Terms of Service

1. The service

Retriever collects recordings and documents of public government meetings (city councils, county commissions, school boards and similar bodies), transcribes them, and turns each agenda item into a short written brief with citations back to the transcript. The service also provides search, keyword alerts, an AI assistant, a reporter’s notebook and draft export. Briefs and transcripts are produced by software. They can contain errors, omissions and misattributions. They are a starting point for reporting, not a substitute for it: verify anything you publish against the cited passage or the original recording. Nothing in the service is legal, financial or professional advice.

2. Accounts and workspaces

• You must give accurate account details and keep your password private. You are responsible for activity under your account.
• Every account belongs to one workspace. A workspace’s owner and admins manage who is in it, their roles and its billing, and the owner is responsible for how its members use the service.
• One account per person. Credentials may not be shared, and seat limits may not be worked around by sharing a login.
• We may require you to confirm your email address before using the service.

3. Free trial

New workspaces get a free trial of the Pro plan for the number of days shown on the pricing page when they sign up. No card is required and nothing is charged. When the trial ends the workspace moves to a read-only preview (headlines and short excerpts) until it subscribes. Trials are for newsrooms evaluating the service once; we may end a trial that is being used to avoid paying, for example by creating repeated workspaces for the same newsroom.

4. Subscriptions and payment

• The Pro plan is billed per workspace, monthly, in advance, at the price shown on the pricing page when you subscribe. Payment is processed by Stripe; we never see or store card numbers.
• Subscriptions renew automatically each month until cancelled.
• Prices exclude sales tax, VAT and similar taxes. Where tax applies it is added at checkout and shown on your receipt.
• Each plan includes a number of people, counting active members and pending invitations. A workspace over its limit keeps access but cannot invite more people until it is back under the limit or on a larger plan.
• If a payment fails, Stripe retries it for a period during which access continues. If it keeps failing the subscription ends and the workspace moves to the preview.
• We may change prices with at least 30 days’ notice by email. A change applies from your next renewal after the notice period; you may cancel before then.
• Enterprise workspaces are set up by us under a written order, billed by invoice (net 30 unless the order says otherwise). Where an order conflicts with these terms, the order controls.

5. Cancellation and refunds

You can cancel at any time from Billing in the app. Cancellation takes effect at the end of the period you have paid for; you keep access until then and are not charged again. We do not issue automatic refunds for unused time, but we review every request. Our refunds and cancellations page explains how to ask.

6. Using what Retriever produces

Subscribers may use briefs, transcript excerpts, exports and search results in their own reporting and publications, with or without attribution to Retriever. You may not:

• resell, sublicense or redistribute the service, or provide access to people outside your workspace;
• republish transcripts or briefs in bulk, or build a competing archive or dataset from them;
• scrape, crawl or copy the service by automated means outside the API, or use the API without an Enterprise agreement;
• interfere with the service, probe its security, or try to reach other workspaces’ data;
• use the service for anything unlawful or to harass or defame.

7. Your content

You own what you create in the service: notes, drafts, beats, alerts, uploads and questions to the assistant. You give us the permission needed to store, process and display that content to run the service for your workspace, and no more. You are responsible for having the rights to anything you upload. Content created in a workspace stays with the workspace when a member leaves it.

8. Public records and third-party material

Meeting recordings, agendas and minutes come from public bodies and the platforms they publish on. We do not control their availability, accuracy or completeness, and coverage of any particular body or area may begin, pause or end. Public officials and speakers are named because they spoke in a public meeting; corrections can be requested at support@retriever.dog.

9. Our property

The service, its software, design and trademarks belong to Retriever Technologies. If you send us suggestions we may use them without obligation to you.

10. Availability and changes

We work to keep the service available but do not guarantee uninterrupted operation. We may change, add or retire features; if a change materially reduces what your plan includes we will tell you by email at least 30 days ahead where practical.

11. Disclaimers

The service is provided “as is” and “as available”, without warranties of any kind, express or implied, including accuracy, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. Transcripts and briefs are machine-generated and may be wrong.

12. Limitation of liability

To the extent the law allows, Retriever Technologies is not liable for indirect, incidental, consequential or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenue or data. Our total liability for any claim connected with the service is limited to the fees your workspace paid us in the twelve months before the claim. What you choose to publish is your responsibility.

13. Suspension and termination

You may stop using the service at any time. We may suspend or end access for a breach of these terms, for non-payment, or where the law requires, giving notice where practical. For 30 days after a workspace ends you can ask us for an export of its notes and drafts.

14. Governing law and disputes

These terms are governed by the laws of [State], without regard to conflict-of-law rules. If we have a dispute, each side agrees to raise it with the other in writing and try to resolve it in good faith for 30 days before going to court. Courts located in [State] have exclusive jurisdiction.

15. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms. For material changes we will email workspace owners at least 14 days before they take effect. Using the service after that date means you accept the new terms.

16. Contact

Retriever Technologies, [Mailing address]. Questions about these terms: support@retriever.dog. Billing: billing@retriever.dog.