Expert terms

These terms apply to every person or business that lists a service on Askobo, including individuals, firms and companies. They are a separate agreement from the Terms of use. You accept them by publishing a listing on Askobo.

For a purchase, the order of precedence is: the listing terms shown at checkout (within Askobo's refund options), the Cancellation and refund policy, these Expert terms, then the Terms of use. The Privacy policy governs personal data.

If you act for a firm or company, you confirm that you have the authority to bind it.

• You are at least 18 years old.
• You hold the qualifications, licences and experience you state on your profile and listings, and you keep them valid while you are listed.
• You follow the rules of your own profession, including, without limitation, the ICAI Code of Ethics for Chartered Accountants. You, not Askobo, are responsible for meeting them. Askobo does not check that your advice meets those rules.
• You give us true account and identity details and keep them up to date.

You are an independent professional or business. You are not our employee, agent, partner or joint venturer, and you cannot bind Askobo. You pay your own costs and decide how you deliver your service.

The contract for each service is between you and the seeker. Askobo does not give the advice and is not responsible for the quality, accuracy or result of your advice or content. Askobo is responsible for its own services: the platform, payment collection, video meetings, hosting of recordings, transcripts and AI summaries, and for its own mistakes. Nothing in these terms removes a seeker's rights under the Consumer Protection Act 2019.

For each listing you set the price, the content, the schedule, what is included, and the refund option. The refund option you choose is shown to the seeker before payment and is frozen at the time of the sale. A later change does not affect a purchase already made.

Courses and digital products use No refund (default), 7 days or 30 days. Programs use Guarantee, Unused sessions (default) or Non-refundable. Courses are not refundable once more than 30% is completed. See the Cancellation and refund policy for the full rules.

Accuracy undertaking. You confirm that everything in a listing is accurate and not misleading, including your qualifications, the content, the schedule, what is included, the price and the refund option. You deliver what the listing says. You do not use a listing to collect payment outside Askobo.

You give us, and we display on your profile or listing where the law requires it:

• Your legal or business name.
• Your business address.
• Customer-care contact details, including an email address.
• Your GSTIN and PAN, where applicable to you.

We handle these details as described in the Privacy policy. If any detail changes, update it in your dashboard. A listing with false or missing details can be taken down under the suspension rules below.

• You deliver each service as described on the listing, at the booked time, with the inclusions you stated.
• You join the meeting on time. Seekers can join shortly before the start, and hosts are not subject to that window.
• If you cancel, or you do not show up: the seeker gets 100% back, including GST and the processing fee, whatever refund option you chose. Askobo cancelling has the same effect.
• If a service is not delivered, is deficient or is not as described: the seeker gets a refund, as the Consumer Protection (E-Commerce) Rules 2020 require. A seeker reports non-delivery within 24 hours after the scheduled end. Statutory rights still apply after that window.
• Repeated no-shows or cancellations by you are a ground for suspension (see the suspension section).

We check a refund request against the booking, payment, meeting and access records and ask you for your side, then decide using those records and the listing terms.

• You record or transcribe a meeting only when it needs it, for the reasons in the Terms of use, and you tell the people in the meeting when you start. If someone asks you to stop, you stop.
• If you download a recording, transcript or AI summary, or keep any other seeker data outside Askobo, you are separately responsible for that copy under the data protection law. You keep it secure, use it only for the service you gave, do not share or sell it, and delete it when you no longer need it.
• You do not use seeker data to market to them unless they have agreed to it.
• If you host through your own Zoom account, Zoom's recording settings and terms apply as well.

How recording, transcripts, AI summaries and our providers work is explained on Recording, AI and providers.

Askobo takes a commission on each paid sale. The rate is set by the billing plan shown in your expert dashboard. Founding experts can have a special rate, which also shows in the dashboard. Creating an account is free.

• The seeker pays your price plus GST and a payment processing fee. Both are shown at checkout and are not deducted from your price. Rates are admin settings and can change.
• Your commission is taken from your earning on each sale. The dashboard shows the earning for each sale.
• We tell you of any change to commission or fees by email and in the dashboard at least 15 days before it applies. A change does not apply to sales made before it takes effect. If you do not accept a change, you can stop listing before it takes effect and close your account.

Each earning becomes available at the latest of these three points. This is a fixed rule built into the platform, not a case-by-case decision.

For a booking the seeker paid for offline, the earning is released at least 72 hours after the session ends.

When an earning is held longer. An earning stays on hold, and only until the matter is resolved, while any of these is open:

• A refund or refund request on that sale.
• A dispute or charge-back on that payment.
• A review of a paid cancellation on that sale.

Your dashboard shows the reason for every hold. If you think a hold is wrong, write to [email protected] with the booking reference. We reply with the reason and the next step, and you can escalate to the grievance officer.

1. Add your bank account in the dashboard and complete verification.
2. Request a payout from your available earnings. Earnings still on hold cannot be paid out.
3. We run checks on the request, then process it. The dashboard shows the status of each request.

We do not promise a payout time in hours. Processing depends on our checks and on your bank. Referral rewards you earn are withdrawable earnings and follow the same steps. We use your bank details only to pay you.

• Refund: when a seeker is refunded, the matching earning is reduced by the refunded amount. The refund goes back to the seeker's original payment method.
• Dispute or charge-back: if a seeker disputes a payment with their bank and the money is returned, the matching earning is cancelled. We share the evidence we hold, ask for yours, and contest the charge-back where there are grounds.
• Already paid out: if the refund or charge-back happens after we paid the earning to you, we set the amount against your next earnings. If there are none, we ask you to repay it. We send you written notice with the booking, the amount and the reason before we recover it, and you can respond before we do.

Refund decisions follow the Cancellation and refund policy. A seeker with 3 completed refunds in 90 days has later claims sent to manual review.

• You are responsible for your own GST registration and returns, and for income tax on what you earn.
• Where the law requires, we collect your PAN and GSTIN and deduct tax at source: TCS under section 52 of the CGST Act (0.5%) and TDS under section 194-O of the Income-tax Act (0.1%). The rates follow the law and change when the law changes.
• Experts supplying services through an e-commerce operator are exempt from GST registration up to Rs 20 lakh of turnover (state limits differ). Whether this applies to you is for you and your tax adviser to confirm.

Askobo does not give tax advice.

• Billing plans are monthly or yearly. The price, renewal period and how to cancel are shown before you pay.
• A plan renews automatically at the end of each billing cycle until you cancel.
• You cancel in the dashboard. The cancellation takes effect at the end of the current billing cycle, and you keep the plan until then.
• We send a notice at least 24 hours before each recurring charge. Payment is taken through Razorpay.

The main factors that decide the order of experts and services in search are:

• Relevance to what the seeker searched for.
• Your ranking score: ratings from users who booked through Askobo, completed sessions, how quickly you respond, and use of agendas and forms. Few reviews or sessions lower the score.
• Profile completeness: photo, bio, headline, years of experience and languages.
• Price: in the default order, experts with lower-priced services can be shown higher.

Effect of a paid billing plan on visibility: experts whose billing plan includes listing priority are shown first in the default order.

• Reviews come from users who booked through Askobo.
• You do not write reviews of yourself, ask others to write fake reviews, pay or reward people for reviews, or trade reviews with other experts.
• You do not pressure a seeker to change or remove a review.
• We remove a review that breaks these rules or the Community guidelines, and we tell you the reason. Breaking this rule is a ground for suspension.

For 12 months after the last booking between you and a seeker you met through Askobo, you do not take that seeker's later bookings or payments outside Askobo to avoid our fees. This includes, without limitation, asking them to pay you directly or to book through another platform.

This applies only to seekers you met through Askobo, and only for that period. It is not a non-compete. You are free to work with anyone else, on any platform, and to keep working with your own existing clients.

You keep ownership of your content, including your profile, photos, videos, descriptions, courses and materials. You give Askobo a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to host, store, copy, stream, record, transcribe, summarise, display and distribute that content. We use it only to run, show and improve the service and to promote your listing.

• Media covered: text, images, audio, video, documents and live streams, on Askobo's website and apps, in emails and notifications, and in Askobo's own marketing that features your listing.
• How long: as long as the content is on Askobo, plus a reasonable period for backups. A seeker who has already bought keeps their access.
• You confirm that you own the content or have the rights to use it, and that it does not infringe anyone else's rights.

We suspend or close an expert account, or remove a listing, only on these grounds:

• Repeated no-shows, late cancellations or complaints about non-delivery.
• False details about your identity, qualifications or listings.
• Fake or bought reviews.
• Moving seekers off Askobo in breach of the earlier clause.
• Fraud, abuse, harassment, or content that breaks the Community guidelines or the law.
• Recording or sharing seeker data without consent.
• A legal order or a request from an authority.

1. We give you written notice with the reason, and you have 7 days to respond. Where there is a risk of serious harm, fraud or a legal duty, we act first and tell you straight away.
2. You can appeal the decision to the grievance officer at [email protected]. See Grievance redressal for timelines.
3. You can close your own account at any time.

Bookings and pending earnings. Future bookings are cancelled or handed over, and those seekers are refunded in full. Earnings already released are paid out. Earnings on hold are released under the normal rule once their conditions are met. We keep back only the amount needed to cover refunds and charge-backs linked to the breach, and we tell you about it in writing.

We change these terms for these reasons: a change in law, new or changed features, security or fraud prevention, and a change of provider. We tell you of a material change by email and in the dashboard at least 15 days before it applies. A change required by law or for safety can apply at once. A change does not affect bookings already paid for or complaints already open. If you do not accept a change, you can stop listing and close your account.

These terms are an electronic record under the Information Technology Act 2000. Disputes with experts follow the process in the Terms of use: talk first for 30 days through the grievance officer, then arbitration in Coimbatore.

• Help with bookings and payments: [email protected]
• Complaints: [email protected]
• Legal notices: [email protected]
• Phone: +91 98812 23337, Mon–Fri, 9:00–18:00 IST
• ASKOBO TECHNOLOGIES PRIVATE LIMITED, Sf.No.456/1, Site.No.147, Breeze Garden, Athipalayam, Coimbatore-641110, Tamil Nadu, India