Terms and Conditions

Version 1.0 · Last updated: October 25, 2026 · Effective: October 25, 2026

1. Welcome to Penpal

Penpal is a service of [COMPANY NAME], a company in the United States ("Penpal", "we", "us", "our"). Penpal helps adults who are new to a city make friends: you get a Penpal and a small group each week, you can see and join activities on a map, and you can chat, add friends and meet up. Penpal is for friendship. It is not a dating or hookup app and it must not be used to find sexual or romantic partners or for sexual solicitation.

By creating an account or using the Penpal app and our related services (the "Service"), you agree to these Terms. They apply together with our Privacy Policy, Community Guidelines and Safety Tips & Event Etiquette, and any extra terms shown when you buy something (such as Penpal Plus). If you don't agree, please don't use Penpal.

We may change these Terms. If we make a material change we'll tell you in the app or by email and update the date above. Changes to the sections on liability and dispute resolution need your acceptance. By continuing to use Penpal after a change, you accept the update where the law allows.

2. Who can use Penpal

You can use Penpal only if all of these are true. By using it you promise that they are:

You are an individual and you are at least 18 years old.
You can legally form a binding contract with us.
You are not in a country under a US government embargo, and you are not on a US list of people barred from doing business.
You are not prohibited by law from using the Service.
You have never been convicted of, or pleaded no contest to, a felony or a sex crime, or a crime of violence or threatened violence, and you are not required to register as a sex offender anywhere.
You have only one account, and you have not been removed from Penpal before unless we gave you written permission to return.

If you stop meeting these requirements, your right to use Penpal ends and you must delete your account.

3. Your account

Give accurate information. Use your real first name, your real age and your own photos. Don't pretend to be someone else.
Keep your login private. You are responsible for what happens with your account.
Your birthdate and gender can't be changed after sign up. If one was entered by mistake, contact [SUPPORT EMAIL].
You must follow these Terms, the law, the Community Guidelines and the Safety Tips.

4. Content

Your Content is anything you post or send through Penpal: your profile, photos, messages, activities and requests. Member Content is what other people post. Our Content is everything else in the Service.

Your Content

You own it, and you are responsible for it. Don't post anything you wouldn't want others to see, and don't post anything that breaks these Terms or the law.
Don't put contact details, addresses, banking details or payment details in your profile or in public spaces.
Other people can see your profile and may share what they see with others, even though they shouldn't. Share carefully.
You promise you have the rights to everything you post.

Member Content

Member Content belongs to the person who posted it. You may use it only to use Penpal as intended. Don't copy it, scrape it or use it for spam, harassment or advertising.
Member Content may be wrong, offensive or misleading. We don't check it and we aren't responsible for it.

Our Content

Penpal's name, logo, Pal and Gal characters, design, text and software belong to us or our licensors. You get a limited license to use the Service for its intended purpose and nothing more.

5. Rules of the road

You agree that you will not:

Harass, bully, stalk, threaten, intimidate, abuse or discriminate against anyone, online or in person.
Send sexual, romantic or unwanted advances, or use Penpal to look for dating or sex.
Post or share anything obscene, violent, hateful, illegal, deceptive or that exploits or endangers a person, especially a child.
Share another person's private information, photos or messages without permission.
Ask for money, gifts or financial details from another user, or use Penpal for scams, fraud, selling, advertising or any commercial purpose.
Use someone else's account, create a second account, or create a new account after we suspend or remove you.
Use bots, scrapers or automated tools, or try to reverse engineer, probe, overload or break the Service.
Work around our safety tools, including blocks, reports, rate limits, Girls Rule, girls-only activities, age ranges and privacy settings.
Send false or abusive reports.
Help anyone under 18 use Penpal.
Break any law, or help anyone else break these Terms.

6. Moderation, reporting and enforcement

We use automated tools and people to keep Penpal safe. These include checking uploaded photos, limiting how fast accounts can act, and looking at reports and flagged content. We don't routinely read private messages, but moderators may look at relevant content when it is flagged, reported or needed for a safety, legal or policy investigation. See the Privacy Policy for details.
Use Report on a profile or chat, or Settings > Report an Issue, if you see something wrong. Use Block to stop someone from contacting you or seeing your profile.
We may, at our discretion and without notice where the law allows, remove content, limit features, suspend or permanently remove an account, and take other steps, including for behavior off the Service, such as at a meetup arranged through Penpal. While a case is reviewed we may temporarily restrict an account.
If you think we made a mistake, tell us within 30 days at [SUPPORT EMAIL] and a person will take another look.
We have zero tolerance for child sexual abuse material. We report it and preserve it as the law requires.
We may work with law enforcement and share information when the law requires it or when we believe it is needed to protect someone.

7. Safety, meetups and activities

Penpal does not run, supervise or check any activity, venue or person. Activities are created by people like you, not by Penpal. We don't promise that an activity will happen as described, that a place is safe, or that anyone is who they say they are.
Penpal does not do criminal background checks or identity checks on its users and makes no promises about anyone's conduct, identity or intentions. Use good judgment and follow the Safety Tips.
Meeting people in person is your choice and at your own risk. You accept the risks of going to, taking part in, or travelling to or from any activity or meetup, including the actions of other people and venues. To the fullest extent the law allows, Penpal isn't responsible for injury, loss or harm connected to any meetup, whether or not it was arranged through Penpal.
In an emergency, call your local emergency services.
Girls Rule, girls-only activities and age ranges rely on information people give us. They are preference tools, not verification, and not a guarantee about anyone's identity, gender, age, conduct or safety.
Weekly matches and suggestions are a convenience. They are not an endorsement or a safety or compatibility check.

8. Privacy and location

Your privacy matters to us. Please read our Privacy Policy. In short, you can choose to share an approximate location, which we use for nearby alerts and rough distances. We never show your location on a map. Others only see an approximate distance, rounded to whole miles and never under 2 miles. In quiet areas even a rough distance may hint where someone is, so you can use Snooze mode to hide from the nearby list. Protecting your own privacy settings is your responsibility. Activity meeting spots are public to anyone who can see the activity.

Location features depend on your phone's location settings. If you turn location off, features that need it won't work.

9. What you grant us

You give us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to host, store, copy, process, display and distribute Your Content, and to adapt it as needed (for example to resize a photo), only as needed to run, protect and improve the Service, and as described in our Privacy Policy. We won't use your photos or messages in our advertising without your permission. This license ends when you delete the content or your account, except for copies in backups, content that other people have shared or that remains in chats with others, and content we must keep for legal or safety reasons.

If you send us feedback or suggestions, we can use them freely, with nothing owed to you.

You agree we may access, keep and share your information if we think it is reasonably necessary to follow the law, enforce these Terms, respond to claims, respond to your requests, or protect the rights, property or safety of anyone.

10. Penpal Plus and purchases

Penpal is free to use. Penpal Plus is an optional paid subscription with extra features, such as seeing who viewed your profile and unlocking full nearby lists. What is included may change over time.
Plans may be offered weekly, monthly, every three months or yearly. The price, length and renewal terms are shown to you before you buy, in the App Store's purchase screen and in the app.
Subscriptions are bought through the Apple App Store and are managed by Apple. Your subscription renews automatically at the same price and length until you cancel at least 24 hours before the current period ends. Your Apple ID is charged for renewal within 24 hours before the period ends.
To cancel, go to your Apple ID subscription settings in your phone (Settings > your name > Subscriptions), or use Settings > Manage Subscription in Penpal. Cancelling stops future renewals. You keep your benefits until the end of the period you already paid for.
Cancelling Plus does not delete your account. To fully leave, delete your account as described in section 11.
Purchases are generally non-refundable, except where the law requires it. Refund requests for App Store purchases are handled by Apple (reportaproblem.apple.com). If a different right of withdrawal applies to you where you live, we will honor it.
We may change prices or plans going forward, and we will tell you before a price change affects your renewal where the law or Apple requires it.
If we suspend or terminate your account for breaking these Terms, you won't get a refund for the period you paid for.

11. Ending your account

You can delete your account at any time in Settings > Delete Account. You must also cancel any subscription through Apple, or you may still be charged.
We may suspend or end your access at any time if we believe you broke these Terms, harmed or put someone at risk, or misused the Service, or if the law requires it.
These Terms continue to apply after your account ends, and any sections that by their nature should continue (like those on liability, disputes and indemnity) will.
Your information is kept and deleted as described in our Privacy Policy.

12. Notifications

If you allow notifications, we may send alerts about messages, friend requests, activities, matches and similar things. You can turn them off in your phone's settings or in Penpal's Settings at any time. We may also send emails about your account and safety. Notifications may include a preview of message text.

13. Third-party services

Parts of Penpal use services from others, and your use of them may also be subject to their terms. These include Apple Maps and MapKit for maps, place search and location lookup, Apple for the App Store, subscriptions and push notifications, Supabase for hosting, and RevenueCat for subscription management. Apple Maps content is provided by Apple "as is", and we don't guarantee that a venue, address or route is correct or current. Use your own judgment when travelling anywhere.

14. Copyright (DMCA)

We respect creators' rights. If you believe something on Penpal infringes your copyright, send a notice to our designated agent at [DMCA AGENT NAME AND ADDRESS], [SUPPORT EMAIL], with:

Your physical or electronic signature, or that of a person authorized to act for the copyright owner.
A description of the copyrighted work you claim is infringed.
A description of the material you want removed and where to find it, in enough detail for us to locate it.
Your contact details (address, phone, email).
A statement that you have a good faith belief the use is not authorized by the owner, its agent or the law.
A statement, under penalty of perjury, that the notice is accurate and you are authorized to act for the owner.

We will end the accounts of repeat infringers.

15. Disclaimers

PENPAL IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE". TO THE FULLEST EXTENT THE LAW ALLOWS, WE MAKE NO WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING ABOUT QUALITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, OR THAT THE SERVICE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED, SECURE OR ERROR FREE. WE DON'T PROMISE HOW MANY PEOPLE WILL BE ACTIVE IN YOUR CITY, THAT ANYONE WILL WANT TO MEET YOU, OR THAT YOU WILL BE COMPATIBLE WITH ANYONE YOU MEET. WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR WHAT YOU OR OTHERS POST OR DO, FOR THE IDENTITY OR INTENTIONS OF ANYONE YOU COMMUNICATE OR MEET WITH, OR FOR DAMAGE TO YOUR DEVICE FROM USING THE SERVICE. SOME PLACES DON'T ALLOW THESE LIMITS, SO THEY MAY NOT FULLY APPLY TO YOU.

16. Limit of our liability

TO THE FULLEST EXTENT THE LAW ALLOWS, PENPAL, ITS OWNERS, EMPLOYEES, LICENSORS AND SERVICE PROVIDERS WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR LOST PROFITS, DATA OR GOODWILL, ARISING FROM YOUR USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE THE SERVICE, THE CONDUCT OR CONTENT OF ANY USER OR THIRD PARTY (ONLINE OR IN PERSON), OR UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS TO YOUR CONTENT. OUR TOTAL LIABILITY TO YOU FOR ALL CLAIMS WON'T EXCEED THE GREATER OF $100 OR THE AMOUNT YOU PAID US IN THE 24 MONTHS BEFORE THE CLAIM. THIS APPLIES WHATEVER THE LEGAL THEORY. SOME PLACES DON'T ALLOW THESE LIMITS, SO THEY MAY NOT FULLY APPLY TO YOU.

17. Resolving disputes

[Have a lawyer review and complete this section for your state and business.]

Talk to us first. If you have a problem, email [SUPPORT EMAIL] and give us 60 days to try to fix it informally before starting any formal case. Tell us your name, your account details and what happened, and what you want us to do.
Individual arbitration. If we can't fix it, and unless the law says otherwise, you and Penpal agree to resolve the dispute through binding individual arbitration with [ARBITRATION PROVIDER], instead of a court or jury. Either of us may instead bring an individual claim in small claims court. Claims of sexual assault or sexual harassment connected to your use of Penpal may, at your choice, be brought in arbitration or in court.
No class actions. To the fullest extent allowed, you and Penpal each give up the right to join or bring class, group or representative claims.
Opting out. You may opt out of arbitration within 30 days of first accepting these Terms by emailing [SUPPORT EMAIL] with the subject "Arbitration opt-out".
Governing law and courts. The laws of [STATE], USA, and the Federal Arbitration Act govern these Terms. Any claim not sent to arbitration or small claims court must be brought in the courts in [COUNTY, STATE].
If you live in the EU, EEA, UK or Switzerland, or anywhere the law gives you consumer rights that can't be waived, those rights stay in place. You can bring claims in your home country, and the parts of this section that the law doesn't allow won't apply to you.

18. Indemnity

To the extent the law allows, you agree to defend and hold harmless Penpal, its owners, employees and service providers from any claims, losses, costs and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) that come from your use of the Service, Your Content, your conduct toward others, or your breach of these Terms. Some places don't allow this, so it may not fully apply to you.

19. Special terms for some places

European Union, United Kingdom, Switzerland and similar: you may have a right to withdraw from a purchase within 14 days where the law gives you one. If you bought through Apple, refunds and withdrawals are handled by Apple. We tell you when we take action against your account unless the law says we can't.
United States: if your state gives you extra cancellation or refund rights, contact [SUPPORT EMAIL] and we'll follow them.
Digital Services Act (EU): our legal representative in the EU is [NAME AND ADDRESS, IF REQUIRED].

20. Everything else

These Terms, with the Privacy Policy, Community Guidelines, Safety Tips and any extra purchase terms, are the whole agreement between you and Penpal and replace earlier agreements.
If part of these Terms can't be enforced, the rest still applies. If we don't enforce a right right away, we haven't given it up.
You can't transfer your account or your rights. We may transfer ours, for example in a business sale.
Penpal accounts can't be passed on after death, unless the law says otherwise.
Nothing here makes you our agent, partner or employee.

21. Contact

[COMPANY NAME]

[STREET ADDRESS], [CITY, STATE, ZIP], United States

Email: [SUPPORT EMAIL]