Terms & Conditions
Welcome to Your Native Teacher.
These terms and conditions describe the way users are allowed to view, log on to, and use our website and its provided services. Using the Your Native Teacher website in any of the above mentioned ways shall be taken as your total agreement to being legally bound by all the conditions hereafter explained in this document.
If you are not in total agreement with any or all of the conditions, you must immediately exit the website and are not permitted to procure or use our services.
Your Native Teacher has the legal right, and may sometimes exercise such a right, to add additional terms, delete terms from, or modify any term of this agreement at any time, and for any reason, without any prior notice to you. We will do our best to indicate the last updated date of these terms at the top centre of this page. Your continued use of the Your Native Teacher website after any change shall be deemed your acceptance of the revised terms and conditions.
We provide an online service that connects students desiring to learn a foreign language with native-speaking tutors.
Our service is provided for individuals at least 18 and can enter into legally binding agreements. We grant such individuals a limited, reversible, non-exclusive, non-assignable, and non-sublicensable license to access and use Your Native Teacher in compliance with these terms and conditions.
Minors under 18 must sign up for our service with the consent of and under the supervision of an adult who can enter into legally binding agreements on behalf of such a minor.
Our services are offered to two sets of clients.
Our first set of clients are persons who register on the platform as Tutors. Tutors are users who wish to offer video lessons through the platform.
The second set of clients are Students who wish to use the website services to learn a foreign language. Based on the Student’s preference, Your Native Teacher provides one-on-one online video sessions or video sessions in small groups of two or three students.
You are to register the appropriate user account peculiar to your needs. In your quest to register a Your Native Teacher account, you will be asked to make available some personal information, including but not limited to your full name, country of residence, physical address, email address, and phone number. We may also request you to fill in your payment information.
You hereby affirm that all personal information provided by you on the Your Native Teacher website is truthful and complete. We may refuse your service if we discover that your provided information is false, incorrect, or misleading.
Questionnaire
As a new user desiring to use our service as a Student, we will ask you to fill out a questionnaire in a bid to find/match you with a Tutor that fits best for your learning compatibility. You agree to choose the subscription plan that best fits your learning goals.
Free trial session
You are allowed to try a free Tutor’s trial session to determine connection and fit before making your first payment. You are allowed to request a Tutor change after your first trial lesson without incurring any additional charges, but you may not do this more than twice. You will be liable for the next lesson if you decide to change Tutors more than two times.
Tutoring contract
You will be asked to choose a suitable plan after taking the trial lesson(s) and desire to continue learning with a specific Tutor. You can conclude a tutoring contract with a Tutor by purchasing credits for video lessons through the Platform. You must pay in full for your chosen subscription plan. You are to transfer payments to the merchant account of Your Native Teacher through external payment service providers such as MasterCard, Visa and Stripe, with the understanding that all fees for our service are recurring fees and are non-refundable once purchased. You agree that a tutoring contract is concluded between a student and a Tutor as per the relevant provisions of this Agreement. The credits for video lessons can be purchased in the form of hourly packages. Your Native Teacher is the administrator of the credit payment to the Tutor. You will be credited every 28 days (starting from the day you had made your first Your Native Teacher payment) with the number of sessions specified in the tutoring contract, and the corresponding sum will be debited automatically for the contract period. Credited sessions can be used to book lessons until the next recharge date. However, they cannot be carried beyond the next recharge date. Cancellation of subscriptions is possible up to seven days before the next renewal date. You agree that Your Native Teacher will deduct the amount per unit agreed upon from your credit balance and credit the Tutor with the credit balance due to them for this unit at the conclusion of the tutoring contract. You are liable for any credit in your account that is not used by you, and that expires within the period provided. Such credit will be deducted from your account.
Rescheduling
You may create a rescheduling request up to 24 hours before a video lesson already agreed with a Tutor, provided that the Tutor accepts this. In this case, you will be automatically rescheduled for the newly selected date free of charge, based on the discretion and availability of the Tutor. All other group members must also agree to a modification to a lesson as requested by you in case of a group lesson. Where the other members disagree, the course will be held at the originally scheduled day and time, and you will be charged for the course as usual. However, you may view the lesson later if you request that the lesson be recorded. Your cancellation or rescheduling of a video lesson not in accordance with the above regulations. Your failure to attend a video lesson gives Your Native Teacher the right to deduct one unit of video lesson(s) from your credit balance in the name and for the account of the Tutor.
Pausing a tutoring contract
After a two-month period of tutoring is completed, you may pause the tutoring subscription every three months for two weeks; the pause time is added to the subscription period, which is then extended accordingly. If you are absent for longer than two weeks, your position as a student will be released from the tutor and a new tutor may be assigned to you. Pausing requests must be made in the WhatsApp group or by email to info@yournativeteacher.com.
Cancellations, renewals, and upgrades/downgrades
You may cancel your subscription at any time by sending a formal notice to info@yournativeteacher.com or by using the cancellation link provided in your initial subscription confirmation email. Upon cancellation, you will retain access to any previously scheduled lessons until the end of your current subscription period.
Please note that your subscription automatically renews at the conclusion of each term. To avoid automatic renewal charges, you are required to initiate the cancellation process prior to the renewal date. We do not impose any fees for cancelling your subscription and offer the flexibility to adjust your plan (upgrade or downgrade) through your account settings or by reaching out to our support team for assistance.
You are welcome to upgrade or downgrade your Your Native Teacher subscription by emailing info@yournativeteacher.com. The applicable subscription fee for an upgraded plan will take effect immediately, while downgrades to your plan will take effect on the next billing date.
Lesson Audio Recording and Transcription
In our continuous effort to enhance the quality of our educational services, we are using an advanced AI assistant feature. This AI assistant is designed to audio record and automatically transcribe the content of each lesson conducted on our platform. This feature is part of our commitment to providing high-quality educational experiences and improving lesson quality through detailed review and analysis.
The primary purpose of the AI assistant feature is to facilitate the evaluation and improvement of teaching quality by providing accurate transcriptions of lessons. These transcriptions are intended for use strictly within the educational context to support learning, teaching enhancement, and quality assurance processes.
It is important to note that the AI assistant will solely perform audio recordings and transcriptions of lessons. At no point will video recordings be made of any lesson, ensuring the privacy and comfort of all participants.
All data captured by the AI assistant, including audio recordings and transcriptions, will be treated with the utmost confidentiality. Access to this data will be strictly limited to authorized personnel for the purpose of quality improvement and educational enhancement. We are committed to protecting the privacy of our students and educators and will not share this data with any third parties without explicit consent, except as required by law.
By using our platform and participating in lessons that utilize the AI assistant feature, you consent to the audio recording and transcription of these sessions. If you have any concerns about this feature or wish to opt-out, please contact us directly to discuss alternative arrangements.
We reserve the right to update or amend these terms at any time to reflect changes in our services or legal requirements. We will notify you of any significant changes to these terms, and continued use of our services following such changes will constitute your acceptance of the new terms.
You agree to the following as per your Tutor use of the Your Native Teacher services:
You are an independent contractor for Your Native Teacher.
We may notify you but do not have an obligation to do so when a user request video lessons from you.
Tutoring contracts are concluded between you and a student(s), considering the relevant provisions of these T&Cs.
You are not subject to instructions from Your Native Teacher and act independently when holding video lessons. However, you are not in any way authorized to represent Your Native Teacher in legal transactions.
A credit account will be set up for you once you have successfully registered on the Platform. All credits acquired by you through holding video lessons or are credited into this account. You accept that your credit balance does not attract an interest in any way, shape, or form.
Your hourly pay depends on the level that you teach and whether you teach one-on-one or in groups. You can check your current balance of your credit balance in your user account.
You agree to work/provide online lessons for at least 15 hours per week. This is a minimum requirement for all our Tutors.
Your Native Teacher is the administration of all credit payment processing. Under no circumstances can you solicit or receive payment from a Student without Your Native Teacher’s knowledge and consent. You will owe Your Native Teacher a commission for each arranged tutoring contract. Your Native Teacher is entitled to withhold the commission amounts owed by you from the Student’s payments (or their credit balance). After holding a video lesson, Your Native Teacher will deduct credits from the Student’s account and credit you with the credits minus the commission, provided the student does not move or cancel a session or does not show up for it.
Your Native Teacher will credit you for a lesson only after the lesson has been delivered. You may reschedule appointments up to five times per month per student.
Payment from your credit balance to your bank account will be made once a month, between the 5th and 6th working day of the next month. You can be paid by either bank transfer or by PayPal.
You are responsible for declaring and paying all taxes and duties related to your credit balance. Also, you are in no way covered by Your Native Teacher in any matter(s) of insurance, and you will take out your insurance policy in respect of any personal and/or third-party claims. Your Native Teacher is in no way obligated to, cover the insurance costs for tutors (not taxation and VAT).
You are obliged to fulfil all contracts you enter into with students, with particular emphasis on the timely holding of the video lesson. Terminating a tutoring contract is only possible based on a mandatory legal right of revocation or with the Student’s consent. You accept that you will incur penalty payments to Your Native Teacher if you violate the obligations arising from the tutoring contract.
You may request to terminate your tutor agreement with Your Native Teacher by providing 14 days’ written notice. If Your Native Teacher can find an alternative Tutor within the 14 days notice period, you are no longer obliged to fulfill the 14 days’ notice period. You accept that terminating your tutor agreement without the stipulated 14 days’ notice means that Your Native Teacher will withhold all payments it owes you.
Any unpaid credit balance that has not yet been paid out shall be due for pay out to you at the end of the next calendar month if the contract between you and Your Native Teacher is terminated.
You guarantee that you are the exclusive and sole proprietor of all user content uploaded by you to the website. Otherwise, you must have all rights, approvals, releases, and licenses required to grant Your Native Teacher the license to the user content.
While all user content provided by you remains your property, you, however, grant us an international, continuous, transferrable, irreversible, royalty-free license with the right to sub-license, duplicate, adjust, distribute, openly show, make derivative works of, publicly perform, and to otherwise use such user content without further notice to you or consent from you, and without needing to financially reimburse you or any other entity.
You are not to provide us with any content that contains information that Your Native Teacher, in its sole discretion, deems obscene, harmful, abusive, vulgar, unlawful, defamatory, racially or ethnically offensive, invasive of personal privacy or publicity rights, infringing, distressing, threatening, humiliating, defamatory, irreverent, or otherwise harmful to Your Native Teacher and other users of the website.
You may not post any content or take any action that is false, unlawful, undermining, hassling, damaging, or discriminatory, including, without limitation, discrimination due to colour, race, religion, age, gender, sexual orientation, or nationality.
Do not upload any content or perform acts that encourage criminal conduct and offenses; and/or upload any content that advertises or solicits business for third-party products or services other than those that we offer and promote on the website.
Do not post any content or wilfully take any action that contains or distributes viruses, spyware, malware, or other harmful content or code; upload any content that you have no rightfully able to make available due to fiduciary duty, contract, or operation of law; and/or knowingly post any content or take any action that contains information that you know is incorrect and not up to date.
Do not provide Your Native Teacher with inaccurate, misleading, or false information.
Do not circumvent or try to circumvent the website; reverse engineer the website or attempt to do so; and/or use unauthorised automated means to gain access to the website.
You may not restrict other users from using the website.
You are not to obtain or try to obtain, access to specific areas of the website that are off-limits to users.
You are not to manipulate or forge headers and identifiers so as to camouflage the origin of any information posted on the website.
You are not to post any content or act in a way that creates a risk of harm, loss, emotional distress, physical or mental injury, death, disability or disfigurement, or mental or physical illness to other users.
You are not to involve yourself in spamming, chain letters and other unsolicited communications. You may not harvest, scrape or illegally collect information from the website via an automated software tool or do so manually on a mass basis.
Under no circumstances may you overburden the website with requests or otherwise disrupt or harm the website.
You are not to impersonate any person, including, but not limited to, other Your Native Teacher users or its employees.
We do not advise users to physically meet up with other users. Should you organise any meetings with any person through the use of the service, you do so at your own risk. We advise users to take all precautions as they may consider necessary to ensure personal safety.
If you violate any of the provisions of these terms, we will hold you liable and fully responsible for any and all legal and accounting costs and losses arising from your breach. We may also terminate your use of the website permanently without any prior warning if you breach any of these terms.
The Your Native Teacher website and the content, names, text, and images included on them are provided ‘as is.’
While we have taken cautious care to ensure that website’s information and content are precise and accurate, or obtained from dependable sources, we do not guarantee fitness for a particular purpose, satisfactory quality, non-infringement of title or suitability, whether express or implied.
We do not warrant that the materials and information contained on our website are free from errors or inaccuracy or that any error or inaccuracy will be corrected.
We disclaim any liability regarding the consequences of any user actions or inactions taken in trust upon Your Native Teacher’s content or for harms/losses suffered, whether significant, immediate, exceptional, circuitous, corrective, or otherwise, even if we are pre-informed about the likelihood of such harms.
Nothing in these terms and conditions is included with the aim of excluding or limiting any legal responsibility for death or injury that may arise from our carelessness or fraud or from any other liability that is not exemptible by law or that is directed at inhibiting your statutory rights as a consumer.
If relevant law does not allow the limitation or exclusion of liability or consequential or incidental damages, the above limitation and exclusion may not apply to you. In such cases, Your Native Teacher’s liability will be limited to the fullest extent permitted by applicable law.
You hereby agree that you will release, defend, indemnify, and hold Your Native Teacher and its associates and subsidiaries, including their officers, management, representatives, and agents, blameless from and against any claims, liabilities, losses, reparations, and expenses, including but not restricted to, fair legal and accounting fees, arising out of your use of the website and services or your infringement of these terms.
