Merchant terms and conditions

These terms govern the use of Oktapus by a merchant, that is, by a professional who opens a loyalty programme on the platform. The customer who collects stamps has a separate document, the customer terms of use, and those are the ones that apply to them.

They are accepted at the moment a shop is opened from the merchant space, and they form the agreement between Altis Koten SRL and the merchant. There is no forthcoming version: this is the applicable one, and any amendment follows the procedure described below.

Oktapus replaces the cardboard stamp card. The merchant displays a printed poster that enrols their customers. To receive a stamp, the customer shows their code in the Oktapus app, and the merchant scans it with Oktapus Pro, the merchant app, on their own phone or tablet. Without the app, the customer can show their code from the customer space on the website, and the merchant can scan it from their phone's browser, in the merchant space. This fallback needs a network for every stamp. On the contactless plan, the customer can also hold their phone to the shop's contactless card. Once the loyalty card is full, the reward is handed over on the next visit and a new card opens carrying that stamp.

Oktapus provides the platform, the customer app, the Oktapus Pro app, the merchant space, the customer space and the material to print. Oktapus does not provide the reward and is never a party to the contract between a merchant and their customer.

An account is opened with an email address and a six digit code. There is no password.

The merchant answers for access to the inbox tied to their account: whoever receives a code receives access. An address that changes is updated from the merchant space, before the old one is lost.

A shop may have several people, each with their own account and their own role: owner, administrator, employee. No account is shared, and no counter device carries somebody else's account.

The owner answers for the access they grant and for what is done under that access. Access is withdrawn from the merchant space, and the withdrawal is immediate.

Two plans, and what separates them is the gesture at the counter, not a list of locked features.

• The free plan: the customer's code scanned with Oktapus Pro or from the browser, the poster to print, unlimited visits and stamps, the whole team, and up to 100 enrolled customers. Beyond that, nothing locks at the counter: the merchant is told.
• The 14.90 euro a month plan: the contactless card sent by post, with the customer's code as a fallback, unlimited enrolled customers, the shop's figures and the Oktapus contest. The contest is only held in Belgium and France, it has not been launched yet, and it will then only open in a region once 10 shops there have subscribed (see the section on the contest).

The paid plan is taken out online, from the merchant space of oktapus.app, once online payment is open there. Until a shop has subscribed, no invoice is issued to it.

The free plan is free, with no bank card and no minimum term.

The contactless plan costs 14.90 euros per month, value added tax included at the applicable rate. A business registered for VAT in a European Union member state other than Belgium, whose number has been verified with the European VIES register, is invoiced the same amount excluding VAT: the tax is then due by the merchant itself, under the reverse charge mechanism. Payment is made in advance for each month, by bank card or SEPA direct debit. No debit takes place without an explicit subscription.

Invoices are issued by Altis Koten SRL (BE 1037.896.832), Traverse d'Esope 6, 1348 Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgique, to the name and billing address given by the merchant.

• Who can subscribe: a shop whose billing address is in Belgium or France, through its owner, from the "My subscription" page of the merchant space.
• Term and renewal: the subscription is monthly and renews automatically every month, on the date of subscription, until it is cancelled.
• Cancellation: possible at any time from the subscription management. It takes effect at the end of the current monthly period. The plan stays active until then, after which the shop returns to the free plan, with its customers and their cards.
• Refunds: the current period is not refunded, except where the law requires it.
• SEPA direct debit: by choosing this payment method, the merchant accepts a SEPA direct debit mandate in favour of Altis Koten SRL, presented at payment. A debit takes a few business days to be confirmed. The plan starts once it is confirmed.
• Failed payment: if a renewal fails, the plan stays active for a grace period of 7 days, during which the payment is retried and the merchant is notified by email. The contactless card keeps working during this period, but the contest is suspended. Without payment at the end of the period, the shop returns to the free plan.
• Kit: the first payment includes a kit containing the contactless card, sent by post to Belgium or France, to the delivery address given by the merchant. Only one kit is sent per shop, except to replace a kit lost in transit.
• VAT: a business registered for VAT in a European Union member state other than Belgium, whose number is verified with the VIES register, is invoiced excluding VAT under the reverse charge mechanism (Article 196 of Directive 2006/112/EC). Otherwise, VAT is included in the price at the applicable rate.
• Invoices: they are issued by Altis Koten SRL, sent by email and available in the subscription management.

The merchant sets the number of stamps and the wording of the reward, and may change them. A change only applies to cards opened after it: a card already under way keeps the rules it started under.

The reward is owed by the merchant, in their shop, and Oktapus guarantees neither its value nor its availability. A stamp added by mistake is corrected from the merchant space, and the correction is logged.

The printed poster enrols a customer in a programme. It never gives a stamp, and it may stay in the window.

The code the customer shows in the Oktapus app, or in the customer space on the website, gives one stamp, once. It is computed by the customer's phone, it changes every thirty seconds, and it belongs to the customer who shows it. The merchant and their team scan it with Oktapus Pro, or from the browser in the merchant space, at the counter, with the customer present. Scanning a code away from the counter or without the customer there, or scanning a code that has been shared, for instance as a screenshot, amounts to handing out stamps, and the merchant alone bears the consequences.

The contactless card gives a stamp to the customer who holds their phone to it. It stays in the shop. Taking it out of the shop or handing it to someone amounts, in the same way, to handing out stamps.

Whatever the gesture, a customer cannot receive more stamps from the same shop in ten minutes than the limit that shop chose, three by default, and the shop's log names the team member who scanned.

The Oktapus contest is part of the contactless plan. Altis Koten SRL is its only organiser and its sole funder, under rules that entrants read in the Oktapus app. The merchant is neither its organiser nor its sponsor: they host the winners sent to them and honour their vouchers, under the section "Contest vouchers".

• Countries and launch: the contest is only held in Belgium and France. It has not been launched yet: no contest opens, in any region, before Oktapus launches it, and subscribed merchants will be told by email.
• Opening: the contest opens in a region once at least 10 shops of that region subscribe to the contactless plan, with a subscription in good standing, open, not suspended and running an active loyalty programme. Until that threshold is reached, the shop has no contest.
• Region: a shop's region is its municipality. In Belgium, it is the municipality its postcode designates, and the nineteen municipalities of the Brussels-Capital Region form a single region. In France, or without a recognised Belgian postcode, it is the town given by the shop.
• Information: on request, Oktapus tells the merchant whether the contest is open in their region and, if not, how many shops in their region subscribe to the contactless plan.
• Change to the floor or the region: raising the floor, or changing the definition of the region in a way that would make a shop lose the contest it has, is announced to the shops concerned by email at least thirty days before it applies, like an unfavourable change to these terms.
• Rotation: once the region is open, the subscribed shops of the region host the winners each in turn, and none receives a second winner before all have received one. This is a turn, not a guarantee of footfall: a winner may not come, and a contest may designate no winner.
• What is not guaranteed: Oktapus guarantees neither a number of winners, nor that they come, nor any turnover. The number of vouchers per evening, how often contests are held and therefore the length of a turn depend on the number of shops in the region and on the contest's settings. A region that does not open, an evening that designates nobody or a winner who does not come gives no right to any compensation.
• Participation: partner merchants and the members of their team cannot take part in the contest. An account that is the owner or a team member of a shop on Oktapus that is not closed, whatever its plan, cannot answer it, and the entry of an account that joins a team before the draw does not go into the draw.
• Promoting the contest: the merchant may promote the contest to their customers with the materials provided by Oktapus, without changing its terms, without promising a win and without tying entry to a purchase. They undertake not to run any draw or contest of their own on Oktapus or by means of Oktapus. They inform the members of their team of the rules of this section and the next one.
• Suspension: Oktapus may suspend the contest, in one region or everywhere, on one of the following grounds, and for as long as needed to remedy it: fraud or attempted fraud, a technical or security problem, a legal or regulatory requirement, the decision of an authority or a court, a requirement of Apple or Google for the Oktapus apps, or a case of force majeure. The suspension takes effect immediately when its ground requires it, and the shops concerned are informed of it by email, with its ground. During a suspension, no new contest opens, the contests under way are still drawn, and vouchers already won must still be honoured and reimbursed.
• Change or termination: Oktapus may change the contest (the number or value of the vouchers, how often contests are held, the opening floor, the definition of the region) or end it, for an objective reason that it states: a change in the law or in its interpretation by an authority or a court, a requirement of a supplier or an app store, or a cost of the contest that has become disproportionate to the participation in it. A change unfavourable to the merchant is announced to them by email at least thirty days before it applies, as provided in the section "Amending these terms".
• Merchant's right: the subscription can be cancelled at any time, at no cost, with effect at the end of the current monthly period. A suspension, a change or a termination decided under these conditions gives no right to any other compensation.

A contest voucher is worth 10 euros, VAT included. It is funded by Altis Koten SRL, not by the merchant, and the winner spends it at the shop the rotation assigned to them. What follows applies to a shop that hosts winners.

• Accepting the voucher: while it is valid and during opening hours, the merchant accepts any contest voucher that names their shop, as payment for products or services from their usual range, in compliance with the rules that apply to those products.
• At least one product at 10 euros: the shop that hosts winners undertakes to offer at least one product or service at 10 euros or less, with no extra charge, that the winner can pay for in full with their voucher.
• On the same terms as other customers: the merchant may not raise their prices, require a minimum purchase amount, charge fees or restrict the voucher to certain products.
• Once, with no change: the voucher is used in one go. It is never exchanged for money and no change is given.
• Scanning at the time of sale: the voucher is scanned with Oktapus Pro and confirmed when the winner is served. Oktapus Pro shows whether the voucher is valid. A voucher that has expired, has already been used or is meant for another shop is refused.
• Refusal: a merchant who refuses a valid voucher without serious reason is in breach of these terms. Oktapus then replaces the winner's voucher and may remove the shop from the rotation under the conditions of the point "Removal from the rotation".
• Reimbursement: Oktapus reimburses each voucher scanned and confirmed in Oktapus Pro during a calendar month by SEPA bank transfer, at the latest on the 5th of the following month, at its face value, with no commission or fees, to the bank account the merchant gave Oktapus. Oktapus Pro shows the date of this transfer as soon as the voucher is confirmed. As long as the merchant has not given their bank account, the amounts remain due and are paid with the next transfer.
• Statement: each transfer comes with a statement listing the vouchers reimbursed. This statement is not an invoice and does not carry VAT.
• VAT: Oktapus pays this amount as a third party, on behalf of the winner: it is the price of the service the merchant provides to the winner. The merchant owes VAT on it as on any sale, at the rate applicable to what they sold, and does not send Oktapus an invoice for this amount.
• What is not reimbursed: a voucher that was not scanned and confirmed before it expired, and a voucher scanned a second time, since a voucher is reimbursed only once. A voucher obtained or validated through fraud, for example scanned outside a real sale, is not reimbursed either, and its amount may be claimed back from the merchant if it has already been paid.
• Verification: where objective evidence indicates that a voucher was validated without a real sale, Oktapus may suspend the reimbursement of the vouchers concerned while it checks, informing the merchant of the reason. An amount paid in error is returned by the merchant or, with their written consent, deducted from subsequent reimbursements.
• Proof: the record of the scan and of its confirmation in Oktapus Pro is proof of the reimbursement due, unless the merchant proves otherwise.
• Dispute: the merchant may dispute a statement in writing within thirty days of receiving it. Oktapus replies within thirty days.
• After leaving: a voucher issued before the shop leaves the contactless plan, is suspended or closes its programme must still be honoured until its expiry date, as long as the shop is open. The reimbursement follows the voucher, not the plan: it remains due for each voucher honoured.
• Removal from the rotation: Oktapus may remove a shop from the contest's rotation when it refuses valid vouchers, validates vouchers without a real sale, offers no product or service at 10 euros or less, or otherwise breaches the rules of this section. Removal only happens after a written warning, sent by email, stating what is alleged and the time allowed to put it right. The shop keeps its subscription and its other features, and it gets its place in the rotation back once the breach has ended, except in case of proven fraud.

The merchant undertakes not to add fictitious stamps, not to resell access to the platform, not to attempt to bypass its technical limits, and to comply with the rules applicable to their activity and to their promotional offers.

A loyalty programme may not be used to collect customer data for purposes other than loyalty, nor to exclude a person on a ground protected by law.

Everything the merchant publishes on Oktapus, the shop's name, description, address and reward, is their responsibility: that content must be accurate, lawful and free of hateful or offensive material.

Customers are Oktapus's customers as much as the merchant's, and their data is processed by Altis Koten SRL as controller, in accordance with the privacy policy.

In practice, the merchant receives no personal data about those customers: their space displays numbers, members of the programme, today's stamps and rewards handed over. For the members of their team, they know their address, because those are their colleagues and they invited them.

Oktapus undertakes to use its best efforts: to keep the service reachable, to fix incidents within a reasonable time and to give notice of planned interruptions where they can be foreseen.

No contractual service level is promised, neither on the free plan nor on the paid plan for as long as it is not open. When the counter does not answer, the merchant serves their customer and the stamp is caught up afterwards.

A shop may be suspended where it adds fictitious stamps, where it endangers the security of the service or other people's data, or where it uses the platform for an unlawful activity.

A shop may also be suspended where what it publishes on Oktapus, its name, its description, its address or its reward, is unlawful, hateful, misleading or offensive, in particular after a customer has reported it. A suspended shop is no longer shown to customers in the app's lists, search and map, and can no longer give stamps or take new members; its customers keep their cards and their stamps, and lifting the suspension restores the shop as it was.

Save in an emergency or where the law requires otherwise, suspension is preceded by a warning by email setting out what is alleged and the time allowed to put it right.

A shop is closed from the deletion page of this site, by the last of its owners, after their address has been verified with a six digit code and after they have typed the exact name of the shop.

Closure is immediate and final: customers' cards, their stamps, their enrolments and the team's access all go with the shop, there is no thirty day window as there is for an account, and no restoration is possible. Customers are not told by us, including those whose full card was waiting for its reward: that is for the merchant to do. A merchant who wants to step away without closing the shop transfers its ownership to somebody else.

The Oktapus trademark, its logo, its interfaces, its printed material and its code remain the exclusive property of Altis Koten SRL.

What the merchant brings, their shop name, their logo, their photographs and the wording of their rewards, remains theirs. They grant us the right to display it in the app, on their printed material and on their pages of the site, for the duration of their programme only.

Oktapus is not a party to the relationship between a merchant and their customers, guarantees no level of footfall and is not liable for the reward promised. The merchant alone is responsible for what they sell or serve to the winner of a contest voucher and for any dispute arising from it, and they answer for the scans made by the members of their team.

The liability of Altis Koten SRL towards a merchant is limited to the sums paid by them over the last twelve months, and to zero on the free plan, save in cases of gross negligence, wilful misconduct or personal injury, in which no limitation applies. This limit never applies to the reimbursements of contest vouchers owed to the merchant, which remain due in full, whatever their plan. Nothing in these terms excludes a liability which cannot be excluded under Belgian law.

These terms may change. A change unfavourable to the merchant is announced by email at least thirty days before it takes effect. A change imposed by law, by an authority or by the security of the service may apply sooner: the merchant is then informed as soon as possible, with the reason for it.

During that period, or as soon as a change applied sooner is announced, the merchant may close their shop or stop using the service at no cost. Continuing to use it after it takes effect amounts to acceptance.

These terms are governed by Belgian law.

Failing an amicable settlement, the courts of the judicial district of the registered office of Altis Koten SRL have exclusive jurisdiction. This clause concerns relations between professionals and deprives no consumer of the rights reserved to them by the law of their residence.

Altis Koten SRL, Traverse d'Esope 6, 1348 Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgique, company number BE 1037.896.832. By email: hello@fideloop.app.