Terms & Conditions

01What suds is — and is not

suds operates a two-sided marketplace. The suds app is used by customers to request laundry services. The sudsHQ app is used by independent service providers (also called “providers” or “fleets”) to accept and fulfill those requests. The ambassador portal is used by ambassadors, who are independent referral partners.

suds only connects customers and providers. The laundry services themselves — washing, drying, folding, pickup, and delivery — are performed entirely by independent providers, who are not employees, agents, or representatives of suds. We do not control and are not responsible for the quality, timing, safety, or legality of any provider’s services, nor for the acts or omissions of any provider or customer.

02Eligibility and accounts

You must be able to form a legally binding contract to use the Platform, and you must provide accurate information when you register. The Platform is not directed to children, and you may not use it if you are under the age of majority in your jurisdiction. Customers and providers sign in using their mobile phone number and a one-time code sent by SMS; ambassadors sign in with an email address, a password, and a second factor sent by SMS. You are responsible for keeping your account and device secure and for all activity that occurs under your account.

We may refuse, suspend, block, or terminate any account at our discretion, including for violation of these Terms or for conduct we reasonably believe harms the Platform, providers, customers, or third parties.

03How an order works

A customer creates an order describing the laundry, the desired turnaround, and whether the order is a drop-off (the customer brings the laundry to the provider) or a pickup & delivery (the provider collects and returns the laundry). The order is offered to eligible providers within the customer’s selected search radius.

A provider then accepts (claims) the order and moves it through pickup, processing, and delivery until it is marked delivered. Order status, estimated turnaround, and — during active pickup and delivery — the provider’s location may be shown in the app. Turnaround windows are estimates set by the provider and are not guaranteed by suds.

04Pricing, authorization, and payment (customers)

Payments are processed by Stripe. By placing an order you authorize suds and its payment processor to charge your payment method for the amounts described below, and you are responsible for paying for the services you order.

• Estimate at request. When you submit a request, we place a payment authorization (a hold) for an estimated amount. This is an estimate only.
• Finalized on acceptance. The price becomes final when a provider accepts your order, based on that provider’s pricing.
• Charged when service begins. Your payment method is charged when the service begins. Once charged, you are responsible for that amount.
• Changes are confirmed first. If the price needs to change after acceptance (for example, the actual load is larger than estimated), the change is presented to you for confirmation and you are notified. You become responsible for the revised amount only after you confirm it. If you do not approve a change, the order may be cancelled.

05Fees and taxes

• Service price. Set by the provider you choose and shown to you before you confirm.
• Platform fees. suds charges commission, platform, and related fees. These fees, along with payment-processing and per-transaction fees (which are based on Stripe, administrative, and platform charges), belong to suds.
• Minimum commission. suds applies a minimum commission threshold on each order. Where an order does not meet that threshold, the difference is charged to the customer rather than the provider. This keeps the Platform operational, secure, and available to everyone.
• Sales tax. Sales tax, where applicable, is declared and set by the provider and applies to the service subtotal only. No tax is charged on delivery.
• Tips. Tips are optional, go to the provider, and are not refundable once submitted.
• Promotions. Coupons and promotional discounts are subject to their own terms, may be limited to a single use per customer, and may lock an order to a specific provider.

06Cancellations, adjustments, and refunds

You may cancel an order before a provider begins service; once service has begun, the order may not be cancellable and charges may apply. Where a provider proposes a price adjustment, the order pauses for your confirmation and the authorization is updated accordingly before work continues. Refunds, where offered, are handled on a case-by-case basis and processed through Stripe. Because providers perform the services, refund and re-do requests relating to service quality are resolved directly with the provider as described below.

Where a refund is issued for a service issue, the refunded amount is the provider’s responsibility and is recovered from the provider as described in section 12. suds’s own fees are not refundable except where the order was never fulfilled or where the issue was caused by the Platform.

07Customer responsibilities and disputes

suds only connects you with independent providers. If a problem arises with an order — damage, loss, a quality issue, or a missed window — you are responsible for working directly with the provider to resolve and mitigate the issue. suds may, but is not obligated to, assist. You agree to provide accurate pickup and delivery information, to make your laundry available as scheduled, and not to include prohibited, hazardous, or illegal items. You are responsible for items of unusual value and for disclosing special care requirements in advance.

Claims about a completed order should be raised promptly. Report loss, damage, or a missing item within seven (7) days of the order being marked delivered, through the app or at contact@sudshamper.com, so the provider has a fair opportunity to inspect, re-do, or resolve it. Claims raised after that window may not be recoverable.

08Chargebacks and payment disputes

A chargeback is when you ask your bank or card issuer to reverse a payment instead of resolving it with the merchant. Chargebacks are slow, they cost money regardless of who is right, and for a service that has already been performed they are usually the wrong tool.

• Talk to us first. Before disputing a charge with your card issuer, you agree to contact the provider and then suds at contact@sudshamper.com and allow a reasonable opportunity — at least ten (10) business days — to resolve the issue. Most billing questions are resolved faster than a chargeback can even be opened.
• What we will do. We will provide the order record, pricing breakdown, status history, and delivery confirmation, and will put you in contact with the provider. Where an amount was charged in error by the Platform, we will correct it directly.
• What a chargeback does not do. Filing a chargeback does not cancel your obligation to pay for services actually performed, and it does not resolve a service-quality issue — only the provider can re-do or make good on the work.
• Nothing here removes your legal rights. This section is a commitment about the order in which you raise a problem. It does not waive any right you have under your cardholder agreement or applicable law.
• Abuse. Accounts used to obtain services and then reverse payment for them — repeatedly or in bad faith — may be suspended or terminated, and unpaid balances may be pursued.

As between suds and the provider, responsibility for a chargeback on an order is allocated to the provider as set out in section 12.

09Provider terms (sudsHQ)

This section and sections 10 through 13 form the agreement between suds and each independent service provider. Providers are independent contractors, not employees of suds. Nothing in these Terms creates an employment, partnership, agency, or joint-venture relationship, and you remain free to operate your own business, set your own hours, and serve your own customers however you choose. As a provider, you agree that:

• No fee to list, no contract term, no exclusivity. There is no signup cost, no monthly fee, no minimum order volume, and no exclusivity. You may pause your store or stop accepting orders at any time, and either party may end this agreement at any time. Ending it does not cancel your obligations on orders already accepted, or under sections 12 and 13, which survive termination.
• You set your own prices. You set your rates by load, by weight, or per garment, along with any priority turnaround surcharge and your own sales-tax rate. You may change them at any time; changes apply to new orders, not to orders already accepted.
• Orders are offered, not assigned. Orders are offered to eligible providers within the radius the customer selected around the order’s pickup location. suds does not guarantee any level of order volume, visibility, or earnings, and makes no forecast of either.
• Rate limits. suds may publish maximum per-load and per-pound rates for the Platform. A store priced above a published maximum may be excluded from order broadcasts or deactivated until its rates are corrected. We will notify you by email if this happens.
• You accept what you can deliver. Once you claim an order you are responsible for completing it within the turnaround you advertised. Repeatedly abandoning, delaying, or failing to complete claimed orders may result in suspension.
• Taxes are your responsibility. You are solely responsible for determining, collecting where applicable, reporting, and remitting all taxes arising from your services, including any sales tax you declare, and for your own income and employment taxes. suds does not withhold taxes from your payouts and may issue tax forms as required by law.
• Pickup and delivery are your responsibility to manage. If you use a driver, you are responsible for engaging, supervising, insuring, and paying that driver. suds is not a party to and is not responsible for any agreement between you and a driver. No tax is charged on delivery.
• suds pays you directly. Payouts are made through Stripe Connect, which requires identity and bank verification. You are responsible for the accuracy of your payout details and for completing verification; payouts cannot be released until you do.
• You manage your own customer issues. If you have an issue with a customer, it is your responsibility to manage and mitigate it. suds only helps connect customers and providers.
• No off-platform routing. You may not solicit a customer introduced to you through the Platform to transact off-platform in order to avoid Platform fees, and you may not take payment for a Platform order outside the Platform. You are free to serve your own customers, including bringing them onto the Platform with your own offer code.
• You must provide your services lawfully and safely, maintain any required licenses, permits, insurance, and equipment, and handle customer property with reasonable care.

10Provider pricing, fees, and what you keep

suds does not take a commission out of your rate. The Platform’s commission and fees are added on top of the price you set and are paid by the customer. Your settlement is based on the rate you quoted, not a reduced share of it.

• Yours. Your service rate in full; the sales tax collected on your rate, where you have declared one (which you are responsible for remitting); the pickup-and-delivery fee on delivery orders; any priority-turnaround surcharge you set; and customer tips in full, less only the card-processing cost the tip charge itself incurs.
• Ours. The commission added on top of your rate, the platform fee, and the payment-processing and per-transaction fees. These are charged to the customer and never deducted from your rate.
• Minimum commission. suds applies a minimum commission threshold per order. Where an order does not meet it, the difference is charged to the customer as a platform fee — not to you.
• Price adjustments. If a job is larger than quoted, you enter the actual figures and the customer must approve the revised price before work continues. You are not required to absorb the difference, and the customer is not charged more without confirming.
• Discounts and offer codes. Where you create an offer code, the discount is funded by you and the order is locked to your store. Platform-funded promotions, if any, are identified as such.
• Fee changes. suds may change its commission and fee structure on notice. Changes apply to orders placed after the change takes effect. If you do not accept a change, your remedy is to stop accepting orders.

Fees, thresholds, and surcharges in effect at any time are those shown in the sudsHQ app and in your order breakdowns, which control over any example or summary published elsewhere.

11Provider settlement and payouts

Payouts are made only from funds that have settled, cleared, and become available to the Platform, and are deposited in aggregate — one deposit covering all qualifying orders in the period, not one deposit per order. Payment reaches your bank in two steps: suds first transfers your funds to your connected Stripe account, then releases that balance to your bank.

• Standard schedule (free). Runs on the 1st and the 15th of each month, at no charge. Orders are grouped by the date the order was completed: orders completed between the 1st and the 14th of a month are released on the 1st of the following month, and orders completed from the 15th through the end of a month are released on the 15th of the following month. Your earnings screen shows the expected release date for every order.
• Daily schedule (optional). If you opt into daily settlement, qualifying settled funds are transferred once per day, with a flat $0.99 administrative charge per payout run. You can switch between schedules at any time.
• Tips. Tips settle on their own daily cycle, independently of the order they relate to, and are paid net of the card-processing cost on the tip charge. No commission is taken from a tip.
• Bank release. Once transferred, the balance in your connected account is released to your bank on a daily cycle. Stripe then settles to your bank account, typically within 2 to 3 business days.
• Holds. suds may delay, reduce, or withhold a payout where identity or bank verification is incomplete, where an order is subject to an open dispute, refund request, or chargeback, where we reasonably suspect fraud or a violation of these Terms, or where required by law or by Stripe.

Settlement timing also depends on Stripe, the card networks, and your bank. suds is not responsible for delays caused by payment processors, financial institutions, incomplete verification, or incorrect payout details. Payout dates that fall on a weekend or holiday process on the next available banking day.

12Provider responsibility for chargebacks, refunds, and set-off

As between suds and the provider, the provider is responsible for chargebacks and refunds on the provider’s orders. suds operates the marketplace and processes payment; the provider performs the service that the customer paid for. Where a customer reverses or recovers a payment for an order you fulfilled, that loss is yours, not the Platform’s.

• What you are responsible for. The full amount debited or withheld by the card issuer, network, or payment processor in connection with the disputed order, together with any dispute, chargeback, or reversal fee charged by the processor or network, and any refund suds issues to a customer for an order you fulfilled.
• Regardless of outcome. Processor and network dispute fees are generally charged whether or not the dispute is ultimately decided in the merchant’s favour. Those fees remain your responsibility. Where a disputed amount is recovered, we credit it back to you net of fees actually incurred.
• Evidence is yours to supply. Disputes are contested on the strength of the service record. If we notify you of a dispute, you must provide the evidence we request — weights, photographs, timestamps, delivery confirmation, and your communications with the customer — within three (3) business days. If you do not respond in time, we may accept the dispute on your behalf and treat the full amount as your responsibility.
• Right of set-off and recovery. You authorise suds to recover these amounts by any of the following, at our discretion: deducting them from any payout then due or subsequently owed to you; withholding future payouts until the balance is cleared; reversing a transfer to, or debiting, your connected Stripe account; or invoicing you directly, payable within fourteen (14) days. Where your payouts are insufficient to cover the balance, the shortfall remains a debt payable by you, and you are responsible for reasonable costs of collection.
• Where it is our fault, it is our cost. You are not responsible for a chargeback or refund to the extent it results from an error, failure, or unauthorised charge caused by the Platform itself, from fees that belong to suds, or from an amount you never received. In those cases suds bears the loss.
• Pattern of disputes. An elevated rate of chargebacks or refunds against your store may result in payout holds, a reserve against future payouts, exclusion from order broadcasts, or termination. Card networks impose their own dispute-ratio thresholds and we must operate within them.
• Notice. We will notify you at the email address on your provider account when a dispute is opened against one of your orders and when an amount is recovered under this section, with the order reference and a breakdown.

This section applies to disputes, chargebacks, reversals, and refunds however initiated, and survives termination of your provider account.

13Provider liability, care of items, and insurance

You take custody of customers’ property. You are responsible for it while it is in your possession or the possession of anyone you engage.

• Care of items. You must handle customer items with reasonable care, follow disclosed care requirements, keep orders separated and identifiable, and return them complete.
• Loss and damage. You are responsible to the customer for items you lose, damage, or fail to return, and for resolving those claims directly — by re-doing the work, replacing the item, or refunding, as appropriate. suds is not the insurer of customer property and does not underwrite provider claims.
• Insurance. You are strongly advised to maintain, and are responsible for maintaining, general liability and bailee or customer-goods coverage appropriate to your business and to any vehicle used for pickup and delivery. suds does not provide insurance to providers or their drivers.
• Your own limits apply between you and the customer. Any limitation on liability you publish to customers is a matter between you and the customer. Section 17 limits suds’s liability only; it does not limit yours.
• Indemnity. Section 18 applies to your services, your drivers, and your handling of customer property.

13AAdditional terms for Laundry Pros

A “Laundry Pro” is an individual provider who performs services from their own residence as a sole proprietor. In addition to sections 09 through 13, Laundry Pros agree to the following.

• Residence. You must sign up from, and perform services at, the residence shown on the proof of address you submit. The sudsHQ app records your device location once during sign-up for this purpose.
• Identity verification. You must complete identity verification, including a scan of your driver’s license and a live selfie matched to it, and submit a valid proof of address. We review each application manually and may approve or decline it at our discretion. Your legal name is used for verification and payouts. Customers see the display name you choose and your city, state and ZIP, but not your street address.
• Background check. After your first completed order, a background check is run by our screening partner. You pay the fee shown in the app (currently $49.99). It is non-refundable and is charged whatever the result. If the check is not completed within the period shown in the app (currently 14 days), your listing is paused until it is. A result that does not meet our standards ends your listing. The screening partner collects your Social Security number and date of birth directly; suds does not receive them.
• Profile photo. Any photo you use must be of you, and may be checked against your verified identity.
• Unsanitary items and missed pickups. Where the app offers an unsanitary-cancellation or missed-pickup charge, you may apply it only with the photo evidence the app requires, and only where the circumstances genuinely apply. Misuse may result in suspension.
• Order photos. Photos you attach to an order are visible to the customer and are deleted after the period shown in the app.

13BsudsHQ POS

The sudsHQ point of sale (“POS”) lets providers record, and take payment for, in-store sales that do not come from the marketplace.

• Your sales. POS sales are between you and your customer. You set the catalog, prices and taxes, and you are responsible for the sale, refunds, sales tax, and any receipt or consumer-law obligations.
• Card processing. You may use sudsHQ card processing, in which case the processing charge shown in the app is added to the customer’s card total and the sale is paid out to your connected payout account. Or you may connect your own Stripe account, in which case your agreement with Stripe governs those payments.
• POS fees. Where a per-transaction POS fee applies, it is shown in the app before it takes effect, may be passed to the customer as a line item, and is billed to the payment card you save. If POS fees are unpaid, new POS sales may be paused until they are paid. Refunds remain available.
• Customer details. Customer contact details you enter into the POS are used to send receipts and job updates. You must have your customer’s permission to text or email them, including through any messaging account (such as Twilio) you connect.

14Ambassador program

Ambassadors are independent referral partners, not employees, who recruit providers and customers to the Platform. Ambassadors are not authorized to speak or contract on behalf of suds.

• Commission. An ambassador earns a percentage of the platform’s commission on each completed and delivered order fulfilled by a provider the ambassador referred. The commission is a share of platform revenue — not of the order total and not of the provider’s pay.
• Earned orders only. Commission accrues only on orders that reach completed or delivered status. Cancelled, in-progress, or unfulfilled orders earn nothing.
• Attribution. Provider referral attribution is set once and is permanent for that provider. The referring ambassador for an order is frozen at the time the provider is assigned and is not changed afterward.
• Payouts. Ambassador commission amounts are calculated by the Platform and paid out of band on a periodic basis (around the 1st and 15th of the month). Payouts are discretionary, may be subject to verification, and carry no guaranteed minimum.
• Rate and standing. suds may set, adjust, or remove an ambassador’s commission rate or standing at any time. Removal deactivates the ambassador’s referral code and ends future attribution.

15Acceptable use

You agree not to misuse the Platform, including by: providing false information; circumventing fees or routing payments off-platform; interfering with or disrupting the Platform; attempting unauthorized access; harassing or harming other users; or using the Platform for any unlawful purpose. We may remove content and suspend or terminate accounts that violate these rules.

16Disclaimers

The Platform is provided “as is” and “as available,” without warranties of any kind, whether express or implied, including warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement. suds does not warrant that the Platform will be uninterrupted or error-free, or that any provider’s services will meet your expectations. Providers are solely responsible for their services.

17Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, suds and its officers, employees, and partners will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, or for any loss of profits, data, goodwill, or for lost, damaged, or delayed laundry handled by a provider. To the fullest extent permitted by law, our total liability for any claim relating to the Platform will not exceed the greater of the fees suds earned on the order giving rise to the claim or fifty U.S. dollars (US$50).

This limit protects suds only. It does not limit a provider’s responsibility to a customer for the provider’s own services or for customer property in the provider’s care, and it does not limit a provider’s obligations to suds under section 12. Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion of certain warranties or the limitation of certain damages, so parts of this section and section 16 may not apply to you; nothing in these Terms excludes liability that cannot lawfully be excluded.

18Indemnification

You agree to indemnify and hold suds harmless from any claims, damages, liabilities, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of your use of the Platform, your violation of these Terms, your violation of any law or third-party right, or — for providers — the services you provide, your handling of customer property, your relationships with drivers and customers, and any chargeback, reversal, or refund arising from an order you fulfilled.

19Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. When we do, we will revise the “Last updated” date above. For changes that materially affect providers — including changes to fees, payout timing, or the allocation of chargeback responsibility — we will give notice by email to the address on your provider account, or in the sudsHQ app, before the change takes effect. Your continued use of the Platform after changes take effect constitutes acceptance of the updated Terms.

20Governing law and disputes

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of New York and the United States, without regard to conflict-of-laws rules. Disputes between customers and providers are resolved directly between those parties. Any dispute with suds will be resolved in the state or federal courts located in New York, New York, except where prohibited by law, and you consent to the jurisdiction of those courts. Before filing, please contact legal@sudshamper.com — most disputes are resolved informally.

21Contact

Questions about these Terms? Reach us at legal@sudshamper.com. Providers with a question about payout timing or a specific dispute can also reach contact@sudshamper.com. See also our Privacy Policy.

Shrestha Ventures, New York, NY