Terms of
Service.
These terms govern your relationship with PollenGrains. They outline what you can expect from us, what we expect from you, and how we protect the integrity of verified reviews.
1. Agreement to Terms
By accessing or using the PollenGrains platform, including our website, APIs, widgets, and any associated services, you acknowledge that you have read, understood, and agree to be bound by these Terms of Service. If you do not agree to these terms, you must not access or use the platform.
These terms apply to all users of the platform, including reviewers, business owners, business team members, and moderators. Additional terms may apply to specific features or services, and will be presented to you when you access those features.
PollenGrains reserves the right to update these terms at any time. We will notify you of material changes via email or a prominent notice on the platform at least 30 days before the changes take effect. Your continued use of the platform after changes become effective constitutes acceptance of the updated terms.
2. Account Registration & Eligibility
- You must be at least 18 years of age to create an account on PollenGrains. By registering, you represent and warrant that you meet this age requirement.
- You must provide accurate and complete information during registration, including your first name and a valid email address. You agree to keep this information current.
- Each individual may maintain only one account. Creating multiple accounts to circumvent restrictions or manipulate the platform is strictly prohibited.
- You are solely responsible for maintaining the confidentiality and security of your account credentials. You must notify PollenGrains immediately of any unauthorized access to your account.
- Social login is available via Google and Apple OAuth2. When using social login, you authorize PollenGrains to access basic profile information as permitted by the provider.
3. User Roles & Responsibilities
PollenGrains supports four distinct user roles, each with specific responsibilities and capabilities within the platform.
Reviewer
- Must verify purchase before submitting any review
- Star rating (1-5) is required. Optional title (100 characters max). Review body is required (50-5,000 characters)
- Retains full copyright ownership of all review content
Business Owner
- Must verify domain ownership via DNS TXT record or HTML meta tag
- Manages business profile, team members, invitations, and billing
- Can respond publicly to reviews (one response per review, editable)
Team Member
- Invited by the business owner via email
- Admin role: full access except billing and ownership transfer
- Manager role: respond to reviews and view analytics. Support Agent role: respond to reviews only
Moderator
- Independent content moderator structurally separated from sales and revenue
- Cannot see business payment status, plan type, or any commercial relationship
- Handles flagged reviews, moderation decisions, and appeal reviews
4. Review Policies
- Every review requires proof of purchase via one of five verification methods: email invitation, QR code, payment processor match, ecommerce API confirmation, or receipt upload
- Reviews must reflect genuine personal experience with the business being reviewed. Fabricated, misleading, or secondhand accounts are not permitted
- Star rating (1-5) is required. Review body (50-5,000 characters) is required. Title (100 characters max) and photo uploads (up to 5 photos) are optional
- You may edit your review at any time. Edits are logged and the review displays an “edited” indicator with a timestamp. The original version is preserved in the audit trail
- You may delete your review at any time. Deletion is permanent after a 30-day grace period
- Incentivized positive-only reviews are prohibited in accordance with FTC guidelines. Businesses may invite customers to leave honest reviews but may not condition incentives on positive ratings
- PollenGrains recognizes and respects the full copyright ownership of reviewers over their review content, including text, titles, and uploaded media
5. Business Accounts
Business registration on PollenGrains requires domain verification to ensure that only authorized representatives manage a business profile. Verification is performed via DNS TXT record or HTML meta tag placement. The system checks for verification every 5 minutes over a 48-hour window.
If a business profile already exists from reviewer-initiated activity, the rightful owner may claim it by completing the domain verification process.
- Team management is available to all business accounts. Invite team members by email and assign roles (Admin, Manager, or Support Agent). Roles can be changed or revoked at any time
- Integration connections with Shopify, WooCommerce, Stripe, Square, and PayPal are established via OAuth-based authorization flows. PollenGrains accesses only the data necessary for purchase verification
- Businesses are responsible for the accuracy and legitimacy of customer invitation data. Sending unsolicited review invitations to individuals who are not customers constitutes a violation of these terms
- Maximum review invitations per billing cycle vary by plan: Free (100 per month), Pro (1,000 per month), Business (10,000 per month), and Enterprise (unlimited)
6. Intellectual Property & Data Ownership
KEY TAKEAWAY
Your data belongs to you. Reviewers own their review content. Businesses own their responses. PollenGrains holds only a display license that terminates when you delete your content.
What Reviewers Own
Reviewers retain full copyright ownership of their review text, title, and star rating. This extends to all profile information (name, email, avatar) and complete activity history (reviews written, votes cast, badges earned). Reviewers have the right to export all of their data at any time in JSON, CSV, or JSON-LD (Schema.org) format. This right is available on all plans, including Free.
What Businesses Own
Businesses own their responses to reviews, their generated analytics data (derived from review patterns and trends), and their invitation history including all customer interaction records.
What PollenGrains Gets
By posting content on PollenGrains, you grant us a limited, non-exclusive, display-only license to show your reviews on the platform and within embeddable widgets. This license terminates immediately when you delete your content. PollenGrains does not acquire commercial exploitation rights, the right to sell review data, the right to use reviews for advertising, or any perpetual license that survives deletion.
Data Portability Guarantee
Your data follows you. Export anytime. No lock-in. No penalty. No waiting period. Exports include review text, star ratings, dates, responses, and verification types. Exports do not include other users' personal data, internal moderation notes, or AI confidence scores. Reviewer PII is pseudonymized in business exports (first name and initial only).
7. Payments & Billing
Billing Terms
- Polar.sh acts as the merchant of record for all paid plans on PollenGrains. All payment processing, invoicing, and tax compliance are handled through Polar.sh
- Available plans: Free (unlimited reviews, basic widget), Pro ($49 per month), Business ($199 per month), and Enterprise (custom pricing)
- All paid plans are billed month-to-month by default. An optional annual billing cycle is available at a 20% discount
- You may cancel your subscription at any time with no penalty or early termination fee. A reminder notification is sent 7 days before each billing cycle renewal
- There is no per-domain pricing. A single subscription covers all domains and brands managed under one business account
- Data export is available on all plans, including the Free tier. We do not charge for access to your own data and do not use data export restrictions as a lock-in mechanism
8. Content Moderation & Removal
Phase 1 — AI Moderation
All submitted reviews pass through an automated moderation pipeline within 2 seconds. Rule-based checks evaluate for spam patterns, profanity, personally identifiable information (PII), and duplicate content. Reviews that pass all checks are auto-published immediately. Reviews that trigger one or more flags enter the human moderation queue.
Phase 2 — Blind Human Moderation
Flagged reviews are reviewed by independent moderators who are structurally separated from the business and revenue teams. Moderators cannot see whether a business is on a paid plan, what plan type they use, or any commercial relationship with PollenGrains. For each flagged review, moderators may approve (publish or keep), remove (with a documented reason from predefined categories), or escalate (to a senior moderator or the independent oversight board).
Predefined Removal Reasons
- Fake or Fraudulent content
- Spam
- Harassment or Hate Speech
- Personally Identifiable Information (PII) exposure
- Wrong Business (review does not pertain to the listed business)
- Defamatory Content
- Other Guideline Violations
Appeals Process
If your review is removed, you may submit an appeal within 30 days of the removal decision. Appeals are assigned to a different moderator who was not involved in the original decision. The appeals moderator reviews all evidence independently and may either uphold the removal or reverse it (restoring the review to published status). Each review may be appealed only once, and the appeal decision is final.
9. Prohibited Conduct
The following actions are expressly prohibited on the PollenGrains platform. Violations may result in content removal, account suspension, or permanent termination.
- 1.Submitting fake or unverified reviews, including reviews for transactions that did not occur
- 2.Offering or accepting payment, discounts, or other incentives in exchange for positive reviews
- 3.Operating review farms or participating in coordinated manipulation campaigns designed to artificially inflate or deflate business ratings
- 4.Posting content that constitutes harassment, hate speech, or threats of violence against any individual or group
- 5.Exposing personally identifiable information of others, including names, addresses, phone numbers, or financial details
- 6.Submitting reviews for businesses you have not personally patronized or transacted with
- 7.Unauthorized scraping, crawling, or automated data extraction from the PollenGrains platform without express written permission
- 8.Circumventing verification systems, moderation processes, or any technical measures designed to protect platform integrity
- 9.Creating multiple accounts to evade enforcement actions, manipulate reviews, or circumvent platform restrictions
- 10.Using the platform to defame individuals or businesses without factual basis, or to make knowingly false statements of fact
10. Limitation of Liability
The PollenGrains platform is provided “as is” and “as available” without warranties of any kind, whether express, implied, or statutory, including but not limited to implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement.
PollenGrains is not responsible for the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of user-generated reviews. Reviews represent the opinions and experiences of individual reviewers and do not constitute endorsements, representations, or warranties by PollenGrains.
To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, PollenGrains's total aggregate liability arising out of or related to these terms or your use of the platform shall not exceed the total fees paid by you to PollenGrains during the 12-month period immediately preceding the event giving rise to the claim.
In no event shall PollenGrains be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, including but not limited to loss of profits, data, business opportunities, or goodwill, regardless of the theory of liability and even if PollenGrains has been advised of the possibility of such damages.
11. Termination
- PollenGrains may suspend or terminate your account if you violate these Terms of Service, engage in prohibited conduct, or otherwise abuse the platform. We will provide notice of the reason for suspension or termination where practicable
- Business accounts may be suspended for repeated guideline violations, including but not limited to sending fraudulent review invitations or attempting to manipulate their review profile
- Upon account termination, all associated personal data will be deleted within 30 days in accordance with GDPR requirements. Deleted reviews are permanently removed after a 90-day grace period
- You may terminate your account at any time through your account settings. The termination process includes a clear summary of what data will be removed and the timeline for removal
- Data export is available before and during the termination grace period. We recommend exporting your data before initiating account deletion
12. General Provisions
These Terms of Service shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the applicable jurisdiction, without regard to its conflict of law provisions. Any disputes arising under these terms shall be resolved in the courts of competent jurisdiction.
If any provision of these terms is found to be unenforceable or invalid by a court of competent jurisdiction, the remaining provisions shall remain in full force and effect. The unenforceable provision shall be modified to the minimum extent necessary to make it enforceable while preserving its original intent.
These terms constitute the entire agreement between you and PollenGrains regarding your use of the platform and supersede all prior agreements, understandings, and communications, whether written or oral.
The failure of PollenGrains to enforce any right or provision of these terms shall not constitute a waiver of such right or provision. Any waiver of a provision must be in writing and signed by PollenGrains.
Contact
For questions about these Terms of Service, please contact us at legal@pollengrains.com