Terms & Conditions

Your agreement with us

By creating an account, or by otherwise accessing or using the Service, you accept these Terms. If you do not accept them, do not use the Service.

Our Privacy Policy explains what information we collect and what we do with it. It forms part of your agreement with us, and you should read it alongside these Terms.

Who may use Perch

To create an account and use the Service, you confirm that:

• you are at least 18 years old;
• you are legally able to enter into a binding contract with us;
• you are not barred from using the Service under the laws of the country or state you are in;
• you live in a country where Perch is available;
• you will verify your identity and age when we ask you to, using your own genuine government-issued identity document, and the details you verify are yours;
• you have never been convicted of a sex offence or a violent crime, and are not required to register as a sex offender with any government body;
• you have not previously had a Perch account removed by us for breaking these Terms; and
• you will comply with these Terms and with all laws that apply to you.

The Service is for people over 18 only. We do not knowingly allow anyone under 18 to hold an account, and we will close any account we believe belongs to a minor. If you believe a minor is using Perch, tell us at hello@perch.dating.

Your account

You may hold one account, and it is personal to you. You may not sell it, rent it, share it, or let anyone else use it, and you may not create an account on someone else’s behalf.

The information you give us must be truthful and must be about you. That includes your first name, your city, your bio, and your photographs, which must be genuine, recent enough to be a fair likeness, and must show you. Impersonating another person, real or invented, is a breach of these Terms.

Before you can be introduced to anyone, we ask you to verify your identity and age. You do this by photographing a government-issued identity document and taking a selfie, which our identity verification provider compares. We use the result to confirm that you are over 18, that the document is genuine, and that the person holding the account is the person in the document. The provider tells us only the result. We never receive or keep your document, your selfie, the name or date of birth on the document, or any face data; the provider deletes them shortly after verification, as our Privacy Policy explains. If you do not verify, or verification fails, you cannot use the Service. A document may be used to verify one account only.

You are responsible for keeping your login details secure and for everything that happens on your account. Tell us straight away if you think someone else has gained access to it.

Closing your account

You may delete your account at any time from within the app, or by writing to us. Deletion removes your profile from the Service and stops further introductions. We handle the underlying data as described in our Privacy Policy, and some records are kept where we are required or permitted to keep them — for example to comply with a legal obligation, to resolve a dispute, or to enforce a suspension.

How introductions are made

Perch is a curated matchmaking service. Rather than an open queue you sort through yourself, we offer a small number of introductions selected by our matching system, using the answers you give during onboarding, the details in your profile, and the feedback you give us about earlier introductions.

You agree that we may use the information you provide in this way, and that feedback you give about a match may inform the introductions we make to you and to other members in future. We do not show your feedback to the person it is about, and we do not attribute it to you when it informs anyone else’s introductions. Because introductions come in small numbers, we use feedback only in ways that other members cannot trace back to you — but you should not include anything in feedback that you would not want repeated.

We may change how the Service works, add features, and remove them. Where a change materially reduces the Service, we will give you notice where we reasonably can.

What you share on Perch

“Your Content” means everything you put into the Service: your profile details, your photographs, your answers to our questions, your messages, and the feedback you give on matches.

You keep what is yours

You continue to own Your Content. To operate the Service, you grant Perch a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, transferable and sublicensable licence to host, store, reproduce, adapt, format and display Your Content, and to make it available to other members in the ways the Service is designed to work. This licence exists so that we can run Perch; it ends when you delete Your Content or close your account, save for two exceptions:

• copies retained in routine backups or in our records where the law requires or permits us to keep them, until they are deleted in the normal course; and
• content that another member has already lawfully received, such as a message you sent to them.

We will not use your photographs in advertising or marketing without asking you first and obtaining your separate consent.

What you promise about Your Content

You confirm that Your Content is yours to share, and that it does not:

• infringe anyone’s copyright, trade mark, privacy, publicity or other rights;
• contain the personal information of another person shared without their agreement;
• break any law; or
• breach the community standards in clause 6.

Feedback about Perch

If you send us suggestions or ideas about the Service itself, we may use them freely and without owing you anything for them.

Community standards

Perch exists for people who are serious about meeting someone. The following are not permitted on the Service, and doing any of them may cost you your account:

• harassing, threatening, intimidating, stalking, defaming or bullying anybody;
• hate speech, or content that attacks or demeans people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, disability, illness, age, sex, gender identity or sexual orientation;
• sexually explicit or pornographic images, nudity, or unsolicited sexual content of any kind;
• content involving minors in any sexual or suggestive way, and any attempt to contact a minor through the Service;
• violence, graphic content, self-harm content, or the promotion of any of these;
• impersonating anyone, misrepresenting your age, or using photographs that are not of you;
• soliciting money, gifts, cryptocurrency, banking details or personal financial information from other members, and any romance-fraud or confidence scheme;
• commercial use of the Service: advertising, promotion, recruitment, escort or prostitution services, multi-level marketing, or spam;
• promoting illegal activity or illegal goods;
• using the Service if you are married or in an exclusive relationship, where you have not been open with the person you are seeing about doing so;
• collecting, scraping, copying or storing other members’ information or photographs, whether by hand or by any automated means;
• sharing anything another member has sent you privately, including photographs and messages, outside the Service without their agreement;
• reverse engineering, decompiling, or attempting to derive the source code of the Service, or interfering with its normal operation, security or infrastructure;
• using bots, automation, or any means other than the interfaces we provide to access the Service; or
• creating a new account after we have removed one of yours.

Safety and your own judgement

We show you this notice when you create your account and again before your first introduction, and we ask you to acknowledge it. Some states require dating services to tell you in a particular way whether they screen members; this clause and that notice are how we do it.

You are solely responsible for your interactions with other members, online and in person. Members are not employees, agents, contractors or representatives of Perch, and we do not supervise or control what they do. Take the ordinary precautions: meet in public the first few times, tell a friend where you are going, arrange your own transport, and leave if you feel uncomfortable. Never send money to someone you have met on Perch, however convincing the reason.

You can block any member at any time, from their profile or from your conversation with them. Blocking is immediate, ends the introduction, and stops them contacting you through the Service; we do not tell them you have done it. You can also report any member to us, with or without blocking them.

If you are in immediate danger, contact your local emergency services first. Reporting to us is not a substitute for contacting the police and, as clause 8 explains, it is not a warning system for other members.

Reporting, suspension and removal

We do not monitor conversations or review every profile, and we are not obliged to. We do review the reports members make, and we keep them, so that a pattern of conduct across several reports is not lost. We act on reports under an internal standard, and we may remove any content, and suspend or terminate any account, where we reasonably believe it breaches these Terms, harms another member, exposes Perch to legal risk, or is otherwise damaging to the community. In serious cases we may act without prior notice, and where a report describes a crime we may pass it to law enforcement.

Reviewing reports is not a promise to warn anyone. We do not tell members that someone has been reported, and you should not take the absence of a warning as an assurance about anybody.

Content that is illegal — including content that sexualises children, threats, harassment, fraud, and intimate images shared without consent — is removed as soon as we become aware of it, the account responsible is suspended or terminated, and we report it to the relevant authorities where the law requires or permits. If you believe we have wrongly removed your content or suspended your account, or that we have failed to act on a report, you can complain to hello@perch.dating and we will review the decision and reply to you.

We may also stop providing the Service to you, with reasonable notice, for other legitimate business reasons. If we terminate your account and you believe we have made a mistake, write to us at hello@perch.dating and we will look at it again.

The parts of these Terms that by their nature should survive the end of your account — including clauses 5, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18 and 20 — continue to apply after it closes.

Your information

To provide the Service we collect and hold the information you give us when you create a profile — your email address, your first name, your city, your bio and your photographs — together with the answers you give during onboarding, the feedback you give on introductions, your messages, and the technical information our systems record when you use the app.

Our Privacy Policy sets out in full what we collect, why, who we share it with, how long we keep it, and the rights you have over it. By using the Service you agree that we may handle your information as described there.

Your first name, city, bio and photographs are shown to other members as part of your profile. Your email address is not. Please treat anything you put in your profile as information you are content to be seen.

Perch is free to use

Perch does not currently charge for the Service and there are no in-app purchases. If we introduce paid features, we will publish additional terms covering price, billing, renewal, cancellation and refunds, and we will not charge you anything without your clear agreement first.

Our intellectual property

The Service, and everything in it other than Your Content and other members’ content — the software, the matching system, the text, the design, the Perch name, the Perch logo and our other marks — belongs to Perch or to our licensors, and is protected by intellectual property law.

We grant you a personal, limited, revocable, non-exclusive and non-transferable licence to install and use the app on a device you own or control, and to use the Service for your own personal, non-commercial purpose, in accordance with these Terms. We reserve every right not expressly granted here. You may not use the Perch name or logo without our written permission.

Apple and Google

If you downloaded the app from the Apple App Store or Google Play, you are also bound by that store’s own terms, and the following applies.

Apple App Store

• These Terms are between you and Perch alone, not with Apple, and Perch is solely responsible for the app and its content.
• Apple has no obligation to provide any maintenance or support for the app.
• If the app fails to conform to any applicable warranty, you may notify Apple and Apple will refund any purchase price you paid for it. To the maximum extent permitted by law, Apple has no other warranty obligation of any kind in relation to the app.
• Perch, not Apple, is responsible for addressing any claim by you or a third party relating to the app, including product liability claims, any claim that the app fails to conform to a legal or regulatory requirement, and claims under consumer protection or similar law.
• Perch, not Apple, is responsible for the investigation, defence, settlement and discharge of any third-party claim that the app infringes that party’s intellectual property rights.
• You confirm that you are not located in a country subject to a US Government embargo or designated as a “terrorist supporting” country, and that you are not listed on any US Government list of prohibited or restricted parties.
• Apple and its subsidiaries are third-party beneficiaries of these Terms and, on your acceptance of them, will have the right to enforce them against you.

Google Play

If you downloaded the app from Google Play, the Google Play Terms of Service also apply to your use of it. Google is not a party to these Terms and is not responsible for the app or its content; Perch is.

Other services we rely on

The Service may link to or make use of services operated by other companies. We are not responsible for those services or their content, and your use of them is governed by their own terms.

Copyright complaints

If you believe material on the Service infringes your copyright, send a notice under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to our designated agent at hello@perch.dating, or by post to Copyright Agent, Perch Dating, LLC, 117 S Lexington Street, Ste 100, Harrisonville, MO 64701. Your notice must include the elements required by 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3): your signature, identification of the work, identification of the material you say infringes it and where it is on the Service, your contact details, a statement that you believe in good faith that the use is not authorised, and a statement, made under penalty of perjury, that your notice is accurate and that you are authorised to act for the copyright owner.

We remove infringing material and terminate the accounts of repeat infringers.

Disclaimers

To the fullest extent permitted by law, the Service is provided “as is” and “as available”, without warranty of any kind, whether express, implied or statutory. Perch disclaims all implied warranties, including those of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title and non-infringement.

We do not warrant that the Service will be uninterrupted, secure or error-free, that defects will be corrected, or that the Service is free of harmful components. We make no warranty about the conduct of any member, about the accuracy of anything a member tells you, or about the outcome of any introduction or meeting.

Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion of certain warranties, so parts of this clause may not apply to you.

Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, Perch and its officers, directors, employees and agents will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, punitive or exemplary damages, or for any loss of profits, goodwill, data or other intangible losses, arising out of or connected with your use of the Service or these Terms — including any loss or harm arising from the conduct of another member, whether online or in person, and whether or not we introduced you to that member.

To the fullest extent permitted by law, our total liability to you for all claims arising out of or connected with these Terms, the Service, or any introduction, meeting or communication that results from them, will not exceed one hundred US dollars (US$100).

These limits apply whatever the legal theory — contract, tort, negligence, strict liability or otherwise — and even if we have been told that such damages are possible. Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits liability that cannot lawfully be excluded or limited, including for fraud, for gross negligence or wilful misconduct, or for death or personal injury caused by our negligence where the law does not permit that to be limited. Some jurisdictions do not allow the limits above, so parts of this clause may not apply to you.

If you live in the United Kingdom or the European Economic Area, the following applies instead of the two limits above. We are responsible for loss or damage you suffer that is a foreseeable result of our breaking these Terms or failing to use reasonable care and skill, but not for loss that was not foreseeable, for business losses, or for loss caused by another member rather than by us. Nothing in these Terms limits or excludes our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, or for anything else that cannot be limited or excluded under the law of your country. Our liability for all other loss is limited to £100 or its equivalent in your currency.

Indemnification

You agree to indemnify and hold harmless Perch and its officers, directors, employees and agents from any claim, demand, loss, liability or expense (including reasonable legal fees) brought by a third party and arising out of Your Content, your use of the Service, your breach of these Terms, or your dealings with any other member.

This indemnity does not apply to any claim you bring, or that is brought on your behalf, for injury or loss you have suffered, and it does not cover anything caused by Perch’s own negligence or misconduct.

Disputes and arbitration

This clause applies only if you live in the United States. If you live anywhere else, it does not apply to you, and disputes are dealt with under clause 18.

Talk to us first

If you have a problem, write to us at hello@perch.dating setting out what happened and what you would like us to do. Most things are resolved this way. Neither of us may begin arbitration until 60 days after that notice is sent.

Agreement to arbitrate

If we cannot resolve it, you and Perch agree that any dispute arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Service will be settled by final and binding arbitration, administered by the American Arbitration Association under its Consumer Arbitration Rules. The Federal Arbitration Act governs this clause. Arbitration takes place before a single arbitrator, and the arbitrator’s decision may be entered as a judgment in any court of competent jurisdiction.

Arbitration will take place in the county where you live, or by video or telephone if you prefer. Perch will pay all AAA filing, administrative and arbitrator fees beyond an amount equal to the fee for filing a claim in your local court. The arbitrator decides all questions about the scope and enforceability of this clause, except that a court decides whether the class action waiver below is enforceable. If 25 or more demands raising similar issues are filed by or with the help of the same law firm within 90 days, they will be handled in batches of up to 50, with one arbitrator and one set of fees per batch.

Class action waiver

You and Perch agree that each may bring claims against the other only in an individual capacity, and not as a plaintiff or class member in any class, consolidated or representative proceeding. The arbitrator may not consolidate more than one person’s claims and may not preside over any form of class proceeding.

If a court decides that this class action waiver cannot be enforced as to a particular claim, that claim will be heard in court under clause 18, and the rest of this clause continues to apply to everything else.

What is not covered

Either of us may bring an individual claim in small claims court instead, if it qualifies. Either of us may also ask a court for an injunction or other equitable relief to protect intellectual property rights or to stop unauthorised access to the Service. Claims that cannot lawfully be arbitrated are also excluded. Those proceedings belong in the courts of the State of Missouri, and you and Perch consent to their jurisdiction.

Sexual assault and sexual harassment. If your dispute involves a claim of sexual assault or sexual harassment, you may choose to bring it in court instead of arbitration, individually or as part of a class or collective action, as federal law provides. Nothing in this clause limits that choice.

Opting out

You may opt out of this arbitration clause. Send written notice within 30 days of the date you first accepted these Terms, stating your name, the email address on your account, and that you are opting out of arbitration, to Perch Dating, LLC, 117 S Lexington Street, Ste 100, Harrisonville, MO 64701, or to hello@perch.dating. Opting out does not affect any other part of these Terms, and it will not be held against you in any way.

Time limit

If you live in the United States, any claim arising out of the Service must be brought within one year of the events giving rise to it, or it is permanently barred, unless the law of your state does not permit such a limit. This time limit does not apply to claims for personal injury or death, or to any claim covered by the sexual assault and sexual harassment paragraph above.

Governing law

If you live in the United States

These Terms, and any dispute arising out of them or the Service, are governed by the laws of the State of Missouri, without regard to its conflict of laws rules, except that the Federal Arbitration Act governs clause 17. Where clause 17 does not apply to a dispute, it will be heard in the state or federal courts located in the State of Missouri, and you and Perch each consent to the jurisdiction of those courts.

If you live in the United Kingdom

These Terms, and any dispute arising out of them or the Service, are governed by the laws of England and Wales. You may bring proceedings in the courts of England and Wales or, if you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland, in the courts there. Nothing in these Terms affects your rights under the Consumer Rights Act 2015 or any other law that protects you as a consumer and cannot be excluded by agreement.

If you live anywhere else

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Missouri, and disputes will be heard in the state or federal courts located there. This does not deprive you of the protection of any mandatory consumer law of the country where you live, or of any right to bring proceedings in your own country that cannot be excluded by agreement.

Changes to these terms

We may change these Terms where we have a good reason to: because the Service has changed, because the law or the app stores require it, or to make them clearer or safer. When we make a material change, we will update the date at the top of this page and give you at least 30 days’ notice in the app or by email before the change takes effect, unless the law requires us to act sooner.

If you continue to use the Service after a change takes effect, you accept the revised Terms. If you do not accept them, you may close your account at any time before then, at no cost.

General

These Terms, together with the Privacy Policy, are the entire agreement between you and Perch about the Service, and replace anything said or written before about it.

If any part of these Terms is held to be unenforceable, that part is severed and the rest continues in force. If we do not enforce a right straight away, we have not given it up.

You may not assign or transfer these Terms. We may assign them to an affiliate, or in connection with a merger, acquisition or sale of assets.

We may send you notices by email to the address on your account, or through the app. You should send notices to us at the address in clause 22.

Nothing in these Terms creates a partnership, joint venture, employment or agency relationship between you and Perch. Other members are not our employees, agents, contractors or representatives, and nothing they say or do is said or done on our behalf.

Notice for California residents

Under California Civil Code § 1789.3, California residents are entitled to the following notice: the Complaint Assistance Unit of the Division of Consumer Services of the California Department of Consumer Affairs may be contacted in writing at 1625 North Market Blvd., Suite N 112, Sacramento, CA 95834, or by telephone at (800) 952-5210.

Contact

Questions about these Terms, and legal notices, should go to:

Perch Dating, LLC
117 S Lexington Street, Ste 100
Harrisonville, MO 64701
hello@perch.dating