Terms of Service

Last updated: 10 April 2026

These Terms of Service ("Terms") govern your use of the ChangeCheck mobile app and website ("ChangeCheck", "the service"). By creating an account or using the service, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, please do not use ChangeCheck.

1. Eligibility

ChangeCheck is intended for parents, carers, and adults aged 16 and over. By registering, you confirm you are at least 16 years old. The app is designed for use by adults helping families and is not directed at children.

2. Your account

• You must provide a valid email address and choose a secure password (at least 8 characters). Passwords are stored as one‑way bcrypt hashes — we never see your plaintext password.
• You are responsible for keeping your account credentials secure. Notify us if you suspect unauthorised access.
• You agree to provide accurate information and not impersonate another person, business, or venue.
• You can delete your account at any time from the Profile screen. Deletion anonymises your personal data while preserving aggregate community contributions (see section 7).

3. User‑generated content

ChangeCheck is a community‑powered platform. When you submit check‑ins, photos, comments, treasure sightings, venue submissions, or any other content ("User Content"), the following applies:

• You retain ownership of your User Content.
• You grant ChangeCheck a worldwide, royalty‑free, non‑exclusive licence to host, store, display, reproduce, and distribute your User Content within the service for the purpose of operating ChangeCheck.
• You confirm that you have the rights to all content you upload and that it does not infringe on anyone else's rights, privacy, or copyright.
• Do not post content that is illegal, abusive, harassing, hateful, sexually explicit, violent, defamatory, or otherwise inappropriate.
• Do not include personal data of other people (especially children) without their consent.
• Reviews and ratings should reflect genuine first‑hand experience.

4. Automated content moderation

To keep ChangeCheck safe and family‑friendly, all User Content is automatically reviewed before it appears in the app:

• Photos (avatars, check‑in photos, treasure sightings) are scanned by Amazon Web Services (AWS) Rekognition for nudity, violence, and other inappropriate imagery. Flagged photos are rejected at upload. Photos are processed in‑memory by AWS Rekognition and not retained by the analysis service.
• Text content (comments, check‑in notes, treasure notes) is reviewed by OpenAI's content moderation API and an internal profanity wordlist. Content that violates our community guidelines is rejected or hidden pending manual review.
• Photo metadata (EXIF) is stripped before storage, removing GPS coordinates and device details from uploaded images.
• Moderation decisions may be reviewed and overridden by our moderation team. We may remove content at any time at our sole discretion.

5. Where your data is stored

• Account data and check‑ins are stored in PostgreSQL databases hosted on Amazon Web Services in the European Union (eu‑west‑1, Ireland).
• Photos are stored in Amazon S3 buckets in the same EU region.
• Error reports are sent to Sentry to help us diagnose and fix bugs. Personal data is excluded from error reports where possible.
• Location data (when you submit a check‑in or pin a venue) is stored as geographic coordinates linked to your check‑in, not tracked passively in the background.

For full details on what we collect and how we use it, see our Privacy Policy.

6. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

• Use the service for any unlawful purpose or to harm others.
• Submit false, misleading, or spam content.
• Attempt to circumvent rate limits, security measures, or moderation systems.
• Scrape, harvest, or extract data from the service without our written permission.
• Reverse engineer, decompile, or interfere with the service.
• Impersonate venue owners or staff to manipulate venue ratings.

7. Account deletion and data retention

You can delete your account at any time from the Profile screen. When you delete your account:

• Your email, display name, password hash, and avatar are removed or replaced with anonymised values.
• Your favourites, treasure collections, badges, and roles are deleted.
• Check‑ins and content reports remain in the database but are unlinked from your identity (anonymised), preserving aggregate venue data and community history.
• Moderation events tied to your account are preserved for audit and safety purposes.
• If you own venues, you must transfer ownership before deletion.

8. Disclaimer of warranty

ChangeCheck is provided "as is" and "as available". Venue information is community‑powered and may be inaccurate, incomplete, or out of date. We do not guarantee the availability, accuracy, or completeness of any venue information shown in the app, and we are not affiliated with the venues listed unless explicitly stated.

Always verify accessibility, facilities, and opening hours on site before travelling. ChangeCheck is a discovery tool, not a substitute for direct contact with the venue.

Because ChangeCheck is in beta, the service may experience outages, data may be reset between releases, and features may be added, changed, or removed without notice.

9. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, ChangeCheck and its operators are not liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages arising from your use of the service. Our total liability for any claim relating to the service is limited to the amount you have paid us in the previous 12 months (which, for free users, is zero).

10. Suspension and termination

We may suspend or terminate your account at any time if you breach these Terms, upload harmful or illegal content, or otherwise misuse the service. We will make reasonable efforts to notify you, except where required to act immediately to protect users.

11. Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms as the service evolves. The "Last updated" date at the top of this page will reflect the most recent revision. If the changes are material, we will notify you in‑app and may ask you to re‑accept the Terms before continuing to use ChangeCheck.

12. Governing law

These Terms are governed by the laws of Scotland, United Kingdom. Any disputes will be resolved in the courts of Scotland.

13. Contact

Questions, requests, or concerns? Email hello@changecheckapp.com.