Terms of service

Who you are dealing with

Silent Keel is the trading name of Verlox Limited, a company registered in Hong Kong. "We" on this page means that company. Anything you want to ask goes to hello@silentkeel.com.

These terms cover the portal at app.silentkeel.com and the projects run through it. This site asks nothing of you beyond the enquiry form, which the privacy page describes.

What the portal is

The portal is where a project with us happens. You read the agreement we propose, answer its open points and raise your own proposals, accept a milestone, follow the build, talk to us, collect what we deliver, and see what you have been invoiced. Access is by invitation: we set the project up and invite the email address you gave us.

The agreement comes first

Every project has an agreement. We propose it in versions, each a full statement of scope, milestones, prices and terms; you respond on the page and we answer in the next version. Nothing is signed. Accepting a version in the portal binds both of us to that version's next milestone, on the terms it states. A milestone once accepted keeps its terms, whatever later versions say about anything else.

Where an agreement and this page differ, the agreement wins for that project. This page governs the portal itself and whatever the agreement leaves unsaid.

Three costs

Prices are in US dollars, and every charge is one of three kinds:

• Development. A one-time price for a milestone, invoiced when you accept it. Work on the milestone starts when that invoice is paid.
• Operations. A monthly fee from the milestone's launch, charged automatically to the card on file for the project. A later launch that carries a different fee re-prices it from that launch onward.
• Infrastructure. What the project's external dependencies cost us, passed on at cost as itemised lines on the monthly invoice. The dependencies are listed in the agreement.

Invoices and payments are handled by Stripe. A development invoice is paid in the portal; operations is charged to the card on file. Every invoice has a Stripe page to download it from, and Stripe sends its own receipts.

Ending it

Operations is month to month. Tell us and it stops at the end of the month you have paid for; part months are not pro-rated in either direction. Development is bought per milestone: a paid milestone is delivered, and a milestone you have not accepted commits you to nothing. Either side can end a project by saying so; you keep everything you have paid for.

Your account

Sign-in is by a code emailed to you or through your Google account; there is no password. Anyone who can read that inbox, or use that Google account, can reach your projects, so keeping them secure is part of keeping the account secure. Tell us at once if you think someone else has got in. A sign-in lasts seven days.

What you give us

The messages, files and answers you send through the portal stay yours. You give us the right to use them to do the work, and we use them for nothing else. You are responsible for having the right to send them and for their lawfulness.

What you get

Unless the agreement says otherwise, what we build for you is yours once the milestone that delivers it is paid for. Components under an open-source licence stay under that licence, which is how all modern software works and costs you nothing.

What we are accountable for

Delivering each milestone as its agreement describes, with care and competence. We do not guarantee commercial outcomes, and there is no round-the-clock response unless the agreement says so.

The limits of the promise

The service comes with no warranties beyond what is written here and in the agreement. If we cause you loss anyway, what we owe you is capped at what you paid us under the agreement concerned in the twelve months before the claim, and neither side owes the other for indirect losses such as lost profit. Where the law does not allow a liability to be limited, it is not limited.

Changes to this page

If it changes, you are told before the change applies to you. A milestone you have accepted keeps the terms it was accepted under.

The law behind it

These terms are governed by the law of Hong Kong, and any dispute goes to the Hong Kong courts. Nothing in them takes away rights the law of your country gives you. What we hold about you, and why, is on the privacy page.