Terms of Service

Agreement to Terms

ShopDesk is operated by Arkwell Studio LLC. By accessing or using the ShopDesk platform, you agree to be bound by these Terms of Service. If you do not agree, do not use the Platform.

You must be at least 18 years old to use ShopDesk. If you are using ShopDesk on behalf of a business, you represent that you have the authority to bind that business to these Terms.

Service Description

ShopDesk is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform that provides tools for service businesses to manage bookings, gift cards, customer feedback, and related operations.

ShopDesk provides tools — we are not a party to any transactions between Merchants and their customers. Available features depend on your plan tier and may change over time.

ShopDesk may modify, suspend, or discontinue features from time to time. Where reasonably practicable, we may provide advance notice of material changes.

Nothing on the platform should be interpreted as legal, tax, accounting, financial, or professional advice. Platform features are not a substitute for understanding the laws applicable to your business.

While we use reasonable measures to protect platform data, you are responsible for maintaining any backups or records your business considers important. ShopDesk does not guarantee uninterrupted availability or recoverability of data at all times.

From time to time, ShopDesk may offer features labeled as "beta" or "experimental." These features are provided for evaluation purposes and may be modified or discontinued at any time without notice.

ShopDesk does not guarantee any specific business results, customer acquisition outcomes, revenue increases, or performance improvements from use of the platform.

Platform vs. Merchant Responsibility

This is a critical distinction for using ShopDesk:

Account Responsibilities

You are responsible for maintaining the security of your account credentials and for all activity under your account. You must notify us immediately of any unauthorized access.

The owner account is protected and cannot be deactivated or transferred through the platform. Staff accounts are created and managed by the account owner.

You agree to provide accurate, current, and complete information when creating your account and to update it as necessary.

Subscription Billing & Cancellation

ShopDesk offers a Free plan ($0, with usage limits) and a Pro plan (paid, with expanded features). Pro includes a 7-day free trial. A credit card is required, and you can cancel anytime during the trial.

Pro subscriptions are billed through Stripe and renew automatically. You may cancel at any time. Upon cancellation, you retain Pro access until the end of your current billing period, after which your account is downgraded to the Free plan.

On downgrade, staff beyond the Free plan limit are deactivated (not deleted). Your data is preserved.

Refunds are handled on a case-by-case basis, except where required by applicable law. Please contact support@shopdeskapp.com for refund requests.

Payments are processed via third-party providers (Stripe) and may only be available in supported countries. ShopDesk reserves the right to limit or disable payment functionality based on geographic location or regulatory considerations.

ShopDesk reserves the right to modify pricing for paid plans with advance notice prior to your next renewal date.

Gift Card & Promotional Compliance

ShopDesk provides software tools for creating, tracking, and redeeming digital gift cards and rewards. ShopDesk's gift card feature is designed for ongoing balance tracking rather than one-time promotional use.

Merchants are solely responsible for the terms offered to customers, honoring balances, and compliance with applicable gift card, promotional, tax, and consumer protection laws.

ShopDesk does not process, hold, or store customer funds. All payments are handled directly between the Merchant and their customers.

Booking Disputes

ShopDesk facilitates booking management but is not a party to any appointment agreements between Merchants and their customers.

Disputes regarding service quality, pricing, cancellations, no-shows, or any other aspect of a booked appointment are strictly between the Merchant and the customer.

ShopDesk does not guarantee the accuracy of business listings, pricing, staff availability, or appointment availability displayed on the platform.

SMS Appointment Reminders

ShopDesk enables Merchants on eligible plans to send transactional SMS appointment reminders to customers who opt in during the booking process.

By opting in to SMS reminders at booking time, you consent to receive automated text reminder messages related to your booking.

Message frequency varies. Customers will generally receive up to one (1) reminder for a scheduled appointment time. If an appointment is rescheduled, a new reminder may be sent for the updated time. Message and data rates may apply. Carriers are not liable for delayed or undelivered messages.

To opt out: Reply STOP to any SMS to unsubscribe from future messages.

SMS consent is per-booking and optional. You are not required to consent to SMS to complete a booking.

ShopDesk may monitor SMS usage patterns for operational, security, compliance, fraud-prevention, abuse-prevention, and service reliability purposes. ShopDesk may apply reasonable usage controls, rate limits, reviews, restrictions, or fair-use measures where necessary to protect the Service, maintain reliable delivery, prevent spam or misuse, and comply with carrier, provider, or regulatory requirements.

SMS features, availability, and related usage policies may be updated from time to time as the Service evolves.

AI Receptionist Add-on

ShopDesk offers an AI Receptionist as a separate paid add-on, with usage limits and billing that are separate from the Pro plan. Availability and feature behavior may evolve as the Service evolves.

When enabled, the AI Receptionist may, based on the Merchant's configuration, help create, cancel, or reschedule bookings, answer questions about the business, or take messages on behalf of the Merchant.

The AI Receptionist is usage-metered. When a Merchant's usage allotment for the billing cycle has been reached, calls may be transferred to a Merchant-designated fallback phone number or politely ended. Calls may also be transferred to a fallback number when the call falls outside the Merchant's configured hours or when the AI is unable to continue the call.

Merchants are responsible for: the accuracy of business information that the AI Receptionist relies on (services, hours, pricing, policies); designating and maintaining a working fallback phone number where applicable; compliance with all laws applicable to the use of phone and voice services in the Merchant's jurisdiction; and any consent or recording obligations that may apply if the Merchant later opts into recording features.

Acceptable Use

You agree not to:

• Use ShopDesk for any illegal purpose or in violation of applicable laws
• Upload malicious content, malware, or attempt to compromise platform security
• Impersonate any person, business, or organization, or falsely claim affiliation with, endorsement by, or authorization from any person, business, or organization
• Scrape, crawl, or extract data from the platform through automated means
• Send spam or unsolicited communications through the platform
• Using SMS features in a manner that is excessive, abusive, spam-like, fraudulent, inconsistent with legitimate booking-related operations, or in violation of carrier, provider, or applicable legal requirements
• Using AI Receptionist features in a manner that is abusive, spam-like, fraudulent, used for robocalling or unsolicited outbound campaigns, used to impersonate any person or business, or otherwise inconsistent with legitimate inbound booking-related operations or applicable carrier, provider, or legal requirements
• Engage in review gating or selectively solicit positive reviews (this violates Google's policies)
• Infringe on the intellectual property rights of others
• Circumvent rate limits, access controls, or other security measures
• Use another business's name, logo, photos, branding, or other identifying information without authorization
• Use ShopDesk to mislead customers into sending payments to an unauthorized account, or to collect payments while falsely claiming to represent, be affiliated with, or be authorized by a person, business, or organization
• Use ShopDesk to facilitate fraud, scams, phishing, or deceptive booking or payment activity

ShopDesk may suspend, restrict, hide, or remove any account, booking page, or content that violates these Terms, or that ShopDesk reasonably believes is involved in impersonation, fraud, abuse, or other unlawful or deceptive activity.

ShopDesk may investigate suspected violations and may request information reasonably necessary to verify business ownership, authorization, or control over the identity presented on the platform. Failure to provide requested verification may result in account suspension or termination.

ShopDesk may act on complaints, credible third-party reports, or its own review to enforce these Terms.

Without limiting the above, ShopDesk may remove or disable any uploaded content (including images, logos, or other media) that we reasonably believe infringes the intellectual property, publicity, or other rights of a third party, or that you do not have permission to use.

Accounts that repeatedly upload infringing content may be suspended or terminated at ShopDesk's discretion.

User Conduct & Responsibility

ShopDesk does not control, verify, or endorse businesses or their activities on the platform. Users are responsible for their own conduct and the content they submit.

ShopDesk is not liable for illegal, fraudulent, harmful, or unauthorized activities conducted by users of the platform.

We reserve the right to suspend or terminate accounts that violate these Terms or applicable laws.

Content Ownership & License

Merchants retain ownership of the content they upload to ShopDesk (business information, service descriptions, images). By uploading content, you grant ShopDesk a non-exclusive license to display and process that content as necessary to provide the platform. You represent and warrant that you have all necessary rights, licenses, and permissions to upload and use the content you submit to the platform.

ShopDesk's name, logo, design, and technology are our intellectual property. Free plan accounts display ShopDesk branding; Pro plan accounts may remove it.

Business Locking & Account Restrictions

ShopDesk may place accounts in a read-only ("locked") state for violations of these Terms, suspicious activity, or billing issues.

Locked accounts can view existing data but cannot create or modify records. Public booking pages for locked businesses display as unavailable.

If you believe your account was locked in error, contact support@shopdeskapp.com.

Termination

Upon termination initiated by ShopDesk (other than for violation of these Terms), Merchants may request an export of account data within 30 days, subject to technical feasibility, legal requirements, and security considerations. Data is retained in accordance with our Privacy Policy. The liability, indemnification, and governing law sections of these Terms survive termination.

Limitation of Liability

To the maximum extent permitted by law, ShopDesk's total liability for any claims arising from your use of the platform is limited to the amount you paid to ShopDesk in the 12 months preceding the claim, or $100 (USD), whichever is greater.

ShopDesk is not liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, including but not limited to loss of profits, data, or business opportunities.

ShopDesk is not liable for outages, errors, or issues caused by third-party service providers (Stripe, Supabase, Vercel, etc.).

While we take commercially reasonable steps to protect data integrity, ShopDesk does not guarantee against data loss, corruption, or unavailability resulting from infrastructure failures, migrations, or events beyond our reasonable control. You are responsible for maintaining your own backups of critical business data.

Indemnification

You agree to indemnify and hold harmless ShopDesk, its officers, employees, and affiliates from any claims, damages, or expenses arising from your use or misuse of the platform, including but not limited to:

• Content you upload or actions you take through the platform
• Your violation of these Terms or applicable laws
• Disputes between you and your customers
• Gift card or promotional compliance failures in your jurisdiction

Governing Law

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Washington, United States, except where prohibited by applicable law.

Any disputes shall be resolved in the state or federal courts located in Washington State, except where prohibited by applicable law. We encourage you to contact support@shopdeskapp.com first to seek informal resolution.

Nothing in these Terms prevents you from bringing claims in small claims court.

International Use

ShopDesk is operated from the United States. The platform is available to users globally, but we do not represent or warrant compliance with every jurisdiction's laws.

Users are responsible for understanding and complying with the laws applicable to their business.

Certain features, including subscription billing and payment processing, may only be available in supported countries and may require additional verification.

General Provisions

• Severability: If any provision of these Terms is found unenforceable, the remaining provisions remain in effect.
• Entire Agreement: These Terms, together with our Privacy Policy, constitute the entire agreement between you and ShopDesk.
• No Waiver: Our failure to enforce any provision does not constitute a waiver of that provision.
• Assignment: You may not assign your rights under these Terms. ShopDesk may assign its rights without restriction.
• Force Majeure: ShopDesk is not liable for delays or failures caused by events beyond our reasonable control.
• Electronic Notices: You consent to receiving notices electronically via the platform or email.
• No Agency: Nothing in these Terms creates a partnership, joint venture, employment, or agency relationship between ShopDesk and any Merchant.

Changes to These Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. We will provide at least 30 days advance notice of material changes through the platform or by email.

Your continued use of ShopDesk after the updated Terms take effect constitutes acceptance. If you do not agree with the changes, you may cancel your account before the effective date.

Contact Us

If you have questions about these Terms, or if you believe an account, booking page, or content on the platform involves impersonation, fraud, abuse, or other misuse, contact us at support@shopdeskapp.com.

If you believe content hosted on ShopDesk infringes your copyright, trademark, publicity, privacy, or other rights, please contact us at support@shopdeskapp.com with enough information for us to identify the content and review the issue.