Terms of use

1. About these terms

These terms are the agreement between you and Kindling. They apply to everyone who uses Kindling, whether you run a campaign as a founder, post videos as a creator, or both.

The company that runs Kindling is not named in this draft. It will be named here before launch, with its registered address and contact details.

Read these terms with the Creator rules and the Privacy notice. If the Creator rules are stricter about a creator's posts, the Creator rules apply to that point.

2. Who can use Kindling, and accounts

You must be 18 or over to use Kindling as a founder or a creator.

One person may hold one account. A social media account can be linked to one Kindling account only. Creating extra accounts to take more budget is a breach of these terms.

Give accurate information. For payouts we also need your legal name, address, date of birth and tax details, collected through Stripe and in the app.

We may ask you to verify your phone number, your identity or your bank details. We can pause an account until we have done so.

3. Founders: campaigns and budgets

A founder may create a campaign only for a product they own or are authorised to promote. Budgets run from £20 to £1,000, in the amounts the app offers.

A campaign runs for at most 30 days. Claims close 9 days before the end date, so every post can finish its earning period.

A campaign takes new claims while its open budget is at least £3.

New founders can fund campaigns by card up to £200 each, and up to £300 outstanding in total, until one campaign completes cleanly and 30 days have passed. Higher limits can apply through Pay by Bank.

For budgets of £50 or more, no single creator can take more than 40% of a new founder's budget.

4. Fees

The service fee is 20% of the first £100 of budget and 15% of anything above that, with a minimum of £4. For example, a £20 budget has a £4 fee, and a £500 budget has a £80 fee.

The fee is charged once, with the budget, when the campaign is funded. Creators do not pay to join, claim or post.

Creators keep 100% of what they earn. The payout fees in section 8 are the only charges a creator can pay.

5. Payments and funds

Founders pay the budget and the service fee in one charge, through our payment provider Stripe. You can pay by card, Apple Pay, Google Pay or Pay by Bank, where it is offered.

Creators are paid through Stripe. Stripe's own terms also apply to the payment and identity steps it runs.

How funds are held, and the regulatory position of that arrangement, is still being confirmed with specialist advisers. This draft does not settle it.

6. Founders: reviewing videos

After a creator submits a video, you have 48 hours to approve it or reject it. If you do nothing, the video counts as approved.

A rejection must give one of the listed reasons, such as off-brief, misleading, offensive or wrong product. Creators can appeal a rejection. Rejections are monitored.

An upheld appeal counts against your account. After 2 upheld appeals, you lose the right to reject videos without a Kindling admin checking the decision first.

7. How earnings work

A creator earns the campaign's rate for each 1,000 eligible views. Eligible views are the lower of the views when the earning window closes and the views when the earnings settle.

The earning window is 7 days from posting. Posts with fewer than 300 views earn nothing.

Claiming sets money aside, which is called a reservation. The reservation is the smallest of the campaign's slot cap, the creator's per-post cap for their trust level, what is left of their monthly cap, and the campaign's open budget.

72 hours after posting, a reservation shrinks to twice what has been earned so far, and the rest returns to the open budget. Anything still unearned at the end of the window is released.

Earnings are held before they settle: 10 days for new creators and 5 days for trusted creators. Views far above a creator's usual reach, and posts that look inflated, are checked by a person before they count.

Likes, comments and shares are recorded and shown, but they do not change the amount paid in this version.

8. Payouts

Payday is every Friday. A balance of £20 or more is paid automatically with no fee. A creator who has already been paid that calendar month can be paid a balance of £5 or more on a Friday with no fee.

A creator can cash out any balance from £5 at any time for a £2.50 fee, which is taken from the payout.

A settled balance still unpaid 75 days after the founder paid for the campaign is paid out automatically. A £2.50 fee applies to balances of £5 or more.

A creator must confirm their identity and bank details within 21 days of their earnings being ready. If they do not, the reserved earnings return to the founder.

After a change to bank details, payouts are paused for 7 days, and the creator is told by email and in the app.

At launch, creators can be paid from the UK, the EEA, the US, Canada and Switzerland. Payments are made in the creator's local currency using Stripe's conversion rate.

9. Refunds

Budget that nobody earns is refunded to the original payment method when the campaign ends, less the service fee on that part. The fee kept is never less than £4 or 3% of the original budget, because card processing costs are not refunded.

A second and final refund follows when the last claim is resolved, so money reserved for an open appeal is released only once the appeal window has closed.

Instead of a refund, you can roll the remaining budget into a new campaign.

10. Fraud, reversals and holds

We may hold, reduce, reverse or remove earnings where we find fake or bought views or engagement, multiple accounts, deals between a creator and the founder's own team, bait-and-switch changes to a post, or any other breach of these terms or the Creator rules.

Unsettled earnings for an affected video can be forfeited. Money already paid can be recovered from future earnings. In serious cases, a payout can be reversed and the account blocked.

Every decision gives a reason and has a deadline. Creators can appeal in the app. If a decision is not made in time, the default stated in the app applies.

Card disputes (chargebacks) can arrive for up to about 120 days after a payment. Unsettled earnings on the affected campaign can be cancelled.

11. Videos and licence

Creators keep ownership of the videos they make.

By submitting a video, the creator gives the founder a non-exclusive licence to reuse the approved video to promote that product on the founder's own channels. The exact scope and duration are shown in the licence terms before a creator claims. This draft leaves that detail to lawyer review.

Creators must keep the video public for the period set out in the Creator rules.

Founders must use approved videos as licensed, and must not edit them to make claims the brief does not allow.

12. Campaigns that are not allowed

These categories cannot be promoted on Kindling:

• Gambling, betting, lotteries or casino products.
• Adult content or sexual services.
• Cryptocurrency, trading or other financial promotions, including investment schemes and pump-style promotions.
• Health, medical or weight-loss claims that are not backed by evidence.
• Weapons and ammunition.
• Anything aimed at children.
• Political campaigns, candidates or political content.
• Fake reviews, fake testimonials, or any request to make them.
• Scams, malware, phishing, or anything that misleads people about what they will get.
• Anything that breaks the rules of the platform where the video will be posted.

Every new campaign is screened before it goes live. Borderline cases are checked by a person. We may pause or end any campaign that breaks these rules, and unearned budget is refunded.

13. Support and problems

Use the Help page in the app to contact us about a campaign, a video, a payment or your account. Keep the campaign or submission in your message so we can find it.

Reports about a campaign or submission can be made from the app. We review them and may act on them.

14. Ending, changes and the law

You can stop using Kindling at any time. Closing an account does not cancel earnings that have already settled, which are paid under section 8.

We may change these terms. Where a change materially affects you, we will tell you before it takes effect.

Which law governs these terms, and which courts decide disputes, will be confirmed before launch.