Terms of service

1. About these terms and who we are

Websay is a product of Avily Pty Ltd, a company registered in South Africa, with its registered address at Block B, Greenford Office Estate, Kenilworth, Cape Town, South Africa. These terms are an agreement between you and Avily Pty Ltd. In these terms, "we", "us" and "our" mean Avily Pty Ltd, and "you" means the person or business using the service.

These terms apply from the moment you start using the service, whether or not you have paid. If you do not agree with them, please do not use the service. If any part of these terms turns out to be unenforceable, the rest continues to apply.

2. The service

Websay builds and maintains business websites through a WhatsApp conversation. You describe your business in ordinary messages, by text or voice note, and Websay turns that into a website.

The chat is answered by an automated artificial intelligence system supervised by our human team: a person reviews anything it is unsure about, and people remain responsible for the service. You are therefore usually talking to automation rather than directly to a person. You can ask for a human at any time, simply by saying so in the chat or by emailing hello@websay.net, and a member of our team will take over the conversation.

Creating a draft website is free and carries no obligation to buy anything. Publishing the site on your own domain requires payment of an annual plan as set out in section 6. Once your site is live, you request changes by messaging Websay in the same conversation, and we make them as part of your plan.

3. The messaging platform and Meta

The service is delivered over the WhatsApp Business Platform, which is provided by Meta. Your use of WhatsApp itself is governed by WhatsApp's own terms of service, which you can read on their legal pages, and by that service's privacy policy. Those terms apply between you and Meta and sit alongside these terms; nothing in these terms changes them.

Websay and Avily Pty Ltd are an independent business. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Meta or WhatsApp. The availability of WhatsApp is outside our control, and we are not responsible for interruptions to WhatsApp itself. If WhatsApp is unavailable, you can always reach us by email at hello@websay.net.

4. Messaging, consent and opting out

We only message people who have contacted us first. By sending your first message to the Websay number, you give us your number and consent to receive replies and service messages in that chat: answers to your questions, build updates, payment links and renewal reminders. We do not send you unrelated marketing in that chat unless you separately agree to it.

WhatsApp's rules also shape when we can message you. Within 24 hours of your last message we may reply freely in the conversation. Outside that window we may only contact you using message templates registered in advance through the platform, such as a build update or a renewal reminder, and you can opt out of any of them.

You can opt out of messages from us at any time: say so in the chat in any words, block the number, or email hello@websay.net. We honour every opt-out, however you make it, and we stop messaging you promptly. Opting out of messages does not by itself cancel a paid plan; your site stays up for the year you have paid for, and section 6 explains how renewal works.

5. Your account and eligibility

The service is intended for business owners and for people authorised to act on behalf of a business. You must be at least 18 years old. When you use the service for a business, you confirm that you have the authority to bind that business to these terms.

You agree to give us accurate and current information about yourself and your business, and to correct it if it changes. The phone number you chat from identifies your account, so keep that number under your control and tell us promptly if it changes or if you believe someone else is using it. We may rely on instructions sent from your number as coming from you.

6. Fees, payment and renewal

Plans are prepaid annually. SITE_ONE costs R1,499 per year and SITE_PRO costs R2,499 per year. Business email can be added to either plan: SITE_ONE with Email costs R1,999 per year and SITE_PRO with Email costs R3,499 per year. We do not offer monthly billing. Your annual fee covers everything described for your plan on the pricing page, including your domain, hosting, design and unlimited edits by chat.

Payments are processed by a secure, independent third-party payment provider. Your card details go directly to that provider and are never seen or stored by us. For that reason, never send your card number, CVV, PIN, banking password or any other financial account details as a chat message; we will never ask for them there, and pay only through the secure payment link we send you. Prices include VAT where applicable, and we may adjust prices for future years, in which case the new price applies only from your next renewal and we will tell you before you renew.

We will remind you before your year ends. Your plan renews only if you choose to pay for another year. If you do not renew, your site retires: it comes down from the internet and you owe us nothing further. There are no cancellation forms, notice periods or exit fees. Not paying is enough.

7. Your content

The photos, words, logos and other material you send us remain yours. We claim no ownership of your content. So that we can provide the service, you grant us a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free licence to host, store, copy, format, adapt and display your content for the purpose of building, publishing and maintaining your website. This licence lasts for as long as we provide the service to you, plus the reasonable period we need to wind the service down.

You warrant that you have the right to use everything you send us: that the photos are yours or properly licensed to you, that any people shown in them have agreed to appear, and that your content does not infringe anyone else's rights. The Websay platform, its software, designs, templates and brand remain ours, and nothing in these terms transfers any of them to you.

8. Our service standards

We provide the service with reasonable skill and care. We use reasonable efforts to keep your site online at all times, and your plan includes the hosting, maintenance and security updates needed to do that. Planned maintenance and events beyond our reasonable control, such as failures at upstream infrastructure providers, may cause short interruptions, and we work to keep these rare and brief.

We do not promise that the service will be uninterrupted or free of errors, and we do not promise any particular business outcome, such as a position in search results, a number of visitors or an amount of sales. Where something goes wrong on our side, our first response is to fix it.

9. Acceptable use

Websay is for lawful business content. You may not use the service for content or conduct that is unlawful, deceptive, fraudulent, defamatory, obscene, harassing or otherwise harmful, that infringes anyone's intellectual property or privacy, that promotes illegal goods or services, or that attempts to distribute malware. You may not use the service to impersonate or misrepresent another business or person, and you may not use it to send spam or bulk or automated unsolicited messages to anyone.

Because the service runs on the WhatsApp Business Platform, you also may not use your Websay site or the chat to offer or promote goods or services that WhatsApp's Business Messaging Policy or Commerce Policy prohibits. These categories include: illegal drugs and prescription or recreational drugs; firearms, ammunition and other weapons; alcohol and tobacco; endangered species; live animals other than livestock; hazardous materials; human body parts and fluids; medical and healthcare products; real, virtual or counterfeit currency, including initial coin offerings and binary options; real-money gambling; adult products and services; dating services; multi-level marketing; payday loans; debt collection; and bail bonds. We may decline or remove such content even where it would otherwise be lawful, so that the service stays compliant with those policies.

We may decline to publish, or may remove, content that we reasonably believe breaches this section. Where it is reasonable to do so, we will tell you what the problem is and give you the chance to replace the content before or after removal. Repeated or serious breaches may lead to suspension or termination under section 12.

10. Domains

Where your plan includes a domain, we register it for your business as part of the service. Domain names are governed by the rules of the relevant registry and registrar, and those rules apply alongside these terms. Transfers of a domain to another provider, and what happens when a domain expires, are handled according to the applicable registrar's processes, and we will give you reasonable assistance with them.

If your site retires because you choose not to renew, we will not renew the domain on your behalf, and it will follow the registrar's normal expiry process. If you want to keep the domain after leaving the service, tell us before your year ends so a transfer can be arranged in time.

11. Liability and indemnity

To the extent the law allows, our total liability to you arising from or in connection with the service is limited to the fees you paid us in the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim, and we are not liable for indirect or consequential loss, including loss of profits, business or data.

Nothing in these terms excludes or limits any liability that South African law does not permit us to exclude or limit. In particular, nothing in these terms limits any rights you have under the Consumer Protection Act, 2008 where that Act applies to you, and these terms must be read subject to it.

You indemnify us against claims brought by third parties that arise from your content or from your breach of the warranties in section 7, except to the extent the claim was caused by our own conduct.

12. Suspension and termination

You may stop using the service at any time, and you end your plan simply by choosing not to renew it. Nothing extra is owed when you do.

We may suspend or end the service for a material breach of these terms, including a breach of the acceptable use rules in section 9. Where it is reasonable to do so, we will warn you first and give you a fair chance to put the breach right before we act. For serious breaches, such as unlawful content, fraud or unsolicited bulk messaging, we may suspend the service immediately. If your service ends, we take your site offline and handle your information as described in our privacy policy, and you may ask us for a copy of your content within a reasonable period.

13. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms from time to time, for example when the service or the law changes. If a change is material, we will tell you through your chat or by email a reasonable time before it takes effect. The current version always lives at this page with its "last updated" date. If you continue using the service after a change takes effect, the updated terms apply. If you do not agree with a change, you can let your plan lapse at the next renewal.

14. Governing law and disputes

These terms are governed by the laws of the Republic of South Africa. The courts of the Western Cape have jurisdiction over any dispute arising from these terms or the service, and you and we both consent to that jurisdiction.

If something goes wrong, please talk to us first: most problems are solved in the chat within a day. Nothing in this section prevents you from using any dispute resolution process that consumer legislation gives you.

15. Contact

Questions about these terms? Message Websay in your chat or email hello@websay.net. You can also write to Avily Pty Ltd, Block B, Greenford Office Estate, Kenilworth, Cape Town, South Africa. Websay is a product of Avily Pty Ltd.