Terms of Service

1. These terms

These terms govern your use of Makini Learning, an online tutoring service providing one-on-one tuition in mathematics and computer science. By creating an account you agree to them.

Our Privacy Policy explains what we do with personal information and forms part of these terms.

Contact: learn@makiniconsulting.com

2. Who may use the service

• You must be 18 or over to create an account and agree to these terms.
• A student under 18 may use the service, but their parent or guardian must be the person who creates the account, agrees to these terms, and pays. If you are under 18, please ask a parent or guardian to set this up rather than signing up yourself.
• We cannot currently accept accounts for children under 13. United States law requires verifiable parental consent before collecting personal information from a child under 13, and that process is still being built. Parents of children under 13 should contact us directly.
• Tutors must be 18 or over.

If you agree to these terms on behalf of a child, you are agreeing to them yourself and you accept responsibility for that child's use of the service.

3. Your account

• Give us accurate information and keep it up to date.
• Keep your password to yourself. Do not share your account.
• Tell us promptly if you think someone else has used your account.
• One account per person.

4. Sessions

• Sessions are booked through the platform and delivered remotely by video.
• Tutoring is academic support. It is not a guarantee of any particular grade, test score, exam result, or admission outcome, and we do not promise one.
• We aim to match you with a suitable tutor. If a match is not working, tell us and we will try to find a better one.
• Sessions must be booked and delivered through the platform.

5. Credits, payment and refunds

• Tutoring is paid for with credits, bought in advance. One credit is one session of the advertised length.
• Prices are shown on the site at the time of purchase and are in US dollars.
• Payment is handled by Stripe. We do not store your card number.
• If tutoring is not working for you, tell us. We would rather find you a better match or refund unused credits than keep money for sessions you do not want.
• Credits are refundable while unused. To request a refund, email learn@makiniconsulting.com.

6. Cancelling and rescheduling

• You may cancel or reschedule a session through the platform.
• Please give as much notice as you reasonably can, so the tutor's time can be reallocated.
• If a tutor cancels or does not attend, the credit is returned to your balance.

7. Conduct

Do not use the service to:

• harass, threaten, or abuse anyone;
• impersonate anyone, or misrepresent who you are;
• share another person's private information;
• attempt to break, probe, or interfere with the platform's security;
• ask a tutor to do work that is being submitted as a student's own unaided work where that would breach an academic honesty rule.

8. Tutors

Tutors provide services as independent contractors and are not our employees.

Tutors additionally agree to our safeguarding rules, which include: keeping all contact on the platform, never contacting a student privately, never arranging to meet a student in person, never recording a session, and reporting immediately any concern that a child may be at risk.

9. Safeguarding

Protecting children comes before anything else in these terms. We may suspend or remove any account immediately and without notice while we look into a concern about a child's safety. A suspension is not a finding against anyone.

If you have a concern about a tutor's conduct, contact learn@makiniconsulting.com immediately.

10. Content

• You keep ownership of what you write and submit.
• You give us permission to store and display it as needed to run the service.
• We keep ownership of the platform, the site, and the learning material we publish.

11. Sessions are not recorded

We do not record tutoring sessions, and tutors are not permitted to record them. If this ever changes we will tell you and ask for consent before any recording takes place.

12. Availability

We try to keep the service running but cannot promise it will always be available or free of faults. We may change or discontinue features.

13. Our responsibility to you

We are responsible for providing the service with reasonable care and skill.

We are not responsible for outcomes outside our control, including academic results, or for loss that does not arise from our failure to provide the service properly. Nothing in these terms limits any liability that cannot lawfully be limited — including liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, or for fraud.

14. Ending the arrangement

• You may close your account at any time. Email us and we will confirm.
• Unused credits are refundable when you close your account.
• We may suspend or close an account that breaches these terms, or where necessary to protect a child.

15. Changes to these terms

Each version of these terms is stored with its own version number, effective date, and a cryptographic fingerprint of its exact text, so it is always possible to establish which version applied on a given day.

If we make a material change we will tell you, and where the law requires fresh agreement we will ask for it rather than assume the old one still covers the change.

16. Disputes

If something goes wrong, contact us first at learn@makiniconsulting.com. Most problems are quicker to fix directly than any formal process, and we would rather hear about it.

17. Contact

learn@makiniconsulting.com