Terms of
Service.

Who and What

1.1 The parties. These terms are an agreement between Accendo Associates LLC, a Maryland limited liability company (“Accendo”, “we”, “us”), and the organization or person that registers for, buys or uses our services (“you”). If you accept these terms for an organization, you confirm that you are authorized to do so. The organization is then bound by them. For an organization’s paid order, an authorized purchaser accepts these terms for the organization, and each participant accepts them as a user.

1.2 The services. These terms apply to:

• Paid services: the AI Circle Cohort, the AI Circle Intensive, AI Circle membership and its renewal, Level 2 Build, and portfolio, funder and other bespoke programs.
• Free services: Impact Lender AI.OS, Set Your Baseline, webinars, events, newsletters, and the content on accendoassociates.com, including Accendo Signals and the Capital Flows Map.

1.3 Business use only. Our services are designed for organizations and professionals acting for work. You must be at least 18 to use them. If the law of your country treats you as a consumer, for example when you buy an AI Circle Intensive seat for yourself in the European Union, the United Kingdom or India, the consumer rights that law gives you apply in addition to these terms. Nothing in these terms limits them.

1.4 Order of priority. If a document signed by both of us (such as an order form, statement of work or contract) differs from these terms, the signed document applies. Next comes your written order confirmation, then these terms. Our Privacy Policy explains how we handle personal data and forms part of these terms.

Accounts and Registration

2.1 Your account. Some services need an account on our website, including Impact Lender AI.OS and AI Circle membership. Give accurate details and keep them up to date. Each account is for one named person. Do not share your sign-in.

2.2 Signing in. We use sign-in without a password, by a link sent to your email or by a passkey on your device. Keep your email account and your devices secure. Tell us at once at [email protected] if you think someone else has used your account.

2.3 Checks at registration. To keep out automated and false accounts, we check each sign-up, as the Privacy Policy describes. We may hold a sign-up for review, ask for more detail, or decline it. A person reviews any sign-up that a check stops, if you ask.

2.4 Acceptance. You accept these terms by ticking an unticked box next to a link to them, when you register or place an order. We record who accepted, the time, the version accepted and the action taken. We keep an unchanged copy of every version of these terms, so the version number identifies the exact text you accepted. If you use a free service without an account, such as our website, these terms apply to that use.

Orders

3.1 When an order is confirmed.

• AI Circle Intensive. Your seat is confirmed when your payment succeeds, or when we accept your invoiced order in writing, and we send you a confirmation email.
• AI Circle Cohort. Your fund’s place is confirmed when we accept your enrollment in writing and issue an invoice. A place covers three named participants from your fund.
• Set Your Baseline. Free. Your place is confirmed when we send the joining details.
• Level 2 Build and bespoke programs. Confirmed by a signed order form or statement of work.

3.2 Places are limited. We may decline a registration or order, for example where a program is full, where the organization does not fit the program, or where accepting it would conflict with our duties to other participants. If we decline a paid order, we refund in full any amount you paid.

3.3 Price lock. The price on your confirmation is the price you pay for that order. A later price change does not apply to it.

3.4 Details for each order. When you order, give your organization’s business address and the countries from which participants will mainly take part. We use them to work out which taxes apply. Where membership comes with a program, the order confirmation shows separately the price of the live program and the price of membership access.

3.5 Screening. Before we confirm a paid order, we screen the buyer, and where relevant its owners and participants, against applicable sanctions lists, as our Sanctions, Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorist Financing Policy requires. We may ask for information to complete the screening. We confirm the order only once the screening is complete.

Fees and Payment

4.1 AI Circle Intensive. The fee is per person, as shown when you register. You pay by card through our payment provider when you register, or by invoice where we agree it, for example for two or more seats.

4.2 AI Circle Cohort. The fee is quoted per fund, based on the fund’s assets under management, and shown on your invoice. You pay by bank transfer before the first session, unless we agree other timing in writing.

4.3 Level 2 Build and bespoke programs. Fees, timing and expenses are set in the order form or statement of work.

4.4 Membership renewal. Renewal fees are set out in the renewal offer we send you before your membership ends (section 12).

4.5 Bank charges and taxes. Fees do not include taxes. You pay your own bank’s charges and any intermediary bank charges, so that we receive the invoiced amount. We pay our own bank’s receiving charges. We charge the taxes the law requires, based on the details in section 3.4. We charge Maryland sales and use tax only where a purchase is sourced to Maryland, not because we are based there. Any tax we charge is shown on the invoice. If the law requires you to withhold tax, tell us before you pay. We then agree how to handle it, and you send us the tax certificate so that we can claim the credit.

4.6 Discounts and credits.

• Only one discount applies to each purchase, at all times. Discount codes apply only as stated when issued, and they cannot be exchanged for cash.
• Intensive credit. Up to two AI Circle Intensive fees paid by one organization are credited against that organization’s place in the next AI Circle Cohort that starts after the Intensive. The credit counts as a discount, so it cannot be combined with a discount code or the member referral code.
• Member referral code. Each active member organization holds a code that gives 20% off a Cohort place for up to two other funds, while its membership is active.

4.7 Late payment. If an invoice is unpaid when due, we remind you in writing. If it is still unpaid 7 days after the reminder, we may pause access to the program until it is paid. A pause does not reduce the fee.

Cancellations, Transfers and Refunds

5.1 AI Circle Intensive. A seat is for one named person. If you buy as a consumer, you also have any right to cancel that your country’s law gives you, such as the 14-day cancellation period in the European Union and the United Kingdom, on the conditions that law sets.

• 7 days or more before the Intensive: cancel in writing and we refund the fee in full.
• Less than 7 days before, or if you cannot attend: tell us before the session starts. We move your seat once to any Intensive held in the next 6 months, or you may pass the seat to a colleague by telling us their name. If we hold no Intensive in those 6 months, we refund the fee in full.
• No notice: if the named person does not attend and you did not tell us before the session, the fee is not refunded. The six months of membership still apply.

5.2 AI Circle Cohort.

• Full refund: cancel in writing at least 14 days before the first session, or within 5 working days after we confirm your place if we confirm it later, and we refund the fee in full.
• After that point: the fee is not refunded. You may move your place once to a Cohort that starts within 12 months. If no Cohort starts in that time, we refund the fee in full.
• After session one: if the program is not right for your fund, tell us in writing within 3 working days after the first session. We refund 50% of the fee and your membership ends. Any Intensive credit used for the place is restored as a credit.
• Replacing participants: you may replace a named participant with a colleague at any time by telling us their name. A place stays at three participants.

5.3 Level 2 Build and bespoke programs. Cancellation terms are set in the order form or statement of work. If none are set, you may end the work on 14 days’ written notice. You pay for work done and costs committed up to the end date, and we refund anything paid in advance for work not done.

5.4 If we cancel or reschedule. If we cancel a program, or move it to dates you cannot attend, you choose a transfer to other dates or a full refund of the fees paid for the part not delivered. If a single session has to move, we offer a replacement session or a recording. If two or more sessions of a Cohort cannot be delivered as scheduled and you cannot attend the replacements, we refund the fees for those sessions pro rata.

5.5 How refunds are paid. We pay refunds within 14 days of the refund becoming due, to the card or account you paid from. If a payment provider or bank deducts a charge from a refund that we owe because of our cancellation, we cover it.

5.6 Card disputes. Please contact us before you raise a dispute with your card issuer. Most issues can be resolved quickly by email.

Delivery

6.1 How we deliver. Sessions are delivered online at the times shown when you register, by video conference, using the AI tools that you and we agree on. We deliver every paid service with the reasonable skill and care expected of a professional adviser. We deliver through our members and through associates and delivery partners who are bound by our policies and by confidentiality duties at least as protective as section 9. We remain responsible for their work. Where your contract requires your consent to subcontracting, we ask for it first.

6.2 Before a Cohort starts. We send a readiness survey to each fund and hold one onboarding call in the week before the first session. The call covers tool access, platforms and data classification.

6.3 Close of a Cohort. Each participant who completes the program receives a completion record. Each fund receives a one-page AI governance statement for its investors. A completion record confirms the sessions attended and the work completed. It is not an accredited qualification.

6.4 Changes to a program. We may make reasonable changes to session content, order, tools demonstrated or facilitators, provided the program you bought is not materially reduced. We tell you about any significant change in advance. If a change materially reduces the program, you may cancel and receive a refund of the fees for the part not delivered.

6.5 Recordings, transcripts and note-takers. We record a session, make a transcript or use an AI note-taker only if we say so before the session starts and the participants agree. The same rule applies to participants (section 9.5). Recordings and transcripts are shared only with the participants of that session or Cohort, are used to support their learning and to improve the program, and are processed only in services approved under our Artificial Intelligence Use Policy. We do not publish them. We delete them when the participants’ membership ends, and in any case within 12 months of the session.

6.6 Our use of AI. We use AI tools in delivering our services, under our Artificial Intelligence Use Policy. Your material goes only into business services we have approved, whose providers may not train models on it. We do not use your material to build anything we reuse for others without your written permission. If you restrict or prohibit our use of AI tools on your work, the restriction applies to the whole engagement, including our associates and delivery partners. On request, we tell you which AI services processed your material.

Impact Lender AI.OS

7.1 What it is. Accendo Impact Lender AI.OS™ is a free set of prompt templates, guides and tools for mission-driven financial service providers, such as microfinance institutions, community development financial institutions, NBFC-MFIs and SOFIPOs. Registration is free. People who register are “registered users”. Impact Lender AI.OS is separate from AI Circle membership: registering does not make you a member, and the benefits of paid membership are not part of it. This section applies together with the rest of these terms. Where they differ, this section applies to Impact Lender AI.OS.

7.2 How it works. No AI runs on our website. You copy a template and run it in your institution’s own AI tools. We do not see what you enter into those tools or what they return. Each copied template starts with a line that gives its ID and version. To check that your copy is current, compare that ID and version with the template’s card on our website. The line alone does not show that a copy is current.

7.3 Licence. Templates and guides are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC 4.0). Under that licence you may use, adapt and share them for non-commercial purposes, with credit to Accendo, and you must say if you changed them.

7.4 Permission for institutions. In addition to the licence in section 7.3, and without changing it, any institution may use and adapt the templates and guides in its own operations, including its lending operations, whether or not it is run for profit. This permission does not allow anyone to sell the templates or guides, to include them in a product or service that is sold, or to distribute them commercially.

7.5 Notices in copies. Each copied template and guide carries the licence link, the credit to Accendo and a disclaimer notice. When you share a copy, keep these with it, so that the people who receive it get them too.

7.6 Names and logos. The names Accendo and Impact Lender AI.OS, and Accendo’s logos, are not licensed. Do not use them in a way that suggests we endorse you or your version.

7.7 Starting points, provided as they are. Each template is a starting point for professional evaluation. It is not legal, regulatory, credit or financial advice. AI output may be inaccurate, incomplete, biased or made up. Subject to applicable law, we give no assurance that a template or its output complies with any regulation, suits your institution or leads to any lending outcome. Your institution must test each template before relying on it, and a person must review every output before it is used in a lending or other decision. Your institution is responsible for the data it enters into any AI tool and for complying with the laws that apply to it, including fair lending and anti-discrimination laws. Impact Lender AI.OS is provided as it is and as available, and section 15.5 applies to it.

7.8 What not to enter. Do not enter into our forms or feedback fields any personal information about your institution’s clients or staff, borrower records, your institution’s confidential information, passwords or other credentials, or any other sensitive information.

7.9 Third-party AI tools. Your institution’s AI tools are governed by their own terms. We are not responsible for them.

7.10 Support. We do not provide support for using Impact Lender AI.OS beyond the written FAQ. Hands-on help is available as a paid service under section 3.

7.11 Updates. We plan to review each template on a regular cycle and show its planned review date on its card. A planned review date is not a commitment. We may update, replace or withdraw templates at any time. A card past its planned review date shows a notice.

7.12 Closing an account. You may close your account at any time from your account page or by email. We may close an account that has not been used for 24 months, after 30 days’ notice by email, as the Privacy Policy sets out. Copies you have already made remain licensed under sections 7.3 and 7.4.

Your Responsibilities

8.1 Your tools and data. Use your own AI accounts and tools, and follow your organization’s policies for them. We recommend business or enterprise plans for any fund or institution material. Before any document goes into an AI tool, apply your organization’s data rules.

8.2 What you share. Share only material you are entitled to use. Do not share personal or regulated data in sessions unless your legal or compliance team has approved it.

8.3 Acceptable use. Do not:

• share your sign-in, joining links or members-only materials outside your organization’s named people;
• copy content in bulk by automated means, or try to get around access controls or registration checks;
• give false details about yourself or your institution;
• upload harmful code, or interfere with the website or other users;
• use our services in breach of law or of another person’s rights.

8.4 Conduct in sessions. Treat sessions as a professional, respectful space. If a participant’s conduct disrupts a session, we give one warning first. We may then remove the participant. In serious cases, such as harassment, we may remove a participant without a warning. The organization may name a replacement participant for the rest of the program.

8.5 Raising a concern. If you have a concern about the conduct of anyone working on an Accendo service, including a safeguarding concern, write to [email protected]. If the concern involves a member of the firm, or you prefer a route outside the firm, write to our independent external contact at [email protected] or [email protected]. Both addresses reach that contact alone. You may raise a concern anonymously. No one suffers retaliation for raising a concern they had reasonable grounds to believe was true. Our Whistleblowing and Safeguarding policies set out the routes in full.

Confidentiality

9.1 What is confidential. Confidential information is non-public information that one party (the discloser) shares with the other (the recipient) in connection with the services, and that is marked confidential or would reasonably be understood to be confidential.

9.2 How it is protected. The recipient uses confidential information only for the services. It protects it with reasonable care, and at least the care it uses for its own information of a similar kind. It may share it only with its staff, associates, professional advisers and service providers who need it for the services and are bound by confidentiality duties at least as protective as this section. The recipient is responsible for their compliance.

9.3 Exceptions. This section does not apply to information that:

• is or becomes public without a breach of these terms;
• the recipient already held lawfully before receiving it;
• the recipient develops independently, without using the confidential information; or
• the recipient receives lawfully from a third party that has no duty of confidentiality.

If the law, a court or a regulator requires the recipient to disclose confidential information, it may do so. It tells the discloser in advance where the law allows, and discloses only what is required.

9.4 AI Circle discussions. Cohort sessions follow the Chatham House Rule: participants may use the information they hear, but may not reveal the identity or affiliation of the speaker or of any other participant. General insights from discussion, such as approaches, lessons and practices, may be reused on that basis. The Chatham House Rule does not override this section. Material that a participant or organization shares as confidential stays protected. We do not share one organization’s confidential material with another organization without its permission.

9.5 Participants’ commitments. Each participant accepts these confidentiality rules before the first session. Participants may not record sessions, make transcripts, or use AI meeting assistants or note-takers in sessions, unless we have announced it and all participants have agreed. Section 6.5 governs recordings that we make. We take reasonable steps to protect confidentiality in sessions, but we cannot guarantee how other participants behave. Each organization is responsible for its own participants’ compliance.

9.6 Naming and publishing. We publish the name of a participating organization, or quote a named person, only with that organization’s or person’s consent. We publish aggregated results only where no person or organization can reasonably be identified, including from the context.

9.7 Separate confidentiality agreement. We do not need access to your accounts or files. If your organization wants a mutual confidentiality agreement, we can agree one before the program starts. Where one applies, it prevails over this section for the information it covers.

9.8 Duration. These duties last for 3 years after the services end. Trade secrets stay protected for as long as they remain trade secrets. Duties about personal data apply separately, under the applicable law and our Privacy Policy.

Personal Data

10.1 Our Privacy Policy. We use the details you give us to register you, run your account, deliver the services, send service emails and issue invoices. The Privacy Policy explains what we collect, how we use and protect it, and how to use your rights. We send newsletters and updates only if you agree, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

10.2 Card payments. Our payment provider processes card payments. We do not see or store your full card details.

10.3 Data we handle for you. If bespoke work needs us to process personal data on your behalf, we sign a data processing agreement with you before that work starts.

10.4 Security incidents. If a security incident affects your confidential information or personal data that we hold, we tell you without undue delay, and within any shorter period that the law or your contract sets. We contain and investigate it, and tell you what we have done.

Intellectual Property

11.1 What you own. You keep all rights in your own documents and data, and in the outputs, prompts and workflows you build from them while using our services.

11.2 What we own. Accendo keeps all rights in its materials, including slides, templates, skills, prompts, guides, frameworks, the ready reckoner, the skills and agents library and the InvestTech list.

11.3 Your licence to our materials. We grant you a non-exclusive, non-transferable licence to use and adapt our AI Circle and paid program materials inside your own organization, for its own work. While you have access, the licence covers the materials we host for you and their updates. Copies you downloaded or adapted while you had access, and the work you created with them, stay licensed for internal use after access ends. Hosted access, updates and new materials end when your program or membership ends (section 12.7). You may not resell, publish or distribute our materials, or use them to train an AI model or to run a competing program.

11.4 Impact Lender AI.OS. Templates and guides in Impact Lender AI.OS are licensed under sections 7.3 and 7.4, not under section 11.3.

11.5 Feedback. If you give us feedback or suggestions, we may use them to improve our services without any duty to you. We do not identify you without your consent.

11.6 Know-how. Each party may use the general skills and know-how it gains from the services, provided it does not disclose the other’s confidential information.

AI Circle Membership

12.1 Who becomes a member. Members are organizations and people who pay for an AI Circle Cohort place or an AI Circle Intensive seat. “Member” in these terms means an AI Circle member only. Registered users of Impact Lender AI.OS and attendees of free services are not members.

12.2 Two kinds of membership.

• Organizational membership (Cohort). The fund holds the membership, for twelve months from the Cohort start date. Up to three authorized users use it, identified by the email addresses the fund registers with us. The fund may replace an authorized user at any time by email. The new user takes over that seat and the previous user’s access ends.
• Individual membership (Intensive). The attendee holds the membership personally, for six months from the date of the Intensive. It cannot be shared or transferred, except with the seat under section 5.1 before the Intensive takes place.
• Set Your Baseline does not include membership.

12.3 What membership includes. At the time of purchase, membership includes:

• access to the members-only materials, including the skills and agents library and the InvestTech list;
• a written member pack each quarter;
• a member check-in twice a year, held online in the first week of June and the first week of December. Booking closes 2 working days before each check-in. Every Intensive membership includes at least one check-in: if none falls within its six months, the member may join the next one;
• webinars, summits and member communications, as we offer them.

Cohort participants also receive the benefits described for their Cohort. We may move a date for good reason with reasonable notice, and may replace a benefit with one of equal value.

12.4 Skills and agents. Skills and agents from the library run in your own systems and AI accounts, not through Accendo. We do not receive the data you process with them. You are responsible for that data, for the systems you run them in and for checking their output. If we agree to run anything for you, a signed order form sets out the data and responsibility terms.

12.5 If we reduce membership. If we materially reduce membership during its initial term or a renewal term, you may end the membership and we refund the unused part of the membership fee. Where membership comes with a program, the order confirmation shows the part of the fee that relates to membership. The refund is that part, divided by the months in the term, multiplied by the full months left.

12.6 Renewal. Membership never renews automatically, and we never charge for a renewal without your written agreement. We write to you with the renewal terms at least 30 days before your membership ends. A monthly renewal buys one month of access at a time. It is not an instalment toward a longer commitment, and you may cancel it at any time, with effect at the end of the month already paid.

12.7 When membership ends. Access to hosted materials, updates, the quarterly pack and check-ins ends. You keep the copies and the work covered by section 11.3.

12.8 Use of membership. Organizational membership is for the fund’s authorized users. Individual membership is for the named member. Neither may be shared beyond those people.

No Regulated Advice

13.1 Methods, not advice. Our programs are training and capability building, and our templates are tools for you to adapt. Nothing we provide is investment, legal, tax, accounting, credit or regulatory advice, and nothing is a recommendation to make, hold or decline any investment or loan. Your decisions remain yours.

13.2 AI output. AI tools can produce wrong or incomplete output. You are responsible for checking any output before you rely on it, and for the decisions your organization makes.

13.3 Third parties. References to third-party tools and vendors, including in the InvestTech list, are for information. They are not endorsements. Your use of those tools is governed by their own terms.

Our Commitments

14.1 What we promise. We deliver paid services with reasonable skill and care. We have the right to provide and license our materials, and to our knowledge they do not infringe anyone else’s rights.

14.2 Errors and shortfalls. If we find a material error in a deliverable, we tell you without delay, whether or not you have noticed it, and within five working days we issue a correction or a timetable for one. If you think a paid service fell short, tell us in writing within 30 days of the session or deliverable concerned. If we agree that it fell short of section 14.1, we deliver it again at no cost or refund the fees for that part, as you choose.

14.3 What you promise. You have the authority to accept these terms, and the right to share the material you bring to the services.

14.4 No other promises. Apart from what these terms say, and to the extent the law allows, neither party gives any other warranty about the services.

Liability

15.1 How the caps work. In this section, an “order” means one AI Circle Intensive seat, one Cohort place with its included membership, one renewal term, or one signed order form or statement of work. All claims that arise from the same or related facts count as one claim, under one cap. If that claim relates to more than one order, the highest single cap applies, and the caps do not add together.

15.2 General cap. Each party’s total liability to the other for all claims connected with an order is limited to the total fees paid and payable for that order. For a monthly renewal, the cap is the fees paid and payable for that renewal in the 12 months before the claim arose.

15.3 Confidentiality and intellectual property cap. For a breach of section 9, or an infringement of the other party’s intellectual property that is not knowing, each party’s total liability is instead limited to the greater of USD 10,000 and three times the fees for the order. This higher cap includes, and is not added to, any amount under section 15.2. Within it, the reasonable costs of investigating and containing a confidentiality incident, notifying those affected and restoring affected data can be recovered, despite section 15.6.

15.4 Paid services only. Sections 15.2 and 15.3 apply to paid services. Section 15.5 applies to free services.

15.5 Free services. Free services are provided as they are and as available. To the extent the law allows, we give no warranty of any kind about them, express or implied, including any warranty of accuracy, completeness, fitness for a particular purpose or non-infringement. To the same extent, we are not liable for any loss that results from using them, including decisions made with any output. For templates and guides, the disclaimer of warranties and limitation of liability in section 5 of the CC BY-NC 4.0 licence also apply. Where the law does not allow us to exclude liability, our total liability for free services is limited to US$10.

15.6 Indirect loss. Except as section 15.3 allows, neither party is liable for indirect or consequential loss, or for loss of profit, revenue, investment returns, data or goodwill, even if it was foreseeable.

15.7 What the limits do not cover. The caps and exclusions in this section do not apply to:

• fraud;
• gross negligence or willful misconduct, including a knowing, unauthorized disclosure of the other party’s confidential information;
• knowing infringement of the other party’s intellectual property;
• your duty to pay fees due; or
• any liability that the law does not allow to be limited or excluded.

These exceptions override both the monetary caps and the exclusion of indirect loss.

15.8 Events beyond control. Neither party is responsible for delay or failure caused by events beyond its reasonable control, such as outages of internet, video or AI services, natural disasters or government action. This does not excuse a duty to pay. The affected party tells the other promptly and takes reasonable steps to limit the effect and resume. If the event stops a paid service for more than 30 days, either party may end the order, and we refund under section 16.4.

Suspension and Ending

16.1 Suspension. We may suspend an account or access to a program, in proportion to the problem, for unpaid fees (section 4.7), for a serious breach of section 8.3, or to deal with a security risk. We tell you why, unless the law or a security reason prevents it. We review a suspension promptly if you ask, and we restore access once the breach or risk is reasonably resolved.

16.2 Ending for breach. Either party may end a paid order by written notice if the other materially breaches these terms and does not fix the breach within 14 days of being asked to. If a material breach cannot be fixed, the party may end the order at once by written notice.

16.3 Insolvency. Either party may end a paid order by written notice if the other becomes insolvent or stops trading.

16.4 Refund when an order ends early. Where these terms give a refund of the fees for the part not delivered, it is calculated as follows:

• Cohort: the program part of the fee, multiplied by the sessions not delivered and divided by the total sessions, plus the membership refund under section 12.5.
• Intensive not yet held: the full fee.
• Bespoke work: fees paid in advance for work not done.

If we end an order because of your breach, we may deduct reasonable costs we have committed and cannot recover, but only costs that the fees kept for delivered work do not already cover. We pay refunds under section 5.5.

16.5 What continues. Fees already due, and the sections on confidentiality, personal data, intellectual property, liability, disputes and general terms, continue after an order or account ends, each for the period it states. This does not extend confidentiality beyond section 9.8, and it does not end any licence that these terms say continues.

Integrity and Compliance

Each party complies with the anti-bribery, anti-corruption, sanctions and anti-money-laundering laws that apply to it. We do not knowingly provide services to any person or organization subject to applicable sanctions. Either party may decline or end a service if continuing would breach these laws. In that case we refund the fees for the part not delivered.

Disputes and Governing Law

18.1 Talk first. If a dispute arises, write to the other party. Senior representatives of both parties try in good faith to resolve it within 30 days.

18.2 Mediation. If talks do not resolve it, either party may propose online mediation under the mediation rules of the International Centre for Dispute Resolution (ICDR) of the American Arbitration Association. Mediation goes ahead only if both parties agree.

18.3 Claims of USD 50,000 or less. A dispute goes to the state courts of Maryland, United States, and not to arbitration, if the total amount claimed, counting all related claims and counterclaims between the parties, is USD 50,000 or less, and no party seeks a remedy other than money. Both parties submit to the jurisdiction of those courts. This section overrides section 18.4. If a later counterclaim takes the total above USD 50,000, or a party later seeks a remedy other than money, either party may move the whole dispute to arbitration under section 18.4.

18.4 Arbitration. Any other dispute that is not resolved within 60 days of the first written notice is settled by binding arbitration administered by the ICDR under its International Arbitration Rules.

• There is one arbitrator. The seat of arbitration is Maryland, United States. The language is English.
• Hearings are held online, unless the arbitrator decides otherwise.
• Each party pays half of any deposit the ICDR requests in advance. The arbitrator decides how the final costs are shared. Where mandatory law or an applicable consumer procedure requires a different allocation, that rule applies.

18.5 Urgent relief and time limits. Either party may at any time, without waiting for the periods in sections 18.1 to 18.4, ask a court for urgent interim relief (for example to protect confidential information or intellectual property), or start proceedings needed to stop a limitation period from running out.

18.6 Governing law. These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Maryland, United States, without regard to its conflict of laws rules. This does not remove any right that the mandatory law of your country gives you. If you are a consumer, you may also bring a claim in the courts where you live, where that law gives you this right.

General

19.1 Changes to these terms. We may update these terms. The version in force when your order is confirmed applies to that order. For members and registered users, we email you at least 30 days before a material change takes effect. We then ask you to accept the new version before you continue to use your account, and we keep the record of your earlier acceptance. If you do not accept the change, you may close your account, and we refund the unused part of any renewal you paid for in advance.

19.2 Transfer. Neither party may transfer these terms without the other’s consent, except to a successor business that takes over the relevant activity, with notice to the other party.

19.3 Whole agreement. These terms, together with any order confirmation, signed document and the Privacy Policy, are the whole agreement between the parties about the services.

19.4 Other points. The parties are independent contractors. Nobody else has rights under these terms. A delay in using a right is not a waiver of it. If any part of these terms is found unenforceable, the rest remains in effect. If these terms are translated, the English version applies.

19.5 Notices. Send notices by email. For the AI Circle, write to [email protected]. For everything else, including Impact Lender AI.OS, write to [email protected]. Send legal notices to [email protected]. Legal notices may also be sent by post to Accendo Associates LLC, 306 W Redwood St, Ste 201, Baltimore, MD 21201, USA. An email notice takes effect on the next working day after it is sent.