Terms of Service

1. Agreement to These Terms

Hokku ("Hokku," "we," "us," or "our") is a software-as-a-service platform operated by Hokku LLC, an Illinois limited liability company. These Terms of Service, together with our Privacy Policy and any order, plan, or pricing page you accept (collectively, the "Terms"), form a binding agreement between you and us governing your access to and use of the Hokku platform, websites, APIs, and related services (the "Service").

By creating an account, clicking to accept, or otherwise accessing or using the Service, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, do not use the Service. If you use the Service on behalf of an organization, you represent that you are authorized to bind that organization, and "you" refers to that organization.

2. Definitions

• "Authorized Users" — the individuals you permit to use the Service under your account (e.g., your agents, admins, and end customers using your portal).
• "Customer Data" — the data, content, and materials you or your Authorized Users submit to or generate within the Service, such as tickets, comments, attachments, custom fields, knowledge-base articles, and automation flows.
• "AI Features" — features that use artificial intelligence or machine-learning models, including the in-app assistant ("Verse") and related capabilities.
• "Output" — content generated by AI Features in response to inputs.
• "Documentation" — our published guides and materials describing the Service.

3. Eligibility & Accounts

You must be at least 18 years old and able to form a binding contract. You agree to provide accurate, current, and complete information and to keep it updated. You are responsible for safeguarding your credentials and any API keys, and for all activity that occurs under your account, whether or not authorized by you.

You are responsible for your Authorized Users' compliance with these Terms and for all use of the Service through your account. Notify us immediately of any unauthorized access or security breach.

4. Plans, Trials & Early Access

The Service is offered under various subscription plans with different features and usage limits. Free trials, beta, and early-access features may be offered at our discretion, are provided "as is," and may be modified, limited, or discontinued at any time. We may change plan features and limits prospectively.

5. Fees, Billing & Taxes

Paid plans are billed in advance on a recurring basis (monthly or annually, as selected) and automatically renew for successive periods unless cancelled before the renewal date. You authorize us and our payment processor to charge your payment method for all applicable fees, including at renewal and for any overages or add-ons.

Fees are exclusive of taxes; you are responsible for all applicable sales, use, VAT, and similar taxes, excluding taxes on our net income. Prices may change with at least 30 days' notice, effective at your next renewal. Early-adopter pricing, where offered, remains locked for the lifetime of your subscription so long as it stays continuously active.

6. No Refunds

Except where required by applicable law, all fees are non-refundable, including for partial periods, unused capacity, or features not used. Downgrading or cancelling stops future charges but does not entitle you to a refund of fees already paid.

7. Failed Payments, Chargebacks & Suspension

If a payment fails, we may retry and may suspend or limit your access until amounts are paid. You agree not to initiate a chargeback or payment dispute without first contacting us to resolve the issue; initiating an unwarranted chargeback is a breach of these Terms, and we may suspend your account, charge a reasonable reactivation fee, and recover the disputed amount plus our costs. You are responsible for reasonable costs of collection, including attorneys' fees.

8. Acceptable Use

You agree not to, and not to permit any Authorized User or third party to:

• Use the Service for any unlawful, harmful, fraudulent, infringing, or abusive purpose, or in violation of any law or regulation;
• Copy, modify, translate, create derivative works of, reverse-engineer, decompile, disassemble, or otherwise attempt to discover the source code, object code, models, or underlying structure of the Service, except to the extent this restriction is prohibited by applicable law;
• Access or use the Service to build, train, or improve a competing product or service, or to copy its features, "look and feel," or ideas;
• Scrape, crawl, harvest, or use bots, spiders, or automated means to access or extract data from the Service except through our documented API within its limits;
• Resell, sublicense, rent, lease, time-share, or operate a service bureau using the Service without our written permission;
• Circumvent or attempt to circumvent any usage limits, rate limits, access controls, tenant isolation, or security or authentication measures;
• Probe, scan, or test the vulnerability of the Service, or access accounts, engines, data, or systems you are not authorized to access;
• Upload or transmit malware, or interfere with or disrupt the integrity, performance, or availability of the Service or its infrastructure;
• Use the Service to send spam or unsolicited bulk communications, or in violation of anti-spam, telemarketing, or electronic-communications laws;
• Store or transmit content that is illegal, infringing, defamatory, or that violates the privacy or rights of others, or that you lack the right to submit;
• Misrepresent your identity or affiliation, or remove or obscure any proprietary notices;
• Use the Service to benchmark or for competitive analysis, or publish performance results, without our prior written consent.

We may investigate suspected violations and may remove content or suspend access as described in Sections 9, 17, and 19. These rules are detailed further in our Acceptable Use Policy, which forms part of these Terms.

9. Usage Limits & Fair Use

Your plan includes specified usage allowances (which may include limits on users, storage, API calls, AI usage, and other resources). We may meter usage and enforce limits. If your usage materially exceeds your plan's limits or our reasonable fair-use expectations, or imposes an excessive or disproportionate load on the Service, we may — at our discretion and in addition to our other rights — throttle or rate-limit your usage, require an upgrade, charge for overages at our then-current rates, or suspend the offending activity, in each case with notice where practicable.

10. AI Features (Verse)

The Service includes optional AI Features. Your use of AI Features is subject to plan-specific usage allowances (which may be expressed as tokens, messages, compute, or similar units). Because AI processing is costly, we may meter, cap, throttle, charge overages for, or suspend AI usage that exceeds your allowance or our fair-use expectations, or that is automated, excessive, or abusive.

If you connect your own AI provider key ("bring your own key"), you remain responsible for all costs, usage, and compliance with that provider's terms, and we are not liable for your provider charges. Inputs you submit to AI Features, and relevant context, may be transmitted to third-party AI providers acting as our sub-processors to generate Output, as described in our Privacy Policy.

AI Output is generated automatically, may be inaccurate, incomplete, or offensive, and is provided "as is" with no warranty. You are solely responsible for evaluating Output before relying on it and for your use of it. Do not rely on AI Features for legal, financial, medical, or other professional advice. As between you and us, you are responsible for your inputs and for ensuring you have the rights to submit them. You may not use the Service or any Output to develop, train, or improve any competing AI model or service. We may use de-identified, aggregated usage data to operate, secure, and improve the Service.

11. Customer Data & Your Responsibilities

As between you and us, you retain all rights in your Customer Data. We do not claim ownership of it. You grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to host, store, process, transmit, display, and otherwise use Customer Data solely as needed to provide, secure, and improve the Service, to comply with law, and as you instruct through your use of the Service.

You represent and warrant that you have all rights, consents, and lawful bases necessary for your Customer Data and its processing through the Service, including for any personal data of your Authorized Users and end customers. You are responsible for the accuracy, quality, legality, and appropriate backup of your Customer Data and for your relationships with your end customers. You must not submit sensitive data (such as payment card numbers, government IDs, or health information) into free-text fields except where the Service is expressly designed for it.

12. Our Intellectual Property

The Service, including all software, source code, object code, APIs, models, algorithms, designs, user interfaces, text, documentation, and the "Hokku" name, logos, and branding, and all intellectual property rights in them, are and remain the exclusive property of Hokku LLC and its licensors. The Service is licensed, not sold.

Subject to these Terms and your payment of applicable fees, we grant you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, non-sublicensable, revocable right to access and use the Service during your subscription for your internal business purposes. We reserve all rights not expressly granted. Nothing in these Terms transfers any ownership of, or grants any license to, our source code, trademarks, or other intellectual property except the limited use right stated here.

13. Feedback

If you provide suggestions, ideas, or feedback about the Service, you grant us a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free license to use and incorporate them without restriction or obligation to you.

14. Confidentiality

Each party may access the other's non-public information. The receiving party will protect it with reasonable care and use it only to perform under these Terms. The structure, organization, code, and non-public features of the Service are our confidential information. This section does not apply to information that is public through no fault of the receiving party, independently developed, or rightfully obtained from a third party.

15. Third-Party Services & Integrations

The Service may interoperate with third-party services (including payment processors, email/SMTP providers, and AI providers). We are not responsible for third-party services, and your use of them is governed by their terms. Your configuration of integrations (such as connecting email channels or API keys) is your responsibility.

16. Tenant Isolation & Security

Each engine within Hokku is maintained as a separate, logically isolated datastore, and data in one engine is not accessible from another. We apply administrative and technical safeguards described in our Privacy Policy. No system is perfectly secure, and you are responsible for configuring your account appropriately, managing your Authorized Users' access and permissions, and safeguarding your credentials and API keys.

17. Service Availability & Changes

We aim for high availability but do not guarantee that the Service will be uninterrupted, timely, secure, or error-free. We may perform maintenance (with advance notice where practicable) and may modify, add, or discontinue features. We will not materially decrease the core functionality of a paid plan during a paid term without notice.

18. Suspension

We may suspend or restrict your access to all or part of the Service, immediately and without liability, if we reasonably believe that: (a) you have violated these Terms, including the Acceptable Use or Usage Limits sections; (b) your use poses a security, legal, or operational risk to us, the Service, or others; (c) your account is overdue; or (d) suspension is required by law or legal request. We will restore access once the cause is resolved, where appropriate.

19. Term, Termination & Data Deletion

These Terms apply while you use the Service. You may cancel your subscription or close your account at any time; cancellation takes effect at the end of the current paid period and does not entitle you to a refund (Section 6).

We may terminate or suspend these Terms or your account: (a) immediately, for cause, if you materially breach these Terms or fail to pay; or (b) for convenience, on reasonable notice. We may also remove content or terminate accounts we reasonably determine are abusive, unlawful, or harmful to the Service or others.

Before or promptly after termination, you may export your Customer Data using the Service's export tools (CSV or JSON) while your account remains accessible. Upon termination, your right to use the Service ends, and we will delete your Customer Data within 30 days, except (i) where a longer period is required by law, (ii) data in routine backups, which is deleted on our standard backup cycle, and (iii) de-identified or aggregated data. We may delete Customer Data sooner in cases of abuse, security risk, or legal requirement. Sections that by their nature should survive (including 6, 7, 12–14, 20–27) survive termination.

20. Disclaimer of Warranties

To the maximum extent permitted by law, the Service, AI Features, and Output are provided "as is" and "as available," without warranties of any kind, whether express, implied, or statutory, including implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, accuracy, and non-infringement. We do not warrant that the Service will meet your requirements, be uninterrupted or error-free, or that data will not be lost. Any beta or free offerings are provided with no warranty whatsoever.

21. Limitation of Liability

To the maximum extent permitted by law: (a) neither party will be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenue, goodwill, or data, even if advised of the possibility; and (b) our total aggregate liability arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Service will not exceed the total fees you paid to us for the Service in the twelve (12) months immediately preceding the event giving rise to the liability, or one hundred U.S. dollars ($100) if you use the Service for free. These limits apply to all claims in the aggregate and regardless of the theory of liability. Some jurisdictions do not allow certain limitations, so some of the above may not apply to you.

22. Indemnification

You will defend, indemnify, and hold harmless Hokku LLC and its members, officers, employees, and agents from and against any claims, damages, liabilities, losses, and expenses (including reasonable attorneys' fees) arising out of or related to: (a) your Customer Data; (b) your or your Authorized Users' use of the Service; (c) your violation of these Terms or applicable law; or (d) any claim by your end customers or any third party relating to your use of the Service.

23. Copyright Complaints (DMCA)

We respond to notices of alleged copyright infringement. If you believe content on the Service infringes your copyright, send a notice with the information required by the DMCA to our designated agent at support@hokku.app. We may remove allegedly infringing content and terminate repeat infringers.

24. Export Controls & Sanctions

You represent that you are not located in, and will not use the Service in, any country or by any person subject to applicable export-control or economic-sanctions restrictions, and that you are not on any restricted-party list. You will comply with all applicable export and sanctions laws.

25. Dispute Resolution & Binding Arbitration

Please read this section carefully — it affects how disputes are resolved.

Before filing a claim, you agree to first contact us at support@hokku.app and attempt to resolve the dispute informally for at least 30 days. If we cannot resolve it, any dispute arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Service will be resolved by binding individual arbitration administered under the rules of a recognized arbitration provider, seated in Illinois, except that either party may bring an individual claim in small-claims court or seek injunctive relief for misuse of intellectual property or violation of Sections 8, 12, or 14.

To the extent permitted by law, disputes will be conducted only on an individual basis; you and we waive any right to a jury trial and to participate in a class, collective, or representative action. Any claim must be brought within one (1) year after it arises, or it is permanently barred, except where applicable law prohibits such a limit.

26. Governing Law & Venue

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Illinois, without regard to its conflict-of-laws rules. Subject to Section 25, the exclusive venue for any permitted court action is the state and federal courts located in Illinois, and you consent to their jurisdiction.

27. Changes to These Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. For material changes, we will provide notice by email or in-app notification before they take effect. Your continued use of the Service after the effective date constitutes acceptance. If you do not agree, you must stop using the Service.

28. General

We may assign these Terms, including in connection with a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets; you may not assign them without our prior written consent. Neither party is liable for delays or failures caused by events beyond its reasonable control (force majeure). These Terms (with the Privacy Policy and any order page) are the entire agreement between the parties and supersede prior agreements on this subject. If any provision is held unenforceable, the rest remains in effect and the provision is enforced to the maximum extent permitted. Our failure to enforce a provision is not a waiver. Notices to you may be sent to your account email; notices to us go to the contact below. Nothing in these Terms creates a partnership, agency, or employment relationship. Headings are for convenience only.

29. Contact

Hokku LLC
support@hokku.app · support page