Community terms

1. Who These Terms Are With

These terms are between Better Seasons Inc., a Delaware corporation (“Better Seasons”), and the community that accepts them (“the community”). They cover the community’s use of Amenity Reserve at amenityreserve.com and app.amenityreserve.com, and they govern only payments made under Amenity Reserve, not those made under any other Better Seasons product. Better Seasons does not recover an amount owed under these terms from payments under any other Better Seasons product.

A “member” is a person who books through Amenity Reserve for a home or unit on the community’s member list. A member may be an owner, tenant, occupant or guest, and need not be a member of an association. Where these terms say a member pays, is refunded or disputes a payment, they mean the member who made the booking and paid for it. A plan’s member limit counts the homes and units on the member list, not the people who book for them.

A community admin accepts these terms in the setup wizard. We keep a record of the version, the time, the admin’s account, how the admin holds authority to accept (as the owner, or as a teammate), and the community, and of the three statements in section 8.

These terms, the pricing page and the order details shown when the community signs up or changes plan are the whole agreement about fees. The community has not relied on any other statement about Better Seasons’ fees.

2. Plans, Changes and Renewal

Amenity Free. Amenity Free costs nothing for one community with up to 3 amenities and up to 250 members. It takes no card payments: a community on Amenity Free collects no rental fee or deposit by card through Amenity Reserve. Sections 3 to 7 keep applying to card payments made, and deposit holds placed, while the community was on a paid plan, including refunds, disputes and recovery on them; an amount still owed under section 6 is invoiced as that section describes.

Amenity Silver. Amenity Silver is $20 a month per community, or $200 a year. It costs less when the same community also has a paid VendoRFP plan, at the bundle prices shown on the pricing page. When the community’s other VendoRFP plans change, a lower Amenity Silver price applies from the day it is due, and a higher one applies from the next renewal. Amenity Silver holds up to 5 amenities and up to 500 members, and lets the community take rental fees by card under sections 3 to 7.

Amenity Gold. Amenity Gold is $50 a month per community, or $500 a year. Its price does not change with the community’s VendoRFP plans. It has no limit on the number of amenities and holds up to 1,000 members. Beyond those limits it adds these to Amenity Silver.

Card deposits. A security deposit can be held on a member’s card for a booking, under the deposit rules below. Card deposits are not available to apartment communities.

Signed agreements. For each booking a member initials each rule and types a signature, and the signed text is kept with the booking. The community writes the rules and is responsible for them.

Delegated permissions. The community’s owner may give a teammate the power to accept these terms and to manage deposits, payments, the Buildium connection and the team. By giving a teammate a power, the community states that the teammate is authorized to use it for the community, and Better Seasons may rely on that. A teammate who accepts these terms makes the three statements in section 8.

Live Buildium sync. Amenity Reserve connects to Buildium directly, where Amenity Silver imports files only. The community chooses to connect, and Buildium’s own terms govern Buildium’s service. Better Seasons exchanges with Buildium only the data the connection needs.

Lighter Amenity Reserve branding. The community’s name leads on the pages and emails members see.

Deposit rules. A deposit is never charged when a member books. The member saves a card, and a hold for the deposit amount is placed on it the day before the booking starts, or closer to the start for a long stay, and never after it begins. No card deposit is taken for a stay longer than 83 hours. A hold is not a charge. After the booking ends, a community admin either releases the hold or keeps part or all of it, entering the amount and a reason, which the member is emailed. The community sets a release window, and card holds use it up to 48 hours after the booking ends. The community always has at least 24 hours after the end to decide. A hold that nobody decides by the release time, or that is within 6 hours of lapsing, is released automatically. A kept amount settles to the community’s Stripe balance less the payment fee under section 4. Refunds of a kept amount follow section 7.

Amenity Platinum. Amenity Platinum is by arrangement. Its price, term, renewal and features are agreed with Better Seasons and set out in written order details that the community accepts. These terms apply to Amenity Platinum. Where the order details differ from these terms on price, term, renewal or features, the order details control; on everything else, these terms control. No community is required to take it. A community given Amenity Platinum or Amenity Gold without buying it has that plan’s features and follows these terms in the same way, including the acceptance of these terms that card deposits need.

Moving up. A plan bought at checkout starts when its first payment succeeds. A move from Amenity Silver to Amenity Gold takes effect only after the difference for the rest of the current billing period is paid. If that payment fails, the community stays on Amenity Silver and nothing is charged. A community added to a subscription its billing owner already holds starts at once, before its share is paid. That share for the rest of the period is billed pro rata: for Amenity Gold on an invoice issued at once, and for Amenity Silver on the next invoice. An unpaid share is handled as a failed renewal below.

Moving down. A move from Amenity Gold to Amenity Silver takes effect at the end of the current billing period, with no refund or credit for that period. The billing owner can withdraw it before then. The change is made in the last 6 hours before the plan renews, so Amenity Gold features can stop up to 6 hours before the period ends. If the change cannot be made before the renewal, the community keeps Amenity Gold for one more period, the move takes effect at its end, and Better Seasons refunds the difference between the Amenity Gold and Amenity Silver price for that period to the card it was charged to. Nothing the community set up is deleted. From the move on, new bookings take no card deposit, and a booking whose deposit hold has not yet been placed gets none. Better Seasons emails the community’s admins a list of those bookings, and emails each member whose booking will no longer have a deposit hold. A hold already placed is released or kept as usual. New bookings are agreed with one checkbox instead of initials and a signature, and agreements already signed are kept. Permissions given to teammates under Amenity Gold are kept but not used until the community returns to Amenity Gold. Amenities and members above the new plan’s limits stay and can still be booked, but no more can be added until the community is within the limit.

Renewal and cancellation. A paid plan renews automatically each month or each year, as chosen, until the community’s billing owner cancels it under Plan, Manage billing. A year costs 10 months of the monthly price. Better Seasons will email the billing owner at least 30 days before it raises the price of a plan the community holds, and the higher price applies only from the first renewal after that notice. Before a yearly plan renews, Better Seasons emails the billing owner the total, up to 30 days ahead. If a payment for the plan fails, the plan stays in effect while Stripe tries the card again, for up to 14 days. If it is still unpaid after that, the community returns to Amenity Free, and Better Seasons does not charge for the unpaid period. Nothing the community set up is deleted. A deposit hold already placed is released or kept as usual, and no new hold is placed. A cancellation takes effect at the end of the current billing period, with no refund or credit for that period, and the community then moves to Amenity Free. Removing one community from a subscription that covers several works the same way. These terms keep applying to card payments and deposit holds made before a plan changes or ends, including refunds, disputes, kept deposits and recovery on them. An amount the community still owes is recovered by the invoice described in the last paragraph of section 6, or from later member payments if the community returns to a paid plan.

3. Payment Collection

Members pay the community by card through Amenity Reserve, using Stripe. Each payment is a charge on the community’s own Stripe account: the community is the merchant, and the payment settles to the community’s Stripe balance, not to Better Seasons. Better Seasons provides the software that takes the booking and asks Stripe for the payment. From each payment it receives only the payment fee in section 4 and any amount recovered under section 6, which Stripe sends to Better Seasons out of that payment. Stripe pays the community’s balance out to the community’s bank on the schedule set in the community’s Stripe account. Better Seasons never receives, holds or controls a member’s payment, and it does not set, delay or stop the community’s payouts, except where Stripe or the law requires it or to stop suspected fraud on the community’s account; it may stop new charges and holds for the community under these terms. Stripe Payments Company receives each payment as the community’s agent under Stripe’s terms with the community, and a member’s obligation to the community is satisfied when Stripe receives the payment.

4. Payment Fee

For each card payment a member makes to the community through Amenity Reserve, Better Seasons receives a payment fee of 3.2% + 30¢ of the payment, never more than the payment itself. Stripe takes it out of the payment and sends it to Better Seasons, and the rest stays in the community’s Stripe balance. Better Seasons pays Stripe’s processing fee on the payment out of its own funds. The community pays the payment fee; the member pays the price the community set, and the fee is never added on top. A deposit hold that is released pays no fee. A deposit that is kept pays the fee on the amount kept. Better Seasons will give the community at least 30 days’ notice by email before it changes this fee, and a change applies only to payments made after it takes effect. Stripe shows the fee as an “application fee”.

The payment fee is not returned when a member is refunded, including a refund under the community’s cancellation rules and a refund after the community cancels or declines a paid booking. It is returned only when Better Seasons itself sends back a payment that arrived after its booking had already been cancelled, or that duplicated a payment already made for the same booking. A booking request that is declined before the card is charged has no payment fee.

The fee is charged only to a community that has accepted a version of these terms that contains this section, with the fee acknowledgment in section 8.

5. Card Disputes

If a member disputes a card payment with their bank, Better Seasons will prepare and submit a response to Stripe for the community before Stripe’s deadline, at no cost to the community.

While a dispute (not an inquiry) is open, Stripe takes the disputed amount from the community’s Stripe balance. If the dispute is won, Stripe returns it to that balance. If it is lost, the amount stays with the member and the community bears it.

Stripe charges Better Seasons a dispute fee when a dispute is opened, whatever the outcome. If Better Seasons submits a response, the community is responsible for that fee, whether the dispute is won or lost, and Better Seasons recovers it as described in section 6. Better Seasons pays any additional fee Stripe charges for submitting a response. The current amount of Stripe’s dispute fee is shown on the pricing page; Stripe sets it and may change it.

If Better Seasons does not submit a response before Stripe’s deadline, or decides not to contest a dispute, Better Seasons bears both the disputed amount and the dispute fee for that dispute, and the community owes nothing for it. This is the community’s only remedy for a response that was not submitted. If such a dispute is lost, Better Seasons compensates the community for the disputed amount from its own funds. It does so by first reducing any amount the community owes under section 6, then by not taking its payment fee on the community’s later member payments until the rest is made up. Any part not made up within 60 days after the dispute closes, Better Seasons pays by bank transfer to an account the community names.

Refunds and disputes on the community’s payments come out of the community’s Stripe balance. Better Seasons turns on a Stripe setting for the community’s account under which, if that balance cannot cover one, Stripe may debit the bank account the community connected to its Stripe account for the difference, under Stripe’s own terms with the community. Better Seasons itself never charges the community’s card or bank account for a refund, a dispute or an amount under section 6.

6. Recovery from Later Payments

If the community owes Better Seasons a dispute fee under section 5, the community authorizes Better Seasons to recover it from later member payments to the community, until it is paid. Better Seasons does this by adding it to the application fee Stripe sends to Better Seasons out of later member payments, starting with the oldest amount owed. Recovery amounts are taken after the payment fee. From any one payment, Better Seasons recovers at most half of the payment less its payment fee. No interest or other charge is added.

Recovery amounts are repayment of what the community owes and are separate from the payment fee. In the community’s Stripe dashboard, the payment fee and any recovery on a payment appear together as one “application fee”; the Payments tab in Amenity Reserve shows them separately.

If the community closes payments, or receives no member payments for 90 days, while an amount is still owed, Better Seasons may send the community an invoice for the balance. An invoice is not a charge to the community’s card or bank account.

7. Refunds and Amounts Owed

A refund to a member comes out of the community’s Stripe balance. A refund does not reduce an amount the community already owes from a dispute, and does not return the payment fee, including when the community cancels or declines a paid booking. The only exception is when Better Seasons itself sends back a payment that arrived after its booking had already been cancelled, or that duplicated a payment already made for the same booking. If a payment from which Better Seasons recovered an amount is refunded, the refunded share of that recovery is returned to the community and added back to what the community owes, and it is recovered from later payments in the same way.

8. Authority and Governing Documents

The admin who accepts these terms states that they are authorized to accept them for the community, that the community’s governing documents or board rules authorize the rental fees and deposits it sets in Amenity Reserve, and that they understand the payment fee. A teammate who accepts these terms under a power the owner gave them makes the same three statements for the community. The setup wizard asks for all three statements before it records the acceptance. The second reads: “Our governing documents or board rules authorize the rental fees and deposits we set in Amenity Reserve.” The third reads: “I understand that Better Seasons keeps a payment fee of 3.2% + 30¢ from each card payment to our community, that our community, not the member, pays it, and that it is not returned when we refund a member, except a payment Better Seasons itself returns as late or duplicate.” When a teammate accepts under a permission the owner gave, the owner’s grant of that permission is part of the authority the teammate states.

Overnight guest-suite rentals may be subject to hotel occupancy tax. The community is responsible for that tax; ask your accountant.

Apartment communities. If the community is an apartment owner or operator, the admin also states that the community’s leases or a lease addendum authorize the amenity fees and damage holds it sets in Amenity Reserve, and any amount it keeps from a hold. The community is the landlord. It alone is responsible for complying with the landlord-tenant laws that apply to its fees, holds and damage charges, including any limit on total security, any deadline to return or account for an amount held, and any required statement of amounts kept. Better Seasons does not hold deposits and is not the community’s agent for them. Better Seasons may turn off card holds or rental fees for apartment communities in any state. The community will indemnify Better Seasons against claims by its tenants that arise from the fees, holds and damage charges the community sets or keeps.

9. Changes to These Terms and Governing Law

Changes to these terms. Better Seasons may change these terms by giving the community’s admins and billing owner at least 30 days’ notice by email. A change applies from the date in the notice and only to payments, bookings and billing periods after that date. If the community does not agree, it may cancel its paid plan before that date, and Better Seasons will refund the unused part of a yearly plan. A change to the payment fee follows section 4. These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Delaware, without regard to its conflict-of-laws rules.

10. Contact

Questions about these terms: admin@vendorfp.com.