Our terms of business

Between OPENQUOTES SOFTWARE LTD (“we”, “us”), company number 17489082, registered office 9 Anson Villas, Paull, Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire, HU12 8AJ, and the business that uses OpenQuotes (“you”).

OpenQuotes is for businesses, including sole traders, using it for their trade. It is not for personal use. The person who accepts these terms confirms they are allowed to do so for the business.

These terms, together with anything we agree with you in writing when we set up your account, are the whole agreement. If the two disagree, what we agreed in writing wins.

Access to OpenQuotes for everyone you invite: quoting, invoicing, job costing and accounts. Sending VAT returns to HMRC under Making Tax Digital for VAT will be added once HMRC’s recognition process is complete; our VAT returns page explains how it will work.

We set up your account personally. We keep improving OpenQuotes, so features change over time. If we plan to take away something you rely on, we will tell you at least 30 days before.

• The price is the one we agree with you in writing when we set up your account, plus VAT if we charge it.
• Paying: unless we agree otherwise, we invoice you monthly in advance, and each invoice is due within 14 days.
• Price changes: we will tell you at least 30 days before a new price applies. If you don’t want to pay it, you can leave before then.
• If an invoice isn’t paid: we will remind you first. If it is still unpaid 30 days after it was due, we may pause your access until it is paid. Your records stay safe while access is paused, and we will still send you a copy of them if you ask.

• Everyone who uses your account needs their own login, with a password and a second sign-in step. Don’t share logins.
• You decide who to invite and what each person can do. You are responsible for what they do in your account.
• Keep sign-in details safe. Tell us straight away if you think someone has got into your account who shouldn’t have.
• Don’t use OpenQuotes for anything unlawful, try to get into other businesses’ records, or do anything that could harm the service or other people using it.

You do. We only use your records to run OpenQuotes for you, to keep it secure and working, and where the law requires us to. We don’t sell them or use them for advertising.

For the personal data in your records (your customers, suppliers and people you work with), you are the controller and we are your processor. Section 13 sets out the data protection terms the law requires. Our personal data page explains how we handle personal data generally.

When you put people’s details into OpenQuotes, you are responsible for having the right to do so, and for telling them how you use their details.

• Your figures. OpenQuotes works things out from what you enter. You are responsible for checking that what you enter, and what you send to customers and to HMRC, is correct.
• Your VAT returns. When a return is sent, the declaration is your business’s legal declaration to HMRC, not ours.
• Advice. OpenQuotes is a tool. Nothing in it, and nothing we say about it, is tax, legal or accounting advice. If you are unsure, ask your accountant.
• Deadlines and payments to HMRC. Sending returns on time and paying HMRC are up to you.

Once this is switched on:

• You authorise OpenQuotes to send a VAT return to HMRC for your business when someone in your business with permission to file VAT ticks HMRC’s declaration and presses Submit to HMRC.
• OpenQuotes sends HMRC the fraud prevention details HMRC require with every request. They are listed on our personal data page.
• A return cannot be changed once HMRC have accepted it. Mistakes are corrected the way HMRC set out.
• HMRC’s systems are outside our control. If HMRC are unavailable, a return may not go through until they are back.

We provide OpenQuotes with reasonable care and skill. We work to keep it available and correct, but we can’t promise it will never be unavailable or never have a fault. Where we can, we do planned work outside normal working hours.

If you think OpenQuotes has worked something out wrongly, tell us. We will look into it promptly and, if it is our fault, fix it.

We are not responsible for delays or failures caused by things outside our reasonable control, such as a failure at HMRC, at our hosting providers or of the internet.

• We are responsible for losses that are a foreseeable result of us breaking these terms or not using reasonable care and skill.
• We are not responsible for loss of profit, business or opportunity, or for indirect losses.
• We are not responsible for penalties, interest or tax that come from figures you entered, or from returns sent late or not sent.
• Our total responsibility to you in any 12 months is limited to what you paid us in the 12 months before the problem arose.
• Nothing in these terms limits responsibility for death or personal injury caused by negligence, for fraud, or for anything else the law does not allow to be limited.

• Yes, at any time. Email us. There is no minimum term. Your access ends at the end of the month you have already paid for, and we won’t charge you after that.
• Your records after you leave: businesses must keep VAT records for six years, so we keep yours for six years after you leave, unless you ask us in writing to delete them sooner. During that time we will send you a copy of them if you ask, in a form you can open, such as PDF, Excel or CSV. After six years we delete them.
• Before you go, download what you want to keep. Our security page lists what you can download yourself.

• We can end it for any reason by giving you at least 60 days’ notice by email.
• We can end it sooner if you seriously break these terms, for example by not paying after the steps in section 3, or by misusing the service, and you don’t put it right within 14 days of us asking. If the misuse puts the service or other people at risk, we can pause your access straight away while we sort it out.
• However the agreement ends, section 10 still applies: we keep your records for six years and send you a copy if you ask.

We keep your records and anything you tell us about your business confidential, and you do the same with anything we tell you that isn’t public. Either of us can share confidential information if the law requires it.

UK data protection law (Article 28 of the UK GDPR) says what an agreement between a controller and a processor must cover. This section is that agreement. When we process personal data in your records for you:

• Your instructions. We only process it on your instructions. These terms and the way you use OpenQuotes are your instructions. If we think an instruction breaks data protection law, we will tell you.
• Confidentiality. Anyone at OpenQuotes who can access it is bound to keep it confidential.
• Security. We protect it with the measures on our security page.
• Other processors. You agree to us using the providers listed on our personal data page. We have written agreements with each of them that protect your data in the same way. We will tell you before we add or replace one, and you can leave if you object.
• Outside the UK. Where data goes outside the UK, it is protected as our personal data page explains.
• People’s requests. We will help you answer requests from people exercising their data protection rights.
• Breaches. We will tell you without undue delay after we find out about a breach affecting your data, and give you what you need to deal with it, including any report to the Information Commissioner’s Office.
• Your other duties. We will help you with data protection impact assessments and any consultation with the ICO, where they concern OpenQuotes.
• At the end. When the agreement ends, we keep the data for six years so that you can meet your duty to keep VAT records, unless you ask us in writing to delete it sooner or to return it and then delete it. After that, we delete it.
• Checking on us. We will give you the information you need to show we are meeting these terms, and allow reasonable audits by arrangement.

Details of the processing

We will tell you by email at least 30 days before a change takes effect. If you don’t agree with it, you can leave before then. Changes the law requires may take effect sooner.

If something isn’t right, tell us first at [email protected] and we will try to sort it out.

These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales, and the courts of England and Wales deal with any dispute.