Terms and Conditions

PLEASE READ THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE USING THIS WEBSITE

 

1. INTRODUCTION 

1.1 These terms tell you the rules for using our website https://thisisbud.com (the “Site”), whether as a guest or registered user. Use of the Site includes accessing, browsing or registering to use the Site.

1.2 The Site is operated by Bud Financial Limited. We are a limited liability company registered in England and Wales, number 09651629 and our VAT number is GB 220890817. We have our registered office at Linen Court, Floor 3, 10 East Road, London, England, N1 6AD.

1.3 Bud Financial Limited trades as Bud. In these terms and conditions, reference to “Bud”, “we” or “us” is a reference to Bud Financial Limited.

1.4 We are authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”) under Financial Services Register numbers 793327 and 765768. We are authorised by the FCA to arrange regulated products and services, as well as provide account information services and payment initiation services. The FCA’s address is 12 Endeavour Square, London E20 1JN, and they can be contacted on 0800 111 6768 (freephone) or 0300 500 8082 from the UK. 

1.5 To contact us, please email support@thisisbud.com or write to us at Linen Court, Floor 3, 10 East Road, London, England, N1 6AD.

1.6 By accessing or using the Site through any means, you are agreeing to be bound by these terms and conditions which govern your registration for and use of the Account Services (see paragraph 2.1 below) and the Site (the “Terms & Conditions”). If you do not agree to these Terms & Conditions, you must not use the Site or use the Account Services.

1.7 Our Privacy Notice, available at www.thisisbud.com/privacy, sets out how we process personal data we collect from you (which may be indirectly, for example when we retrieve information from one of your accounts) and how we use cookies. Please read this carefully before using our Site. 

1.8 These Terms & Conditions also contain provisions about what we will and will not accept liability for if you suffer loss in connection with use of the Site.

1.9 We may make changes to the way we operate the Site and the Account Services from time to time. If you do not agree to any changes made to them, you must not use, and must cease using, the Site and the Account Services. 

1.10 These Terms & Conditions are only available in the English language and will not be filed by us. 

 

2. OUR SERVICES

2.1 You may register for an account by following the instructions set out on the Site.

2.2 The registration process allows you to check and amend any errors before registering for an account with us. Please check the information you provide before registering for an account. You are responsible for ensuring that the information you provide is complete and accurate. 

2.3 Your registration for an account is an offer by you to begin using the Account Services. 

2.4 We provide the following products which you may choose to use all or some of:

a) an account aggregation service that combines and displays in one place account balances and transactional information for certain banks, building societies and other payment providers. Our Account Services enable users to organise and manage their finances effectively by giving them access to related tools and services, which help you to make the most out of your money. Based on analysis of your account information, we can also identify where you might be interested in products and services offered by our partners on our marketplace (the “Marketplace”) (see paragraph 3 below). Where this is the case, we will direct you to the Marketplace which will give you the option of visiting our product partners’ websites or mobile applications and finding out more about the products and services. 

b) a rent recognition service whereby the information relating to your tenancy that you share with us by using our account aggregation service will, with your consent, be shared with credit reference agencies, TransUnion International UK Limited, Equifax Ltd and Experian Ltd (the "CRAs"), to add to your credit history. The CRAs may disclose information related to your tenancy to their other customers for the purposes of verifying identity, assessing the risk of giving credit, preventing fraud, tracing debtors, or as otherwise detailed in their CRAIN notices below. The sharing and processing of information related to your tenancy by the CRAs will be based upon your consent. Once shared the CRAs may continue to process information related to your tenancy, even if you revoke your Open Banking consent or stop using Bud's Rent Recognition service.  For more information on how the CRAs use your data, please see: www.transunion.co.uk/crain; https://www.equifax.co.uk/crain and https://www.experian.co.uk/legal/crain/

c) Bud can provide you with access to your credit report and credit score from Equifax Ltd.. Use of the credit score service will result in a monthly "soft search" on your credit report. A soft search has no impact on your credit score or any future credit applications you may make. Please be aware that Equifax Ltd may continue to hold and use your information following any termination of the credit score services. For more information on how Equifax uses your data, please see https://www.equifax.co.uk/crain (individually or together, the "Account Services")

2.5 Note the distinction between: (i) sharing your online details with any third party; and (ii) using your online details on our Site, which is a secure environment. You do not have to proceed with registering with us if you do not feel comfortable to do so, and you may stop the process at any time.

2.6 When you register for our Account Services by creating an account (“Connected Account”), you consent to us collecting information about your account transactions and presenting this to you through the creation of new or modified content to help you understand and manage your financial data. 

2.7 Where we provide Account Services to you, we do not check the accuracy of that information nor whether it is up to date. Accordingly, we make no warranty that our Account Services will be uninterrupted, timely or error-free; or that the information presented (including any category tags applied by Bud) will be accurate or reliable. 

2.8 We make no representation, guarantee or agreement of any kind as to the accuracy of the information generated by our tools or displayed on our Site, nor the functionality of the Site. This means that you should not exclusively rely on such information when making decisions about your finances.

2.9 We do not offer advice about financial products or investments and nothing on the Site constitutes advice. If you are not sure whether a product or service is suitable, which you may discover through the Site, we recommend that you seek advice from a financial advisor. We are independent and support your own decision making. We do not promote any product or sponsored content to you directly in preference of any other service.

2.10 We may use sub-contractors to deliver some or all of the Account Services. We carefully select the sub-contractors that we use and they have agreed to follow our instructions and our data privacy requirements. 

3. THE MARKETPLACE

3.1 The content in the Marketplace part of the Site is provided for general information only. We will not provide any financial advice, appropriateness assessment, or suitability assessment in relation to the products or services offered - we simply introduce you to our partner providers. Please consider taking professional or specialist advice before doing anything on the basis of the information on the Site.

3.2 Nothing in the Site is intended to constitute or contain any investment advice or any offer, invitation, recommendation or solicitation to buy or sell investments in any jurisdiction or to enter into any transaction.

4. REGISTERING FOR, AND USING, THE ACCOUNT SERVICES

4.1 We will provide you with the relevant Account Services, in accordance with these Terms & Conditions.

4.2 By registering or applying for a Connected Account to receive our Account Services via the Site, you agree and confirm: 

  •  all the information you have provided to us and/or the financial institution (where applicable) is accurate and correct and you are the person whose details you have provided;

  • you can enter into a legally binding agreement with us;

  • you will only use the Site for the purposes envisaged by these Terms & Conditions;

  • you have provided a current address, telephone number and e-mail address and will notify us immediately if your contact details change; and

  • you are over 18 years of age.

4.3 To apply or register for the relevant Account Service you will be asked to provide certain personal information for use in analysing your financial data, including your name, date of birth and email address.
 
4.4 We may suspend, withdraw, discontinue or change certain parts of the service made available via the Site without notice provided that it does not materially and adversely affect the overall provision of the Account Services to you.
 
4.5 Your right to access the Site is personal to you.

4.6 When you create a Connected Account, you will be asked to set a password. You agree to keep your password and Connected Account information strictly confidential and you must not disclose them to any third party nor keep them in any form or format that would allow them to be accessed by or on behalf of another person. You agree to protect them in the same way as you would details of your bank account or your bank cards. Any failure to do so will be at your sole risk and expense.
 
4.7 You agree that we are entitled to assume all correspondence, orders, transfers and instructions made by reference to your password and Connected Account are made by you, and that all correspondence and instructions posted by us via your Connected Account have been received by you. You agree to inform us immediately (via the Site or by e-mail) if you know or suspect that your Connected Account or any of your Connect Account information or password has been compromised or are being misused so that we may suspend your account.

4.8 We have the right to disable your Connected Account or password at any time if, in our reasonable opinion, you have failed to comply with any material provisions of these Terms & Conditions.

4.9 You agree to inform us as soon as possible if any information provided by you or contained in your Connected Account changes and/or if you become aware of any errors with respect to your Connected Account and/or if you lose access to your Connected Account for any reason whatsoever.


4.10 The Site is directed to people residing in the United Kingdom. We do not represent that services available on or through the Site is appropriate for use or available in other locations. 


5. CHANGES 

5.1 As our agreement with you has no fixed end date, we need to be able to make changes to these Terms & Conditions or to the services we provide from time to time. We will give you at least two months’ notice of such changes.

5.2 You must choose whether you agree to the new terms and conditions or not. If you do not want to agree to the change, you can cancel your agreement to these Terms & Conditions at any time that you wish by cancelling your Connected Account. Your continued use of the Site following the prior notification of the amended terms and conditions will be understood as your acceptance of the new terms and conditions.

5.3 We can add or remove product partners from the Site at any time.

6. COMMUNICATION 

6.1 You agree that all communications that we may need to send to you may be sent electronically and you agree that Bud has no obligation to send communications in paper form (other than in respect of legal proceedings). We may send to you information and notifications through the Site and/or by email to the email address on your Connected Account. 

6.2 Once registered for a Connected Account, you have the right to receive these Terms and Conditions. We will use all reasonable efforts to ensure that our latest terms and conditions can be accessed via the Site at all material times. If for any reason you have any issues accessing any of our terms, or would like to request a copy of these Terms & Conditions, please email us and submit your request at support@thisisbud.com.

7. FEES

7.1 No fees are payable by you to us for use of the Site as a user in relation to the Account Services. 

7.2 If you use our Site to register with, or use the service of, a third-party provider listed within our service directory (i.e. one of our partners), that partner may pay us a fee for introducing you to them and/or a commission based upon any fees that they charge to you or to another third party in connection with brokered services. In some cases, the fees they earn may relate to the use of their services directly through their own site where you have been introduced to them by us.

7.3 If we receive (or pay) fees or commission for the introduction of business we will act in accordance with all applicable laws.

8. ACCESS TO AND USE OF THE SITE

8.1 We do not guarantee that the Site, or any content on it, will always be available or be uninterrupted. Access to the Site is permitted on a temporary basis and we may need to suspend access to the Site, or any part of it, without notice where we are required to do so by any related amendment, re-enactment, subordinate legislation and regulations ("Applicable Law") or where the Site is unavailable through no fault of our own. 

8.2 We will not be liable to you if, for any reason (other than our negligence, wilful default or fraud), the Site is unavailable at any time or for any period.

8.3 You are responsible for making all arrangements necessary for you to have access to the Site. You are solely responsible for any telecommunication costs that you incur whilst using the Site. 

8.4 Where the Account Services are being accessed from any website or application other than the Site, you agree to comply with both these Terms & Conditions and any terms of use relating to the third party website or application. You agree that you will not access or use the Site except for their intended purpose and will not attempt to:

  • gain unauthorised access to, make unauthorised alterations to, or introduce any kind of malicious code to the Site or Bud by any means;

  • except as permitted by law, reverse engineer or decompile (whether in whole or part) the Site or any software available through the Site;

  • make copies, modify, reproduce, transmit, alter or distribute all or any part of the Site or any material or information contained in them, other than as permitted by law;

  • use the Site for any purpose that is unlawful under any Applicable Law;

  • use the Site to commit any act of fraud;

  • use the Site to simulate communications from us or another service or entity in order to collect identity information, authentication credentials, or other information (‘phishing’); 

  • use the Site to access any Connected Account or Connected Account information in respect of which you do not have authority to do so; or

  • use the Site in any manner that disrupts their operation.

8.5 Failure to comply with any of your obligations under clause 8.4 constitutes a material breach of these Terms & Conditions. 

8.6 You will not disguise or interfere in any way with the IP address of the device you are using to access the Site or otherwise take steps to prevent us from correctly identifying the actual IP address of the device you are using whilst accessing the Site.

8.7 Although we make reasonable efforts to update the information on the Site, we make no representations that the content on the Site is accurate, complete, up to date or free from errors or omissions.

9. OUR MOBILE APPLICATION 

9.1 To improve the App and its functionality, we will ask you to update it from time to time.

9.2 We grant you a limited licence to use this App on the basis of these Terms & Conditions. You may not transfer this licence to any other person. This licence is not exclusive to you. We may withdraw this licence at any time, for example if you or we terminate this Agreement or if the App is discontinued.

10. WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR VIRUSES AND YOU MUST NOT INTRODUCE THEM

10.1 We do not guarantee that the Site will be secure or free from bugs or viruses.

10.2 You are responsible for configuring your information technology, computer programmes and platform in order to access the Site. You should use your own virus protection software. 

10.3 You must not misuse the Site by knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material that is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to the Site, the server on which the Site is stored or any server, computer or database connected to the Site. You must not attack the Site via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of service attack. By breaching this provision, you would commit a criminal offence under the Computer Misuse Act 1990. We may report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and we will co-operate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them. In the event of such a breach, your right to use the Site will cease immediately.

11. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

11.1 Bud is the owner or the licensee of all intellectual property rights in the Site and in the material published on it. These works are protected by copyright laws and all such rights are reserved.

11.2 BUD is a trademark of Bud Financial Limited. Bud Financial Limited is the sole owner of the same. You may not make any unauthorised use of the Bud trademarks and any unauthorised use may result in legal action being taken against you.

11.3 www.thisisbud.com is the uniform resource locator ("URL") of Bud Financial Limited. 

11.4 We own all rights in any price data and related content on the Site. Your registration and use of the Site does not transfer any rights to the content and related intellectual property rights contained in the Site. Except as otherwise permitted by law, you agree not to monitor, use or copy our web pages or any content on the Site including, without limitation, any price data without our prior consent. Any unauthorised use or reproduction may be prosecuted.

11.5 Any data licensed to us from third parties is provided for use on the Site only and may not be used for any commercial purposes without the consent of such third parties.

11.6 You may print off one copy and may download extracts of any page(s) from the Site for your personal use. You must not modify any hard or digital copy of any materials you have printed or downloaded in any way and you must not use illustrations, photographs, video, audio sequences or graphics separately from any accompanying text. Our status (and that of any identified contributors) as the authors of the content on the Site must always be acknowledged. 


12. OUR LIABILITY TO YOU 


12.1 If we fail to comply with these Terms & Conditions, we are responsible for loss or damage you suffer that is a foreseeable result of our breach of these Terms & Conditions or our negligence, but we are not responsible for any loss or damage that is not foreseeable. Loss or damage is foreseeable if it was an obvious consequence of our breach or if it was contemplated by you and us at the time we entered into these Terms & Conditions.

12.2 However, you will be responsible for any losses arising from unauthorised access if we can show that:

  •  you negligently, or intentionally, failed to take all reasonable precautions to keep safe, and prevent fraudulent use of, your mobile device and security information; 
  • you acted fraudulently; or
  • you are aware of the Site being accessed without authority but fail to inform us promptly.

12.3 We will not be liable to you for any loss or damage if another bank, building society, payment provider or one of our product partners is responsible for such loss or damage. 

12.4 We will not be liable for any loss or damage that you may suffer because of any abnormal or unforeseeable circumstances outside our reasonable control which would have been unavoidable despite all efforts to the contrary, for example, delays or failures caused by problems with another system or network, any breakdown or failure of transmission, communication, data processing or computer facilities, mechanical breakdown, an act of state or government, war, riot or terrorism, any act of God, the suspension of any market, postal or other strikes or similar industrial action or any prevention from or hindrance in obtaining any materials, energy or other supplies necessary for the performance of our obligations under these Terms & Conditions.

12.5 We only supply the Site for domestic and private use. You agree not to use the Site, or any content on the Site, for any commercial purposes and we have no liability to you for any loss of profit, loss of business, business interruption or loss of business opportunity. 

12.6 We will have no liability for refusing any application submitted by you to register for use of the Account Services or any other product or service we may provide.

12.7 We do not exclude or limit in any way our liability to you where it would be unlawful to do so. This includes liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence or the negligence of our employees, agents, or subcontractors for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation. 

12.8 We do not exclude or limit our liability for any failure to perform duties that we owe to you under the Payment Services Regulations 2017 or under the rules of the FCA.

12.9 Nothing in these Terms & Conditions affects your statutory rights. Advice about your statutory rights is available from your local Citizens' Advice Bureau or Trading Standards Office. 


13. CONFIDENTIALITY

13.1 Bud and you will keep confidential and will not disclose to any third party any information that is marked or otherwise indicated as being confidential, except information that any of us is bound to disclose under any Applicable Law or by order or request of any regulatory authority or by a court of law, or to our respective professional advisers for the purposes contemplated in these Terms & Conditions, or in our case, where disclosure is necessary to exercise any of our rights or perform any of our obligations under these Terms & Conditions, including providing Account Services.


14. TERMINATION

14.1 We can terminate, restrict or suspend your Connected Account and your contractual agreement with us by notice in writing (which can include email) to you at any time in the event that:

  • you are in material breach of any term of these Terms & Conditions and/or any other agreement with us; and/or
  • we suspect that you have used the Site or the Account Services, or intend to use the Site or the Account Services, for the purpose of an illegal activity; and/or
  • we suspect you have given us false information; and/or
  • we have concerns about the security of the Site; and/or
  • a device is used that we do not recognise or is used in a way it was not designed for (such as 'jail broken' or we detect viruses or malicious software); and/or
  • we are compelled to do so pursuant to any legal or regulatory requirement; and/or
  • the App is withdrawn by the manufacturer of your device operating system or any intermediary; and/or
  • we stop supporting the App on your device or on its operating system; and/or
  • you apply for bankruptcy or become subject of a bankruptcy petition or order.

14.2 We or you can also end our agreement with you for any other reason (or no particular reason) immediately on notice.

14.3 Upon termination of your agreement to these Terms & Conditions for any reason:

  • all rights granted to you under these Terms & Conditions will cease;
  • you must immediately cease all activities under these Terms & Conditions, including your use of the Account Services;
  • the App may be withdrawn and its functionality terminated; and
  • you must stop using the App, delete it from your device and destroy all copies of the App including all components of it in your possession.

14.4 Any of these Terms & Conditions which are expressly or by implication are intended to come into or continue in force on or after termination will remain in full force and effect.

14.5 Termination will not affect any rights, remedies, obligations or liabilities of the parties that have accrued up to the date of termination, including the right to claim damages in respect of any breach of the Terms & Conditions which existed at or before the date of termination or expiry.


15. LINKING

15.1 We may link to other websites which are not within our control.  Once you have left the Site, we cannot be responsible for the content of other websites or for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide on these websites. Please note that these websites have their own privacy policies and website terms and conditions. We do not accept any responsibility or liability for these policies, nor do we endorse the content of these websites. Please check their privacy policies and their website terms and conditions when you visit them and before you submit any personal data to these websites.

15.2 You may link to this Site from another website without our consent in writing if you:

  • link only to the homepage of the Site at https://thisisbud.com;
  • don’t create frames or any other border around the Site;
  • comply with all relevant laws and regulations on the website or platform you are linking from; and
  • don’t imply that we endorse or are associated with your (or any other) website, product or service.

15.3 You may not link to this Site from another website which contains inappropriate or distasteful content which reflects badly on us. You must not establish a link to our website in any website which is not owned by you. 

15.4 If you wish to make use of the content on our website other than as set out in these Terms & Conditions, please contact us at support@thisisbud.com.

15.5 We reserve the right to withdraw linking permission without notice. 


16. UPLOADING CONTENT TO OUR SITE 

16.1 We may allow you and other users to post content to our publicly available areas of our Site, such as our blog. You retain all of your ownership rights in your content but you are required to grant us a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sub-licensable and transferable licence to use, reproduce and create derivative content in whole or in part and in any format through any media channel, including social media.

16.2 You must not post any content that is libellous, defamatory, indecent, obscene, pornographic, harassing or otherwise offensive (in our reasonable opinion). 


17. COMPLAINTS

17.1 We consider a complaint as being defined as an expression of dissatisfaction made by you in relation to any of the services we provide. In the event that you make a complaint, we will make every effort to rectify the problem as soon as practicably possible.  If you have any complaint about this Site or any of the services we provide, you should contact our support team at support@thisisbud.com and we will try and resolve it as soon as possible.  

17.2 If the nature of your complaint relates to the provision of Account Services, we will send you a final response within 15 business days of your complaint. In exceptional circumstances, we will send you a holding reply specifying the deadline by which you will receive our response, being not later than 35 business days from the date of your initial complaint.. If you do not receive our final response or you are unhappy with our final response, you may able to refer the matter to the Financial Ombudsman Service ("FOS"). You can contact the FOS at The Financial Ombudsman Service, Exchange Tower, London, E14 9SR or by calling them on 0800 023 4567.

17.3 If you do refer your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service, this will not affect your right to take legal action.


18. WHICH COUNTRY’S LAWS APPLY TO APPLY DISPUTES?

18.1 These Terms & Conditions, their subject matter and their formation, shall be governed by English law. This means that any dispute (contractual or non-contractual) or claim arising out of or in connection with these Terms & Conditions or will be governed by English law.

18.2 You may bring any dispute which may arise under these Terms & Conditions to - at your discretion - either the competent court of England, or to the competent court of your country of habitual residence if this country of habitual residence is an EU Member State, which courts are - with the exclusion of any other court - competent to settle any of such a dispute. We shall bring any dispute which may arise under these Terms & Conditions to the competent court of your country of habitual residence if this is in an EU Member State or otherwise the competent court of England.

18.3 As a consumer, you will benefit from any mandatory provisions of the law of the country in which you are resident.  Nothing in these Terms & Conditions, including clause 18.1, affects your rights as a consumer to rely on such mandatory provisions of local law.


19. GENERAL

19.1 The provisions of these Terms & Conditions are personal to you and you cannot assign or transfer any of your rights or obligations under them. 

19.2 We can assign or transfer our respective rights and/or obligations under these Terms & Conditions. If we intend to do so, we will give you at least fourteen days’ notice. If you do not wish to continue using the Site following the assignment or transfer, you can cancel your agreement to these Terms & Conditions by cancelling your Connected Account. 

19.3 If any provision of these Terms & Conditions is or becomes illegal, invalid, or unenforceable that will not affect the legality, validity, or enforceability of any other provision of these Terms & Conditions. 

19.4 These Terms & Conditions are made between you and us. No other person shall have any rights to enforce any of its terms except for any person to whom the benefit of these Terms & Conditions is assigned or transferred in accordance with clause 19.2.

19.5 These Terms & Conditions are in English and any communications we send to you will be in English.

19.6 Nothing in these Terms & Conditions affects the liabilities, rights, and obligations of you and the third-party provider under the applicable terms between you and the third-party provider.

19.7 These Terms & Conditions, together with the Privacy Notice, apply however you decide to access the Site.

19.8 If you have any questions about these Terms & Conditions, please contact our support team at support@thisisbud.com.

Updated: August 2022