Legal framework
Terms of Use
Draft version. This text describes how the service actually works and serves as a working basis. It must be reviewed by a lawyer before going live, and its final version may differ from this one.
Document in draft versionThese terms are not yet enforceable: the service is not open to the public and the text has not been reviewed by a lawyer. They are published now because it is better to show the framework being built than to let it look final.
1. Purpose
- SaqrBridge is an online service that connects breeders and equipment suppliers with buyers, structures a transaction file, organises verifications carried out by qualified third parties, and keeps a time-stamped record of each party's declarations.
- These terms govern access to the service and its use. They do not govern the sale contract concluded between a seller and a buyer, to which SaqrBridge is not a party.
2. Role of the platform
- SaqrBridge is neither seller, nor buyer, nor agent, nor custodian, nor carrier, nor freight forwarder, nor legal adviser, nor certifying authority.
- It holds no bird, no original document and no funds. It escrows nothing and guarantees no payment.
- No step of a file is validated by SaqrBridge in place of the party who bears legal responsibility for it. The platform records, time-stamps, displays and alerts.
3. Access and registration
- The qualification tools (price index, export compliance assistant, calendar, knowledge centre) are open without an account.
- Publishing a listing, responding to a purchase request, registering a lineage or opening a file requires an approved account: organisation identity, an identified director, and, for any specimen listed in CITES Appendix I, a breeding establishment registered with the CITES Secretariat.
- Every registration request is reviewed. The processing time is announced and any refusal is justified.
4. Declarations and attestations
- Every binding act triggers the display of an attestation text, in an identified version, with a checkbox that is never pre-checked.
- The user remains responsible for the accuracy of what they declare. An inaccurate declaration, a false document or an expired document are the responsibility of whoever submitted it.
- Accepted attestations are retained together with the signatory's identity, the date and time, the IP address, the version of the text and its fingerprint. The version accepted at the time of the act is the one that governs.
5. Verifications and pricing
- Being put in contact carries no charge. The qualification tools are free.
- Documentary verification of a transaction is a paid service. It carries a minimum amount per file, a rate that decreases with the declared value, and a cap per file.
- Where a verification involves a firm or a laboratory, the service is provided to the client by that third party, under its own name and its own responsibility. The order screen displays its name, its scope and the nature of its responsibility before any payment, and the price separates the share going to the platform from the share going to the third party.
- The amounts are not fixed as of the publication date of this draft version.
6. Prohibitions
- The following are prohibited: publishing a bird taken from the wild, presenting a wild-caught bird as captive-bred, submitting a falsified document, impersonating a third party, and encouraging a transaction to be pursued outside the platform in order to avoid traceability.
- An account, a listing or a file may be suspended without notice as soon as a serious doubt exists about a bird's origin or the authenticity of a document. The reason is notified and the decision remains open to challenge.
7. Limitation of liability
- SaqrBridge's liability is limited to the amount of fees actually collected on the file concerned.
- SaqrBridge is responsible for its own service: retention of documents, time-stamping, transmission to the designated third party, and the accuracy of the display of batches, dates and limits.
- It is not responsible for the parties' declarations, the authenticity of submitted documents, performance of the sale contract, transport, payment, or opinions given by firms in their own name.
- No check carried out through the platform establishes the authenticity of a document, the captive origin of a bird, the solvency or good faith of a party, the animal's actual health condition, or the overall legal compliance of a transaction.
8. Data and reporting
- The processing of personal data is described in the privacy policy.
- A reporting form is open to everyone, without an account. Every report is reviewed within the announced time frame and every decision is justified and logged.
9. Amendment and governing law
- Any amendment to these terms results in a new, identified version. Acts carried out under an earlier version remain governed by that version.
- The governing law and competent jurisdiction will be specified when the service opens, consistent with the publisher's country of establishment.