Terms of Service

Yenko (yenko.africa) is an online platform for event registration, ticketing and fundraising. It is run by Yenko (“we”, “us” or “our”).

These terms are a legal agreement between you and us. They apply when you visit the site, buy or register for a ticket, give to a cause, create an account, start a fundraising page, or list an event or cause. By doing any of these things you agree to them. If you don’t agree, please don’t use Yenko.

Our Refund and cancellation policy forms part of these terms and, if you are an organiser, so does the Organiser agreement below. Our Privacy Policy explains how we handle personal data.

If you use Yenko for a church, charity, business or other organisation, you confirm that you are allowed to accept these terms for it, and “you” includes that organisation.

Organiser

A person or organisation (for example a church, NGO, community group or business) that lists an event or cause on the site.

Event

An in-person, online or hybrid event listed by an organiser, with free or paid tickets.

Cause

A fundraising campaign listed by an organiser, which people can give to.

Buyer and attendee

A buyer is the person who places a ticket order. An attendee is anyone named on, or admitted by, a ticket.

Donor

A person who gives to a cause, once or on a monthly or yearly basis.

Fundraiser page

A page a supporter creates to raise money for an organiser’s cause (peer-to-peer fundraising).

Payment provider

A third-party company that processes payments for us: Paystack, Flutterwave, Safaricom (M-Pesa) and Stripe.

Platform fee

Our fee, charged to organisers as a percentage of the money paid for their tickets and causes (see Our fees).

Content

Anything posted on the site: text, images, event details, cause stories, updates and messages.

Organisers create and run events and causes. We provide the technology that helps them do it: event and cause pages, checkout, tickets and QR check-in, and payment collection through payment providers.

• When you buy a ticket, your contract for the event is with the organiser. The organiser, not Yenko, is responsible for the event taking place as described.
• When you give, you give to the organiser for the cause they describe. Yenko is not the beneficiary of the gift and is not a charity.
• We are not the venue, promoter or organiser of events listed by others, unless a page clearly says that Yenko itself runs that event or cause.

Where we receive money for an organiser, we do so as the organiser’s limited agent for collecting payments. That means that once your payment has been confirmed, you have paid the organiser, and it is up to the organiser to provide the event or use the gift as described.

We review some organisers and give verification badges (see what verification means). We do not check every event or cause, and a badge is not an endorsement or a guarantee.

You must be at least 18 years old, or the age of majority where you live if that is higher, to buy tickets, give, create an account or organise on Yenko.

Yenko is not aimed at children. Someone under 18 may attend an event or benefit from a gift, but a parent or guardian must place the order or make the gift for them and is responsible for accepting these terms. Organisers set any age limits for their events.

You must not use Yenko if the law, including sanctions laws, forbids you from doing so.

Guest checkout

You can buy tickets and give without an account. Your confirmation email contains private links to your order or receipt. Anyone with those links can see the order, so please don’t share them.

Optional account for buyers and donors

You can sign in with a one-time code sent to your email address. Your account brings together the tickets and gifts made with that email address, and lets you manage or stop recurring gifts.

Organiser accounts

Organisers sign in with an email address and password. Organisers can add team members (for example admins, organisers and check-in staff). You are responsible for what your team members do on your account.

Keeping your account safe

• Give us accurate details and keep them up to date.
• Keep your password and your email account secure, and don’t share sign-in codes.
• Tell us straight away at support@yenko.africa if you think someone has used your account without permission.
• You are responsible for activity on your account, unless it happened because of our failure to keep the site secure.

• Prices and details are set by the organiser. Prices are in the event’s own currency. Amounts shown in other currencies are estimates; your bank or payment provider may use its own exchange rate and charge its own fees.
• What you pay. The total shown before you pay is the amount you will be charged. We do not currently add a separate booking fee for buyers. If that changes, any fee will be shown clearly before you pay.
• Your order. Tickets are held for 30 minutes while you pay. Your order is only confirmed when the payment provider confirms your payment to us. We then show your tickets on screen and email them to you, each with its own QR code. If the payment fails or is not confirmed in time, the tickets are released.
• Free registrations are confirmed straight away and are subject to the same rules on entry.
• Group tickets such as a “Family pass for 4” or “Table for 8” admit the number of people stated on the ticket.
• Promo codes are created by organisers, have the conditions the organiser sets, and have no cash value.
• Online events. The joining link is shown on your order page. Please don’t share it with people who haven’t bought a ticket.
• Waitlists. Joining a waitlist for a sold-out event does not guarantee you a ticket.

When an event supports a cause

Some organisers pledge a share of every ticket to one of their causes (“every ticket gives”). That share comes out of the organiser’s ticket income: it is the organiser’s gift, not a donation by you, and the full ticket price is the price of your ticket. If you choose to add your own gift at checkout, that part is a gift by you and Giving to causes applies to it.

When we can cancel an order

We or the organiser may cancel an order and refund it in full if it appears to be fraudulent, was placed in breach of these terms, or was charged at an obviously wrong price because of an error.

A ticket gives you the right to attend the event on the conditions set by the organiser and the venue. The organiser is responsible for running the event as described, safely and lawfully, including the venue, permits, security and accessibility.

• Each QR code can be checked in once. Keep your ticket private: if it is copied or forwarded, someone else may use it first, and the organiser does not have to admit a second person on the same code.
• Entry can be refused. Organisers and venues may refuse entry or ask people to leave, for example for safety reasons, behaviour, age limits, missing ID or venue rules. If this is because of something you did, you may not be entitled to a refund.
• Resale. Tickets are for your own use and the people you buy them for. Don’t resell them for profit or use them in promotions without the organiser’s permission. Organisers may cancel tickets resold against their conditions, where the law allows.
• Changes, postponements and cancellations are the organiser’s responsibility. See our Refund and cancellation policy for what happens to your ticket.
• At the event, your safety, belongings and experience are the responsibility of the organiser and the venue. We are not responsible for what happens at an event, unless it is caused by our own failure.

When you give, your gift goes to the organiser named on the cause page, to be used for the purpose described there. The organiser writes the story, sets the goal and posts updates.

What we don’t guarantee

• That a cause is exactly as described, or that the money will be used as the organiser says.
• That a cause will reach its goal, or what the organiser will do if it doesn’t.
• That a gift is tax-deductible. This depends on the organiser’s status and the law where you pay tax.

Totals and progress bars may include gifts made offline (cash, bank or M-Pesa Paybill) that the organiser has recorded themselves, which we have not checked, and amounts converted between currencies at approximate rates. If you are giving a large amount, it is sensible to get to know the organiser first.

Covering fees, messages and anonymity

• You can choose to add an amount to cover payment fees. It is part of your gift and is shown before you pay.
• Messages and dedications you add may be shown publicly on the cause page, so please don’t include private information.
• If you give anonymously, your name is hidden on the public page. The organiser still sees your name and contact details, so they can thank you and keep records.

Monthly and yearly gifts

If you choose a recurring gift, you authorise the payment provider to charge the same amount at the interval you chose (monthly or yearly) until you stop it. You can stop it at any time from your account or the link in your receipt. Stopping a gift prevents future payments; it does not refund payments already made. The organiser or we may also stop a recurring gift, for example when a cause ends. M-Pesa gifts are one-off only.

Refunds and receipts

Gifts are generally final. Our Refund and cancellation policy explains when a gift can be refunded, for example if it was made by mistake, twice, or without your permission. We send you a payment receipt for every gift. A payment receipt is not a tax receipt: if you need one, ask the organiser.

Fundraiser pages

Supporters can create their own page to raise money for an organiser’s cause. Money given through a fundraiser page goes to the cause’s organiser, not to the person who created the page. If you create one, you must describe the cause truthfully, must not make promises on the organiser’s behalf, and must follow these terms. The organiser or we may hide or remove fundraiser pages.

Payments are processed by third-party payment providers: Paystack, Flutterwave, Safaricom (M-Pesa) and Stripe. The options you see depend on the currency and your country. When you pay, the provider’s own terms and privacy policy also apply to the payment.

• We never see or store your full card number, card security code or M-Pesa PIN.
• A payment is only complete when the provider confirms it. If money has left your account but you haven’t received a confirmation, contact us at support@yenko.africa with your reference and we will check with the provider.
• We and the payment providers may decline or cancel a payment that looks fraudulent or unlawful.

Chargebacks and payment disputes

If there is a problem with an order or gift, please contact the organiser or us first: it is usually the fastest way to sort it out. If you dispute a payment with your bank or card issuer, we may share details of the order or gift, its use and our communications with the payment provider so that the dispute can be decided. Tickets on a disputed order may be cancelled while the dispute is open. Disputing a payment for a ticket or gift you authorised and received, without a valid reason, is a breach of these terms.

For buyers and donors

We do not currently charge buyers or donors a separate fee. The price of a ticket or the amount of a gift is what you pay, plus any amount you choose to add to cover fees.

For organisers

We charge organisers a platform fee on each payment made for their events and causes. Our current standard rates are:

Ticket sales

5% of the amount paid for tickets.

Gifts

3% of the amount given, including gifts added at ticket checkout.

Free tickets and offline gifts

No platform fee on free registrations or on gifts the organiser records offline.

We may agree a different rate with an individual organiser. The rate that applies to you is shown in your organiser dashboard, and the fee on each payment is shown in your reports.

• Payment processing fees charged by the payment provider are paid by the organiser and deducted from the organiser’s share, except for payments through Stripe, where we pay the processing fee out of our platform fee.
• Changes. We may change our fees by telling organisers at least 30 days in advance (by email or in the dashboard). New fees only apply to payments made after the change takes effect.
• Taxes. Our fees may be subject to VAT or similar taxes where the law requires. Organisers are responsible for their own taxes on ticket sales and gifts.

This section applies to you if you create an organiser account or list an event or cause. It applies in addition to the rest of these terms.

11.1 Eligibility and approval

You must be at least 18 and, if you act for an organisation, be authorised to bind it. We may review new organiser accounts before they can publish, and we may refuse an account, an event or a cause at our discretion, for example if we can’t confirm who you are.

11.2 Verification

• We may ask for documents to confirm your identity, your organisation and your payout account, such as a government-issued ID, a registration certificate and proof of your bank or mobile money account. These are kept private and are only seen by our team.
• If the documents support it, we may give you verification badges. Badges reflect the documents we saw at the time. We may remove them if your details change or a concern is raised.
• You must tell us promptly about changes, such as a new payout account or a change in who is responsible for your organisation.
• You must never submit false or altered documents or misrepresent your verification status. If you do, we will close your account and may report it to the authorities.

11.3 Accurate listings

Your events and causes must be real, lawful and described accurately: the date, time and venue, prices and what each ticket includes, age limits and accessibility, your refund policy, and, for causes, who benefits, how the money will be used and who controls it. Keep your pages up to date, and tell buyers and donors promptly about important changes.

11.4 Running your events

You are the organiser of your events and are responsible for them, including:

• delivering the event as described;
• the venue, licences, permits, insurance, health and safety, security, crowd control and accessibility;
• any age restrictions, ID checks and the conditions of entry you set;
• answering questions and complaints from buyers and attendees; and
• setting a clear refund policy on each paid event. It must at least meet our Refund and cancellation policy (for example, a full refund if the event is cancelled) and the law.

11.5 Lawful fundraising

You are responsible for raising and using money lawfully. In particular:

• you must hold any registration, licence or permit you need to raise money from the public where you and your supporters are, for example charity or NGO registration or a public collection permit;
• you are responsible for your own tax obligations, and for issuing any donation or tax receipts. Don’t tell donors a gift is tax-deductible unless it is;
• you must use gifts for the purpose you described, and keep records that show how they were used;
• if you can’t use the money as described (for example, the project is cancelled), you must tell donors promptly and either offer them a refund or clearly explain a closely related purpose the money will be used for. We may require you to offer refunds;
• you must not raise money for someone else without their permission; and
• you must give us evidence of how funds were used if we ask for it, for example after a complaint.

11.6 Personal data of your buyers and donors

You will receive personal data about your buyers, attendees and donors, such as names, email addresses and phone numbers. You are responsible for how you use it, and must comply with the data protection laws that apply to you. In particular you must:

• use it only to run your events and causes, communicate with your attendees and donors about them, and keep proper records;
• send marketing only where the person has agreed to it or the law otherwise allows;
• respect a donor’s choice to give anonymously, and not publish their details;
• keep it secure, not sell it, and delete it when you no longer need it; and
• help us respond if someone asks us about data you hold.

11.7 Fees

You agree to pay our platform fees as described in Our fees. We deduct them from each payment before your share is paid to you.

11.8 Payouts and payout accounts

• With a connected payout account. If you connect a payout account (a Paystack or Flutterwave subaccount, or a Stripe Connect account), the payment provider splits each payment automatically: your share goes to your account and our fee comes to us. Payout timing is set by the provider’s settlement schedule. You must accept the provider’s own terms, and the provider may carry out its own checks and may delay or hold payouts. We do not control this.
• Without a connected payout account. We receive the full payment and pay your share to the account you give us, after deducting our fees, processing fees and any refunds. We will tell you how often we make payouts. We may delay a payout while we complete verification, investigate possible fraud or a high number of complaints, or where refunds or chargebacks are likely, for example before an event has taken place.
• Payout accounts must be in your name or your organisation’s name. We are not responsible for money sent to incorrect details you gave us.
• Your dashboard shows payments, fees, refunds and payouts. Please tell us about any mistake within 60 days of the payment or payout concerned.

11.9 Refunds and chargebacks

• You are responsible for refunds to your buyers and donors: under your refund policy, when you cancel or postpone an event, when an event or cause is not as described, and whenever the law requires.
• You and your team can issue full or partial refunds from your dashboard. We may also issue a refund on your behalf where you haven’t responded within a reasonable time, where the law or a payment provider requires it, or in cases of fraud or cancellation.
• When a payment is refunded, we return our platform fee in proportion to the amount refunded. Payment processing fees are usually not returned by the provider and remain your cost.
• You are responsible for chargebacks and payment disputes on payments for your events and causes, including the disputed amount and any fee the provider charges for the dispute. You must help us respond, for example by providing evidence that the event took place.

11.10 Negative balances

If refunds, chargebacks or reversals are more than the money we are holding for you (for example because the money was already paid out to you), you owe us the difference. We may deduct it from any future payouts to you, ask the payment provider to recover it from your connected account where their terms allow, or ask you to pay it within 14 days. If you don’t pay, we may take steps to recover it, including through the courts.

11.11 Suspension and removal

We may pause ticket sales or giving, hide or remove an event or cause, hold payouts, remove badges, or suspend or close your account if you break these terms, if information you gave us is false, if we receive credible complaints or reports of fraud, if the law or a regulator or payment provider requires it, or to protect buyers, donors or the public. Where appropriate we will tell you why and give you a chance to respond, unless the law or safety reasons prevent it. If we cancel an event because you broke these terms, we may refund buyers from money we hold for you.

11.12 Closing your account

You can ask us to close your organiser account at any time. You remain responsible for tickets already sold, gifts already received, refunds, chargebacks and any negative balance, and we will keep records for as long as the law requires.

11.13 Events and causes that are not allowed

You must not use Yenko for events or causes that:

• are illegal where they take place or where money is raised, or need a licence or permit you don’t have;
• promote hatred, violence, terrorism or discrimination against people, or harass anyone;
• are fake, misleading or fraudulent, or where the money won’t go where you say it will;
• are investment, lending, “money doubling”, pyramid or Ponzi schemes, or offer financial returns to donors;
• involve gambling, lotteries or raffles, unless they are licensed and lawful where they are held;
• sell or promote weapons, drugs, or other goods or services that are illegal or need a licence you don’t have;
• involve sexually explicit content or services;
• raise money for political parties or election candidates, unless we have agreed to it in writing and it is lawful;
• benefit people or organisations that are subject to sanctions; or
• infringe anyone’s intellectual property or privacy.

When using Yenko, you must not:

• break the law, or help anyone else to break it;
• use a payment card or account you are not authorised to use, or use the site to launder money or commit fraud;
• pretend to be someone else, or misrepresent your connection with a person or organisation;
• send spam, or harass or abuse organisers, attendees, donors or our team;
• collect other people’s personal data from the site without permission;
• use bots or automated tools to buy tickets, scrape the site or overload it;
• interfere with the site’s security, test its vulnerabilities without our permission, or upload malicious code;
• copy, reverse engineer or resell the site or its software; or
• ask buyers or donors you found through Yenko to pay you outside the site for tickets or gifts listed on it, in order to avoid our fees.

Your content

You keep ownership of the content you post. You give us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to host, store, copy, adapt (for example resize images), display and share it, to run the site and to promote the site and your events and causes, for example on our home page, in newsletters or on social media. The licence lasts while the content is on the site and for a reasonable time afterwards (for example in backups and promotional material already published).

You confirm that you have the rights to everything you post, including photos of other people, and that it is accurate, lawful and not defamatory. We don’t check all content before it is published, but we may remove content that breaks these terms.

Our content

The site, its design and software, and the Yenko name and logo belong to us or our licensors. You may use the site for its intended purpose, but you may not copy or use our brand without our written permission.

Reporting content

If you think content on Yenko infringes your rights, is unlawful or is misleading, email support@yenko.africa with a link to the page and an explanation. We will review it and may remove it.

You can stop using Yenko at any time. We may suspend or end your access, cancel orders or remove content if you break these terms, if we reasonably suspect fraud or other misuse, or if we must do so by law. Where appropriate we will tell you why.

Sections that by their nature should continue after your use ends (for example on fees owed, refunds, chargebacks, negative balances, intellectual property, liability and indemnity) will continue to apply.

We work hard to keep Yenko running, secure and accurate, but we can’t promise that it will always be available or free of errors. We may need to pause the site for maintenance, and payment providers may occasionally be unavailable. We may change, add or remove features.

Event and cause information is provided by organisers and we can’t guarantee it is accurate. Currency conversions are estimates. To the extent the law allows, the site is provided “as is” and we make no promises about it beyond those in these terms.

What we don’t limit. Nothing in these terms limits or excludes our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that cannot be limited or excluded by law.

If you are a consumer (using Yenko for personal purposes), 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. We are not responsible for loss that was not foreseeable.

Subject to the paragraphs above, and to the extent the law allows:

• we are not responsible for the acts or omissions of organisers, venues, fundraiser page creators or payment providers, for events themselves, or for how organisers use money raised;
• we are not liable to organisers or anyone using Yenko for business purposes for loss of profits, revenue, business, goodwill or data, or for indirect or consequential loss; and
• our total liability to you for all claims relating to Yenko is limited to: for buyers and donors, the amount you paid for the order or gift concerned; and for organisers, the platform fees you paid us in the 12 months before the claim arose.

If you are an organiser or create a fundraiser page, you agree to compensate us (and our staff) for claims, losses, fines, penalties and reasonable costs, including legal costs, that arise from your events or causes, your content, your use of personal data, or your breach of these terms or the law.

If you are a consumer, this section only applies to the extent the law allows and where the loss was caused by your breach of these terms or the law.

If you have a problem with an event, a cause or Yenko itself, email support@yenko.africa with your order or receipt reference. If your complaint is about an event or cause, we will pass it to the organiser and follow it up; you can also contact the organiser directly if you have their details. We will look into it and reply as soon as we can.

You may also have the right to contact a consumer protection authority or regulator in your country. Nothing in these terms stops you from doing so.

These terms, and any dispute about them or about Yenko, are governed by the laws of the country where the operating company is registered. The courts of that country have jurisdiction.

If you are a consumer, you also keep the protection of the mandatory laws of the country where you live, and you may bring a claim in the courts where you live if the law allows.

We may update these terms, for example to reflect changes to the site, our fees or the law. The date at the top of this page shows when they last changed.

If a change is significant, we will tell organisers and account holders by email or on the site at least 30 days before it takes effect, unless we need to make it sooner for legal or security reasons. Changes don’t affect orders or gifts already made. If you keep using Yenko after a change takes effect, the new terms apply. If you don’t agree, you should stop using the site and, if you are an organiser, you may close your account.

• These terms, and the documents they refer to, are the whole agreement between you and us about using Yenko.
• If a court finds part of these terms invalid, the rest still applies.
• If we don’t enforce a right straight away, we can still enforce it later.
• We may transfer our rights and duties under these terms to another organisation, for example if our business is sold, and we will make sure your rights are not reduced. You may not transfer yours without our written agreement.
• We are not responsible for delays or failures caused by events outside our reasonable control, such as power or network failures, strikes, or payment provider outages.
• We may contact you by email at the address you gave us. These terms are written in English, and the English version applies.

Yenko

Email: support@yenko.africa