Terms of Service

CauseCentral provides self-help software and document-preparation services. We are not a law firm, we are not your attorney, and we do not provide legal advice. No attorney–client relationship is created by using our services. Our staff cannot tell you which choices are right for your situation — they can explain what a form asks for and how our software works.

If you need legal advice, hire a licensed attorney. For situations our service isn't built for — private foundations, complex multi-entity structures, and similar edge cases — we will tell you so and refer you to our partner network of nonprofit attorneys and CPAs rather than guess.

Every document we generate is assembled from attorney-reviewed templates using information you provide and choices you make. You are responsible for reviewing every document before signing or filing it, and for the accuracy and completeness of the information you give us. Generated documents carry self-help disclaimers because that is what they are: self-help materials, prepared at your specific direction.

State filing fees and IRS user fees are set by governments, not by us. We itemize them separately at checkout, pass them through at cost, and never mark them up. Once a government fee has been paid to the relevant agency, it is subject to that agency's rules — we cannot refund money a government has already received.

If you purchase the Accelerate or Complete formation tier, complete the application process through our platform, and the IRS issues a final determination declining your application for recognition of exemption, we will refund our service fee in full.

Plain-English conditions: the information you provided must have been accurate and complete; you must respond to IRS requests for additional information within the deadlines the IRS sets (we'll help you do that); and government fees are excluded, since they were paid to the government. A request from the IRS for more information is not a decline — most applications that get questions still get approved, and we work them with you. The Launch tier is guided self-service and does not carry the approval guarantee.

Operate suite subscriptions renew automatically until you cancel. You can cancel anytime from your account — no phone call required — and cancellation takes effect at the end of your current billing period. We send you a reminder email before every renewal charge, on every subscription, every time. Full details are in our refund & cancellation policy.

Formation-service refunds follow a published schedule based on how far your work has progressed: full refund before document generation begins, 50% after documents are generated, and no refund after a filing has been submitted to a government agency. See the refund policy for the complete terms.

You're responsible for keeping your account credentials secure and for what happens under your account. Use the service only for lawful purposes and only for organizations you are authorized to act for. Don't misrepresent your identity or your organization, attempt to breach our systems, or use the service to prepare filings containing information you know to be false.

We work hard to keep state and IRS rules current — they live in versioned, verified data that we maintain deliberately. But governments change rules, forms, and fees on their own schedules, and processing times (especially IRS determination times) are outside anyone's control. We publish honest timeline estimates rather than guarantees of speed.

Except for the approval guarantee described above, the service is provided "as is." To the fullest extent permitted by law, our total liability for any claim related to the service is limited to the amount you paid us for the service giving rise to the claim. Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law.

How we handle your information — including our commitment to never collect Social Security numbers — is described in our privacy policy.

We may update these terms as the service evolves. When we make a material change, we'll notify you by email before it takes effect. Questions? Write to support@causecentral.org — a person reads it.