Terms of service

These terms are the agreement between you and Literacy Trail for use of the website and the app. By creating an account or using the service you accept them. If you are accepting on behalf of a school, centre or other organization, you confirm you are authorised to bind it.

What the service is

Literacy Trail is a planning and record-keeping tool for literacy instruction. It stores lesson names, their order, and the records you create about the sessions you teach.

It is deliberately not several things. It contains no lesson content, no teaching materials, no assessments and no instruction. It does not diagnose, screen for or treat any condition, including dyslexia, and nothing in it is educational, clinical or medical advice. The professional judgement stays yours.

Who may use it

You must be at least 18 and able to enter a contract. Literacy Trail is for the adult who teaches: a parent, tutor, teacher or specialist. Students do not get accounts and must not be given yours.

Your account

Keep your sign-in details private and tell us promptly at hello@literacytrail.com if you believe someone else has access. You are responsible for what happens under your account.

Records about students

You decide what goes in. By entering a record about a student you confirm that you have the authority to do so, whether as the child's parent or under the arrangement you have with their family or your employer, and that you will follow any rules that apply to you.

Record only what you need. There is no field for a date of birth, address, contact detail, photograph, identifier, health record or assessment score, and you should not put those in a note. Where a first initial will do, use a first initial.

Your content and curricula

You keep ownership of everything you enter. You grant us only the permission needed to store it, display it back to you, back it up and provide the service.

When you build or import a curriculum, enter only names, numbers and short labels you have the right to use. Do not upload copyrighted lesson materials, manuals or passages. Third-party curriculum names are the property of their respective owners. Literacy Trail is an independent planning and progress-tracking tool and is not affiliated with or endorsed by those publishers or organizations.

Plans, trials and billing

The free plan

New accounts start on a free plan for one student and no payment card. The free seat is for the life of the account: archiving or deleting that student does not make room for another. Printed reports and certificates on the free plan carry a short Literacy Trail line. We may change what the free plan includes for new accounts; we will not take features away from an existing free account without telling you first.

The trial

Paid plans start with a 15-day free trial that requires a payment card. Nothing is charged during the trial. One trial per person; we keep a record of addresses that have used one so the offer is not taken repeatedly.

Extra students and the School plan

The Educator plan includes a number of students and lets you add more one at a time at the price shown when you add them. Extra students are billed with the plan, prorated from the day they are added, and credited when the roster falls below the number paid for. The School plan is priced per student per year with a stated minimum, invoiced to the organization; the count is agreed in writing before the first invoice.

Referral passes

Someone who joins through your referral link receives a period of the Educator plan at no charge, and you receive a shorter period when they finish setting up. Passes stack only to a fixed limit, carry no cash value, and end when a paid plan begins. We may withdraw a pass obtained by creating accounts for the purpose of earning it.

Renewal

At the end of the trial the card is charged for the billing period you chose, weekly, monthly or yearly, and the subscription renews automatically at the then-current price until you cancel. Prices are in US dollars and exclude any tax that applies where you are.

Cancelling

Cancel at any time from Plan and billing. Cancel during the trial and nothing is charged. Cancel afterwards and access continues to the end of the period you have already paid for. We do not refund part-used periods except where the law requires it, and we would rather you cancelled early than paid for something you are not using.

What happens after

Your records are not deleted when a subscription ends. They stay readable and exportable. Recording new sessions needs an active plan.

Price changes and school plans

We may change prices with at least 30 days' notice by email before a change affects your renewal. School plan agreements are quoted and invoiced separately on their own terms, which take precedence over this section where they differ.

Acceptable use

Do not:

• Try to reach data that is not yours, or probe, scan or disrupt the service.
• Share an account between people who should have their own, or resell access.
• Upload material you do not have the right to, or anything unlawful.
• Use automated means to extract data at scale, or attempt to rebuild the service from it.
• Enter a student's sensitive personal information, as described above.

Suspension and termination

You can delete your account at any time from Settings, which removes the records you own and cancels any subscription. We may suspend or end an account that breaks these terms or puts other users at risk. Unless the breach makes it impossible, we will tell you first and give you a chance to export your records.

Availability

We work to keep the service running and take backups, but we do not promise it will be uninterrupted or error free, and we may change or retire features. If we ever discontinue the service we will give reasonable notice and time to export. Export your records regularly if they matter to you.

Disclaimers and liability

The service is provided as is, without warranties of any kind to the extent the law allows. We are not liable for indirect, incidental or consequential losses, or for lost profits, lost data or lost goodwill. Where liability cannot be excluded, it is limited to the amount you paid us in the twelve months before the claim.

Nothing here limits liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that cannot lawfully be limited. If you are a consumer, you keep the rights your local law gives you.

Privacy

How we handle information is set out in the privacy policy, which forms part of these terms.

Changes to these terms

We may update these terms. The date at the top changes, and material changes are announced in the app or by email before they take effect. Continuing to use the service after that means you accept the new version.

Contact

hello@literacytrail.com