Terms of Service

These terms govern your use of SMP eSign, operated by SMP Consulting LLC ("we", "us"). By creating an account or subscribing, you agree to them.

1. The Service

SMP eSign lets you send documents for electronic signature and returns a signed PDF together with a Certificate of Completion and an immutable audit trail.

2. Your Account

You are responsible for the accuracy of your account details, for the security of your credentials, and for the actions of everyone you invite into your account. Tell us promptly if you believe an account has been compromised.

3. Pricing, Billing, and Why We Do Not Give Refunds

Our prices are deliberately low, and this section explains what that costs.

Comparable electronic signature products charge many times what we do. We are able to price the way we do because we run deliberately lean. In particular, we do not staff a large support organisation. We do not maintain a 24-hour call centre, we do not staff overnight or at weekends, and we do not employ the account managers, retention teams, and billing support staff that a company charging four times our price can afford.

Handling refunds is itself a staffed activity. Every refund request has to be received, investigated, decided, processed, and reconciled, and the people who do that work are paid for out of the price everyone pays. We would rather not charge everybody for it.

Accordingly, all charges are final and non-refundable. This includes monthly and annual subscription fees, charges for documents sent beyond your plan's allowance, and any partial period following a cancellation or downgrade. We do not provide pro-rated refunds for unused time, for unused document allowance, or for a period during which you did not use the Service.

What you get instead of refunds:

• You can cancel at any time, effective at the end of your current billing period. You will not be charged again.
• Nothing you have already paid for is taken away. Your completed documents, certificates and audit trails stay available for download throughout the retention window described in our Privacy Policy, and documents still out for signature complete normally.
• We never withhold a signed document over a billing dispute. If your account is past due, over its allowance, or paused, you can still retrieve every executed agreement. We will not hold your paperwork hostage.
• We tell you before you spend money. Plans with a strict allowance block further sending rather than silently billing you, and plans that permit overage show the accrued amount before it reaches an invoice.

If we make a genuine billing error — charging you twice, charging you after a cancellation took effect, or charging an amount that does not match your plan — that is our mistake and we will correct it. That is not a refund; it is a correction.

Nothing in this section limits any right you have under applicable law that cannot be waived by agreement.

4. Permitted Use and Regulated Data

You are solely responsible for determining whether your use of the Service complies with any laws, regulations, professional rules, or contractual obligations applicable to you. SMP Consulting LLC does not hold any compliance certification or third party attestation, does not represent that the Service is certified under any regulatory framework, and does not enter into business associate agreements.

You may not use the Service to transmit, store, or process: (a) protected health information as defined under 45 CFR 160.103; (b) nonpublic personal information as defined under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act; (c) cardholder data or sensitive authentication data; or (d) information subject to attorney-client privilege where your professional obligations require controls beyond those described in our published documentation.

If you are a covered entity, business associate, financial institution, or law firm, this restriction applies to the content of the documents you send, not to your organization as such. Ordinary commercial agreements between your organization and its vendors, clients, or partners are generally not restricted by this section.

We may suspend or terminate accounts that violate this section. You agree to indemnify SMP Consulting LLC against claims arising from your use of the Service in violation of it.

5. United States Only

The Service is offered to United States entities and operates entirely on United States infrastructure. We make no representations about the law of any other jurisdiction.

6. Availability

We target 99.5% availability and do not offer service credits. We will tell you about planned maintenance in advance where we reasonably can.

7. Your Content

Your documents remain yours. We do not claim ownership, we do not use them to train anything, and we do not sell them or the data in them. Access by our personnel to document content requires either your explicit time-limited grant or a logged emergency procedure that alerts your account owner when it is used.

8. Termination

You may cancel at any time. We may suspend or terminate an account that breaches these terms, that is used unlawfully, or that is materially past due. On termination your account becomes read-only and your completed documents remain retrievable for the window described in our Privacy Policy.

9. Disclaimers and Limitation of Liability

The Service is provided "as is". To the maximum extent permitted by law, our total liability arising out of or relating to these terms is limited to the amount you paid us in the twelve months preceding the claim.

Electronic signatures are governed by the federal ESIGN Act and state UETA equivalents. We provide the tooling and the evidentiary record; we do not provide legal advice, and we do not warrant that any particular document is enforceable.

10. Changes to These Terms

We may update these terms. Every version is published with a version number and an effective date, and we keep a record of which version you accepted and when. Where a change is substantive we will ask you to accept the new version before you continue.

11. Governing Law

These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Texas, without regard to its conflict of laws rules.

12. Contact

Questions about these terms: legal@smpesign.com