Terms of service

Vavita – Terms of Service – Version 0.2 (0725)

PART 1: Introduction

The Parties & Terms
1. This document (the Terms) details our agreement with you (the User).
2. Vavita is a trade name of Istimar Tech Limited (we, us, our, the Company).
3. Istimar Tech Limited is registered as a Money Service Business with Fintrac in Canada.
4. Collectively, the User and the Company are referred to as the Parties, and each is a Party.
About the Terms
1. If you use any of our Services, you agree to be bound by the Terms.
2. These terms apply:
  1. To the website at vavita.com (including any subdomains, applications or pages)
  2. To any Vavita App for any device
  3. To any quote or payment transaction
  4. To any User or Customer who performs any action using our Services, including requesting a quote, signing up to our mailing list, executing a transaction, creating a profile, or any other activity
3. THESE TERMS ARE IMPORTANT, PLEASE READ THEM IN FULL, AS WELL AS OUR COOKIE POLICY, PRIVACY POLICY, AND ANY OTHER INFORMATION WE PROVIDE YOU WITH.
4. If you do not consent to being bound by the Terms, you must stop using the Services immediately.

PART 2: General Terms

Using our Services
1. You must be at least 18 years old to use our Services
2. You must only use our Services:
  1. Safely
  2. Yourself, and not on behalf of any other person or legal entity, nor by providing your user credentials to any other person to carry out any activity on your behalf
  3. For permitted purposes
  4. From a jurisdiction we support, and transacting between jurisdictions which we support
  5. In accordance with these Terms, and with any other instructions we provide you with on a case-by-case basis including the reasonable requests of our Customer Support Agents
  6. In a manner fully compatible with the laws and regulations in any relevant jurisdiction
3. You must never use our Services:
  1. To commit or conspire to commit fraud, money laundering, financing of terrorism or proliferation financing, or any other illegal activities in any jurisdiction
  2. If you or any beneficiaries of Payment Transactions (or the jurisdictions in which they reside) are under any Economic Sanctions, or are Politically Exposed Persons
  3. If you have been blocked from using our Services for any reason
  4. To transfer money for any purpose not permitted by law, or not permitted by our Terms
  5. To register more than one account with us in the name of the same individual
  6. In a way which, with respect to finance, reputation, physical safety, IT security, or otherwise, threatens us, our systems, our brand, our reputation, our customers, our partners, or any other parties with whom we have a relationship
  7. Having provided us with any false information, falsified documents, or false statements
4. You agree to cooperate with any investigation that we, or any law enforcement agency or regulator, may carry out for any reason, commit to providing accurate information as we may require, and communicating with us in a timely fashion, in any such cases.
5. You may not under any circumstances do anything which may infringe on intellectual property rights we may have, including copying, licensing, modifying or renting out any or any part of our trade marks, logos, code, website, app, legal terms, processes or anything else related to any of our business activity.
Fees, Exchange Rates & Commissions
1. You agree to pay our Fees and agree to the presented exchange rate that may apply to any transactions that you execute using the Services
2. We aim to provide competitive pricing even for illiquid currencies. This means that in certain cases, it may be necessary to change or rescind your quote even within the “Guaranteed Period” and even if you have already sent us your funds, for example but not limited to where:
  1. we do not receive your funds within the Guaranteed Period, regardless of when you instructed your bank to send them
  2. there has been a significant change in the exchange rate or the spreads relating to the market of those presented to us by our partners at the point we facilitate your transaction
  3. for reasons outside of our control the cost of facilitating the transaction for us has changed since the quote was provided, for example if one of our FX partners experiences downtime
  4. technical or human error occurred at any point in the course of presenting you with a quote, or
  5. a Force Majeure event occurs, as per a reasonable definition. In the case that you have already sent us funds, no refund fee will be charged in such cases if you choose not to proceed for this reason.
3. Fees become due to us at the time that you submit your transaction request
4. You or the beneficiary of the transaction may have to pay other charges (such as taxes or bank fees) which are outside of our control and are not charged by us. We generally endeavour to identify these before you send any money, but this is not always practical or feasible.
5. We can your funds that you send to us or to our Collection Agents to pay what you owe to us.
Our responsibilities
1. We are responsible for foreseeable loss which we cause. This means a loss we could have expected to occur and could reasonably have avoided.
2. We’re not responsible (to the extent allowed by law) for losses which:
  1. were unforeseeable or unavoidable
  2. which arise due to our legal obligations, arise from a need to comply with our obligations under the law
  3. in the case that you are acting in breach of any terms of this agreement
  4. if we’ve blocked you or refused you service, whether presently or in the past if that instance has not been fully rectified to both parties satisfaction
3. In all cases, losses you may be able to claim are limited. For each Transaction completed through us, the most you may claim will be the total Fees & Commissions you have paid for it.
4. In the case you have any problems whatsoever with our services, and in particular if you think you or we have made any mistakes, you must contact us immediately. If any refunds are due, as per local laws, then once we’ve paid you a refund, we are no longer responsible for paying you anything further. In certain cases, we may be entitled to not refund you, or refund you less than you paid us, for example where we have incurred costs, or the exchange rate has changed. In some cases, you may not be entitled to a refund, in particular if you have not contacted us in good time or you’ve been dishonest or fraudulent, or used the Services in a way not compatible with the Terms
Our rights
1. We may refuse, cancel, suspend or delay our services if:
  1. we believe your account may be compromised
  2. we believe that your account may have been used fraudulently
  3. law enforcement agencies, courts or regulators request or require that we do so
  4. there is an operational incident or regulatory decision or change which temporarily or permanently means we are unable to lawfully or practically provide the services
  5. there is a Force Majeure event, reasonably defined, including for the avoidance of doubt significant market volatility or our practical inability for an unforeseen reason to service a respective transaction, including (i) changes to services provided to us by our bank and other partners, (ii) market volatility, (iii) changes to legislation, regulatory guidance, sanctions lists or processes, in any market
Your Obligations
1. You warrant that your use of this service does not contravene any law or tax rule in any jurisdiction, including for the avoidance of doubt that payments you make are for purposes permitted by law, including where local law sets limitations or restrictions on number, volume, or nature of outbound FX transactions, and where such monetary limits exist you declare that the transactions you instruct through Vavita shall not mean you breach such limits in any period.
2. Any tax filings, tax liability, regulatory filings or permissions, or other items incumbent upon you as a user of such a service as described herein are your sole responsibility. Vavita cannot give advice on such matters and accepts no responsibility for such matters beyond those expressly applying to us under law.
Termination
1. This Agreement starts when you access our website, or register with us, whichever comes first. It will continue until terminated in writing by you or us.
2. We reserve the right to terminate this agreement without notice for any or no reason.
Variations to this Agreement
1. We will change this Agreement from time to time for various reasons, including regulatory or legislative changes, changes in our operational workflows, to modify, improve or expand the Services, or for other reasons.
2. We will only give you explicit notice of such variation of the Agreement where legally required. The latest version of these Terms is always available at www.vavita.com/terms.
3. If you don’t wish to accept any changes to the Agreement, you can terminate it and stop using the Services at no cost, so long as you give us written notice before the change occurs, or within 7 calendar days of such change being visible on the website.
Measures to ensure your safety
1. For your safety and security you are reminded NEVER to:
  1. Send money to people you don’t know well
  2. Keep passwords, credit card details or personal details which may be used to access your financial assets or commit fraud including identity theft in an easily accessible place or in an unencrypted manner, nor transmit them (including to us) in any way not in keeping with these Terms
2. You commit to PROMPTLY inform us if:
  1. you get messages from anyone pretending to be us
  2. you believe your credentials or the device you use to access our Services may have been compromised
  3. someone attempts to coerce or force you to use the Services or provide us with information against your will, or execute a transaction on their behalf
3. We will refuse to accept any liability if these steps are not followed, they are included here to ensure your safety.
Complaints
1. If you have a complaint, let us know at team@vavita.com and we will to our best to address it. We’ll investigate it and aim to provide a Final Response to you within 15 business days. If it takes longer than that to address your complaint, we we’ll let you know within that time, and shall provide a Final Response within 35 business days.
Contacting each other
1. You may contact us at team@vavita.com. We may contact you using the email, phone, social or postal addresses which you provide to us. You commit to keeping these details up to date on our systems.
Additional terms
1. You agree to let us use your information to provide Services to you and communicate with you in a manner that we reasonably believe may be of value or interest to you. Where required to facilitate the Services (but not for marketing purposes), you agree that we may share your information with third parties, for example our regulated Financial Institution partners, ID verification or other partners, in any jurisdiction. This is often required when executing cross-border payments due to the fact that multiple regulated companies in different jurisdictions have responsibilities under their local laws to collect such information to prevent money laundering, terrorist and proliferation financing, and for other reasons. You are entitled to refuse to accept this paragraph in writing, but if you do so, we will not be able to provide you with any Services.
2. You expressly permit us to share any information about you and your transaction(s) with other companies within our Group for the purpose of detecting and preventing fraud and money laundering, and for the purpose of facilitating the services you have requested.
3. This Agreement is between the Parties. No other person(s) have any rights to enforce any terms herein.
4. If we don’t enforce a right immediately, we may still enforce it at a later date and have not forfeited that right.
5. Our rights & obligations under the Terms may be transferred to another company at a later date at our sole discretion, and the relationship will continue between you and that company. However, you cannot transfer your rights or obligations.
6. This Agreement constitutes the entire agreement between the Parties and supersedes all previous communications and explicit or implicit agreements.
7. If any part of these Terms cannot be legally enforced, the remainder shall remain in full force subject to the minimum possible amendment to these Terms such that they become compatible with the respective law.
8. You consent to important information including these terms being delivered electronically.
9. English law applies to these Terms, and the courts of England & Wales have exclusive jurisdiction to settle any disputes. The laws of other countries may sometimes apply to the use of our services.

PART 3: Money Transfer

Definition of Money Transfer
1. Our Money Transfer Service lets you send money overseas.
2. This Money Transfer Service must only be used to send money to people or entities which you know and trust
3. The Money Transfer Service is normally available 24/7/365, however, availability may be limited at any time and for any reason without notice.
4. By sending a Transaction Request, you commit to allowing us to send money on your behalf, and you commit to agreeing to the Terms and the Fees & Commissions presented.
5. We have not agreed to providing the Money Transfer Service with respect to a specific Transaction Request until we confirm that we have accepted it, and we have performed certain checks. In particular, we are responsible for checking details about the transaction, the sender (you), the beneficiary, and other details for the purposes of countering money laundering, terrorist & proliferation financing, and no transfer of funds will take place until such checks are complete.
Onboarding requirement
1. Anyone (subject to the restrictions in these Terms) may become a User of our services by registering their email or social accounts with us. This will allow them to view the website, request quotes, and get to know what we offer.
2. Prior to us facilitating any Money Transfer, a User must be formally onboarded by us to become a Customer. This is because of the regulated nature of the Money Transfer process, and will entail us collecting information and performing checks on you.
3. You hereby consent to us sharing information, as strictly necessary, with third parties that we use to verify your identity, your address, other details you provide to us (such as your university course or your income). These third parties will not contact you and we are not selling them your information – we are purely using their services to verify what you have told us.
4. We may refuse to onboard anyone, for any reason, as a Customer and it may not always be possible to confirm why this has been the case.
Details we require
1. Various pieces of information and supporting documentation may be required to be collected before we can facilitate any Money Transfer for a Customer. These may include, but are not limited to:
  1. With respect to you (the Customer): full name, date of birth, physical address, country of residence, proof of identification and proof of physical address, email address, phone number
  2. With respect to whoever you are sending the money to (the Beneficiary) if they are an individual: full name, date of birth, physical address, country of residence, bank account details as per local market conventions
  3. With respect to whoever you are sending the money to (the Beneficiary) if they are a legal entity: the entity name, registered address, country and company number if applicable, an invoice demonstrating the purpose for the payment, and other details as we may require depending on various factors
  4. With respect to whichever student is being supported somehow through this transaction (the Student): proof of the status of the student, student’s full name, the university they are attending, course start date, and any other proof which may be required based on the specific transaction, email address, phone number, confirmation of their consent to be contacted
2. Based on our requirements to collect information in accordance with respective legislation and our AML Policy, certain information may be required from you:
  1. at the point of registration (onboarding)
  2. at the point of quoting for a transaction
  3. after a transaction quote has been accepted (including after you have paid funds to us or our Collection Partner
  4. after a transaction has been executed
Execution of Money Transfers
1. When a Transaction Request is received (i.e. you are onboarded as a Customer, have accepted our quote, and have submitted a transaction for processing), it’s generally not possible to make any amendments. The quote provided is valid only for that transaction, at that time, and you may need to request a new quote to make any changes.
2. The Company’s focus is to facilitate money transfers from jurisdictions which are not well-served today. Given the infrastructure available in these jurisdictions, it may take up to five business days for funds to be received by a Beneficiary, and (if available) for this information to be confirmed back to you. Holidays, technical outages (whether ours, our Partners’, or the beneficiary or intermediary bank or financial institution), Force Majure events, or requirements by police, regulators, or under laws of any jurisdiction may delay Money Transfers.
3. We may refuse to facilitate a Money Transfer at our sole discretion. However, if we do this, we’ll endeavour if possible to tell you why. We won’t be responsible losses in such cases. Do not send money to us until we have expressly requested you to pay, or you may need to bear administration and custody costs of us holding those funds, which may be deducted directly from such funds.
4. Limits may be applied to how much may be transferred from, or to, a specific Customer or Beneficiary, over a certain period. We’ll endeavour to make such limits clear, but Transaction Requests exceeding those limits will not be processed.
5. Quotes are valid for a fixed period (the “Guaranteed Period”) as communicated to you via the Service. If you make a payment outside of that period, we may need to provide you with a new quote, or you may need to pay an administration fee for us to refund your money. This paragraph is subject to exceptions noted elsewhere in these Terms.
6. Paragraph (e) above does not apply in certain jurisdictions where we don’t have an ability to offer a “Guaranteed Period”, and in this case we reserve the right to re-price your transaction at the point you wish to send funds to us. You will have the right to cancel your transaction at no cost to you prior to sending us funds if you object to the new quote. This is required due to the volatility in exchange rates in certain markets.
Fees & Commissions
1. An Exchange Rate is the price of one currency relative to another at a specific time – for example if one British Pound (GBP) is worth two US Dollars (USD), then the Exchange Rate of USD per GBP (USD/GBP) is 2/1 = 2.000
2. We keep track of a variety of sources of Exchange Rate information for the currencies we support, and we aim to offer a competitive price and safe, smooth and transparent Money Transfer service to our Customers.
3. When you request a quote using our Services, we’ll provide you with a quote which tells you:
  1. the total amount you’ll need to pay to us or our Collection Partner
  2. how much the Beneficiary will receive
  3. how much in Fees & Commissions we will retain for the money transfer
  4. an approximate timescale for the money to be received by the Beneficiary (this assumes, among other things, that you pay us promptly, and that there is no additional information which we subsequently require from you)
  5. where you should send the funds once you’ve confirmed you’d like to proceed
  6. how long the quote will remain valid (after this time, the price may change)
  7. other details which may be legally required
4. Our Fees & Commissions, and the quotes we provide, can change without notice
Local Regulated Partners & Their Role
1. In certain markets, based on local regulations and other factors, our Money Transfer service is offered to you through the support of locally-licensed partners (the “Local Regulated Partners”) with presence in those markets, for example under a Merchant of Record or similar model.
2. After we provide you with a quote and collect your details, in such cases, it is these Local Regulated Partners who shall collect your funds in local currency, and we shall then instruct them on what subsequent action to take with respect to your funds. If you wish to obtain further information about the partners we utilise for your transaction please contact us as described in these Terms.
3. You acknowledge that our service is dependent on utilising such Local Regulated Partners and also that the delivery of our service to you is dependent on the smooth operation of the services operated by such partners. We accept no responsibility for the failure of Local Licensed Partners to deliver on their contractual obligations.
4. The bank accounts into which we request you to make local currency payments under such arrangements may be in the name of such Local Regulated Partners, or in our name, or both (eg a hyphenated or bracketed name). When you make payments into such accounts, the terms “we, us, our, Vavita” in instructions we provide to you shall be interpreted as meaning Vavita and/or our Local Regulated Partner(s) as appropriate.
5. Where such a model is used, to avoid ambiguity, it is the Local Regulated Partner and not Vavita who are collecting funds from you in your local currency and jurisdiction, and facilitating the transfer of those funds outside of your jurisdiction and/or into another currency. Vavita is responsible for ensuring the payment reaches the destination account in the destination market once we receive funds from the Local Regulated Partner.
6. The name of the Local Regulated Partner shall be made clear to you on the account details we provide when we request your payment.
Tracking your payment(s)
1. You may use your Vavita “Dashboard”, which is automatically available to you after you sign up using your email address or social media handle, to view your quotes, track your payments, and download or print transaction confirmations. Log in at app.vavita.com and follow the instructions on screen.
2. You are free at any time to contact us at team@vavita.com or using our live chat support function on our website with any questions you may have.
3. A downloadable PDF transaction confirmation should be available on the dashboard within 24 hours of a payment transaction being paid to the beneficiary.

PART 4: Fee Collections

Definition of Fee Collection
1. Our Fee Collection Service lets you pay bills which you owe to academic and professional institutions, accommodation providers, among others (collectively the “Collecting Partners”), in a simplified fashion, where we have a direct agency relationship with those Collecting Partners and they have authorised us to collect funds from Payers on their behalf
2. In practical terms for you as a user, the service otherwise works equivalently to that described in Part 3, though there may be differences regarding the information and supporting documents we request.
In circumstances where a dispute arises between you and a Collecting Partner for any reason, with the sole exception of our facilitation of the initial collection of your payment and its delivery to that partner, you are required to directly contact the Collecting Partner to determine the appropriate course of action. We are willing and able to assist with certain follow up actions but can only do so on their direct instruction. For the avoidance of doubt this includes (i) refunds of payments previously successfully made, for ANY reason, (ii) disputes regarding invoices and amounts due, (iii) the impact of any visa process, changes in travel or study plans, changes in personal circumstances, (iv) the Collecting Partner’s failure to deliver a product or service paid for, in part or in full, through Vavita, or (iv) any other circumstance not wholly in Vavita’s control.
Where we have a collection relationship with such a Collecting Partner, they may provide us with specific beneficiary account details which are not available or visible to you as a consumer (the “Institution’s Internal Account”), which they have requested us to pay your funds to. In the case that you make a payment using Vavita to such a Collecting Partner, you expressly authorize us to make a payment to that Institution’s Internal Account in place of any beneficiary instructions you may have provided in your transaction request.

PART 5: Facilitation of Refunds from Institutions

Vavita understands that sometimes academic fees paid to Institutions need to be refunded to Payers for various reasons (eg visa application failure, change of circumstances, applying for multiple courses, etc). We are happy to help facilitate such refunds, subject to the following:
1. The Institution must proactively engage with us to facilitate this refund. We have documentation to provide to Institutions to ease this process, but we are not in a position to recover funds from an Institution unilaterally, they must send us the funds in order for us to remit them back to the Payer. We note that sometimes Institutions can be slow to take the requisite action and we therefore encourage Payers to bear this in mind when making or planning their payments
2. Any such Refund payment is subject first to satisfactory onboarding and transaction monitoring checks
3. There is a small discretionary administration fee applied to a refund given the additional complexity involved
4. The exchange rate at which we pay out to the Payer will be based on market conditions at the time we receive the funds from the Institution and may not be the same rate as the Payer originally paid
5. Due to the potential for fraud or money laundering, it is only possible for us to send refunds back to the original account details from which we received the payment, if we facilitated the original payment to the Institution
Institutions wishing to leverage our Refunds service are encouraged to contact us at team@vavita.com

Terms of service

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