Terms of Service

1. Who you are contracting with

"Maitre," "we" and "us" mean Jeshwanth Anthony, doing business as HireMaitre, of Arlington, Virginia, United States, a sole proprietorship. We plan to form a limited liability company. When we do, this agreement will be assigned to it under Section 28, and we will email the account address with the notice period in Section 27 before that happens. You will not need to accept these terms again.

Notices to us are effective when sent to team@hiremaitre.com. Notices to you go to your account email.

2. Agreement, definitions and the documents that make up these terms

By creating an account, signing in, accepting these terms during setup or in the dashboard, embedding the widget, connecting a third-party account, or using any part of the service, you agree to these Terms of Service. If you accept for a restaurant or company, you confirm you may bind it, and "you" means that business. If you do not agree, do not use the service.

Your acceptance is recorded with the version of these terms you accepted, the time, and the sign-in method used.

These terms take effect on November 15, 2026 for accounts created before October 16, 2026, which stay under the version effective September 17, 2026 until then, and at sign-up for accounts created on or after October 16, 2026.

"Guests" are people who use the widget on your website. Guests are not parties to these terms; the Guest Terms of Use govern them. "Restaurant content" is the information, menus, images and instructions you provide or connect. "Guest data" is personal information about guests that the service handles for you. "Input" is what is sent to an AI provider; "Output" is what the AI returns. "Square content" is anything we receive from Square.

These terms include the Privacy Policy, the AI Terms, the Data Processing Addendum and the Acceptable Use Policy, and any order form you sign with us. If they conflict, the order form controls, then the Data Processing Addendum for guest data, then these terms, then the AI Terms.

3. The service and its status

Maitre is an AI host for restaurant websites. It answers guests' questions from the restaurant information you provide, can show dish photos, can take pickup orders through Square when you turn ordering on, and can hold a voice conversation when you turn voice on. It also provides an owner dashboard, menu import and editing tools, and the website widget.

The service is a commerce and customer-service assistant for restaurants. It is not designed for companionship, emotional support or open-ended conversation, and it must not be used to make or support decisions about anyone's employment, credit, housing, insurance, education or access to essential services.

The service is offered in a controlled availability program. Features may be added, changed, limited or withdrawn, and the service may contain defects. Do not use it as the only record of important restaurant information.

4. Eligibility and business authority

The service is for restaurant owners and their authorized representatives who are at least 18 years old. You must give accurate registration and restaurant information, keep it current, and not create an account for a restaurant you are not authorized to represent. The service is offered only to restaurants in the United States.

5. Account security

You are responsible for protecting your password, email, trusted devices and multi-factor methods, and for activity through your account. Do not share credentials. Tell us at team@hiremaitre.com if you suspect unauthorized access.

We may require email verification, approval of a new device or multi-factor verification, and may restrict access while account, device, payment or security status cannot be confirmed or activity looks fraudulent.

6. Your responsibilities and merchant of record

You are responsible for the accuracy, completeness, legality and timely review of everything the host can say about your restaurant: menu items, prices, taxes, fees, modifiers, availability, ingredients, allergens, dietary and religious-diet claims, hours, locations, pickup details, policies, links, ordering settings and contact details. Review imported Square, menu, website or Google information, and any custom instructions, before you publish them to guests, and review the conversations the dashboard flags for your attention at least weekly.

You represent that you keep a current written list of the ingredients and the nine major food allergens for each standard menu item. The nine are milk, eggs, fish, crustacean shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat, soybeans and sesame. You will update that information in Square or the dashboard within 24 hours of a menu change. Where a law such as California SB 68 applies to you, you will supply allergen disclosures in the form it requires. You will disclose any mandatory service charge or fee, and its purpose, in your menu data.

You are the merchant of record for every guest order placed through the service. Between you and Maitre, you alone are responsible for food preparation and safety, alcohol rules, fulfillment, pricing, taxes, receipts, refunds, cancellations, chargebacks, guest support, consumer disclosures, and compliance with food, health, consumer protection, accessibility, advertising, payment, privacy and local laws. Maitre is not the seller of your food and is not a party to a guest's order. You must give guests access to your own refund, cancellation and pickup policies.

If you turn on cancellation requests, you answer them. Approving a request in Maitre does not cancel or refund anything in Square: you cancel the order and make any refund in Square yourself, under your own policy. You are responsible for the cancellation policy text you publish, for any refund policy notice the law requires of you as the seller, for answering in time, and for how your staff use the decision links we email them. Maitre shows guests what Square reports and does not cancel orders or issue refunds.

Order alert emails are optional and are a second channel. Keep Square's own order alerts on. You remain responsible for your kitchen, your orders, cancellations and refunds, and we do not promise that an alert arrives, or arrives on time. You may add up to five staff email addresses per location. Add only work addresses of people who have agreed to receive alerts. Each person confirms the address before alerts start and can stop them from any alert. Alerts carry order details such as dishes, pickup time and amount paid, never the guest's name or contact details.

You must have the rights needed for us to host, process and display the content you provide. Do not upload malware, payment card data, regulated health information, confidential third-party information, or unlawful or infringing content.

7. Notices you must keep on your website and in the widget

The widget carries built-in notices. Before a guest's first message, a note under the message box says: "AI, not a person · Recorded by Maitre & OpenAI · Check allergies with staff · Chatting means you accept the Terms and Privacy" After the first message a shorter note stays: "AI can make mistakes · Chats are recorded · Privacy" The pop-up greeting shows "AI, not a person · Recorded by Maitre & OpenAI · Privacy" under its buttons. Where these are not yet switched on for your website, the widget shows that the AI can make mistakes, that allergies and prices must be confirmed with staff, and that chats are recorded, with links to the guest terms and the privacy notice. The host's AI identity also shows in the chat header, the host's name and its opening message.

You may not remove, hide, delay, cover, restyle below legibility or alter those notices or their links, or, where voice is on, the voice-start control and its consent wording.

Recording and privacy laws vary by state, and several require notice or consent from everyone in a conversation. On every page where the widget loads, you will link to a privacy policy that says guest chat and voice conversations are recorded and processed by Maitre and its AI providers as your service providers, and you will give any other notice or consent your location requires. Text you can use is at Privacy Text for Your Website; you remain responsible for your policy.

The host is an AI and is presented as one. You may not configure it to claim to be a person or to deny being an AI when asked.

8. AI limitations and no reliance

AI answers may be incomplete, inaccurate, outdated, unavailable or inconsistent, even when your information is accurate. The AI Terms set out how the AI works and the rules for using it.

Maitre does not guarantee allergy, cross-contact, medical, nutritional, dietary, religious-diet, legal, pricing, availability, accessibility, alcohol or other safety information. The host tells guests to confirm those matters with staff, and you must make trained staff available to do so. The widget must not be relied on for emergencies.

9. Widget domains and acceptable use

By default the widget only runs on the websites you approve, with the chat, ordering and voice settings you choose for each. You may choose an allow-any-website mode after a warning; then copied embed code can run on other websites, while usage and abuse limits still apply.

You will follow the Acceptable Use Policy. Domain checks stop ordinary copied embeds but are not authentication against a custom non-browser client, and abuse controls may occasionally block legitimate traffic.

10. Pre-signup previews, imports and connected accounts

Before or during setup you may use previews: website, PDF or pasted-menu imports, an AI-assisted import that searches the web for your menu, a text or voice preview, and a Square preview connection. These terms and the Privacy Policy apply as soon as you use them.

You confirm you have the right to import what you submit and that you are the restaurant or act for it. Imported material is sent to our AI providers to extract and organize menu information; nothing is shown to guests until you approve it.

11. Square connection

Maitre is an independent developer. Maitre is not affiliated with, endorsed by or an agent of Block, Inc. or Square, and Square is not responsible for the service.

When you connect Square, you authorize Maitre, through Square's sign-in and only with the permissions shown at connection, to read and synchronize your restaurant, location, catalog, menu, modifier and availability information and, where you turn ordering on, to create orders and hosted checkout links for you. The dashboard shows whether the connection is active.

If you disconnect in the dashboard or revoke access in your Square account, Maitre stops accessing your Square account at once and deletes all content obtained from Square, including catalog, location, modifier, order and customer information, from its systems within 24 hours, keeping only billing and dispute records that contain no Square content.

Maitre never uses content received from Square, anonymized or not, to train, fine-tune or otherwise improve any AI model. Maitre never stores, processes or sends card numbers, expiration dates or security codes; Square's hosted checkout handles payment under Square's terms. Ordering is pickup only.

Item, modifier, quantity, availability and price references are checked on our servers against your synchronized catalog before an order or checkout link is created, and Square is authoritative for the final checkout. You are responsible for your Square account standing, item and location setup, acknowledging orders, fulfillment, taxes, refunds, chargebacks and guest support. Turning ordering off hides it from guests but does not cancel orders already placed.

12. Data processing

For guest data, you are the business and controller, and Maitre is your service provider and processor. The Data Processing Addendum governs that processing. In short, Maitre uses guest data only to provide the service to you. It never sells or shares it, and never uses it for its own purposes or to train AI. It keeps it confidential and secure, tells you of a confirmed breach within 72 hours, and helps with guests' requests. It gives you 15 days' notice of new subprocessors and deletes guest data as the Privacy Policy describes.

13. Plans, message allowances and prices

Plan prices, billing intervals and included allowances are those shown in the hosted checkout or your order form when you subscribe, and may change for future purchases under Section 14.

One billable guest message is a public-widget guest request that produces a useful answer for the restaurant. Owner previews count against the account's allowance when the dashboard says so. Requests rejected before the AI runs do not count; a useful answer counts even if the guest leaves; and a provider failure before a useful answer releases the reservation.

Usage is measured by our server records and the billing period, not by a browser counter, clock, cookie or checkout-return page. Allowances reset once per billing period, and unused messages do not roll over unless an order form says so. Attempts to bypass usage accounting are prohibited.

14. Automatic renewal, cancellation and reminders

Paid subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each monthly or annual term, and your payment method is charged the then-current price for your plan at each renewal, until you cancel. Before your first charge, the hosted checkout shows the price, the billing interval, that the subscription renews automatically, and how to cancel; your confirmation there is your express authorization for the recurring charge.

You can cancel at any time in the billing portal linked from the dashboard, which takes no more steps than signing up did. Cancelling stops future renewals; you keep access to the end of the period you paid for. For annual plans, we send a reminder 15 to 45 days before each annual renewal, stating the renewal date, the amount and how to cancel. We give at least 30 days' notice before a price increase takes effect at your next renewal, and you may cancel before then. We keep the record of your renewal consent for 3 years after it is given or 1 year after your subscription ends, whichever is longer.

Stripe processes checkout, payment methods, invoices and the billing portal. Plan changes follow the options shown in the billing flow. A checkout success page is not proof of payment; access depends on Stripe-confirmed status, and an unpaid, failed, cancelled, refunded or disputed subscription may block paid access until it is resolved.

15. Refunds, disputes and billing errors

Subscription fees are non-refundable except as required by applicable law or as stated in these terms. If you are charged in error, charged twice, or charged after a confirmed cancellation, tell us within 30 days at team@hiremaitre.com or through the dashboard support form and we will refund the erroneous charge. If Maitre ends your subscription for a reason other than your breach, we refund prepaid fees for the unused period.

A refund, chargeback or dispute may limit paid access while the payment status is resolved. Refunds and disputes for a guest's restaurant order are yours to handle under your policies and Square's processes.

16. Suspension and termination

We may limit, suspend or end access for nonpayment, fraud, illegal conduct, security threats, abusive automation, misuse of AI, infringement, interference with another restaurant, payment manipulation, bypassing plans or limits, removing required guest notices, or other material breach. Where practical we tell you why and give you a chance to fix it.

Either party may end the subscription at the end of the current term. Maitre may also end it for convenience on 30 days' notice with a pro-rated refund. You may stop using the service, remove the widget, disconnect services or ask for account deletion at any time.

For 30 days after the account ends you may export your restaurant content and conversation history from the dashboard or by asking us; after that, deletion follows the Privacy Policy's retention table.

17. Intellectual property, content license, feedback and copyright complaints

Maitre and its licensors keep all rights in the software, interfaces, prompts, documentation and branding. You keep ownership of your restaurant content, subject to others' rights.

You grant Maitre a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to host, copy, process, transform, index, transmit and display your restaurant content solely to provide, secure, support and debug the service for you, to check the service's quality, and to create aggregate statistics that identify neither you nor any guest. This license does not permit training or fine-tuning any machine-learning model.

If you send feedback or ideas, Maitre may use them without obligation to you. Feedback never includes guest data, which stays under the Data Processing Addendum.

Copyright complaints. If you believe content shown through the service infringes your copyright, email team@hiremaitre.com with:

• your physical or electronic signature;
• a description of the copyrighted work;
• where the material appears (a link or the restaurant's name);
• your name, address, phone and email;
• a statement that you believe in good faith the use is not authorized by the owner, its agent or the law;
• a statement, under penalty of perjury, that your notice is accurate and that you are the owner or authorized to act for the owner.

We will review it and remove or disable material where appropriate.

18. Third-party services and AI providers

Maitre depends on the providers listed on the Subprocessors page and on the websites the widget runs on. Their outages, errors, policy changes or account restrictions may affect Maitre, and their own terms apply to your use of them. You and your guests are bound by the usage policies of our AI providers to the extent they apply to your use; they are linked from that page. You are responsible for complying with the terms of the services you connect.

19. Confidentiality

Each party will protect the other's non-public information with at least reasonable care, use it only to perform under these terms, and disclose it only to personnel and providers bound by similar duties, during these terms and for 3 years after they end. Guest data is governed by the Data Processing Addendum, not this section.

20. Availability and support

We may perform maintenance, change features or providers, set reasonable limits, suspend risky traffic or discontinue features, and the service may be interrupted by maintenance, provider failure, security response or events outside our control. We make no uptime promise during the controlled availability program. This includes order pages, order progress in the widget and order alert emails. Support is described at Support and Availability. If a change materially reduces a paid feature, you may cancel and receive a pro-rated refund of prepaid fees for the unused period.

21. Warranty disclaimer

THE SERVICE AND ALL OUTPUT ARE PROVIDED "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE," WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND. MAITRE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS, IMPLIED OR STATUTORY, INCLUDING MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE AND NON-INFRINGEMENT, AND DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THE SERVICE OR OUTPUT IS ACCURATE, COMPLETE OR ERROR-FREE OR THAT ITS USE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED. OUTPUT IS NOT ADVICE AND IS NOT A REPRESENTATION ABOUT THE SAFETY, INGREDIENTS OR CHARACTERISTICS OF ANY FOOD. MAITRE MAKES NO WARRANTY ABOUT THIRD-PARTY SERVICES, INCLUDING SQUARE, STRIPE AND AI PROVIDERS. RIGHTS THAT CANNOT LEGALLY BE WAIVED ARE UNAFFECTED.

22. Limitation of liability

EXCEPT FOR EXCLUDED CLAIMS, NEITHER PARTY IS LIABLE FOR INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR LOST PROFITS, REVENUE, DATA, GOODWILL OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY. EXCEPT FOR EXCLUDED CLAIMS, EACH PARTY'S TOTAL LIABILITY ARISING OUT OF OR RELATED TO THE SERVICE IS LIMITED TO THE FEES PAID TO MAITRE FOR THE AFFECTED ACCOUNT IN THE 12 MONTHS BEFORE THE EVENT, OR ONE HUNDRED US DOLLARS IF YOU HAVE PAID NO FEES.

EACH PARTY'S TOTAL LIABILITY FOR BREACH OF SECTION 19 (CONFIDENTIALITY) OR OF THE DATA PROCESSING ADDENDUM IS LIMITED TO THREE TIMES THE AMOUNT IN THE PARAGRAPH ABOVE, UNLESS THE BREACH IS AN EXCLUDED CLAIM UNDER (B) BELOW.

"EXCLUDED CLAIMS" MEANS (A) DEATH OR PERSONAL INJURY CAUSED BY A PARTY'S NEGLIGENCE, (B) A PARTY'S FRAUD, WILLFUL MISCONDUCT OR GROSS NEGLIGENCE, (C) A PARTY'S INDEMNIFICATION OBLIGATIONS, (D) YOUR BREACH OF SECTION 6 (YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES), SECTION 7 (NOTICES) OR THE ACCEPTABLE USE POLICY, (E) YOUR FAILURE TO PAY FEES DUE, AND (F) ANY LIABILITY THAT APPLICABLE LAW DOES NOT ALLOW TO BE LIMITED. THESE LIMITS ARE A FUNDAMENTAL BASIS OF THE BARGAIN.

23. Indemnification

You will defend, indemnify and hold harmless Maitre and its owners, employees, contractors and providers against any third-party claim, including claims by guests. This covers the resulting losses, fines and reasonable attorneys' fees, for claims arising from:

• your restaurant content and your menu, allergen, dietary, price or availability information;
• guest orders, fulfillment, food safety and refunds;
• your website, including any failure to give notices or obtain consents required by recording, wiretap, biometric, privacy, or consumer protection laws where the widget runs;
• your instructions to the host, and unauthorized connected accounts;
• your breach of these terms or of law, and infringement by content you provide.

This does not apply to the extent a claim is caused by Maitre's own breach.

Maitre will defend you against any third-party claim that the service software, as provided by Maitre and used under these terms, infringes a United States patent, copyright or trademark or misappropriates a trade secret, and will pay resulting damages and settlements. This does not cover claims arising from your restaurant content, your instructions, Output, Square or other third-party content, combinations with anything not supplied by Maitre, or use after we tell you to stop. Maitre may instead get a license, change the service, or end it and refund prepaid fees.

The party claiming protection will notify the other promptly, let it control the defense with reasonable counsel, and cooperate at its expense. Neither party may settle in a way that admits fault for, or imposes obligations on, the other without its written consent.

24. Governing law, arbitration and class action waiver

These terms and any dispute about them or the service are governed by the laws of the Commonwealth of Virginia and applicable United States federal law, without regard to conflict-of-law rules.

Before starting arbitration, a party must send the other a written notice of the dispute and allow 30 days to resolve it informally. Any dispute that is not resolved will be settled by binding individual arbitration administered by the American Arbitration Association under its AAA Commercial Arbitration Rules and, where 100 or more similar demands are filed, its AAA Mass Arbitration Supplementary Rules, before a single arbitrator seated in Arlington County, Virginia. Hearings may be held by video. The Federal Arbitration Act governs this section. The arbitrator may award any individual relief a court could, and judgment may be entered in any court with jurisdiction. Either party may bring an individual claim in small claims court if it qualifies, or seek an injunction in court to protect intellectual property or stop unauthorized use of the service.

If 100 or more similar demands are filed by claimants represented by the same or coordinated counsel, they will be administered in batches under those supplementary rules, with the same appeal rights for both sides; no decision in one batch binds a claimant in another without that claimant's consent.

YOU AND MAITRE EACH WAIVE THE RIGHT TO A JURY TRIAL AND TO PARTICIPATE IN A CLASS, COLLECTIVE, CONSOLIDATED OR REPRESENTATIVE ACTION. CLAIMS MAY BE BROUGHT ONLY ON AN INDIVIDUAL BASIS.

If the class action waiver is found unenforceable for a claim, that claim proceeds in court and this arbitration agreement does not apply to it. Any claim not subject to arbitration shall be brought exclusively in the Circuit Court of Arlington County, Virginia, or the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, and both parties consent to those courts.

You may opt out of arbitration by emailing team@hiremaitre.com within 30 days after you first accept these terms, stating your account email and that you opt out of arbitration. Opting out does not affect the governing law, venue or class action waiver. Changes to this section do not apply to disputes of which either party gave notice before the change, and any change restarts your 30-day opt-out window.

25. Export controls and sanctions

You may not use or give access to the service in a country embargoed by the United States, or by or for anyone on a United States government list of prohibited or restricted parties, and you confirm you are not on such a list.

26. Events outside our control

Neither party is liable for a delay or failure caused by events beyond its reasonable control, including natural disasters, war, terrorism, labor actions, government action, internet or power failures, and outages of hosting, payment or AI providers, except for payment obligations.

27. Changes to these terms

We may change these terms. For a material change we will email the account address and show a notice in the dashboard that asks you to accept, at least 30 days before the change takes effect, unless the change is needed to comply with law, in which case it takes effect on notice. Changes never apply retroactively. If you do not accept, you may cancel and receive a pro-rated refund of prepaid fees. Every version is listed on the changelog.

28. Notices, assignment and general terms

Notices to Maitre are effective when sent to team@hiremaitre.com; notices to you go to your account email. Maitre may assign these terms, without your consent and without you needing to accept them again, to a company it forms or controls (including the planned limited liability company) or in a merger, acquisition or sale of the business, and will email you before the assignment takes effect. You may not assign them without our written consent.

If any part of these terms is unenforceable, the rest stays in effect. These terms, with the documents in Section 2, are the entire agreement on their subject. A failure to enforce a term is not a waiver. The parties are independent contractors. Sections 6, 12, 15, 16 (the export window and data handling), 17, 19, 21, 22, 23, 24 and 28 survive the end of these terms.

Questions: team@hiremaitre.com. Jeshwanth Anthony, doing business as HireMaitre, Arlington, Virginia, United States.