Terms of service

The agreement between you and Steve Spence for using Document Control. Written to be read: plain words, no hidden catches.

Seller: Steve Spence, New York, USA · Effective 8 November 2026 · Applies to every plan, including the beta

1. Who we are and agreeing to these terms

Document Control is a hosted document library at https://dc.kk4hfj.com, run by Steve Spence, an individual based in the United States ("we", "us"). These terms are an agreement between us and you, the person or organization using Document Control ("you").

By creating an account, subscribing or using the service, you agree to these terms and to our Privacy and security page. If you use Document Control for an organization, you confirm you are allowed to accept these terms for it, and "you" includes that organization.

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account.

2. The service and your account

Document Control stores versions of your documents, makes them searchable, and uses AI to summarize them, answer questions with citations, translate them and run web research. What each plan includes is listed on the pricing page and in the app under Plan and billing.

• Beta. Some features are marked beta. They may change, be limited or be withdrawn, and may have more errors than the rest of the service.
• Organizations. Each account belongs to one organization. The organization's owner controls its plan, billing and members, and is responsible for the people they add and the roles they give them.
• Your login. Keep your password private and tell us at steve@kk4hfj.com if you think someone else has used your account. You are responsible for what happens under your login until you tell us.
• Accurate details. Give us a working email address and keep it current. We send account and billing notices there.

3. Plans, billing and cancellation

Paid plans are subscriptions billed monthly or yearly in US dollars, in advance, until you cancel.

• Who you pay. Payments are processed by Stripe and sold through Link, Stripe's merchant of record. Link appears on your card statement, sends your receipts and handles payment questions. Link's own terms also apply to the payment.
• Taxes. Prices do not include sales tax, VAT or GST. Link adds any that apply where you are, and shows it before you pay.
• Renewal. Your subscription renews automatically at the end of each billing period at the then-current price, unless you cancel first.
• Changing plans. You can switch plan or billing period at any time from Plan and billing. Upgrades take effect at once, charged for the rest of the period; downgrades are credited against your next payment.
• Cancellation. You can cancel at any time from Plan and billing. Your plan stays active until the end of the period you have paid for, then your organization moves to the Free plan. Your documents are not deleted when a subscription ends.
• Refunds. Payments are not refundable for partial periods or unused allowances, except where the law requires it. If you think you were charged in error, write to steve@kk4hfj.com within 30 days and we will put it right. Link may also refund a payment within 60 days of purchase in some cases.
• Free trials and offers. A trial or offer, such as the Founding Member offer of 3 months of Pro free for beta testers, is described when you sign up for it. Your card is taken at the start; you are first charged when the trial ends unless you cancel before then. Each organization can use an offer once.
• Price changes. We will email the account owner at least 30 days before a price increase applies to your subscription. You can cancel before it takes effect.
• Allowances. Monthly allowances (answers, research reports, translation pages) reset on the 1st of each month and do not carry over.

4. Your content

You own the documents you upload and everything Document Control writes from them for you. We use them only to run the service for you.

• What you let us do. You give us permission to store, copy, index, convert, translate and back up your documents, and to send the parts needed to our AI provider, only as needed to provide Document Control to you. This permission ends when your content is deleted, apart from backup copies, which expire on their normal schedule.
• AI processing. Summaries, answers, translations and research use Anthropic's Claude API, as described on the Privacy and security page. We do not use your documents to train any AI model, and we do not sell or share them.
• Your responsibility. You confirm you have the right to upload what you upload, and that doing so does not break any law, contract or confidentiality duty.
• Getting your files out. You can download every original file and version at any time while your account is open.
• Deletion. You can permanently delete documents from the app. Their off-site backup copies are removed 30 days later, so a mistake can still be recovered. If the owner asks us to close your organization, everyone is signed out at once; 30 days later, unless you ask us to reopen it, the organization, its documents, users and usage records are permanently deleted, and its off-site backup copies are removed the same night. Nightly snapshots of the library records are kept for 30 days, and our hosting provider's server snapshots expire on its own schedule. An organization that is still being billed is not deleted, so cancel any subscription first.

5. Acceptable use

Use Document Control only for lawful purposes and only for your own organization's documents. You agree not to:

• upload anything illegal, infringing, or that you have no right to store or share;
• upload malware, or try to get around the virus scan;
• upload health records, payment card data, government ID numbers or other regulated personal data unless we have agreed in writing that your plan supports it;
• try to reach another organization's documents, test the service's security without our written permission, or overload it on purpose;
• resell, rent out or give public access to the service, or use it to build a competing product;
• use automated tools to scrape it, or share logins between people (add them as team members instead).

We may remove content or limit an account that breaks these rules. Where we can, we will tell you first and give you a chance to fix it.

6. AI answers, translations and research

AI output can be wrong. Answers, summaries, translations and research reports are produced automatically and may be incomplete, out of date or mistaken, even when they cite a source.

• Check anything important against the cited page of the original document before you rely on it, especially figures, settings, limits, safety instructions and legal or regulatory requirements.
• A translation is for reference only. The original document remains the controlled version.
• Research reports come from public web pages we do not control. Check them against their listed sources.
• Document Control is not professional engineering, legal, medical, financial or safety advice, and does not replace a qualified person's judgment.

7. Availability and changes

We aim to keep Document Control running at all times but do not promise any level of uptime. The service may be briefly unavailable for updates, maintenance, or outages at our hosting or AI providers.

We improve the service often and may change, add or remove features. If we remove a feature your paid plan includes, we will tell the account owner at least 30 days ahead where we can, and you may cancel. If we stop offering Document Control altogether, we will give at least 60 days' notice, refund any period paid for after the shutdown date, and keep your files available to download until then.

Keep your own copies of documents that matter. Document Control is a working library, not your only archive.

8. Disclaimers and limitation of liability

No warranty. Document Control is provided "as is" and "as available". To the fullest extent the law allows, we make no warranties, express or implied, including that it will be uninterrupted, error-free, or fit for a particular purpose, or that AI output will be accurate.

Limit on what we owe. To the fullest extent the law allows:

• we are not liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenue, data or business, even if we were told they were possible; and
• our total liability for all claims about Document Control is limited to the greater of (a) what you paid us in the 12 months before the event that caused the claim and (b) US $100.

Some places do not allow these limits, so they may not all apply to you. Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law.

Your responsibility to us. If someone brings a claim against us because of content you uploaded or because you broke these terms, you agree to cover our reasonable costs and losses from that claim.

9. Ending the agreement, and the rest

Closing your account. You can cancel your subscription at any time from Plan and billing, and ask us to close your organization's account by writing to steve@kk4hfj.com. We close it at once and delete it 30 days later, as described in section 4.

Suspension. We may suspend or close an account that seriously or repeatedly breaks these terms, does not pay, or puts the service or other customers at risk. Except in an emergency or where the law prevents it, we will warn you first and give you at least 14 days to download your files.

Governing law. These terms are governed by the laws of the State of New York, USA. Disputes go to the state or federal courts there, unless the law where you live gives you the right to bring them locally.

Changes to these terms. We may update these terms. For changes that matter, we will email the account owner and show a notice in the app at least 30 days before they take effect. If you keep using Document Control after that, the new terms apply; if you do not agree, you can cancel.

Everything else. These terms and the Privacy and security page are the whole agreement between us about Document Control. If any part cannot be enforced, the rest still applies. You may not transfer this agreement without our consent; we may transfer it if the business is sold or reorganized, and we will tell you.

Contact. Steve Spence, Document Control, steve@kk4hfj.com.