Terms of Service

These Terms of Service (“Terms”) are an agreement between you and Varanda (“Varanda”, “we”, “us”), the operator of the Varanda marketplace at https://www.joinvaranda.com (legal entity: Varanda (business registration in progress)). By creating an account or using Varanda you agree to these Terms and to our Privacy Policy. If you don't agree, please don't use Varanda.

Varanda is a marketplace. Brands hire creators directly; we provide the platform, hold payments in escrow, and help resolve disputes. We are not the employer, agent or partner of any brand or creator, and creators work as independent contractors.

• You must be at least 18 years old and able to enter a binding contract.
• If you sign up as a brand for a business, you confirm you are authorised to act for that business, and “you” includes it.
• You must not use Varanda if we have suspended or removed you before, or if the law prevents you from doing so.

• Sign up with email and password (and verify your email), an email sign-in link, or Google. One email address = one account.
• Give accurate, current information, including on your profile, and keep it up to date.
• Keep your sign-in details secret. You are responsible for what happens on your account; tell us at hello@joinvaranda.com straight away if you think someone else has access.
• Don't create multiple accounts to get around limits, reviews, strikes or a suspension, and don't sell or transfer your account.
• We may ask you to verify your identity or business (KYC) at any time, for example before payouts or after a dispute.

Brands post briefs, review applications, invite creators, pay for orders and approve content. Brands must describe what they want honestly and lawfully and may not ask creators for anything outside the agreed brief without agreeing a new order.

Creators build a profile and portfolio, apply to briefs with their own price and delivery time, accept invites and deliver content. Creators must only show work they made and have the right to use, and deliver original content that matches the brief.

Varanda admins can verify brands, review identity checks, moderate content and reviews, and handle disputes.

• Open briefs: a brand posts a brief; creators apply with a pitch, price (at least ₦10,000) and delivery time. When the brand accepts an application and pays, an order is created.
• Direct invites: a brand can invite a creator and pays into escrow when sending the invite. If the creator accepts, the order starts. If the creator declines, or doesn't reply within 72 hours (shorter if the brief deadline is sooner, at least 24 hours), the brand gets a full refund. A brand can also withdraw a paid invite before the creator accepts, for a full refund.
• Each order is one creator making the agreed content at the agreed price, under the brief as it stood when the order was paid (including its usage-rights period).
• An order only becomes binding once the brand's payment is confirmed. Before then, the brand can cancel it at no cost.
• Varanda doesn't guarantee that any brief will get applications, that any creator will be hired, or any particular result from content (such as views or sales).

• All payments go through Varanda using Paystack, in Nigerian naira unless we say otherwise. By paying you also accept Paystack's terms.
• The brand pays the creator's price plus a service fee (currently 5% of the price).
• Varanda keeps a commission from the creator's price (currently 10%). The creator receives the rest.
• Example at the current rates: for a ₦50,000 video the brand pays ₦52,500; when the order is approved the creator gets ₦45,000 and Varanda keeps ₦7,500.
• Payment is held in escrow by Varanda until the order is approved (or a dispute is decided). Escrow is a contractual arrangement on the platform; Varanda is not a bank and pays no interest.
• We may change the fee rates. The rates that apply are always shown before you pay, and changes never affect orders that are already paid.
• Each party is responsible for its own taxes. Creators are responsible for declaring their income.

• The creator uploads the finished content to the order by the agreed delivery date.
• The brand can approve it or request one included revision, explaining what to change within the original brief. More changes need the creator's agreement or a new order.
• Auto-approve: if the brand doesn't approve, request a revision or open a dispute within 72 hours of a delivery, the delivery is approved automatically. (Varanda may change this window; the current one is shown on the order.)
• Approval (manual or automatic) releases the escrow: the creator's payout is queued and Varanda keeps its fees. Approval is final, except where a dispute was already open.

• Either party can open a dispute on a paid order before it is approved (for example: not delivered, very late, poor quality, doesn't follow the brief, out-of-scope requests, unresponsive, or being asked to pay or talk outside Varanda). There can be one active dispute per order.
• While a dispute is open the order is paused: no delivery, approval, revision request or auto-approve. Both parties can add statements and evidence. The person who opened it can withdraw it, and the paused time is added back.
• A Varanda admin reviews the brief, the order history, chat, deliveries and evidence, and decides one of: release to the creator; a partial refund to the brand; or a full refund to the brand. How the money is split is explained under Refunds and cancellations.
• The admin's decision is final within the platform and Varanda will move the money accordingly. It does not stop either of you from pursuing your legal rights against the other party outside Varanda, but Varanda will not reopen a decided dispute.
• Admins never decide disputes on orders they are a party to.

• Refunds go back to the brand's original payment method through Paystack. A full refund returns everything the brand paid, including the service fee.
• Partial refunds (disputes only): the admin sets the amount returned to the brand out of what the brand paid. Varanda's service fee and the creator commission are reduced in the same proportion as the amount kept, so the brand gets the matching share of the service fee back, and the creator receives the rest. Example at the current rates: on a ₦50,000 video the brand paid ₦52,500; if the admin refunds ₦26,250 (half), the ₦26,250 kept is split ₦1,250 service fee and ₦2,500 commission to Varanda, and ₦22,500 to the creator.
• Full refunds happen when an invite is declined, expires or is withdrawn before acceptance, or when an admin decides a dispute with a full refund. Partial refunds happen only through a dispute decision.
• Once a creator has accepted an order, a brand can't simply cancel it; if something goes wrong, open a dispute.
• Banks and Paystack decide how long a refund takes to appear (often 5 to 15 working days). If a refund fails, we retry it.
• Approved orders aren't refundable, except where the law requires.

• Creators outside Nigeria can choose USD payouts in their dashboard instead; these are sent manually by the Varanda payment team after approval, to the details you provide, and may take a few working days.
• Add a Nigerian bank account in your dashboard. We confirm the account name with Paystack. The account should be in your own name (or your business's), and we may ask you to prove it.
• After approval, payouts are sent by Paystack transfer. Payouts are subject to identity verification (KYC) and to Paystack's rules, limits and availability. We retry failed payouts.
• We may hold a payout while a dispute, a chargeback, a fraud check or a breach of these Terms is being investigated, and we may deduct amounts refunded to brands by a dispute decision or chargeback.
• You are responsible for giving correct bank details. Varanda isn't responsible for losses caused by wrong details you entered.

Keep everything on Varanda. To protect your money, you must not:

• share or ask for phone numbers, emails, social media handles, messaging apps (such as WhatsApp or Telegram), personal links or similar contact details in chat, pitches, invites, briefs or your profile;
• pay, ask to be paid or offer to pay outside Varanda for work found on Varanda (including bank transfer, mobile money, other apps or crypto), or try to avoid Varanda's fees.

Varanda automatically blocks messages that look like contact or payment details and logs each blocked attempt. Repeated attempts lead to strikes, and we may warn, restrict or suspend accounts (we look closely at 3 or more attempts in 30 days). A suspended account can't sign in or use Varanda.

You also must not:

• post content that is illegal, fraudulent, misleading, defamatory, hateful, harassing, sexually explicit, violent, or that infringes anyone's rights;
• ask for or create content that breaks advertising rules (for example hidden ads or false health claims) or a platform's policies;
• include minors in content without the legally required parental consent, or include anyone without their permission;
• post fake reviews, manipulate ratings, or impersonate anyone;
• scrape, hack, overload or reverse-engineer Varanda, or use bots to access it;
• harass, threaten or discriminate against other users;
• use Varanda for money laundering, fraud or any unlawful purpose.

• The creator keeps ownership (copyright) of the content they make, unless the creator and brand agree otherwise in writing.
• When an order is approved and paid for, the creator grants the brand a worldwide, non-exclusive licence to use, copy, edit, cut, caption and publish the delivered content, including in paid ads, on any platform, for the usage-rights period stated in the brief (30 days, 90 days, 6 months, 1 year or unlimited). Ads already running when the period ends must be stopped within a reasonable time.
• Before approval (or if the order is refunded in full) the brand has no right to use the content.
• After a partial-refund dispute decision, the brand gets the licence only if the decision releases money to the creator.
• The creator may show the content in their Varanda portfolio and personal showreel, unless the brief says the work is confidential.
• The creator confirms the content is original, that they have the rights to any music, footage or people in it (including releases from anyone shown), and that it doesn't infringe anyone's rights. The brand is responsible for how it uses the content and for any claims it makes about its products.

The Varanda name, logo, website and software belong to Varanda. You may not copy or use them without our permission.

You keep ownership of what you upload. You give Varanda a non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to host, store, process and display your content as needed to run the platform (for example showing your portfolio in the directory, delivering content to the brand, and reviewing disputes), and to show public profile content in our own promotion of Varanda. This licence ends when you delete the content or close your account, except for copies we must keep (see the Privacy Policy).

If you believe something on Varanda infringes your rights, email hello@joinvaranda.com with details and we will review and, where appropriate, remove it.

Varanda is provided “as is” and “as available”. We work hard to keep it running, but we don't promise it will be uninterrupted or error-free. We don't check every profile, brief or piece of content and aren't responsible for what users say, make or do.

To the extent the law allows:

• Varanda is not liable for indirect or consequential losses, such as lost profits, revenue, data, reputation or opportunity;
• Varanda's total liability to you for any claim related to an order is limited to the fees Varanda earned on that order, and for any other claim to the fees you paid Varanda in the 12 months before the claim (or ₦50,000 if that is higher);
• nothing in these Terms limits liability for fraud, death or personal injury caused by negligence, or anything else that can't be limited by law, including your rights under the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Act 2018.

You agree to cover Varanda's reasonable losses and costs arising from your breach of these Terms or the law, or from content you provide.

• You can close your account at any time by emailing hello@joinvaranda.com. Open orders and disputes must be finished first, and money owed will still be settled.
• We may suspend or close your account, remove content or hold payouts if you break these Terms, if required by law, or to protect users or Varanda. Where reasonable we will tell you why. If you think we got it wrong, email hello@joinvaranda.com.
• Sections that by their nature should continue (such as fees owed, content licences already granted, liability and governing law) survive after an account closes.

These Terms are governed by the laws of Nigeria. If you have a complaint about Varanda, email hello@joinvaranda.com first and we will try to resolve it within 30 days. If we can't, the courts of Nigeria (Lagos State) have jurisdiction. If you are a consumer living elsewhere, you keep any mandatory rights your local law gives you.

We may update these Terms. The date at the top shows the current version. For significant changes we will give you notice by email or in the app at least 14 days before they apply, unless a change is needed sooner for legal or safety reasons. Orders already paid continue under the Terms in force when they were paid. If you keep using Varanda after a change takes effect, you accept the new Terms.

Questions about these Terms: hello@joinvaranda.com.