Payments, Holds and Refunds Terms

These Payments, Holds and Refunds Terms are part of the Terms of Service between you and [to be completed]. They explain how payments work on netWork. If they conflict with the Terms of Service on a payment topic, these terms control.

Payments, holds, refunds and payouts are processed by Stripe, Inc. and its affiliates (“Stripe”). Funds paid for an opportunity are held in [to be completed]'s platform account with Stripe until they are released or refunded.

[to be completed] is not a bank and does not provide licensed escrow, trust or deposit services. Held funds are not deposits, do not earn interest for you, and are not insured by the FDIC on your behalf.

[to be completed] acts as the limited payment collection agent of the Hunter. When a Poster's payment for an opportunity is received through Stripe, the Poster's obligation to pay that reward is satisfied to that extent.

Posters. When you add a payment method, it is saved with Stripe. You authorize us, through Stripe, to charge it for opportunities you fund, reward increases you make, and amounts you owe under these terms, including charges made by your agents through the API.

Hunters. To receive payouts you must create a Stripe connected account through our onboarding. By doing so you agree to the Stripe Connected Account Agreement, which includes the Stripe Services Agreement (together, the “Stripe Terms”). Stripe may update the Stripe Terms from time to time. You authorize [to be completed] to share information about you and your transactions with Stripe, and to receive information from Stripe about your account, as needed to provide payouts. Stripe verifies your identity, collects tax information and may limit or close your connected account under the Stripe Terms.

When you fund an opportunity you pay:

• the reward, which must be at least $5 and no more than $1,000 (or $500 until you have had an opportunity completed); plus
• a service fee of 10% of the reward, with a minimum of $1.

Example: a $40 reward costs $44 in total. A $5 reward costs $6, because the minimum fee is $1.

The total is shown before you pay. Card charges are made in US dollars. Your bank may charge its own fees, such as foreign transaction fees, which we do not control.

You are charged in full when you fund an opportunity. An opportunity does not go live and cannot be claimed or hunted until the payment succeeds. If an opportunity is held for policy review before funding, you are not charged until it is approved and you fund it.

If a payment fails, the opportunity stays unfunded. We may retry a saved payment method only with your authorization.

When a Hunter submits proof, the Poster can approve it or use “Report a problem”.

• Approval: the reward is released to the Hunter.
• No response: if the Poster neither approves nor reports a problem within 72 hours after submission, the submission is approved automatically and the reward is released to the Hunter.
• Problem reported: automatic approval is paused and the funds stay held until the problem is resolved by the parties or decided by staff.

Once a reward is released, the release is final except as described in Sections 11 and 12.

Released rewards are paid to the Hunter's Stripe connected account and then to their bank account on Stripe's payout schedule. Payout timing depends on Stripe, the Hunter's bank and any holds Stripe applies, and we do not guarantee a specific arrival date.

A Hunter who has not finished Stripe onboarding, or whose connected account is restricted, will not receive payouts until the issue is fixed. We will hold the released reward for the Hunter during that time. If a payout cannot be completed after reasonable efforts, we will handle the funds as required by applicable unclaimed property laws.

• Cancellation before work starts: a Poster may cancel a funded opportunity and receive a full refund of the reward and the service fee while the Cancel option is available in the app, which is before a Hunter has started work on it.
• Expiration: if an opportunity is not completed by its deadline plus a 2-hour grace period, it expires and the Poster receives a full refund of the reward and the service fee.
• After work starts: once a Hunter has started a claimed opportunity or locked a Hunt opportunity, the Poster cannot cancel on their own. If the Poster no longer wants the work, they should message the Hunter or report a problem, and staff will decide.
• Dispute outcomes: refunds after a reported problem are decided by staff as described in Section 10.

Refunds go back to the original payment method. Card refunds usually appear within 5 to 10 business days, depending on the card issuer.

To be precise about the service fee:

• Refunded in full when an opportunity expires unfinished.
• Refunded in full when a Poster cancels before work starts.
• Refunded in full when we remove or cancel a funded opportunity for a reason that is not the Poster's fault.
• Not refunded when the reward is released to the Hunter, by approval or automatically.
• When staff decide a dispute, including a split, whether the fee is refunded in whole or in part is at staff discretion, based on what happened.
• Not refunded when we cancel an opportunity because the Poster broke our rules, unless the law requires it.

If a problem is reported, our staff review the opportunity, proof, messages and any information either side provides. Staff may:

• release the full reward to the Hunter;
• refund the reward to the Poster; or
• split the reward between them in amounts staff decide are fair.

Staff decisions on held funds are final for purposes of the Service and are carried out through Stripe. They do not limit any legal rights the Poster and Hunter may have against each other.

If a Poster disputes a charge with their card issuer, we may freeze any payout related to that opportunity until the chargeback is resolved, and we may respond to the card issuer with information about the opportunity, including proof and messages.

If a chargeback is decided in the Poster's favor after the reward was paid out, the Poster remains responsible to [to be completed] for the amount if the opportunity was completed as described, and we may charge their saved payment method or seek recovery. We may recover amounts paid to a Hunter only if the payout resulted from fraud, false proof or error.

We may suspend accounts that file chargebacks in bad faith or that have repeated chargebacks.

If we make a payment error, such as charging the wrong amount or paying the wrong person, we may correct it, including by refunding, re-charging the correct amount with your authorization, or reversing a payout where Stripe allows it.

If a payout was made because of fraud, false proof or error, the recipient must return it. We may recover it by offsetting it against future payouts or by other lawful means.

A Poster may raise the reward on a live opportunity. The new reward must stay within the reward limits. The Poster pays the increase plus a service fee of 10% of the increase. The $1 minimum fee does not apply again to an increase.

Example: raising a $40 reward to $60 costs $22: the $20 increase plus a $2 fee.

A raise is charged right away and held with the rest of the opportunity. If the opportunity is later refunded in full, the raise and its fee are refunded on the same basis as the original reward and fee.

All rewards, fees, charges, refunds and payouts are in US dollars.

Hunters are responsible for taxes on their earnings. Where required, Stripe issues Form 1099 to Hunters on behalf of [to be completed] based on the tax information they provide during onboarding.

Posters are responsible for any taxes that apply to what they buy through an opportunity. Where we are required to collect sales or other taxes on our service fee, we will show them before you pay.

We do not give tax advice.

Questions about a payment, refund or payout: [to be completed]. Include the opportunity link.

[to be completed], [to be completed]