Terms of Service

Scholarised ("the platform", "the service") is operated by Scholarised ("the Company", "we", "us", "our"), based in United Kingdom. These terms, together with our Privacy Policy, govern your use of the service. If you do not agree with them, please do not use the platform.

We may provide additional terms for specific features (for example mentor payouts). Where they apply, those terms form part of this agreement.

• Student - a learner who books and attends mentoring sessions and follows courses.
• Parent - an adult who manages one or more linked child accounts and is responsible for their billing.
• Mentor - a teacher or tutor who is approved to create courses and deliver mentoring sessions on the platform.
• Family account - a parent account together with every child account linked to it. A student with no parent attached is treated as a family of one.
• Credits - the prepaid unit used to book sessions. Credits sit in one shared wallet for the whole family account.
• One-to-one session - a private scheduled mentoring appointment between a single student and a mentor.
• Seminar - a small group session with a limited number of places, where students can speak and type but do not appear on camera.
• Lecture - a large group session where students watch and ask questions by typing.
• Seat - one student’s place on a seminar or a lecture, paid for in credits.
• Session - any of the above, unless we say which one we mean.

Scholarised lets you find an approved mentor, book and manage sessions, buy and spend credits, follow video courses and quizzes, and keep a record of everything you have booked and completed. Mentors use it to publish courses, set their availability, run sessions and be paid.

Some things people often expect are deliberately not part of the service yet. At the date of these terms we do not provide in-app video rooms, in-session chat, or session recordings, and we do not promise them. Where a live session needs a joining method, it is confirmed with you and your mentor for that session. If we add these features we will update these terms and tell you before they go live.

Features and content can change. Nothing on the platform is a guarantee that a particular mentor, subject, course or session time will be available.

To create an account you must give accurate information and keep it up to date. You are responsible for keeping your login details secure and for activity that happens under your account. Tell us straight away if you think someone else has used it.

Scholarised is used by young people, so age matters:

• You must be at least 18 to hold a parent account or a mentor account.
• You must be at least 16 to hold a student account in your own name.
• A learner under 16 does not register themselves. A parent or guardian opens a parent account and creates a linked child login for them, and the parent remains responsible for that account.
• A learner aged 16 or 17 may hold their own student account, but we expect a parent or guardian to know about it and we may involve them where safety requires it.

A parent or guardian who sets up or approves a child account accepts these terms on the child’s behalf and is responsible for supervising their use of the platform. We may ask for evidence of age or of parental responsibility, and may close an account where the age rules are not met.

Admin accounts are created by us. Nobody can register as an administrator.

Parents can create linked accounts for their children. Where accounts are linked they form one family account with a single shared credit wallet, and the following applies:

• Only the parent can buy credits or see billing information. A child login never reaches a payment screen.
• Every member of the family account books from the same shared balance, so credits bought by a parent can be spent by any linked child on their own sessions.
• A parent can set an optional monthly credit limit for an individual child. That limit only restricts what the child can book for themselves; it does not restrict the parent.
• A child can send their parent a request asking for more credits. A request is only ever a request: nothing is charged and no credits move until the parent chooses to buy them.
• The parent is responsible for the conduct of their linked children on the platform, and for making sure any information they give us about a child is accurate and shared with the child’s awareness.

Anyone applying to be a mentor goes through a review before they can teach. A mentor is only listed to learners, and can only deliver sessions, once they are both approved by us and cleared on a background check.

• We review each mentor application and may approve or reject it at our discretion.
• Mentors must hold an enhanced DBS check appropriate to working with children. There are two routes: a mentor can tell us about an enhanced certificate they already hold and provide evidence of it, or we can arrange a check through a screening provider.
• Both routes end in a review by a person on our team. Telling us about a certificate never clears a mentor by itself, and we may ask for more evidence or decline to accept it.
• We ask mentors to refresh their check every three years. A DBS certificate has no legal expiry date, so this renewal period is our own safeguarding policy rather than a legal requirement.
• Mentors must hold any qualifications and right to work they claim, keep their profile accurate, and comply with our safeguarding and community standards at all times.
• We may suspend or remove a mentor at any time if we have safeguarding, quality or conduct concerns, including while we look into a concern.

Mentors are independent providers of their own tuition. They are not employees, workers or agents of the Company, they decide which sessions to offer and when, and we do not control the content or outcome of an individual session beyond our platform standards. Mentors are responsible for their own taxes and for deciding whether to hold their own professional insurance, which we recommend but do not require.

Mentors earn a share of what learners spend on their sessions. The share depends on the format, because the larger the group the more of the work of filling it is done by the platform rather than by the mentor. At the date of these terms the shares are:

• One-to-one sessions - 80% to the mentor, 20% to the platform.
• Seminars - 70% to the mentor, 30% to the platform, calculated on the seats actually sold.
• Lectures - 60% to the mentor, 40% to the platform, calculated on the seats actually sold.

The rate that applies to a session is worked out when the session completes and is shown in the mentor’s earnings record. We may change these rates for future sessions and will give mentors reasonable notice before we do; a change never affects a session that has already been delivered.

• To receive payouts a mentor must complete onboarding with our payments provider (Stripe) and provide the information it requires. Until that is done, earnings are recorded but cannot be paid out.
• Payouts are for completed sessions. Sessions that are cancelled or refunded are not paid out, and a group session that is cancelled pays nothing however many seats had been sold.
• Mentors are responsible for their own taxes, National Insurance and any registration required for their self-employed income.
• We may withhold or reverse a payout where a session is disputed, appears fraudulent, or is in breach of these terms.

Sessions are booked with credits held in a single wallet for your family account. One credit represents mentoring time and can be used with any approved, background-checked mentor - credits are never locked to a particular mentor.

• Credits are added to your wallet when they are bought or when we grant them to your account. There is no other way credits appear.
• Credits have no cash value, are not transferable between accounts, and cannot be exchanged for money except where we must refund you by law or under these terms.
• The number of credits a session costs depends on the format and, for one-to-one sessions, on the mentor’s tier. The cost is always shown before you confirm a booking.
• Credits are valid for four years from the date they are added to your wallet. We chose four years so that a learner can buy early, take a break and come back later in their studies.
• If we ever shorten that period we will give you clear notice first, and it will not apply to credits you have already bought.

You book a one-to-one session by choosing an available slot with a mentor and spending the required credits. The credits are deducted from your wallet when you book, so the slot is held for you.

• Each mentor sets how much notice they need for a booking and how long before the start you can cancel with your credits returned. Both are shown to you when you book.
• If you cancel inside that cancellation window, or do not attend, the credits are not returned.
• If the mentor cancels, or the session cannot go ahead for a reason within our control, the credits are returned to the wallet they came from in full.
• Where credits are returned they go back to the wallet that paid for them, for exactly the number of credits that were taken.

Nothing in this section affects the statutory rights of consumers, including the right to cancel a purchase described in section 12.

A mentor can also publish a group session that several learners join at once. You buy a seat rather than a private slot, and a seat costs fewer credits than a one-to-one session of the same length.

• A seminar is a small group. The mentor chooses a maximum of between 2 and 12 places.
• A lecture is a large group of up to 200 places.
• The credit price of a seat, the number of places, and how many places are left are all shown before you book. The price of a seat is fixed when the mentor publishes the session and does not change afterwards, even if our general prices change.
• One account can hold only one seat on the same session. A parent can book a seat for themselves and a seat for each linked child, but not two seats for the same person.
• Group sessions that a mentor has not published yet are drafts and are not visible or bookable.

A mentor also sets a minimum number of places for a group session, because a seminar with one person in it is not the session anyone signed up for. If that minimum has not been reached 24 hours before the start, the session is cancelled automatically:

• Every seat is refunded in full, whatever the cancellation window would otherwise have said.
• Everyone who had a seat is told, and so is the mentor.
• The mentor is not treated as having cancelled and it does not count against them.

The rules for giving up a seat are:

• Give up your seat before the cancellation window shown for that session and your credits are returned in full.
• Give up your seat inside that window, or do not turn up, and the credits are not returned.
• If the mentor or we cancel the whole session, every live seat is refunded in full.

Group sessions are shared spaces, so a few extra rules apply. Other participants can see your first name and the initial of your surname, and nothing else about you: no email address, no profile and no link to your account. You must not identify other participants outside the session, and you must not capture, record or share what happens in one. Our acceptable use standards in section 13 apply in full, and we may remove someone from a group session immediately where their behaviour affects others.

Credit purchases are processed by our payments provider, Stripe. Prices are shown in pounds sterling (GBP) and include any applicable taxes unless stated otherwise. You authorise us and Stripe to charge the payment method you provide. We do not store full card details; those are handled by Stripe.

The price of a credit, any discount for buying several at once, and the number of credits each session format costs are all shown in the app before you pay or book. We may change prices, bundles and discounts from time to time. A change never affects credits you have already bought or a session you have already booked.

Mentor payouts are made by Stripe to the mentor’s own connected account. Purchases and payouts are separate: buying credits is a payment to us, and a payout is a later, separate payment from us to a mentor for a session that has been delivered.

If you are a consumer, UK law gives you 14 days from buying credits to change your mind. Within that period we will refund credits you have not spent, to the payment method you used.

• Credits you have already spent on a session that has taken place cannot be refunded as money, because the service has been delivered.
• Credits spent on a session that has not happened yet can be released by cancelling that session under section 9 or section 10 first, and then refunded if you are still inside the 14 days.
• To cancel a purchase, contact us using the details in section 21 and tell us which purchase you mean.

This is in addition to your other statutory rights, including your rights if a service is not carried out with reasonable care and skill. Nothing in these terms takes those rights away.

When using Scholarised you agree not to:

• behave abusively, dishonestly or in a way that harms or endangers another user, especially a child;
• share, request or attempt to obtain another user’s personal contact or payment details in order to take sessions or payments off the platform;
• record, capture, copy, redistribute or resell course content, a session, or anything said in a group session, without our written permission;
• identify another participant of a group session outside that session, or share anything that would let someone be identified;
• upload unlawful, harmful, misleading or infringing content, or misrepresent your identity, age or qualifications;
• attempt to disrupt, probe or gain unauthorised access to the platform, another account, or any part of the service you have not been given access to;
• use the platform to advertise or sell anything unrelated to your own mentoring on it.

We may remove content, end a session, and suspend or close accounts that breach these standards.

The safety of young people is our priority. Mentors are background-checked before they teach, we have a named Designated Safeguarding Lead, and we expect every user to help keep the platform safe.

If you have a safeguarding concern about a child, tell us immediately at [email protected]. Concerns reach our Designated Safeguarding Lead. Where we believe a child may be at risk we may act on that information without waiting for consent, including sharing it with the police, a local authority or another appropriate authority. Conduct that endangers a child leads to immediate removal from the platform and may be reported.

If a child is in immediate danger, contact the emergency services first and then tell us.

We send you messages about things that happen on your account: a booking confirmed, a session cancelled, a seat refunded, a credit request answered, a mentor application decided. These can reach you in the app, by email, and as a notification on a device where you have allowed them.

• You choose which of these channels you want for each kind of message in your account settings, and you can change your mind at any time.
• Device notifications only happen if you allow them in your browser or on your device, and you can withdraw that permission there.
• A small number of messages are essential to the service - for example confirming a payment or telling you a session has been cancelled - and cannot be switched off while you hold an account.

You can subscribe your own calendar to your Scholarised sessions using a private link we generate for you. Treat that link like a password: anyone who has it can see your session times, titles and the name of the other person, without signing in.

• Do not share your calendar link, publish it, or add it to a calendar other people can read.
• You can replace the link at any time from your settings. The old one stops working immediately, and any calendar still using it will stop updating.
• The feed is one-way and read-only. Nothing you change in your own calendar app changes a booking on the platform.

The platform, its branding and its software are owned by the Company or our licensors. You may use them only to access the service.

Mentors keep ownership of the course content and materials they create, but grant the Company a licence to host, display and deliver that content to learners through the platform. When you submit any content (for example a profile, message or uploaded file) you confirm you have the right to do so and grant us a licence to use it as needed to run the service. You must not copy, redistribute or resell platform or mentor content without permission.

We work to keep the service available but do not guarantee it will be uninterrupted or error free. We may update, change or withdraw features, and we may carry out maintenance, including putting the platform into a maintenance mode for a period. We may suspend or restrict access where necessary to protect the platform or its users.

Scholarised connects learners with independent mentors and provides learning content. We do not guarantee any particular educational result, exam grade or outcome. Mentoring and course materials are educational support and are not a substitute for a learner’s school or formal education. To the extent permitted by law, the service is provided "as is".

Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law, including liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, for fraud, or for a consumer’s statutory rights. Subject to that:

• we are not liable for loss that is not reasonably foreseeable, or for loss caused by mentors acting as independent providers;
• we are not liable for business losses, since the service is provided for personal and educational use;
• where we are liable to you, our total liability for any claim is limited to the amount you paid to us in the 12 months before the claim arose.

If you are using the platform other than as a consumer, you agree to cover reasonable losses we suffer arising from your breach of these terms or your misuse of the service.

You can stop using the service and close your account at any time by contacting us. We may suspend or close an account that breaches these terms, poses a safeguarding or security risk, or where we are required to by law.

• If you close your account, we will refund unspent credits you paid for where we are required to, and will always tell you what will happen to the balance before it closes.
• Credits we granted rather than sold have no cash value and are not refunded.
• If we close your account because of a serious breach, we may withhold unspent credits to the extent the law allows.
• Where a child account is closed, credits sit in the family wallet and stay with the parent account that paid for them.

When an account closes, provisions that by their nature should survive (such as payment, liability and intellectual property terms) continue to apply.

We may update these terms from time to time. If we make a significant change we will take reasonable steps to let you know, for example by a notice in the app or by email. Continuing to use the service after a change means you accept the updated terms. The "last updated" date at the top shows when they last changed.

These terms are governed by the laws of England and Wales, and the courts of England and Wales have jurisdiction, except that if you are a consumer you may also have the right to bring proceedings in your own country of residence.

You can reach us at [email protected], or by post at Scholarised, United Kingdom.