Tips and Larger Payments Terms

In short

• A tip is a voluntary payment to Tillyard, which runs Tillyard, for a free service you have already used. The site's button calls it a donation. Leave one only if you have used the site yourself. No part of a tip goes to any member.
• We cannot yet say whether it can be deducted from your taxes, and we send no tax receipt.
• You pay on a page run by Stripe. You do not need an account here, we never see your card number, and our own site stores nothing about your tip.
• In the company's Stripe records the owner can see your name, your email address and the amount. We use that for refunds, bank disputes, bookkeeping and tax.
• Tipping does not change your standing here. It earns no title, publication, reading, record or decision, and tips are not linked to member accounts. Not tipping costs you nothing.
• A tip gives you no ownership in the company, nothing back later, and no goods or services.
• Ask within 30 days and we will refund the full amount to the original payment method, unless you have already raised a chargeback (a dispute you raise with your bank). Stripe keeps its processing fee when we refund, so a refund costs the company a little. Ask anyway if you want your money back.
• If you are under 18, or the amount matters to you this month, please do not tip.
• Larger amounts and sponsorships are arranged in writing and paid by invoice. They give no ownership, no return and no say over any decision.
• We keep no public list of people who tip.

If this summary and the full text below ever differ, the full text governs.

1 Who these terms are for, and how they fit with our other documents

1.1 Who we are

Tillyard is an Ohio nonprofit corporation. Post goes to 10602 York Rd SW, Etna, Ohio 43062. In these terms, we, us, our and the company mean Tillyard. You means the person who leaves a tip or offers a larger tip.

The president also runs a business of their own under another name that has nothing to do with Tillyard. These terms cover payments made to Tillyard for Tillyard only.

We are not a school or a public body, and we are not connected with any college. The IRS has not recognized Tillyard as tax-exempt, and we do not say that it has.

1.2 What these terms cover

• Tips left through the payment links on tillyard.org. Sections 2 to 8 and 11 to 16 are about tips.
• Larger tips from individuals, which are arranged in writing. Section 9 says how, and the letter you and we sign governs each one.
• Sponsorships, in outline only. Section 10 points to the Sponsorship and Independence Policy, which governs them.

1.3 How you agree to these terms

If you are a member, you accepted the Terms of Use when you joined, and these terms are part of that agreement.

If you are not a member, you can still leave a tip if you have used the site. These terms are published at tillyard.org/policies. This is how far they bind you. Where the tips page, or the payment page that Stripe runs for us, asks you to tick a box that names these terms, you agree to them when you tick it. Where neither asks, these terms are the basis on which we accept the payment, and we give you notice of them here and in the statement in section 2.1; we do not claim that you signed a contract by paying. Either way, sections 29, 30 and 32.5 to 32.7 of the Terms of Use (covering our costs, the release, individual claims only, no jury trial and the time limit for a claim) do not apply to a person who has no account.

Either way, the short statement in section 2.1 appears beside every tip button, so that the most important facts are in front of you before you leave our site.

1.4 Which document governs

Several of our documents touch on tips. Section 37.5 of the Terms of Use sets the order among all our documents: the more specific one governs its own subject, except for the sections of those terms that prevail over every other document (which include the limits on liability and how disagreements are resolved). Applied to tips, that means:

• For tips, refunds, bank disputes and larger tips from individuals, these terms are the more specific document and govern.
• For what happens to information about you, the Privacy Notice governs. Section 6 of these terms is a summary of it.
• For how the dispute and correction form works, the Disputes and Corrections Policy governs. For whether a refund is owed, these terms do.
• For sponsorships and for the rules that keep money apart from decisions, the Sponsorship and Independence Policy governs.
• For a particular larger tip, the signed letter governs over these terms, except that no letter can give a payer anything that section 9.3 says a payment does not give.
• For everything these terms do not cover, the Terms of Use apply. Section 15 explains how far they apply to a tipper who is not a member.

1.5 Words we use

Words that have one meaning in every one of our documents, such as member, visitor, staff, the editor, record item, hold, case and tip, are defined in Definitions. The words below are added for this document's own subject, or repeated from Definitions for convenience. If a repeated meaning ever differs, Definitions governs the meaning of the word.

• A tip is a voluntary, one-time payment made through one of our payment links, for a free service you have already used.
• A tipper is anyone who has used the site and leaves a tip, member or not. A payer is anyone who makes a payment to us, by tip link or by invoice.
• The payment page is the page where you pay. It is run by Stripe, not by us.
• The processor is Stripe, the company that takes the payment on our behalf. If we ever change processor, the word means the new one.
• The original payment method is the card, wallet or bank account a payment came from.
• A chargeback is a challenge to a payment that you raise with your bank or card issuer and not with us. Some of our pages call it a bank dispute. It is not the same as using our dispute and correction form, and it is not a legal claim.
• A larger tip is a voluntary payment from an individual who has used the site, arranged with us in writing and not paid through a tip link. Definitions also calls it a larger payment. Earlier drafts called it a "larger contribution"; we do not use that word for money, because a payment to us is not a gift to a cause.
• A sponsorship is a payment in return for a text-only acknowledgement, under a signed agreement.
• Your standing is your place here in every sense: your account, your titles and perks, your papers and readings, your records, and how any report, appeal or dispute that involves you is handled.

2 What a tip is

2.1 The statement beside every button

This statement appears wherever a tip button does, and it is part of these terms:

"Tillyard is an Ohio nonprofit corporation and cannot yet accept donations. No part of a donation goes to any member. Donating does not change your standing here."

2.2 A voluntary payment for a free service you have already used

You have read something here, worked at a table, used a tool or kept a record, and it cost you nothing. A tip is a way of paying something for that afterwards, if you want to. It is like the jar on a coffee shop counter: the coffee has already been served, and nobody watches the jar.

A tip is never required. Nothing on the site is held back until you tip, and nothing opens up when you do.

Leave a tip only if you have used the site yourself. A tip is a payment for a service already received, so it is not for a parent, a relative, a friend or anyone else who has not used the site, however kindly meant. If you have not used it and want to pay us something, please do not; if you already have, ask for it back under section 7.

2.3 Who receives it

The tip is paid to Tillyard. Tillyard is the nonprofit's own legal name, so there is no separate body to receive it. No member, author, reader, host or organization receives a tip, and we do not pass tips on to anyone.

The nonprofit has no owners. A board of trustees governs it, and its president runs the site day to day.

2.4 Where it goes

A tip becomes part of the company's general revenue the moment it is received. It is not set aside for any purpose, it is not held in trust, and we make no statement about what any particular tip is spent on. It belongs to the nonprofit, which uses it to run Tillyard as its board decides.

We do not accept tips that come with conditions. If you tip and tell us the money is for a particular person, paper, table or purpose, that request does not bind us. If the condition matters to you, ask for a refund under section 7.

We do not publish what the site costs to run beside a tip button, and we do not say that a tip pays for any particular thing.

2.5 What a tip covers

A tip is a payment for a service you have already had, free. It buys nothing further: no product, no membership, no feature, and nothing that you did not already have before you paid. It is not a fee, because membership costs nothing, and a tip is not a charge for joining, submitting, being read, being published, being listed or anything else.

The IRS has not recognized Tillyard as tax-exempt. Nothing we say should be read as a promise that a tip is a charitable contribution or that you can deduct it (section 12 says more). A tip is not an investment or a loan (section 3.4), and it earns no acknowledgement and no right to be named (section 10).

A tip is not a payment to a member. If you want to thank another member, the site has ways to do that which involve no money. A word of thanks in the shop is not a tip and no money moves. Every tip is a single payment, so nothing recurs and there is nothing to cancel.

3 What a tip does not do

3.1 It does not change your standing

A tip does not earn, speed up, protect or improve anything here. In particular it does not:

• get a paper read sooner, read more kindly, approved or published;
• earn or keep a title, a perk, a stamp, a founding number or a place in Readers' Selection;
• add, confirm or restore an item on The Record;
• affect a round, a score or a tally;
• change how a report, a hold, a suspension, an appeal, a removal request, a copyright notice or a dispute is handled, whether it is about you or made by you;
• lift a limit, a waiting period or a pause;
• get you an answer sooner.

Not tipping does not cost you anything on that list either. The service works the same way for everyone.

3.2 Tips are not linked to member accounts

The tip buttons around the site lead to our tips page, and the amounts on that page are ordinary links that take you to Stripe. Our site does not record that you followed one, nothing comes back to the site after you pay, and no account on Tillyard is marked as belonging to someone who has tipped. No member's account, and no page of the site, shows whether that person has tipped. The staff console holds no list of tips; it keeps only the refund and dispute log described in section 6.7.

The owner can see payers' names and email addresses in the company's Stripe records (section 6.3). The owner is also the editor of Tillyard Research and the person who decides reports and appeals. We do not look up whether a payer is a member, we do not look up whether a member has paid, and tips play no part in any decision about a paper, a title, a record, a report or an account.

3.3 No thanks, names or recognition

We do not thank tippers in public, list them, rank them, give them a mark on their profile, or tell anyone who has tipped. Stripe's receipt is the only acknowledgement you will get from the payment itself. If you write to us about a tip we may write back, and that is all.

3.4 No ownership and no return

A tip gives you no share or membership interest in the company, no vote, no seat, no say in how the company or the site is run, and no claim on its assets, revenue or profits. Nothing comes back to you later: no repayment, no interest, no credit, no discount and no reward. A tip is not a loan, an investment, a deposit, a pre-payment or a pledge toward anything.

3.5 No goods or services

You receive no goods or services in return for a tip. We send you nothing, unlock nothing and owe you nothing for it. Everything you can use on the site today you could use before you tipped.

3.6 Nobody may sell you an outcome

We never ask for a tip in return for a decision, and nobody is allowed to do so in our name. If anyone tells you that a tip, a payment or a favour will get a paper published, a title granted, a report dropped or anything else decided your way, it is not true and it is not us. Please tell us at support@tillyard.org or through the report form.

Members may not ask for tips for themselves under our name, collect money in our name, or tell anyone that tipping earns something. The Community Guidelines and the Trademark and Brand Use Policy apply.

3.7 We never ask you directly

Nobody from Tillyard asks for a tip in an email, a note, a thread, a notification or a table chat. As this version is written, no email we send carries a tip button or a link to a payment page, and we put no tip links on printed material or anywhere off the site.

So a message, a code to scan or a post that asks you to tip Tillyard, or that sends you straight to a payment page, did not come from us. The way to leave a tip is to start from the tips page at tillyard.org. If you are asked any other way, please report it.

3.8 It is not a way in

A tip does not create an account, does not open membership to someone who is not eligible, and does not stand in for any of the checks at sign-up. The Eligibility and Verification Policy says who may join, and it applies in the same way to everyone.

4 Who should tip, and who should not

4.1 Who a tip is meant for

An adult who has used Tillyard, found it useful, and can spare the amount without thinking twice. That is the whole of it.

4.2 If you are under 18

Please do not tip. Membership is for adults, but the public pages can be read by anyone, and the tip links do not ask your age. If someone under 18 has left a tip, we will refund it in full when the payer, or a parent or guardian, asks us to, however long ago it was paid, as long as the processor is still able to send a refund to the payment method that was used. Write to support@tillyard.org.

4.3 If the amount matters to you this month

Please keep it. The site works the same either way, nobody will know, and nobody will think less of you.

4.4 If the card or account is not yours

Do not tip with a card, wallet or account that is not yours to use, and do not tip in someone else's name. The Acceptable Use Policy forbids using the tip links to test card numbers or to move money for any purpose other than leaving a tip.

4.5 If you are hoping to influence something

Do not tip. It will not work (section 3.1), and we may refuse or refund any tip, including one we believe was meant to influence a decision.

If you are waiting on a decision and simply want to leave a tip, you can. It makes no difference to the decision. You may prefer to wait until the decision is made, so that you never have to wonder.

4.6 If you are paying for an organization

The tip links are for individuals paying with their own money. A company, a college, a student organization, a recruiter or any other organization that wants to pay us something should use the route in section 9 or 10, so that it is in writing and, where it is a sponsorship, labelled. If an organization tips through a link anyway, the payment is treated as a tip under these terms, it earns no acknowledgement, and we may refund it.

4.7 If United States law restricts you

Do not tip if you are in a country or territory under a United States embargo or comprehensive sanctions, or if you are on a United States government list of prohibited or restricted parties. The processor runs its own checks and may decline a payment.

4.8 If your account here is restricted

If your account is muted, suspended or paused, the site does not show you the tip button. Nothing stops you opening the tips page yourself. A tip does not lift the restriction, shorten it or play any part in an appeal, and we may refund a tip left by someone whose account is restricted.

4.9 If you want to pay through a giving program

A tip, of any size, is a person's own money, paid directly. We cannot accept a payment from a donor-advised fund, a private foundation's grant program, an employer's matching-gift or workplace-giving program, or a platform that collects money for charities. Those exist to pay charities, and we are not one. Please do not ask one of them to pay us, and do not list us as a charity anywhere. If a payment of that kind reaches us, we return it.

5 How paying works

5.1 Where the tip buttons are, and where they are not

A button that says "Donate" appears in the site's header and footer and on some pages. Every one of those buttons leads to the same place, the tips page on our own site. Only that page carries the links to Stripe, so you always pass the statement in section 2.1, the refund rule and our contact details on the way to paying. The statement in section 2.1 is also on every page that carries a tip button.

The button does not appear:

• inside the steps for joining, signing in or recovering an account;
• on report, removal or dispute forms, or the pages where you check on one;
• on the screens where a paper, an entry or a request for a title is submitted, read, scored, decided or appealed;
• on a page shown to someone outside who is confirming something for a member;
• on the page for closing an account;
• in any email, notification, note, thread or table chat (section 3.7);
• as a prompt that follows something you have just done, such as publishing a paper.

In those places it could read as pressure, or as payment for an outcome, and we keep it out. A member whose account is restricted is not shown the button at all (section 4.8).

On public pages that show a paper or a record, the button sits at the foot of the page, below the content, and never beside a title, a decision or a record. On any page that carries a member's name, a tip is still a tip to the company. No part of a tip goes to any member, a tip is not a payment for the paper or the record on that page, and nobody needs to tip in order to read a paper or check a record.

5.2 You pay on Stripe's page

Each amount on the tips page is an ordinary link. Following it takes you off our site to a payment page run by Stripe, at an address that belongs to Stripe. You type your payment details there, not here. No payment form and no payment script runs on any page of Tillyard.

Stripe's own terms and privacy policy apply to what you do on its page. Stripe may offer to remember your details for its own faster checkout. That is Stripe's service, not ours, and you can decline it.

5.3 You do not need an account

Anyone can leave a tip, signed in or not. The link works the same way for a member and for a stranger, and it carries nothing that identifies you from our site to Stripe. Links to Stripe are set so that your browser does not tell Stripe which of our pages you came from.

5.4 Amounts

When tips open there will be four links: three fixed amounts (5, 15 and 40 US dollars) and one where you choose the amount.

• Minimum. The choose-your-amount link has a minimum of 3 US dollars. The minimum is there to make the link less useful to people testing stolen card numbers.
• Maximum. We set no maximum of our own. Stripe sets one for the choose-your-amount link, which was 10,000 US dollars when this was written and may change.
• Large tips. If you want to pay more than the link allows, or you would like an amount put in writing, use section 9. A tip through a link is covered by the same 30-day refund as any other, whatever its size, and section 28.3 of the Terms of Use does not let the liability cap be used to keep money that is yours. If a tip through a link is large enough to look like a mistake, we may refund it without being asked.
• Captions. Each fixed amount carries a short caption, such as "about a coffee". The captions are only a way of sizing a tip. They do not describe anything you are buying, and they say nothing about what the money is spent on.

We may change the fixed amounts, the captions, the minimum and the number of links at any time.

5.5 Currency

Tips are priced in US dollars. If you pay from outside the United States, Stripe may show the price, and charge you, in your local currency. When it does, the price you see already includes Stripe's charge for converting it, which Stripe sets (it said 2 to 4 percent when this was written). Stripe's page shows the amount before you pay and should give you the choice of paying in US dollars instead, in which case your own bank's exchange rate and charges may apply. None of those charges comes to us, and we cannot waive or return them, though section 7.7 explains what Stripe says about refunds.

5.6 Ways to pay

The payment page shows the ways you can pay, such as a card or a digital wallet. We choose which of Stripe's methods to offer for tips and may change them. We do not accept tips in cash, by cheque, through payment apps, by gift card or in cryptocurrency, and we may return anything sent that way.

5.7 One payment, nothing to cancel

Every tip is a single payment. We do not offer monthly tips, we do not keep your card on file, and we cannot charge you again. If you want to tip again, you follow a link again.

5.8 How it should appear on your statement

The charge should appear as TILLYARD HOUSE or something close to it. How a charge is shown is up to your bank, and some banks shorten or change the wording. If you see a charge you do not recognise, section 8.8 says what to do.

5.9 Your receipt

Stripe emails a receipt to the address you give on its page. That receipt is the only one there is. We do not send a separate receipt, a letter of thanks or any document for tax purposes.

5.10 No tax is added

We do not add sales tax or any other tax to a tip. The amount on the payment page is the amount that reaches Stripe for us, before Stripe takes its fee from our side.

5.11 If a payment fails or happens twice

Stripe or your bank may decline a payment, and we cannot override that. If you are charged twice for what you meant as one tip, or charged an amount you did not mean, write to support@tillyard.org and we will refund the extra under section 7.

5.12 After you pay

Stripe returns you to a short page on our site that thanks you. That page does not know who you are or what you paid, and it shows no stamp, mark or number, because a tip earns none. Nothing about any account on Tillyard changes.

5.13 A record of the wording you were shown

The tips page shows the date and the version number of its own wording at the foot of the page. That is so there is a record of what a payer was told on the day they paid.

6 What we can see, and what we do with it

The Privacy Notice is the governing document for personal information. This section summarises what it says about tips, so that you have it in one place.

6.1 On our site: nothing

Our site collects and stores nothing about a tip or a tipper. It does not log that you followed a tip link, it receives no message from Stripe when you pay, and it holds no list of payments. The company's website holds no keys to its Stripe account.

6.2 At Stripe

Stripe collects what it needs to take the payment: your payment details, the name on the card, your email address, and whatever else its page asks for. Stripe holds that under its own privacy policy and for its own legal duties, including checks for fraud.

6.3 What the owner can see

In the company's Stripe account, the owner can see your name, your email address, the amount, the date, and the limited payment details Stripe shows a business. Those may include the card's brand, its last four digits, its expiry date and country, a billing postal code if Stripe asked for one, and Stripe's own fraud-risk rating for the payment. We never see your full card number or your card's security code.

6.4 What we use it for

• to refund you, and to find your payment when you ask about it;
• to answer you if you write to us;
• to respond to a bank dispute;
• to keep the company's books and meet its tax and legal duties;
• to spot and stop misuse of the links, such as card testing.

6.5 What we do not do with it

• We do not copy it into the Tillyard site.
• We do not look up whether a payer is a member, or whether a member has paid.
• We do not publish it, or any list drawn from it.
• We do not use it to send you news, appeals or requests for more.
• We do not sell it, rent it or share it for anyone's marketing.

6.6 If you write to us about a tip

Your message and our reply are kept in the company's mailbox as the Privacy Notice describes. Writing to us about a tip does not link the tip to an account, even if you tell us who you are.

6.7 The refund and dispute log

When you ask for a refund or dispute a payment with your bank, we note the date, the amount and the outcome against a ticket number in the staff console, so there is a record of what we did. We never put card details in that note.

6.8 How long records are kept

Stripe keeps its records under its own rules. Copies we take for bookkeeping and tax, and the refund and dispute log, are kept for the periods in the Data Retention Schedule.

7 Refunds

7.1 Thirty days, no reason needed

If you want a tip back, ask us within 30 days of paying and we will refund the full amount. You do not have to say why. This is a commitment.

The 30 days run from the day you paid. Your request has to reach us within them; the refund itself may be sent after they end.

7.2 How to ask

Write to support@tillyard.org, or use the dispute and correction form on the site and choose the option for a payment or a refund. You do not need an account for either. The form gives you a ticket number you can use to check on your request, and the Disputes and Corrections Policy explains how it works.

So that we can find the payment, tell us:

• the email address you gave on Stripe's page;
• the date and the amount.

That is enough to find most payments, so you do not need to send any card details at all. Never send us a card number, any part of one, a security code or a bank password. We do not need them and will not ask for them, and our refund log records a ticket, a date, an amount and an outcome and never card details.

We may ask a question or two to find the right payment. Because a refund can only go back to where the payment came from, we do not need you to prove who you are beyond that.

7.3 The one exception: a payment already disputed with your bank

If you have already disputed the payment with your bank or card issuer, we cannot refund it while that dispute is open. The processor does not allow a refund outside the bank's process once a dispute has begun, and the bank's process decides the outcome. Section 8 explains.

If you want your money back, asking us first is quicker and simpler than asking your bank.

7.4 To the original payment method only

A refund goes back to the original payment method and nowhere else. We cannot send it to a different card, to a bank account you name, to another person, or by cheque, cash or payment app. This is the processor's rule as well as ours, and it protects you: nobody who learns about your tip can have it sent to themselves.

7.5 You get all of it back, and what that costs us

You get back the whole amount you paid us.

When we refund a payment, Stripe does not give us back the fee it charged for handling it. So each refund leaves the company slightly out of pocket: about 45 cents on a five-dollar tip at Stripe's standard United States card rate when this was written, and more on a larger tip. If you want your tip back, ask.

7.6 How long it takes

We aim to send refunds promptly. Once we have sent one, the timing is in the hands of Stripe and your bank. Stripe says a refund usually shows on a statement within about five to ten business days, and that a refund sent soon after the payment may appear as the original charge disappearing instead of as a separate credit. We cannot speed that up and we do not promise a date.

7.7 Currency

We refund the amount in US dollars. If Stripe charged you in another currency, Stripe says it refunds in the currency you paid in, at the exchange rate of the original payment, so that you get back what you paid. If your own bank converted the payment or charged you for it, what your bank returns is your bank's decision.

7.8 Part refunds

If you want only part of a tip back, say how much, and we will refund that part.

7.9 After 30 days

After 30 days a refund is at our discretion. We aim to say yes where:

• the payment was made without the cardholder's authority;
• the same tip was charged twice, or the amount was clearly a mistake;
• the payer was under 18 (section 4.2 makes that one a commitment);
• the payer was not able to understand what they were doing when they paid.

Whatever the reason, a refund is possible only while the processor can still send one to the original payment method and no bank dispute is open.

7.10 Refunds we start ourselves

We may refund a tip without being asked: for example where it looks like a mistake, where we believe it was meant to influence a decision, where it came from an organization, where we suspect the card was not the payer's to use, or where keeping it would be wrong for any other reason. We do not have to explain. A refund we start ourselves says nothing against you and changes nothing about your standing.

7.11 If a refund fails

Occasionally a refund cannot be delivered, for example because the card has been closed. Card issuers usually pass a refund on to the cardholder's replacement card or account, and that happens between you and your bank. If a refund comes back to us undelivered, write to support@tillyard.org and we can work out with you what the processor and the law allow.

The same applies if the processor itself will not let us send a refund we owe you, for example because it has paused or closed the company's account, or because we have moved to a different processor since you paid. The refund is still owed. Tell us, and we can work out with you how it can lawfully be paid.

7.12 A refund changes nothing else

Asking for a refund, or receiving one, does not affect your standing. Tips are not linked to accounts in the first place.

7.13 Misuse of refunds

The refund rule is for people who change their minds. It is not for testing cards or for running payments through the links and back out again. If the links are used that way we may refuse payments, close a link or switch tipping off (section 13), and the Acceptable Use Policy applies.

7.14 If the payer cannot ask for themselves

Someone with legal authority to act for the payer, such as a parent or guardian of a person under 18, an executor, or a person holding a power of attorney, can ask for a refund in the payer's place. Because a refund can only go back to the original payment method, we may act on such a request without asking for proof of that authority, and we may ask for more where something looks wrong. We do not discuss the payment with anyone else beyond what is needed to find it.

7.15 If you paid while tipping was later switched off

Switching tipping off, pausing it or closing a link does not affect a refund. The tips page keeps the refund rule and our contact details on view while tipping is paused.

8 Chargebacks: disputes you raise with your bank

8.1 Please ask us first

If you want a tip back for any reason, ask us (section 7). Inside 30 days the answer is yes, and it is usually faster than a bank dispute, which can take two or three months.

8.2 Your right to go to your bank

Nothing in these terms takes away any right you have with your bank or card issuer, including the right to dispute a charge you did not make or do not recognise.

8.3 What happens while a dispute is open

When you dispute a payment, your bank takes the money back from us through the processor while it decides. We cannot refund the payment ourselves during that time (section 7.3). The bank makes the decision, not us and not Stripe.

Please do not ask us for a refund and dispute the same payment with your bank. If both go through you could be paid twice, and one of them would have to be undone.

8.4 What we do about a dispute

We may accept a dispute and let the bank return your money, and for a tip that is generally what we do. We may contest a dispute where we believe the payment or the dispute is part of fraud or misuse of the links. Either way the processor charges us a fee for each dispute, which we do not get back.

8.5 A dispute does not count against you

Disputing a payment in good faith never costs you your standing here, and neither does asking for a refund. Using the tip links to test stolen cards or to defraud anyone is a different matter. It breaks the Acceptable Use Policy, and if we learn who did it we may act on it and may pass what we know to the processor and, where appropriate and lawful, to law enforcement.

8.6 If several disputes arrive together

A burst of disputes or failed payments usually means someone is testing stolen cards. We may pause or close the payment links, or hide every tip button, while that is going on.

8.7 The record we keep

We note the date, amount and outcome of a dispute against a ticket number (section 6.7). We do not keep card details.

8.8 A charge you do not recognise

If a charge that looks like ours is on your statement and you did not make it, tell your bank, because your card may have been used by someone else. You are welcome to tell us as well at support@tillyard.org, with the date and the amount. Do not send card details. Where we can find the payment and no dispute is open, we aim to refund it.

9 Larger tips

9.1 What counts as a larger tip

Any amount you would sooner arrange with us directly than pay through a tip link. Usually that is more than the link allows, or an amount large enough that you, or we, would like it written down. This section is for individuals paying with their own money. An organization should read section 10.

A larger tip is a tip. Everything in sections 2 and 3 is true of it: it is voluntary, it is a payment to Tillyard for a free service you have already used yourself, and it does not change anyone's standing. We do not arrange one with a person who has not used the site.

9.2 How one is arranged

1. You write to us. The tips page has a short inquiry form that needs no account. It asks for your name, your email address, your organization if there is one, which of three things you are writing about (a larger tip, sponsoring something, or a question first) and a short message. It sits behind a bot check, and what you type is checked by the same automated screening as other text typed into the site. Do not put card or bank details in it; the form refuses a message that contains a card or bank number. The form is not tied to any account, even if you are signed in when you use it. You are shown a ticket number. The site sends no email yet, so any reply comes from a person.
2. We reply by email. A genuine reply comes from one of the addresses in section 18. We may ask who you are, where the money comes from, why you want to pay, and whether you have anything waiting for a decision here.
3. We put it in writing. If we both want to go ahead, we send a short letter that sets out the amount and the terms in section 9.3. You sign it and so do we.
4. We send an invoice. The invoice is issued through Stripe and is paid by bank transfer. It shows transfer details that belong to Stripe's banking partner and are particular to you, so the company's own account number is never disclosed.
5. You pay the invoice from a bank account in your own name.

Nothing is agreed until the letter is signed by both of us, and we may stop at any step.

The owner reads inquiries and may reply. We do not promise a reply, or a time for one. An inquiry that nobody has answered closes by itself after a while, and so does one that goes quiet after a reply; you are welcome to write again. When the form has had heavy use it rests for the day, and the page then gives an address to write to instead.

We never take a payment by email, and nothing is ever paid through the form.

9.3 What every larger tip is and is not

Each larger tip is governed by its own letter. These points are true of all of them, and no letter can change them:

• No ownership. It gives no share or membership interest in the company, no option, no note and no other stake.
• No return. It gives no right to repayment, interest, profit, revenue or anything of value later. It is not a loan or an investment.
• No influence. It gives no say over editorial decisions, readings, scores, titles, records, moderation, appeals, disputes, who may join, or how the company or the site is run.
• No access. It gives no access to members or to information about them.
• No goods or services. Nothing is bought.
• No recognition. We do not name individual payers in public, and a payment earns no title, mark or listing.
• No charitable receipt. The IRS has not recognized Tillyard as tax-exempt. We say nothing about whether the payment is a charitable contribution, and we issue no tax receipt for it.
• Tax is yours to determine. How the payment is treated for your own taxes is for you and your adviser. Section 12.
• Refunds go back where the money came from. Any amount returned goes only to the bank account it was paid from.
• General revenue. Like a tip, it becomes part of the company's general revenue, is not set aside for any purpose, and is accepted without conditions.

9.4 We never publish our bank details

The company's bank account and routing numbers do not appear on the site, in these terms or in our emails. We do not send them to you, and we do not ask you to pay by wire to an account we name in an email, by gift card, by payment app or in cryptocurrency.

If someone who claims to act for Tillyard sends you bank details you were not expecting, asks you to pay in one of those ways, or tells you our bank details have changed, treat it as an attempt at fraud. Do not pay. Check with us at support@tillyard.org first.

9.5 When we may say no

We may decline any payment, and we do not have to give a reason. Among the reasons we may decline, postpone or return one:

• we cannot tell who is really behind it, or where the money comes from;
• it comes with a condition, a request or an expectation;
• the person offering it has a paper, a title request, a report, an appeal or a dispute waiting for a decision here, or is closely connected with someone who has;
• it is really an organization's money, in which case section 10 applies;
• accepting it would break a law or the processor's rules;
• it would make the company depend on one person to a degree we are not comfortable with;
• our accountant or lawyer advises against it.

9.6 If you are a member

A member may leave a larger tip, and it changes nothing about their standing. Because the owner necessarily knows who has made one, the Sponsorship and Independence Policy sets out what we do about the conflict: among other things, we may decline or postpone a payment from anyone with a matter waiting for a decision, and the Editorial Policy of Tillyard Research lets the editor decline to handle a paper about a person who has made one.

9.7 Refunds of a larger tip

The letter sets the refund terms for that payment, and it governs. Whatever the letter says, any money returned goes only to the bank account it came from, and never to another person or account.

9.8 What we keep

An inquiry is kept until 12 months after it is closed and then deleted. If something is agreed, the signed letter and the invoice are kept as business records for the period in the Data Retention Schedule. The Privacy Notice says who can see them.

9.9 What we do not take

• Anything but money. A larger tip is paid in US dollars, on the invoice. We do not take shares, cryptocurrency, property, equipment, services, gift cards or anything else in its place.
• Money from a giving program. Section 4.9.
• A pledge. A promise to pay later does not bind you, and we do not treat it as owed. Where a payment is paid in parts, each part is voluntary until you pay it.
• Money in memory or in honour of anyone, or left in a will. We do not accept a payment made in memory or in honour of anyone, or left in a will. Those are gifts, and a gift to a company is not a gift to a charity. If a payment of that kind reaches us, we return it.
• Money from two people at once, unless both sign the letter and the payment comes from an account in the name of one or both of them.

9.10 If the tip links are paused

The inquiry form may stay open while the tip links are paused, because a larger tip does not use them.

10 Sponsorships

A sponsorship is different from a tip and from a larger tip. It is a payment, usually by an organization, in return for a text-only acknowledgement, under a signed agreement, and it is labelled wherever it appears.

The Sponsorship and Independence Policy governs sponsorships. It says who may sponsor and who may not, what a sponsor may receive, what a sponsor never receives, how sponsored things are labelled, and how sponsors are disclosed to members. In one sentence: a sponsor gets its name shown as a sponsor and nothing else, and has no say over editorial decisions, readings, records, moderation or anyone's standing, and no access to members or to information about them.

An inquiry about sponsoring uses the same form as section 9.2.

11 No public list of people who tip

We keep no public list of people who tip, whatever the amount. We do not publish their names, amounts or messages, on the site or anywhere else, and we do not offer to. Nobody is named in thanks, in a footer, in the Morning Edition or on a page of their own.

That is deliberate. A list of people who tip would be something given in return for a payment, it would tell members who has paid, and it would invite the thought that paying is noticed.

Sponsors are the opposite case. A sponsor is always named, because members are entitled to know when an organization has paid to be associated with something here. The Sponsorship and Independence Policy explains.

We may tell our accountant, our lawyer, the tax authorities and anyone else the law requires what the company has received and from whom.

12 Tax

12.1 No claim that it is deductible

The IRS has not recognized Tillyard as exempt from tax, and we do not say that it has. We cannot yet say whether a tip, of any size, is a charitable contribution or can be deducted. If the IRS recognizes Tillyard later, this section will say so, and the change will apply only to payments made after it does.

12.2 No tax receipts

We do not issue receipts or acknowledgement letters for tax purposes, at the time of payment or at the end of the year. Stripe's payment receipt, or the paid invoice for a larger tip, is the only record of the payment that you will get from us.

12.3 We do not give tax advice

How a payment to us is treated on your own tax return is for you to determine. A payment for which you receive nothing may be a gift for federal tax purposes, and a large one may need to be reported by you. If it matters to you, and with a larger tip it may, ask your own adviser before you pay. Nothing we say about a payment is advice on how to treat it.

12.4 On our side

We record tips, of any size, as income in the nonprofit's books, and the nonprofit pays any tax due on it.

12.5 Tax forms

We send no tax form to anyone who tips or pays, and we ask a tipper for no tax details. The processor may report the company's own receipts to the tax authorities. That reporting is about the company's receipts.

13 Changes we can make to tipping

We may at any time, without notice:

• hide every tip button, pause tipping, or switch it off altogether;
• close or replace a payment link;
• change the amounts, the minimum, or the ways to pay;
• refuse or refund any payment;
• change the processor.

We do this, for example, when the links are being used to test stolen cards, when the processor requires it, or when we decide tipping is not right for the site.

While tipping is paused. The tip buttons disappear and the tips page shows a short notice in place of the amounts. The notice keeps the refund rule and our contact details, because someone who paid yesterday still needs them. A payment link that Stripe has not yet closed may still work for someone who saved its address; a tip paid that way is still a tip under these terms and can be refunded in the same way.

Monthly tips. We do not offer them. If we ever do, they will have their own terms, shown before you pay, that state the amount and how often it is taken and give you a simple way to stop. We will never turn a one-time tip into a repeating one.

Paid features. There are none. If that ever changes, the new offer will have its own terms, and we will not charge you for anything you have not expressly agreed to buy.

Switching tipping off does not affect a refund you are owed under section 7.

If the site changes, pauses or closes. A tip is for a service you have already used. It is not a payment toward the site's future, and we make no promise in return for it about how long the site will run or what it will offer. So a tip is not refundable because the site later changes, pauses or closes, except as section 7 provides.

If someone else takes over. If the running of Tillyard passes to another company, Tillyard remains responsible for refunds of tips that were paid to it, unless the new company takes that on in writing. Either way, the refund rule that applied on the day you paid still applies.

14 When something goes wrong, and the limits on our liability

14.1 Stripe's part

The payment page, the handling of your card, the receipt, currency conversion and the timing of refunds are Stripe's and your bank's. We chose Stripe with care, but we do not control it and we are not responsible for its service, its decisions about a payment, or its use of the information you give it.

14.2 Our part

If we make a mistake with a tip, such as failing to send a refund we owe under section 7, tell us so that we can put it right.

14.3 Limits

Sections 27 and 28 of the Terms of Use (disclaimers and limits on liability) apply to tips of any size and to anyone who leaves one. They say that the service is provided as it is; neither of us is liable to the other for indirect or consequential loss; and our total liability to you is capped at the greater of US$100 and the total you paid us in the 12 months before the claim arose, as far as the law allows. That cap does not apply to money we hold that is yours, so it never reduces a refund we owe you under section 7, and it does not apply to our breach of a commitment in Schedule 1 of the Terms of Use, which includes the 30-day refund. The limits do not apply where the law does not allow liability to be limited.

15 Governing law and disagreements

15.1 Start by telling us

Almost anything about a tip can be sorted out by writing to support@tillyard.org or by using the dispute and correction form. Please start there.

15.2 The same rules as the Terms of Use

Sections 31 and 32 of the Terms of Use apply to any disagreement about a tip. For a person who has no account, sections 32.5 to 32.7 (individual claims only, no jury trial, and the time limit) do not apply. The main points:

• Ohio law governs, without taking away any protection that the law of the state where you live gives a consumer and that cannot be waived.
• Before either of us starts a court case, the one with the complaint sends the other a written notice, and we spend 60 days trying to settle it.
• A case that is not settled goes to the Ohio courts named in the Terms of Use, or to the small-claims court for the county where you live.
• If you are a member: as far as the law allows, each of us brings claims only on our own behalf and not as part of a class, each of us gives up a jury trial, and a claim must be started within two years of when the person bringing it knew, or should have known, of the facts behind it.
• There is no arbitration.

Where a signed letter for a larger tip says something different about law or courts, the letter governs for that payment.

16 Rights these terms do not take away

• Your bank. Your rights with your bank or card issuer are untouched (section 8.2).
• Consumer law. Nothing here limits a right that the law of your state gives you as a consumer and that cannot be waived by agreement. Section 38 of the Terms of Use has notices for particular states, and they apply to tippers too.
• Regulators. Nothing here stops you from complaining to, or giving information to, a government agency.
• Your privacy rights. The Privacy Notice says what rights you have over information about you and how to use them. They do not depend on these terms.

If a court finds that part of these terms cannot be enforced, that part applies only as far as the law allows and the rest still applies.

17 Changes to this document

We may change these terms. The new version is listed here with its date and a short description of what changed, and the date at the top of the page changes with it.

A change does not reach backwards. The terms in force on the day you paid are the terms that apply to that payment, so a change can never shorten the 30 days you had to ask for a refund of a tip you had already left.

18 Contact

Tillyard is an Ohio nonprofit corporation.

• Refunds, and questions about a tip: support@tillyard.org
• Larger tips and sponsorships: the inquiry form on the tips page, or sponsors@tillyard.org
• Legal notices: legal@tillyard.org, and by mail to Tillyard, Attention: Legal, 10602 York Rd SW, Etna, Ohio 43062
• Mail: Tillyard, 10602 York Rd SW, Etna, Ohio 43062
• Website: tillyard.org

To dispute or correct something, including a payment or refund problem, use the dispute and correction form on the site. You do not need an account.

Questions about this document

support@tillyard.org

Legal notices

legal@tillyard.org

By post

10602 York Rd SW, Etna, Ohio 43062

For anything else, see where to send what.

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