Terms of service

Who these terms are between

Master Cohost is a trading name of Master Cohost Ltd (company number 17431974), whose registered office is 128 City Road, London EC1V 2NX. "We" and "us" mean that company, and "you" means the property owner who signs up to one of our plans.

Our websites and booking platform are run, and guests' payments are taken, by Tech Equity Property Ltd (company number 15813867), which we call "the platform company". It acts for us in providing the service, and where these terms say we take or hold a payment, it is the platform company that does so.

These terms are for owners. The terms a guest accepts when booking are a separate document, shown on your own booking website, and are between the guest and you.

What we provide

We offer three plans. Each is described on our pricing page, and the description there forms part of your agreement for the plan you choose:

• Direct: your own booking website with card payments and calendar sync. £795 setup, then £39 a month.
• Grow: everything in Direct, plus guest email campaigns and outreach to long-stay bookers. £795 setup, then £149 a month.
• Managed: we run the let for you. 15% of booking revenue, or 10% on stays of 28 nights or more, and a one-off setup fee of £249.

Fees

Direct and Grow have a one-off setup fee and a monthly fee, shown on the pricing page when you join. You pay the setup fee and the first month by card when you start, and each month after that by card through Stripe. We take no booking fee on bookings made on your own website.

Managed has a one-off setup fee of £249 and no monthly fee. The setup fee covers setting up your listings, your pricing and calendar sync, a property inspection, a safety compliance check (alarms, the gas safety certificate, the electrical report and whether a fire risk assessment is in place; anything missing is quoted before any work) and a guidebook. Optional extras (professional photographs, a starter linen and amenity pack, key safes and a doorbell camera, which is fitted outdoors only, with the building's permission, and disclosed to guests) are at the prices on the pricing page, and are provided only when you have agreed to them before any work. The setup fee and any extras are added to your monthly statement and invoiced with it; you may spread them over your first 3 to 6 monthly statements.

On Managed we take our commission on accommodation only (not on cleaning, deposits or damage waivers), at 15%, or 10% on stays of 28 nights or more. Cleaning is passed on at cost, without a margin. Non-urgent repairs above £150 are quoted to you and go ahead only when you agree; urgent repairs for safety or security are made straight away and reported to you the same day.

No VAT is charged: we are not VAT-registered.

We do not charge anything that is not on the pricing page. If we change a price, the new price applies to you only after we have given you 30 days' notice, and you may end the agreement in that time.

Guests' payments and your payouts

Guests pay by card when they book. The platform company, Tech Equity Property Ltd, takes the payment through Stripe, and the platform company's name is the one on the guest's card statement.

To be paid, you connect a Stripe account in your name through Stripe's own sign-up pages. Stripe collects and checks your identity and bank details itself, and Stripe's Connected Account Agreement applies to you as well as these terms. We cannot pay you until Stripe has verified your account.

As each booking is confirmed, we transfer your share to your Stripe account. Stripe pays what has cleared in your Stripe balance to your bank once a week, on Mondays; we set that schedule on your account. Your share is the accommodation charge, less our commission if you are on Managed, plus any non-refundable damage waiver, plus the cleaning charge if you arrange the clean yourself, less your share of the card processing fee Stripe charges on that payment. The fee is shared in proportion to the money that comes to you; we bear it on our own commission and on deposits we hold.

Stripe also charges us for each payout to your Stripe account. We pass on its percentage only, as payout processing: 0.25% of each transfer to your Stripe account (your share of a booking, an amount kept from a deposit and paid to you, a handover, a payment received outside Stripe, or what you keep of a cancelled booking when you had not yet been paid for it), taken off that transfer and shown on your statement beside the card fee. If a booking you have been paid for is later refunded in full, the payout processing taken from that payment is waived: we do not charge it to you, and your statement shows none for it. If it is refunded in part, the payout processing taken stays with us, but never more than you keep from the booking. We bear Stripe's fixed charge per payout and its monthly charge for your account. It is never invoiced to you or recovered from a later payout, a credit we pay you bears none, and neither does any payment we do not make through Stripe. We give you 30 days' notice before it rises.

A refundable damage deposit stays with us until it is returned to the guest or applied to damage; we never ask you to repay a deposit. You receive a monthly statement that lists every booking, and each line shows exactly what was paid to you.

If a guest is refunded, or disputes a payment, the matching part of your share, and any fee Stripe charges us for the dispute, may be taken back from later payouts or recovered from you. Refunds follow the booking terms on your website. We may also refund a guest an amount those terms do not set, for example when something went wrong during a stay; we record why, and your share of that refund is in proportion to your share of the payment. We tell you by email whenever we refund a guest, with what it means for your payout, and every refund is shown on your monthly statement.

We may agree with you an approval threshold for your site and name an approver from the people who sign in to it, other than you or anyone who sees only your statements (refunds to guests come out of your payout, so you do not decide them). Over the threshold, a refund to a guest (counting what that booking has already had back), an amount kept from a guest's deposit for repairs and paid to you, a credit to you (counting that month's credits) or a payment received outside Stripe is made only once the approver approves it, and never by the person who asked for it; until then that month's statement waits. For a cancellation's refund the approver may approve a different amount, which is then shared with you in proportion, or decline it: then nothing of the stay is refunded to the guest and you keep your whole payout for it (a refundable deposit is the guest's and always goes back to them). While approval is on, the approver stays on your site's sign-in list until we name another. Without one, our administrators make them straight away. You can see the setting in your site's admin.

What you are responsible for

You are responsible for your property and for letting it lawfully. In particular, you confirm that:

• You have the right to let the property for short stays, including any permission needed from a landlord, freeholder, mortgage lender or insurer, and any planning or licensing that applies where it is
• The property meets the safety rules for letting, such as gas, electrical and fire safety, working smoke and carbon monoxide alarms, and the right insurance
• What your listings, website and photographs say about the property is accurate, and the photographs are your own or you have the right to use them
• You will pay any tax due on your letting income; we do not give tax advice
• You will tell us promptly about anything that affects a booking, such as damage, a safety problem or a double booking
• If we manage the property for you, it has reliable, high-bandwidth wifi

Your website and your content

Your photographs and wording are yours. You give us permission to use them to build, run and promote your site and our marketing for you, for as long as the agreement lasts. The guest details collected on your site are used to run their bookings and are handled under data protection law; they do not transfer to you when the agreement ends.

A new site starts as a draft that only you and we can see, and is not open to bookings or search engines until we publish it. You can edit your wording, photographs and look yourself in your owner portal; prices, booking terms and policies are changed with us, because they affect what guests have agreed to.

We may remove content that is unlawful, misleading or infringes someone's rights.

Your domain name is yours. If we register one for you, it is transferred to you when the agreement ends.

The website, whether on your domain or the address we give it, is managed by us and built with our own website creation and management tools, which remain ours. It is a service you have as part of your plan for as long as the agreement lasts; it is not transferred to you, because its management tools are built into our platform, so it cannot be taken with you and closes when the agreement ends.

Ending the agreement

There is no fixed term. Either of us can end the agreement by giving 30 days' notice in writing; email is enough.

On Direct or Grow, your plan ends when the 30 days' notice runs out, and nothing is billed after that. If you have already paid for days after it ends, we refund that part of your last monthly payment to you. The setup fee is not refunded.

Bookings already taken are honoured, or handed over to you, and we pay you what you are owed. Your domain, your photographs and your wording go with you; the website itself closes: it stays part of our service and its management tools are built into our platform, so it cannot be taken with you. Guest personal data is not handed over: it is kept only as long as the law requires and is then deleted.

We may suspend or end your plan sooner if you seriously break these terms or if you let the property unlawfully. We will tell you why.

If a Direct or Grow payment goes unpaid, we email you. A plan whose first payment has not been made once your site is live counts as unpaid from the day it went live. If it is still unpaid after 14 days, we email you again with the day your site will stop taking new bookings. If it is still unpaid after 30 days, and at least seven days after that second email, your site stops taking new bookings until it is paid, and in any case once it has been unpaid for 37 days: guests cannot book online, and we send no new long-stay quotes or invoices. Your site stays online, and bookings already made go ahead as normal, with guests' emails, statements and payouts. Online booking starts again as soon as the plan is paid.

Personal data

Our privacy notice explains how we handle the details of owners and prospective owners. Guests' details are collected to run their bookings: Tech Equity Property Ltd and we process them for that while the agreement lasts, and each of us must follow data protection law. They are not handed over when the agreement ends, and we will agree further terms where the law requires them.

Our liability

Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law, including for death or personal injury caused by negligence, or for fraud.

Otherwise, we are not liable for losses that were not a foreseeable result of our breach, nor for lost profit caused by something outside our control, such as a platform, payment provider or utility being unavailable. Our total liability to you in any 12 months is limited to the fees you paid us in the 12 months before the claim (for Managed, the commission and any setup fee and extras we took).

We do not promise a level of bookings or income. Any figure we show is an estimate.

Changes to these terms

If we change these terms in a way that affects you, we will tell you at least 30 days before it applies, and you may end the agreement in that time. The date at the end of this page shows the latest version.

The law, and complaints

These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales, and its courts have jurisdiction. If something is wrong, tell us at info@mastercohost.com and we will try to put it right.