Terms and Conditions

Before you register with Patchwork, please take the time to read our Terms of Service. It's a pretty comprehensive set of guidelines about the use of our site at patchworkit.com and its associated services. It's standard stuff but as you're agreeing to our terms by using our website, it makes sense for you to know what you're signing up to.

We’re committed to protecting and respecting your privacy and our Privacy Policy sets out the basis on which any personal data we collect from you, or that you provide to us, will be handled by us.

We also ask that you use the site in accordance with our Acceptable Use Policy, abide by the law and don't cause offence. And if you don't agree then please don't use our site.

Thank you.

Patchwork Ltd

58a Wickham Road

London

SE4 1LS

Company No: 07808371

VAT No: 142 6755 08

 

 

Terms of Service

Please read these Terms of Service (the "Agreement" or "Terms") carefully before using the services offered by Patchwork Limited (“Patchwork”). This page (together with the documents referred to on it) sets forth the terms of service applicable to your use of the Website at patchworkit.com (the “Website”) and/or its associated services (the “Services”). By using the Website and/or the Services in any manner, including, but not limited to, visiting or browsing the Website or contributing content, information, or other materials or services to the Website, you agree to be bound by this Agreement. If you do not agree to these Terms, you must not use the Website and/or the Services.

About Patchwork

Patchwork operates the Website and its associated Services. It is a private limited company registered in England and Wales under company number 07808371 and its registered office is Flat A, 58 Wickham Road, Brockley, London SE4 1LS. The VAT number is 142 6755 08. The Patchwork team office is at 58a Wickham Road, London SE4 1LS.

Summary of service

Patchwork is a platform which allows groups of people to come together to contribute money, time and skills towards a gift, event or experience. The registered user (the “Page Creator”) can set up a Patchwork page (the “Patchwork page”) to collect money and non-financial contributions from friends and family (the “Contributors”).

The Patchwork Service consists of the publication of web pages on the Website and enabling the transactions to the registered Payment Partner account of the Page Creator. Patchwork has no responsibility for the acts or omissions of any Page Creator in relation to the contributions collected.

Acceptance of Terms

The Service is offered subject to acceptance of these Terms, including the Privacy Policy and all other operating rules, and procedures that may be published on the Website by Patchwork, which are incorporated by reference. These Terms apply to every user of the Service. In addition, some services offered through Patchwork may be subject to additional terms and conditions. Your use of those services is subject to those additional terms and conditions, which are incorporated into these Terms by this reference.

Patchwork reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to modify or replace these Terms by posting the updates on the Website. It is your responsibility to check this page from time to time and take notice of any changes made, as they are binding on you. Your continued use of the Service following the posting of any changes to the Terms constitutes acceptance of those changes. Some of the provisions contained in these Terms may also be superseded by provisions or notices published elsewhere on the Website.

Patchwork reserves the right to change, suspend, or discontinue the Service (including, but not limited to, the availability of any feature, database, or content) at any time for any reason. Patchwork may also impose limits on certain features and services or restrict your access to parts or all of the Service without notice or liability.

If your account was created before 22 February 2022, please read the Legacy Account T&C’s, Platform Fees and Privacy Policy that refers to legacy accounts. 

Registration

If you wish to use the Website or its associated services as a Page Creator to collect money from Contributors towards a gift, you must (i) be at least 18 years of age; and (ii) have an active Payment Partner account; (iii) be registered with the Website (iv) agree to a Pre Paid account - subscription or single upfront fee; (iv) choose a charity to donate 50% of the platform fee to.

If you wish to use the Website or its associated services as a Page Creator to organise an event or occasion for someone else, you must (i) meet the requirements above; (ii) have the consent of the individual to use their data in the patchwork, including but not exclusive to their name, details and image; and, (iii) have the recipients consent for us to contact them, only upon your instruction, with details of their gift.

If you wish to use the Website or its associated services as a Page Creator to organise an event or occasion and invite someone else to collaborate and make the patchwork with you, you must (i) meet the requirements above; and (ii) have the consent of the individual for us to contact them on your behalf and invite them to use the site.

You represent and warrant that all registration information you submit is accurate and truthful. Patchwork reserves the right to ask for proof of information from you and your account may be suspended until satisfactory proof is provided. Patchwork may, in its sole discretion, refuse to offer the Service to any person or entity and change its eligibility criteria at any time. This provision is void where prohibited by law and the right to access the Service is revoked in those jurisdictions.

You are required to provide: (i) your full name; (ii) your email address; (iii) a password for your account, which you create (iv) select a charity and whether or not Gift Aid applicable (v) payment towards a Pre Paid account - either Susbcription or Single Up Front Fee. You will receive an email to welcome you to the Website. You can change your password in your Profile section of the website.  

In order to register with the Website you must accurately complete all mandatory areas of the online registration form. Failure to do so shall constitute a breach of the Terms of Service, which may result in immediate termination of your account. You are solely responsible for activity that occurs on your account and shall be responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your password for the Website. You shall never use another User account. You will immediately notify Patchwork of any unauthorized use of your account, or other known account-related security breach at help@patchworkit.com. You must: (i) keep your password or other security information, either chosen by you or allocated by Patchwork as part of the registration process, strictly confidential and not disclose it to any third party; (ii) keep your email address and other registration details up to date and notify Patchwork promptly of any changes, (iii) not create additional registration accounts for the purpose of abusing the functionality of the Website or other users; and (v) not pass yourself off as another user.

Patchwork has the right to disable any password, whether chosen by you or allocated by Patchwork, at any time, if you do not comply with any of the provisions of these Terms of Service and/or if it is believed that you do not fulfil the Registration Requirements.

Platform Fees

The following fees apply to the use of the Website and associated Services when registering with the Website. 

Patchwork charges a PrePaid Fee to use the platform.  There are two options:

Single UpFront Pre Paid Fee: £50.  This option permits one patchwork page per user for as long as is required. The patchwork can be active collecting funds for a period of 6 months.  If a subsequent patchwork page is created a second Single UpFront Pre Paid Fee is required. 

Monthly Subscription Pre Paid Fee: £6.  This option permits 6 patchwork pages per year (and this can be extended to unlimited patchwork pages after anti money laundering procedures are satisfied). Each patchwork can be active and collecting funds for a period of 6 months. The first month of the subscription plan is free.  If you cancel your subscription, or your payment method fails, you will no longer be able to create patchworks or collect funds to existing patchworks.

Charity Payments Partnership: 50% of the Platform PrePaid Fee 

Patchwork Ltd donates 50% of each sign-up fee that it receives to one of three partner charities. Every user who registers to use the Patchwork platform service is required to pay a PrePaid Fee. 50% of these fees (£25 for 50% of the single payment fee £50, or £3 if 50% of the £6 monthly subscription) gets paid immediately to the chosen charity as selected during the registration process, by the user. 

Payment Partner Fees

In order to collect contributions using the Website and its Services, Page Creators must have a Payment Partner (the 3rd party payment provider companies that enable our Creators to collect funds from their Contributors).  

The Payment Partners Fee may change from time to time and Patchwork will amend these Terms of Service to notify you of such changes. You hereby give Patchwork authority to deduct the Payment Partners Fee (as varied from time to time) from contributions made or received via the Website. Any contributions made by contributors outside the UK will be subject to any currency conversions (and associated costs) applied by Payment Partners or any bank, credit card or debit card provider.

The Make and Do functionality within the platform is completely free from Payment Partner service fees.  

Using the Patchwork Service 

Payment Partner

Patchwork uses Stripe to enable the transfer of contributions to Page Creators on the Website in accordance with these Terms. Patchwork do not hold any of the funds. Funds are transferred directly from the Contributor bank card to Stripe and are cleared to the Page Creator's Stripe account within 7 working days and after the deduction of Stripe fees. Stripe's terms and conditions apply to your use of Stripe to use our Services and the Website, and you must agree to those terms and conditions and comply with them in order to use the Services of Patchwork. Patchwork is not responsible for the acts or omissions of Stripe in relation to your use of the Website and its associated Services. As all payments are processed by Stripe, Patchwork cannot assist with this process.

It is the Page Creator’s responsibility to ensure that he or she has the appropriate Stripe account and, if he or she wishes to have the money transferred into their own bank account by Stripe, to ensure that the Stripe verification procedures have been carried out in time to enable them to purchase their gift for the occasion for which they have been collecting money. It may take up to 7 working days for funds to clear with Stripe into their Stripe account and several days to withdraw the money from a Stripe account to the Page Creator’s bank account. The Page Creator is able to review the transaction history for their Patchwork page via ‘My Account’ on the Website or via their Stripe account. All transaction records are held electronically and can only be viewed through the Website. 

Read more about setting up Stripe.

Contributing to a Patchwork page

If you wish to contribute to a Patchwork page, you will need the Patchwork page URL. If you've lost it, you can go to ‘Find a Friends patchwork’ on patchworkit.com to search for the Page Creator. If you want to contribute money towards a patchwork you can pay using a Payment Partner account (depending on which Payment Partner the Creator has connected to their Patchwork) or most registered debit or credit cards.

Once you make a payment you may not change or cancel that payment. If you want your contribution refunded you must contact the Page Creator (see Refunds). All payments are processed by Payment Partners. Accordingly, Patchwork hold no records relating to your bank accounts, credit or debit cards.

Please note that a Page Creator cannot contribute to a page using their own Payment Partner account if the same account is linked to their page as the receiving account.

Limits on contributions and gifts

The maximum value of a single item within a Patchwork page is set at £500, but there is no limit to the quantity of items.

Contributors are limited to four individual contributions (check-out cart totals) to any one Patchwork page with a maximum net contribution of £1300. If your contribution has not gone through please email help@patchworkit.com

Page Creators may have a Patchwork page live and collecting funds for a maximum of six months. The date will be set from receipt of the first financial contribution.

Patchwork pages that do not collect funds will be closed after 12 months.

Patchwork will monitor gift pages with high value gifts and a high volume of contributions and will contact the Page Creator if it is believed that the Website is not being used legitimately. This is primarily for, but not limited to, Anti Money Laundering processes. The Page Creator agrees they may be required to provide Patchwork with further information reasonably deemed necessary to investigate misuse of the Website.

There are thresholds for the amount of cash gifts you can give in the UK. There’s a standard annual exemption of £3000 for the total value of all the gifts you can give in a year.  However there’s an additional allowance for wedding gifts up to £1000 per person, or £2500 for a grandchild and £5000 for a great-grandchild. 

However, we can not advise on your personal tax circumstances - we recommend that you consult your personal tax or accounting professional to check any restrictions that would apply to you in your country.

Refunds

Refunds of contributions via PayPal

Requests for refunds of contributions made by Contributors to a Patchwork page collecting funds via PayPal can only be made by the Page Creator. If you have contributed and wish to have your contribution refunded, please contact the Page Creator. If the Page Creator wishes to have any or all contributions to his or her Patchwork page refunded to the original Contributor he or she can do so via the “Refund” option in their PayPal account.

When you fully refund a contribution, PayPal will not charge a fee to process refunds, however fees from the original transaction will not be returned. PayPal retain the variable (percentage-based) portion of the original transaction fee and the fixed fee portion of the original transaction fee. The remaining amount is taken from your account and refunded to the contributor.

An example, suppose that a contributor sends you a gift of £100.00. 

If you were to make a full refund you would return £96.80 to the buyer and PayPal would retain their fee of £3.20.

Here’s the calculation in £GBP:

Original gift payment sent to you:  £100.00

Less Paypal fee 2.9% = £2.90

Less Paypal fixed transaction fee 30p = £0.30

Total PayPal fees £3.20

Balance of gift amount received into your account = £96.80

Refunds of contributions via Stripe

Requests for refunds of contributions made by Contributors to a Patchwork page collecting funds via Stripe can be made by the Page Creator. In addition, in some circumstances we are able to refund card payments made through Stripe. If the refund request is made immediately after payment it is possible for us to reverse the transaction via our business dashboard with Stripe. Please contact us in this instance - hello@patchworkit.com 

Refunds for Page Creators

If you are a Page Creator and have registered with the single upfront pre-paid fee or the monthly subscription pre-paid fee and find that you are unable to use the Patchwork service or are unhappy with the service for any reason please contact us. We will endeavour to ensure that you are able to use the service and are happy with it, but on the rare occasion this is not possible, we ask that you contact us about a partial refund. Please note that we are unable to refund the charity portion (50%) of your single upfront fee or your monthly subscription fee as this is donated directly to the charity you choose to support with your sign-up fee.

Accessing the website

Access to the Website is permitted on a temporary basis, and Patchwork reserves the right to withdraw or amend the service provided on the Website without notice (see below). Patchwork will not be liable if for any reason the Website is unavailable at any time or for any period.

Reliance on Information posted

Commentary and other materials posted on the Website are not intended to amount to advice on which reliance should be placed. Patchwork disclaim all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on such materials by any visitor to or user of the Website, or by anyone who may be informed of any of its contents.

Website updates

Patchwork aims to update the Website regularly, and may change the content at any time. If the need arises, Patchwork may suspend access to the Website and any of its associated services, any part of the Website or its associated services, or may close it indefinitely or cease the provision of the associated services indefinitely. Any of the material on the Website may be out of date at any given time, and Patchwork is under no obligation to update such material.

Your breach of these Terms

If you fail to comply with or breach these Terms (or Patchwork has reasonable grounds to believe that you have breached these Terms), including the Acceptable Use Standards, Patchwork may take all or any of the following actions:

• Immediate, temporary or permanent withdrawal of your right to use the Website and its associated services;
• Immediate, temporary or permanent removal of Your Content (or any of Your Content) from the Website;
• Issue of a warning to you;
• Legal proceedings against you for reimbursement of all costs on an indemnity basis (including, but not limited to, reasonable administrative and legal costs) resulting from the breach;
• Further legal action against you;
• Disclosure of such information to law enforcement authorities or third parties as Patchwork reasonably feel is necessary.

Patchwork excludes liability for actions taken in response to breaches of these Terms of Service. These actions are not limited, and Patchwork may take any other action it deems appropriate.

Termination

Patchwork may terminate your access to the Service, without cause or notice, which may result in the forfeiture and destruction of all information associated with your account. If you are a Page Creator and wish to terminate your account, you may do so at any time. Any fees paid to Patchwork are non-refundable. These Terms of Service shall continue to apply to any use you made of the Website and its associated Services prior to your cancellation, termination, or discontinuance of use of the Website.

Unauthorised transactions

If you believe your password has been lost or stolen, please contact help@patchworkit.com.

Information about you and your visits to the website

Patchwork processes information about you in accordance with the Privacy Policy . By using the Website, you consent to such processing and you warrant that all data provided by you is accurate.

Linking to the website

You may link to Patchwork’s home page or to a Page Creator’s page, provided you do so in a way that is fair and legal and does not damage Patchwork’s reputation or take advantage of it, but you must not establish a link in such a way as to suggest any form of association, approval or endorsement where none exists. The Website must not be framed on any other Website. Patchwork reserves the right to withdraw linking permission without notice. If you wish to make any use of material on the Website other than that set out above, please address your request to hello@patchworkit.com.

Links from the website

Where the Website contains links to other Websites and resources provided by third parties or users, these links are provided for your information only. Patchwork has no control over the contents of those Websites or resources, and accept no responsibility for them or for any loss or damage that may arise from your use of them.

Indemnification

You shall defend, indemnify, and hold harmless Patchwork, its affiliates, and each of its and its affiliates’ employees, contractors, directors, suppliers, and representatives from all liabilities, claims, and expenses, including reasonable attorneys' fees and other legal costs, that arise from or relate to your use or misuse of, or access to, the Service and Content, or otherwise from your User Submissions, violation of the Terms of Use, or infringement by you, or any third party using your account, of any intellectual property or other right of any person or entity. Patchwork reserves the right to assume the exclusive defence and control of any matter otherwise subject to indemnification by you, in which event you will assist and cooperate with Patchwork in asserting any available defences.

Limitation of liability

The Website and the material displayed on the Website is provided without any guarantees, conditions or warranties as to its accuracy. To the extent permitted by law, Patchwork and other third parties connected to Patchwork hereby expressly exclude:

• All conditions, warranties and other terms which might otherwise be implied by statute, common law or the law of equity.
• All liability for any loss or damage caused by a distributed denial-of-service attack, viruses or other technologically harmful material that may infect your computer equipment, computer programs, data or other proprietary material due to your use of the Website or to your downloading of any material posted on it, or on any Website linked to it.
• Any liability for the acts or omissions of PayPal;
• Any liability for the use made by Page Creators of the funds collected via our associated services;
• Any liability for any failures, interruptions, delays or other matters of a similar nature arising out of circumstances beyond our reasonable control;
• Any liability for any indirect or consequential loss or damage incurred by any user in connection with the Website or in connection with the use, inability to use, or results of the use of the Website, any Websites linked to it and any materials posted on it, including:
  • loss of income or revenue;
  • loss of business;
  • loss of profits or contracts;
  • loss of anticipated savings;
  • loss of data;
  • loss of Your Content;
  • loss of goodwill;
  • wasted management or office time; and
  • whether caused by tort (including negligence), breach of contract or otherwise, even if foreseeable.

This does not affect Patchwork’s liability for death or personal injury arising from Patchwork’s negligence, nor liability for fraudulent misrepresentation or misrepresentation as to a fundamental matter, nor any other liability which cannot be excluded or limited under applicable law.

International

Accessing the Service is prohibited from territories where the Content is illegal. If you access the Service from other locations, you do so at your own initiative and are responsible for compliance with local laws.

Governing law

These Terms of Service (and any further rules, policies, or guidelines incorporated by reference) shall be governed by and construed in accordance with English law. The English courts will have exclusive jurisdiction over any claim arising from, or related to, a visit to the Website although Patchwork retain the right to bring proceedings against you for breach of these Terms of Service in your country of residence or any other relevant country. These Terms of Service and any dispute or claim arising out of or in connection with them or their subject matter or formation (including non-contractual disputes or claims) shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the law of England and Wales.

Integration and severability

These Terms and other referenced material are the entire agreement between you and Patchwork with respect to the Service, and supersede all prior or contemporaneous communications and proposals (whether oral, written or electronic) between you and Patchwork with respect to the Service and govern the future relationship. If any provision of the Terms is found to be unenforceable or invalid, that provision will be limited or eliminated to the minimum extent necessary so that the Terms will otherwise remain in full force and effect and enforceable. The failure of either party to exercise in any respect any right provided for herein shall not be deemed a waiver of any further rights hereunder.

Your concerns

If you have any concerns about material which appears on the Website or these Terms of Service please contact help@patchworkit.com

Acceptable Use

Patchwork is a platform that allows people to organise and fund group gifts, events and experiences. If you create a Patchwork page or use the Patchwork Service, you must use it in accordance with the law and comply with this Acceptable Use Policy. You are responsible for all of your activity in connection with the Service. Patchwork will remove any offensive, obscene, racist or other unacceptable Content as soon as it is noticed and you must ensure that any Content you include on any Patchwork page or the Patchwork Website (particularly pictures and photographs) does not infringe the copyright or trade mark of any other person. Patchwork will decide in ultimate discretion whether you have breached this Acceptable Use Policy and may terminate your account or prevent or restrict your access to the Patchwork Website and our associated Services.

You shall not, and shall not permit any third party using your account to, use the Website and its associated Services:

As part of a business or for any commercial use or purpose;

To collect or contribute money for any of the following:

• Items that infringe or violate any copyright, trademark, right of publicity or privacy or any other similar right in any part of the world;
• Counterfeit or pirated items;
• Items that promote hate, violence, racial intolerance or the financial exploitation of a crime;
• Items that encourage, promote, facilitate or instruct others to engage in illegal activity;
• Items that are illegal products;
• Items that promote, support or glorify acts of violence or harm, whether to self or others;
• Drugs or drugs paraphernalia;
• Guns or offensive weapons of any type;
• Obscene or pornographic items;
• Wild animals, endangered species, (or when necessary by law) unlicensed or unregistered animals;
• Pharmaceutical products (whether prescription or over-the-counter);
• Financial or investment products;
• Any age restricted items, such as alcohol, knives, glue or glue products, DVDs or video games where the intended recipient of such item is below the permitted age for that item. For example you cannot create a Patchwork page for a person under 18 to collect contributions towards an alcoholic product for such person;
• Any other purpose which is in breach of these Acceptable Use Standards or applicable law and regulations;

For the purposes of gaming, gambling, betting or lotteries;

In any way that breaches any applicable local, national or international law or regulation;

In any way that is unlawful or fraudulent, or has any unlawful or fraudulent purpose or effect;

To operate a private banking service or to send or receive potentially fraudulent funds;

In any way which breaches the terms and conditions of service of PayPal;

For the purpose of harming or attempting to harm minors in any way;

To conduct, display or forward raffles, surveys, lotteries, contests, pyramid schemes or chain letters;

To send, knowingly receive, upload, download, use or re-use any material which does not comply with the Standards relating to Your Content, set out below;

To transmit, or procure the sending of, any unsolicited or unauthorised advertising or promotional material or any other form of similar solicitation (spam); or

To knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs, keystroke loggers, spyware, or other material which is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to the Website, the server on which the Website is stored or any server, computer or database connected to the Website. You must not attack the Website via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of service attack;

To collect or contribute money for or to control any account which is linked to another account that is engaged in any of these purposes.

To knowingly navigate around our services for the purpose of avoiding Patchwork fees payable on the collection of funds.

Whenever you make use of a feature that allows you to upload material to the Website (including creating a Patchwork page), or to make contact with other users of the Website, you must ensure that any such material, contributions or content (“Your Content”) does not:

• Contain any material which is defamatory of any person.
• Contain any material which is obscene, offensive, hateful or inflammatory.
• Promote or contain any sexually explicit material;
• Promote violence or any illegal activity;
• Promote discrimination based on race, sex, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age;
• Infringe any copyright, database right or trade mark of any other person;
• Be likely to deceive any person;
• Be made in breach of any legal duty owed to a third party, such as a contractual duty or a duty of confidence;
• Disclose the name, address, telephone, mobile or fax number, email address or any other personal data in respect of any person;
• Be in contempt of court;
• Be threatening, bullying, abusive or invade another’s privacy, or cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety;
• Be likely to harass, upset, embarrass, alarm or annoy any other person;
• Be used to impersonate any person, or to misrepresent your identity or affiliation with any person;
• Give the impression that it emanates from us, if this is not the case;
• Advocate, promote or assist any unlawful act such as (by way of example only) copyright infringement or computer misuse;
• Contain any statement which you know or believe, or have reasonable grounds for believing, that members of the public to who, the statement is, or is to be, published are likely to understand as a direct or indirect encouragement or other inducement to the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism;
• Contain any advertising or promote any services or web links to other Websites.

Additionally, you shall not: (i) take any action that imposes or may impose (as determined by Patchwork in its sole discretion) an unreasonable or disproportionately large load on Patchwork’s or its third-party providers’ infrastructure; (ii) interfere or attempt to interfere with the proper working of the Service or any activities conducted on the Service; (iii) bypass any measures Patchwork may use to prevent or restrict access to the Service (or other accounts, computer systems, or networks connected to the Service); (iv) run Maillist, Listserv, or any form of auto-responder or "spam" on the Service; or (v) use manual or automated software, devices, or other processes to "crawl" or "spider" any page of the Website.

You shall not directly or indirectly: (i) decipher, decompile, disassemble, reverse engineer, or otherwise attempt to derive any source code or underlying ideas or algorithms of any part of the Service, except to the extent applicable laws specifically prohibit such restriction; (ii) modify, translate, or otherwise create derivative works of any part of the Service; or (iii) copy, rent, lease, distribute, or otherwise transfer any of the rights that you receive hereunder. You shall abide by all applicable local, state, national, and international laws and regulations. If in breaching any of these provisions, you commit or Patchwork has reasonable cause to believe you have committed, a criminal offence, in addition to Patchwork’s other rights set out in these Terms and Conditions, Patchwork may report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and will co-operate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them.

Updated: November 2022