.
• effant may pause payouts while it investigates a complaint, refund claim, dispute, chargeback, or suspected breach of these terms.

7. Ownership and maintenance

• A Buyer who pays the price to own receives a perpetual, non-transferable right to use the purchased software for their own business.
• Monthly maintenance, when offered, covers hosting, security updates, bug fixes, and support. While a Buyer's maintenance is active you must keep the software running, secure, and supported as described in your listing.
• When a Buyer's maintenance ends, because they stopped it or because a maintenance payment couldn't be collected, you must keep the software running for that Buyer for a 30-day wind-down period so they can export their data or move to self-hosting. After that you may stop hosting it for them. effant's license API and webhooks give your software the exact date.
• If a Buyer restarts maintenance, you must resume hosting, updates, and support for them at your listing's current maintenance price.
• Your listing must say whether you offer a self-hosting package. If you do, you must deliver it to any Buyer who paid a price to own the software and asks within the wind-down period. A package includes at least: a deployable copy of the software, setup instructions, the list of required services and settings, and a way to import the Buyer's exported data. A Buyer's license to self-host covers their own business only.
• Buyers must always be able to export their own data in a common format (such as CSV), including after maintenance ends.

8. Support

• You must respond to Buyer support requests sent through effant within 2 business days.
• effant may contact you about any support request, and may step in if you do not respond in time.

9. The effant guarantee and refunds

• Buyers may request a refund within 10 days of a payment.
• effant decides each request case by case. A refund is generally granted when the software fails severely to work as described in the listing the Buyer saw, or when the listing or effant's description was materially false or misleading. Changing one's mind or finding the software too complicated is generally not, on its own, grounds for a refund.
• You agree that effant may refund a Buyer from the payment on your Stripe account when effant grants a refund, and that effant's fee on that payment will also be refunded.
• Refunding the payment that bought the software ends the Buyer's ownership. Refunding a later maintenance payment ends their maintenance (with the wind-down period in section 7), but not their ownership.
• You must cooperate with effant's review of a refund request, including responding to questions within 2 business days.

10. Custom work (requests)

• Buyers post requests for custom software, either to every developer or directly to one. You may take a request if effant has approved you, your Stripe account can accept payments, and you have accepted the current Seller Terms. Taking a request commits you to the work it describes at the posted price.
• When you take a request, the Buyer has 48 hours to pay a deposit of half the price. Don't start work until effant tells you the deposit is paid. Before that, either of you can step back.
• Keep the Buyer informed through effant's messages and deliver by the requested date where one is given. When you deliver, describe what you delivered and how to use it.
• The Buyer has 7 days after delivery to approve the work or report a problem. If they do neither, the work is approved automatically. When the work is approved, the other half is charged to the card the Buyer used for the deposit.
• Both payments are direct charges on your Stripe account, each with effant's platform fee from section 5, and payouts follow section 6.
• If the Buyer reports a problem, effant reviews the request, the delivery, and the messages, and may release the payment, send the work back to you to fix, or refund the deposit from your Stripe balance. If you cancel after the deposit is paid, the deposit is refunded in full.
• Ownership: unless the request is marked exclusive, you keep ownership of the delivered work and the Buyer receives a perpetual, non-transferable license to use it for their own business; you may offer the same software to others, but never with the Buyer's data or branding. If the request is marked exclusive, ownership of the delivered work passes to the Buyer once both payments are made. Either way, you keep your pre-existing code and general know-how, and the Buyer receives a license to any of it included in the delivery.

11. No circumvention

For 24 months after a Buyer first purchases from you or hires you through effant, you may not offer that Buyer the same or substantially similar software, maintenance, or services outside effant to avoid effant's fees, or encourage them to cancel through effant and pay you directly. If you do, you owe effant the fees it would have earned, and effant may suspend you.

12. Data protection and security

• You must protect Buyer data with reasonable administrative, technical, and physical safeguards, including HTTPS, authentication, and access controls.
• You may not sell Buyer data or use it for any purpose other than providing your software to that Buyer.
• You must notify effant within 72 hours of discovering any security incident affecting Buyer data.
• You must delete or return a Buyer's data on their request, except where the law requires you to keep it.
• You are responsible for the security of your software and infrastructure. effant may require you to fix a security problem and may delist your software until you do.

13. Conduct

You may not post fake reviews, buy your own listings (directly or through others), manipulate rankings, misrepresent your identity or software, or interfere with effant or other Sellers.

14. Suspension and termination

effant may suspend or remove your listings, hold payouts, or end your account if you breach these terms, if your software is unsafe or does not work as described, or if required by law or by Stripe. You may stop selling at any time, but you remain responsible for Buyers who purchased while maintenance obligations or refund windows are open.

15. Intellectual property

You keep all rights in your software. You grant effant a license to display your listing content, name, and logo to promote your listings on effant.

16. Liability and indemnity

[To be drafted by counsel: disclaimers, limitation of liability, and your indemnity of effant for claims arising from your software, your data handling, or your breach of these terms.]

17. Changes

effant may update these terms. We will give you notice before material changes take effect, and you will be asked to accept the new version before you can continue selling.

18. Governing law

[State and venue to be decided.]