Terms of Use

Last updated: August 17, 2026
Effective: September 17, 2026

These Terms of Use (“Terms”) are an agreement between PayWhirl, Inc., a California corporation located at 9452 Telephone Road #140, Ventura, California 93004 (“PayWhirl,” “we,” “us,” or “our”), and the person or entity that registers for or uses the Service (“Merchant,” “you,” or “your”).

The “Service” means PayWhirl's subscription-management, recurring-billing, order-management, payment-connection, API, and related software, including PayWhirl's Multi-Platform application for BigCommerce and custom websites and its separate Shopify application.

By creating an account, accepting an Order Form, clicking to accept, or using the Service, you agree to these Terms and represent that you have authority to bind the Merchant.

Arbitration notice: Sections 15 and 16 contain an individual arbitration agreement and class-action and jury-trial waivers.

1. Agreement and accounts

The agreement between the parties (“Agreement”) includes, in order of precedence: (1) a separately signed agreement or Order Form; (2) the Data Protection Addendum (“DPA”); (3) these Terms; and (4) documentation or product-specific terms incorporated into an Order Form. The DPA controls for Customer Personal Data and mandatory transfer terms control where applicable.

You must be at least 18 and provide accurate account, business, billing, and contact information. You are responsible for your users, credentials, permissions, account activity, and secure configuration of the Service. Notify us promptly at team@paywhirl.com if you suspect unauthorized access.

2. Service and permitted use

Subject to the Agreement and payment of fees, PayWhirl grants Merchant a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable right to use the Service during the applicable subscription term for its business purposes.

Merchant will not:

violate law or third-party rights;
sell, sublicense, copy, reverse engineer, or misuse the Service except where law prohibits the restriction;
bypass security, access, rate, or usage controls;
introduce malware, disrupt the Service, or access another account without permission;
use unsupported fields to transmit payment credentials, passwords, secrets, or prohibited data; or
use the Service to build or benchmark a competing product without PayWhirl's written consent.

PayWhirl may add, modify, suspend, or discontinue features, integrations, and supported services. Where reasonably practicable, PayWhirl will provide notice of a material reduction to core paid functionality during a committed term. No advance notice is required for a change involving security, law, suspected misuse, a third-party platform or provider, or prevention of harm. PayWhirl is not liable for changes made by a third party or for resulting incompatibility, unavailability, or loss of functionality.

3. Merchant's business and Subscribers

Merchant—not PayWhirl—is the seller, service provider, and merchant of record for transactions with its customers and subscribers (“Subscribers”). Merchant is responsible for its products and services, fulfillment, warranties, taxes, customer support, communications, refunds, disputes, chargebacks, and compliance with applicable law.

For subscriptions, trials, automatic renewals, and recurring charges, Merchant is responsible for:

clearly disclosing price, frequency, renewal, trial conversion, minimum term, cancellation, refund, and other material terms;
obtaining and retaining required consent to the offer, stored payment method, and charges;
providing required acknowledgments, reminders, renewal, trial-ending, price-change, and other notices;
offering legally required cancellation methods and promptly honoring cancellations and revocations; and
configuring and using the Service consistently with Merchant's disclosures and applicable law.

PayWhirl may provide tools or templates, but Merchant remains responsible for the legality of its program and Subscriber relationship.

Merchant is also responsible for the content, recipients, timing, consent, and opt-out handling for email, text, and other communications it sends through the Service.

Merchant must obtain and maintain every license, registration, authorization, underwriting approval, and third-party permission required for its business, products, services, transactions, and use of the Service. Approval or continued service by a Payment Provider, bank, commerce platform, card network, or other third party does not constitute approval by PayWhirl and is not a determination by PayWhirl that Merchant's activities are lawful or permitted. PayWhirl may rely on restrictions, risk decisions, or instructions from those providers and may reject, limit, suspend, or terminate use involving unlawful, fraudulent, deceptive, high-risk, regulated, restricted, or provider-prohibited activity.

4. Payments

PayWhirl supplies software that connects to payment gateway and processing accounts selected, established, and controlled by Merchant (“Payment Providers”). PayWhirl is not a bank, gateway, payment processor, payment facilitator, acquirer, merchant of record, or money transmitter and does not receive, hold, settle, or control Merchant or Subscriber funds.

Merchant is responsible for its Payment Provider accounts, fees, terms, reserves, disputes, and compliance with payment, card-network, stored-credential, authentication, and PCI DSS requirements. PayWhirl does not guarantee authorization, collection, settlement, recovery, or authentication of a transaction.

For Shopify, Shopify controls checkout and full card-credential handling. For Multi-Platform, PayWhirl widgets use Payment Provider-hosted fields or components, including services such as Stripe Elements and Spreedly, so full card numbers and card verification codes are intended to pass directly from the Subscriber's browser to the Payment Provider and not through PayWhirl servers. PayWhirl does not receive full bank-account or routing numbers. PayWhirl may receive provider tokens or identifiers, last four digits, payment type, expiration information, billing information, and transaction records needed to provide the Service.

Merchant must not submit full card numbers, card verification codes, bank-account or routing numbers, gateway credentials, passwords, API secrets, or other authentication information through free-text, support, file, API, MCP, or AI-agent functions. PayWhirl maintains PCI-related controls appropriate to its role and system scope; this does not transfer Merchant's or a Payment Provider's compliance responsibilities to PayWhirl.

5. Fees and billing

Merchant will pay the subscription, transaction, implementation, support, and other fees stated in its plan or Order Form. Payment Provider and commerce-platform fees are separate. Merchant authorizes PayWhirl or the applicable commerce platform to charge its payment method until the Service is canceled or terminated.

PayWhirl may change fees on at least 30 days' notice, effective at renewal or as stated in the notice, subject to committed Order Form pricing. We may suspend the Service for nonpayment after required notice.

If Merchant records a full or partial Subscriber refund through the Service, PayWhirl will refund the corresponding PayWhirl transaction fee attributable to that amount. Other transaction fees are nonrefundable. Other refunds are discretionary and will not exceed one monthly subscription fee for the applicable month. Prepaid annual fees are nonrefundable except where the Agreement or law requires otherwise.

Merchant is responsible for taxes on its transactions and on its purchase of the Service, other than taxes on PayWhirl's net income.

6. Third-party services, APIs, and AI agents

The Service may connect with commerce platforms, Payment Providers, applications, APIs, and other third-party services selected by Merchant. Those services are governed by their own terms and practices. By enabling a connection, Merchant instructs PayWhirl to exchange Customer Data with it as needed for the connection and is responsible for the service, permissions, lawful basis, and continued use. PayWhirl is not responsible for a third-party service, its security or availability, its use or loss of data, or its acts or omissions, except for PayWhirl's non-waivable obligations concerning PayWhirl subprocessors under the DPA.

PayWhirl may offer Model Context Protocol (“MCP”) connections that allow Merchant to authorize its own large language model, AI agent, or compatible client to use permitted PayWhirl API functions. The Merchant-selected service is a third-party service, not a PayWhirl-provided model. Merchant is responsible for selecting and supervising it, reviewing requested access, protecting and revoking authorization, and verifying its outputs and actions.

By authorizing an AI agent or MCP client, Merchant instructs PayWhirl to provide Customer Data and execute authenticated requests within the permissions granted. Merchant is responsible for activity performed under that authorization, including subscription changes, pauses, cancellations, refunds, communications, and deletion. PayWhirl may impose permissions, confirmations, limits, logging, suspension, or other safeguards.

7. Customer Data, privacy, and security

“Customer Data” means data submitted to or processed through the Service for Merchant, including Subscriber, subscription, order, communication, and transaction information. Merchant owns Customer Data. Merchant grants PayWhirl and its subprocessors the limited right to process Customer Data to provide, secure, support, and maintain the Service; comply with the Agreement and law; and follow Merchant's instructions.

Merchant represents that it has the rights, notices, consents, and lawful basis required for Customer Data and PayWhirl's processing. Merchant is the controller or business for Subscriber data and is responsible for its privacy notice and responses to Subscriber requests. The DPA governs PayWhirl's processing of Customer Personal Data for Merchant; our Privacy Policy covers data PayWhirl processes for its own business purposes.

PayWhirl will maintain commercially reasonable safeguards as described in the DPA. Merchant is responsible for its systems, users, configuration, integrations, credentials, and secure use of the Service.

Unless PayWhirl expressly agrees otherwise in writing, Merchant must not use the Service for protected health information, biometric identification data, government identification numbers, authentication secrets, unlawfully collected children's data, or other data requiring special terms or controls the Service does not provide. Merchant remains responsible for prohibited or specially regulated data submitted without PayWhirl's knowledge or approval. Acceptance of Merchant by a Payment Provider or commerce platform does not waive this restriction.

PayWhirl may use technical, operational, security, and usage information and lawfully aggregated or deidentified data to operate, secure, analyze, and improve the Service. PayWhirl will not attempt to reidentify deidentified data except to test deidentification or as permitted by law.

8. Confidentiality

Each party may receive nonpublic business, technical, security, pricing, or customer information (“Confidential Information”). The receiving party will use it only to perform or exercise rights under the Agreement, protect it with at least reasonable care, and disclose it only to personnel and service providers who need it and are subject to confidentiality duties.

Confidential Information does not include information that is lawfully public, already known without restriction, received lawfully from another source, or independently developed. A party may disclose information when legally required after providing notice where permitted.

9. Support and availability

PayWhirl will use commercially reasonable efforts to provide the Service, subject to maintenance, emergencies, third-party services, and events outside reasonable control. Any service-level commitment must be stated in an Order Form.

PayWhirl personnel may access accounts and Customer Data as reasonably necessary for support, implementation, security, maintenance, compliance, or Merchant instructions, subject to confidentiality and access controls.

10. Suspension, term, and termination

The Agreement continues for the term stated in the Order Form. Unless stated otherwise, monthly plans renew monthly and annual plans renew annually until canceled.

Either party may terminate a month-to-month plan at the end of the paid period. For an annual contract billed monthly, Merchant's early termination charge is three times the monthly subscription fee unless the Order Form states otherwise.

Either party may terminate for material breach not cured within 30 days after notice. PayWhirl may suspend or terminate access immediately where reasonably necessary for security, fraud, illegality, prohibited data, sanctions, payment/platform requirements, material harm, or an incurable breach. When practicable, PayWhirl will give notice and limit the scope and duration of suspension.

Upon termination, access ends and accrued amounts are due. Merchant should export records it must retain before termination. Subject to law, security, platform restrictions, and account status, PayWhirl may make a standard export available for up to 30 days after termination and may then delete or deidentify Customer Data in accordance with its standard retention practices, the DPA, and applicable commerce-platform requirements. Information held by Merchant's Payment Provider or another Merchant-selected service remains subject to that provider's practices.

11. Intellectual property

PayWhirl and its licensors own the Service, software, documentation, designs, interfaces, trademarks, and related intellectual property. No rights are granted except as expressly stated.

Merchant may provide feedback and grants PayWhirl a perpetual, royalty-free right to use it without identifying Merchant as the source. PayWhirl may identify Merchant as a customer and use Merchant's name and logo in factual customer lists unless Merchant opts out at team@paywhirl.com. Broader endorsements or case studies require separate approval.

Copyright notices under 17 U.S.C. § 512(c) should be sent to: Ryan Pfleger, PayWhirl, Inc., 9452 Telephone Road #140, Ventura, California 93004; (805) 399-0729; team@paywhirl.com. PayWhirl may terminate repeat infringers.

12. Warranties and disclaimers

Each party represents that it has authority to enter the Agreement. Merchant represents that its business, Customer Data, subscription offers, communications, and use of the Service comply with the Agreement and law.

PayWhirl may provide documentation, templates, automated functions, AI-assisted output, support, or other information for convenience. They are not legal, tax, accounting, financial, regulatory, or compliance advice, and Merchant remains responsible for reviewing its configuration, outputs, decisions, and obligations.

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, THE SERVICE AND THIRD-PARTY SERVICES ARE PROVIDED “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE.” PAYWHIRL DISCLAIMS IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. PAYWHIRL DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THE SERVICE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED, ERROR-FREE, COMPLETELY SECURE, OR SUITABLE FOR MERCHANT'S PARTICULAR REQUIREMENTS, OR THAT A PAYMENT OR THIRD-PARTY SERVICE WILL SUCCEED.

13. Limitation of liability

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, NEITHER PARTY WILL BE LIABLE FOR INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR LOST PROFITS, REVENUE, GOODWILL, OR DATA.

EXCEPT FOR MERCHANT'S PAYMENT AND THE PARTIES' INDEMNIFICATION OBLIGATIONS, EACH PARTY'S TOTAL AGGREGATE LIABILITY ARISING FROM THE AGREEMENT WILL NOT EXCEED THE SUBSCRIPTION FEES PAID OR PAYABLE FOR THE ONE-MONTH PERIOD BEFORE THE EVENT GIVING RISE TO LIABILITY.

14. Indemnification

Merchant will defend and indemnify PayWhirl and its affiliates and personnel against third-party claims, losses, fines, penalties, costs, and reasonable attorneys' fees arising from Merchant's products or services; Subscriber relationship; Customer Data; subscription, payment, refund, privacy, communications, tax, or consumer-law practices; misuse of the Service or a Merchant-selected third party; or breach of the Agreement.

The indemnified party must promptly notify Merchant, permit Merchant to control the defense and settlement, and reasonably cooperate. A settlement may not admit fault by or impose nonmonetary obligations on the indemnified party without consent.

15. Arbitration

Except for qualifying small-claims matters and requests for temporary or injunctive relief, disputes arising from the Agreement will be resolved by confidential, binding, individual arbitration before one arbitrator under the American Arbitration Association's Commercial Arbitration Rules. Arbitration will take place in Los Angeles County, California, unless the parties agree to remote proceedings or another location.

16. Class-action and jury-trial waiver

To the maximum extent permitted by law, each party waives trial by jury and will bring claims only individually, not as a class, collective, consolidated, representative, or private-attorney-general action or arbitration.

17. General

PayWhirl may update these Terms on at least 30 days' notice of a material change, except where a shorter period is required for law, security, or an urgent third-party change. Continued use after the effective date constitutes acceptance where permitted; PayWhirl will obtain affirmative acceptance where required.

Merchant will comply with applicable export-control, economic-sanctions, and anti-boycott laws. PayWhirl may restrict access as reasonably necessary for compliance.

The Service is controlled from the United States. Availability from another country does not mean that PayWhirl has reviewed or approved the Service for that country. A Merchant using the Service outside the United States does so on its own initiative and is responsible for local law, taxes, notices, payment rules, and any required registrations or representatives.

California law governs the Agreement. Subject to Sections 15 and 16, the parties consent to the state and federal courts located in Los Angeles County, California.

Neither party is liable for delay caused by events beyond reasonable control, except payment obligations. The parties are independent contractors. Merchant may not assign the Agreement without consent, except with a permitted business reorganization or sale; PayWhirl may assign it to an affiliate or in connection with a business transaction. Invalid provisions will be modified to the minimum extent necessary. Provisions that should survive do survive.

Notices to PayWhirl must be sent to team@paywhirl.com and, for formal legal notice, to PayWhirl, Inc., 9452 Telephone Road #140, Ventura, California 93004, Attn: Legal. Notices to Merchant may be sent to its account contact or through the Service.