Terms of Service

1About these terms

These terms apply when you use the LivWell Companions website or ask us to introduce a companion. By using our website or our service, you agree to them. If you do not agree, please do not use them.

Where you sign up for our paid service, you will also sign a client agreement. Companions sign a separate companion agreement. Those agreements add detail to these terms (see section 20).

"LivWell", "we", "us" and "our" mean LivWell Companions.

Name

LivWell Companions

Address

[Registered business address]

Email

livwellcompanions@gmail.com

Phone

[Phone number]

2Our service

LivWell is a companionship introductory agency serving families across London. We find, vet, match and introduce independent, self-employed companions to older adults and their families.

We are not a care provider. We do not provide personal care, nursing, medical care or medication, and neither do the companions we introduce. If you need that kind of help, a registered care provider or your GP is the right place to start. LivWell can sit alongside that care but cannot replace it.

We make introductions. Once a family and a companion decide to go ahead, the family and companion are responsible for their arrangement (see section 8). We are not a party to it, and we do not manage, supervise or check on the companionship after the introduction.

3Who can use our service

You must be at least 18 to use our website or our service.

If you arrange companionship for someone else, such as a parent or relative, you confirm that they agree to it, or that you have the legal authority to act for them, for example under a lasting power of attorney. We may ask you for evidence of this.

We may decline to take on any client or application. We will not do so for an unlawful reason.

4Consultation, fees and payment

The consultation

The first consultation is free and does not commit you to anything. We use it to understand what you are looking for and to explain how we work and what we charge.

Our fees

We charge a one-off placement fee for finding, vetting, matching and introducing a companion. We also offer an optional monthly support subscription for ongoing support after the introduction, for example help with replacement matching if a companion becomes unavailable.

We tell you the amounts during your consultation, and they are set out in your client agreement before you pay anything. All fees are in pounds sterling. We will tell you before you pay whether VAT applies.

We ask for payment only after we have agreed to take you on as a client and are ready to begin sourcing and vetting a companion.

What our fees do not cover

Our fees pay for our service. They do not include what a companion charges. The rate, hours and payment for the companion's time are agreed between you and the companion, and you pay the companion directly.

How you pay

You pay by card through Stripe, our payment provider. We do not see or store your full card number. For the support subscription, we will tell you before the first payment how much it is, how often it is taken, and how to cancel. It renews each month until you cancel. If a payment fails, we may pause support until it is paid.

Companions never pay us

We never charge a companion a fee to apply, to be vetted or to be introduced to a client.

5Our 30-day fit guarantee

If the companion we introduce turns out not to be the right fit, tell us within 30 days of the introduction date and we will find you a replacement introduction at no extra placement fee.

This is a free rematch. It is not a refund. It applies once per placement. The full conditions are in your client agreement.

6Cancelling and refunds

If you are a consumer and you sign up to our service online or by phone, you normally have a right to cancel within 14 days of the contract being made, without giving a reason. If you ask us to start work within those 14 days, you will need to pay for the work we have done up to the point you cancel. If we have fully completed the service within the 14 days, with your request and your acknowledgement that you lose the right to cancel, the right no longer applies.

You can cancel the optional support subscription at any time. How to do it, when it takes effect and how refunds work are set out in our Cancellation and Refund Terms and in your client agreement.

Nothing in these terms limits your legal rights.

7How we vet companions

Before we introduce a companion to a family, we:

• verify their identity and the details they give us;
• interview them, including a formal virtual interview;
• carry out a background check, which may include a criminal record check;
• ask for their right to work in the UK and the supporting evidence; and
• take references where relevant.

We also consider each companion's suitability for the specific person they would spend time with.

Vetting reduces risk but cannot remove it. Our checks reflect what we found at the time we did them, and we cannot promise how any person will behave in future. We encourage you to meet the companion before you begin, to use your own judgement, and to tell us at once if something does not feel right.

8Companions are independent

Companions are independent, self-employed people. They are not our employees, workers or agents. We do not control how they do their work, we do not set their rates or hours, and we do not pay them. A companion is free to decline any introduction.

Once we have introduced you, you and the companion agree the rate, hours, duties and any other arrangements directly between you. Depending on how the arrangement works in practice, you could take on legal responsibilities, such as those of an employer. We recommend that you take your own advice about this.

This table shows who is responsible for what.

9What companions do, and what they do not

Companions spend time with people. That might be conversation, a walk, lunch out, a visit to a garden or museum, a small errand, going along to an appointment or event, games and hobbies, or good company at home. Where you and the companion agree it, this can include sleeping-night companionship, where the companion stays on the premises and is available if woken, without active monitoring.

Companions do not:

• provide personal care, such as washing, dressing or toileting;
• provide nursing or medical care, or give or manage medication;
• provide emergency response, waking-night care or round-the-clock supervision;
• do heavy household work; or
• provide any service that needs a regulated care provider.

If a companion drives you or the person they are with, that is a matter between you and the companion. They are responsible for holding a valid licence and any insurance they need. We do not provide or arrange insurance for companions or clients.

In an emergency, call 999 first, then contact us.

10Your responsibilities

If you use our service for yourself or for someone else, you agree to:

• give us accurate and complete information, including about health, mobility, risks and the home, and tell us promptly if anything changes;
• provide a safe place for visits and treat the companion with courtesy and respect;
• meet the companion, and make your own decisions about whether to go ahead;
• not ask a companion to provide personal care, medical care or medication;
• keep the companion's personal information private and use it only for the arrangement; and
• tell us straight away if you have a safeguarding concern (see section 11).

11Safeguarding

We take safeguarding seriously. If you are worried about the safety or wellbeing of the person receiving companionship, or about a companion's conduct, tell us as soon as you can. If someone is in immediate danger, call 999.

Where we think it is necessary, or the law requires it, we may look into a concern, pause or end an introduction, remove a companion from our network, and share information with the police, the local authority, the Disclosure and Barring Service or other bodies. Our Safeguarding Policy explains how we handle concerns.

12Applying to be a companion

This section applies if you apply to join our network.

• Applying is not an offer of work. We can decline an application, and we are not obliged to introduce you to any client.
• You must give us accurate information and agree to our checks, which include identity and right-to-work checks, a background check and a virtual interview, before we introduce you to any family.
• You will sign a separate companion agreement before any introduction.
• You are an independent, self-employed person. Nothing creates an employment relationship between you and LivWell. You are responsible for your own tax, insurance and any registrations you need.
• You can decline any introduction without any effect on future opportunities.
• We never charge you a fee to apply, to be vetted or to be introduced.

13Using our website

You may use our website for lawful purposes only. You must not:

• give false or misleading information in any form;
• copy, scrape or harvest information from the website by automated means;
• try to interfere with, damage or gain unauthorised access to the website or its systems; or
• use the website to send us anything harmful, unlawful or abusive.

The information on our website is general and is not advice. We try to keep the website available and accurate, but we cannot promise that it will always be free of errors or interruptions. Our website may link to other sites, and we are not responsible for them.

14Intellectual property

The LivWell name, logo, website, text, images and design belong to us or our licensors. You may view them and use them for your own personal use in connection with our service. You must not copy, reproduce, republish or use them for any other purpose without our written permission.

15Privacy and cookies

We handle your personal information as described in our Privacy Policy, which forms part of these terms. We use cookies as described in our Cookie Policy.

16Our responsibility to you

Nothing in these terms limits or excludes our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, or for anything else the law does not allow us to limit. If you are a consumer, nothing in these terms affects your legal rights, including your right to have our services provided with reasonable care and skill.

We take care when we vet, match and introduce companions, and we are responsible for doing that with reasonable care and skill. We are not responsible for what companions or families do or fail to do after an introduction. That includes the conduct and the quality of a companion's services, any agreement or dispute between you and a companion, and loss, injury or damage that happens in the home or on an outing. The exception is where it is caused by our failure to use reasonable care and skill in our own services.

We are not liable for loss that we could not reasonably have foreseen when you signed up, or for loss of profit or business losses.

Subject to the first paragraph above, our total liability to you for all claims arising from our service is limited to the fees you have paid us for that service.

17Complaints

If you are unhappy with our service, tell us. You can contact us by email, phone or post using the details in section 22. We will acknowledge your complaint within 5 working days, look into it properly and aim to give you a full response within 20 working days. If it will take longer, we will tell you why. Our Complaints Procedure gives more detail.

Complaints about how we handle your personal information are covered in section 14 of our Privacy Policy.

18Changes

We may update these terms from time to time, for example when our service or the law changes. The latest version is always on this page, with its date at the top. Changes do not affect a service you have already agreed to, which continues on the terms you signed up to. If we make a significant change, we will tell you by email where we have your address, or by a notice on our website.

We may also change or withdraw parts of our website or service. We will give reasonable notice of any change that affects a service you have paid for.

19Ending or suspending access

We may suspend or end your use of our website or our service if you break these terms, misuse the website, give us false information, or if we have a safeguarding concern. Where we can, we will tell you why. You can stop using our website at any time. Ending the service does not affect rights or fees that have already arisen, apart from your legal rights.

20General

• The whole agreement. These terms, together with your client agreement or companion agreement, our Privacy Policy and our Cookie Policy, are the whole agreement between you and us. If these terms conflict with your client agreement about the paid service, the client agreement applies.
• If part is unenforceable. If a court finds any part of these terms cannot be enforced, the rest still applies.
• No waiver. If we do not enforce a right straight away, we have not given it up.
• Transfers. You may not transfer your rights under these terms to anyone else. We may transfer ours to a successor to our business, as long as that does not reduce your rights.
• Other people. Only you and we can enforce these terms. No one else has rights under them.
• Events outside our control. We are not responsible for failing to meet these terms because of something beyond our reasonable control.
• Notices. We may give you notices by email at the address you gave us.

21Governing law

These terms, and any dispute arising from them or from our service, are governed by the law of England and Wales, and the courts of England and Wales have jurisdiction. If you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland, you can also bring a claim in the courts where you live. If you are a consumer, you keep the protection of the mandatory laws of the part of the UK where you live.

22Contact us

For any question about these terms, contact us.

LivWell Companions

Terms of Service enquiries

Email

livwellcompanions@gmail.com

Phone

[Phone number]

Post

[Registered business address]