Terms of Service

Pal (operated at pal.com.ng) is a campus food marketplace based in Nigeria. We connect three kinds of people: customers who want food, vendors — the independent campus kitchens that cook it — and riders who carry it. Pal provides the ordering system, the delivery coordination, the payment processing and the receipt-confirmation system. The food itself is cooked and sold by the vendors, not by Pal.

In these terms, "Pal", "we", "us" and "our" mean the Pal marketplace, and "you" means anyone who uses it — guest, account holder, vendor or rider. By creating an account, placing an order, selling on, delivering through, or otherwise using Pal, you agree to these terms. If you do not agree, please do not use the service.

We may update these terms as the service grows. The effective date at the top always shows the current version, and material changes are announced in the app before they take effect. If you keep using Pal after a change, you accept the updated terms.

• Account — a registered Pal profile (name, phone, email, password). Unlocks saved addresses, favourites, wallet credit, referral rewards and loyalty history.
• Guest — someone who orders without an account. A phone number is all Pal needs to place, track and confirm a guest order.
• Vendor — an independent kitchen business that sells its menu on Pal. Vendors accept or decline orders, cook the food, and hand it over.
• Rider — a delivery agent who picks orders up from vendors and delivers them to customers inside the campus delivery zones.
• Order — a request for food placed through Pal. A Delivery Order is carried to a hostel or campus address; a Pickup Order is collected by the customer at the vendor's counter.
• Receipt Code — the 6-digit one-time code that completes an order. It is shown on the customer's tracking page, emailed to them, and sent by push notification. The rider (for delivery) or vendor (for pickup) must verify it — or the customer taps "I've received this order" themselves.
• Wallet — the balance on a registered account that can be spent on Pal orders. Refunds for certain orders land here.
• Credits — promo credits and referral rewards added to your wallet. They are spendable on Pal but have no cash value.
• Group Buy — a shared cart that friends fill together using a room code; the room's host checks out for the whole cart in one payment.
• Platform — the Pal app and website, including the marketplace, tracking pages, vendor boards, rider tools, notifications, emails and WhatsApp groups we link from the app.

You can use Pal in two ways. As a guest, you check out with just a name and phone number — everything (tracking, receipt codes, email receipts) works from your phone number. Or you can create anaccount, which additionally gives you saved addresses and address history, favourites, wallet credit, referral rewards and push notifications.

• You must be at least 13 years old to use Pal. If you are under 18, use Pal with the involvement of a parent or guardian — a guardian can be the account holder or the payer.
• One account per person, and your details must be accurate. Your phone number is your identity on Pal: receipt codes, security alerts and support callbacks go there, so keep access to the phone you register or order with.
• Keep your account secure. You are responsible for activity under your account and your phone number. If you suspect someone else can place or confirm orders as you, contact support immediately.
• Using the same phone number across roles is allowed — you can be a customer today and apply to be a rider or vendor tomorrow. The roles are separate: rider and vendor duties, payouts and rules apply only to the role, never mixed with your customer activity.

Menus, prices, portion sizes and preparation times on Pal are set by each vendor. Pal displays what vendors publish and holds them to it, but the vendor is responsible for the accuracy of their menu, photos and promises.

When you place an order, the vendor sees it and either accepts or declines it. Until they accept, nothing is locked:

• Before acceptance: you can cancel the order yourself at any time from the tracking page, instantly and at no charge.
• After acceptance: the price you were shown is locked — the vendor cannot add charges later. You can still cancel, but only while the kitchen is within its preparation promise; once a rider is already out with your food, cancellation would strand them, so the tracking page routes you to Pal support instead.
• Missed prep promise: if the kitchen blows past its preparation promise, the cancel window re-opens — you can cancel yourself and be refunded (see Refunds and wallet credit).
• Vendor cancels: if a vendor cancels an accepted order for any reason, you always get a full refund.
• Substitutions: vendors should not swap items without asking. If something you ordered runs out after acceptance, the vendor should contact you through the order before substituting or cancelling the affected items.

Every order on Pal completes the same honest way: you confirm you received the food. No vendor, rider — or Pal itself — can mark your order delivered on your behalf. There are exactly two ways an order completes:

• The receipt code. Your order generates a 6-digit code. For a delivery, the rider asks you for the code at your door; for a pickup, the vendor asks for it at the counter. The code is emailed to you, shown on your tracking page, and sent by push notification, so you never have to share it if you would rather not.
• The self-confirm. From the tracking page or the confirmation pop-up, you can tap "I've received this order" — the order completes without anyone asking you for a code.

The code system has guard-rails so a handover can never be faked silently: a code can only be re-sent after a 60-second cooldown and at most 3 times per order, and a rider or vendor who enters wrong codes gets at most 8 attempts before the order locks for support review.

If you are not reachable

If a rider or vendor cannot reach you, coordinate through the tracking page — your phone number is shared with them for exactly this. If an order cannot be confirmed after repeated attempts, Pal support reviews it and may complete or refund it case by case. Food that was prepared and delivered but could not be handed over is rarely refundable in full; food never prepared or never dispatched is.

Delivery zones

Pal delivers to the campus hostels we serve — currently the girls' hostels (Paetos Mega, New Paetos, Old Kelson, New Kelson, CICL and Stanzel) and the boys' hostels (Hostel S and Hostel R). Pickup orders are collected at the vendor's own counter. The zone list evolves with the campus — the checkout page always shows what is deliverable to your address.

All prices on Pal are in whole Naira (₦). What you pay at checkout is the vendor's menu price for your items, plus the delivery fee for your zone (delivery orders only), minus any promo or wallet credit you apply. Pal caps delivery fees by zone; the exact fee for your address is always shown before you pay.

You can pay in two ways:

• Card or bank transfer — processed by our payment processor, Kora Pay. Your card details are entered into and held by Kora Pay under its bank-grade security rules. Pal never sees or stores your card number.
• Payment on delivery — the charge is taken online (card or bank transfer) when your food arrives, or at pickup for collection orders. No physical cash changes hands: payment on delivery is available for personal orders but not for group-buy checkouts, which are paid online in full by the host.

Promotions (discounts, free delivery, bonus credits) are offered by Pal or by vendors and are always shown applied at checkout. Promos cannot be exchanged for cash and may have conditions — a minimum order, a specific vendor, or an expiry — displayed with the promo.

Money should follow the order. If an order is cancelled, rejected, or not fulfilled, this is what happens to what you paid:

• Failed or stuck online payments are retried or reversed automatically — you are never charged for an order that did not exist.
• Refunds on cancelled or unfulfilled orders go back to your original payment method (card or bank transfer) through the processor — typically 3 to 7 business days, depending on your bank.
• Refunds to registered accounts can land in your Pal wallet instead — instantly — where the refund flow supports it (for example, deadline cancels). Wallet credit is spendable on any Pal order immediately.
• Payment on delivery refunds — where the charge at the door failed or was never taken — are issued as wallet credit, or handled by support where no account matches.

Wallet balance, promo credits and referral rewards have no cash value: they are spendable on Pal orders only, cannot be withdrawn as cash or transferred to another person, and expire if your account is closed. We may adjust or remove credits that were issued in error or obtained through abuse.

Problems with a refund — or an order that arrived wrong, late or not at all — go through the in-app support tickets (an admin calls you back) or [email protected]. Refund decisions are made case by case, looking at the order timeline.

A group buy lets friends build one cart together: one person opens a room, shares the room code, and everyone adds their items (each labelled with who they are for). When the room is closed, the host checks out the whole cart as one order — one payment, one delivery or pickup.

• The host is the customer of record: payment, receipt codes, refunds and support all run through them. Participants settle up with the host however they like — Pal is not a party to that.
• Group checkouts are paid online by the host; payment on delivery is not available for group orders.
• Room codes are for people you actually know. Anyone with the code can add items to the cart and see the room — do not post it in public channels.
• Participants must add items honestly (their own name, their own appetite). Fake or junk entries in a room are the host's problem to remove before checkout — after checkout, the order is the host's as placed.

Pal runs reward features on top of orders. They are perks, not obligations, and they have rules:

• Referrals — reward you for bringing genuine new users to Pal. Referrals require a registered account (we need somewhere to credit the reward); the person you refer must be a real new user who completes a real order.
• Promotions — occasional credits, discounts or free delivery offered by Pal or by vendors.

Anti-farming: rewards exist to thank genuine orders and genuine invitations, not to be harvested. Referring yourself, cycling phone numbers, ordering in circles, or any other scheme to manufacture rewards is abuse. We reverse farmed credits and may suspend the accounts involved.

Vendors on Pal are independent businesses, not employees or agents of Pal. You set your menu, your prices, your preparation promises and your hours; you cook, pack and hand over the food. With that independence comes responsibility:

• Food safety and hygiene are entirely the vendor's duty — sourcing, storage, cooking temperatures, packaging and handover. Pal never touches the food.
• Menu honesty: photos, descriptions, portion sizes and allergen information must describe what you actually serve. Your preparation promise is on record — customers can cancel past it — so quote times you can keep.
• Your Pal page and slug must represent your own kitchen honestly. Impersonating another business, or claiming a name, slug or branding you are not entitled to, is grounds for immediate suspension.
• Payouts: Pal collects customer payments, deducts its service fee, and pays out your balance on the published payout schedule. Withdrawal history is available to you in the vendor tools.
• Compliance: you are responsible for the licences, registrations and tax obligations that apply to your kitchen business.

You own your menu content — photos, descriptions, prices. By publishing a menu on Pal you grant Pal a licence to display it inside the platform while you sell through it. Pal owns the platform itself: the software, the brand, the marketplace design.

Vendors get a WhatsApp group for coordination with Pal, and customers get one for their favourite kitchens. Conduct in those groups is subject to the same standards as the platform — the prohibited conduct section applies.

Riders are the hands of the marketplace. You pick orders up from vendors and deliver them inside the campus zones. The rules are short and strict:

• Verify every handover. An order is only delivered when the customer gives you the 6-digit receipt code, or confirms from their own phone. Entering a code without the customer reading it to you — or guessing codes — is the most serious violation a rider can commit. You get 8 attempts; misuse them and the order locks for support review.
• Care of the food: carry orders sealed and protected, hand them over promptly, and never open a customer's package.
• Campus conduct: respect hostel rules (especially in girls' hostels, where delivery is to the gate or agreed point), treat customers, vendors and staff courteously, and follow campus traffic and security rules.
• Equipment and readiness: keep the equipment you need (an insulated bag, a working phone) and only accept orders you can actually deliver.
• Payouts: delivery fees are paid out on the published rider payout schedule, viewable in your rider tools with your withdrawal history.

Your rider account, order assignments and performance record are personal to you. Sharing assignments or letting someone else deliver under your account is not allowed — the campus trusts the person we vetted.

Do not do any of this on Pal — for anyone, in any role:

• Fake orders — placing orders you never intend to receive or pay for, or ordering to harass a vendor or rider.
• Referral farming — self-referrals, recycled phone numbers, or any scheme to manufacture referral or loyalty rewards.
• Chargeback abuse — reversing a card payment for food you ordered and received, or abusing disputes to avoid paying. Disputes filed in bad faith end the account behind them.
• Abuse — harassment, threats or discriminatory behaviour toward vendors, riders, staff or other customers, on the platform or in the WhatsApp groups.
• Other people's numbers — ordering under, or registering, a phone number that is not yours without that person's consent.
• Unlawful items — using Pal to order, sell or move anything that is not lawful food service, including alcohol sold outside the law or anything restricted on campus.
• Technical abuse — scraping, reverse-engineering, automated bulk ordering, credential-stuffing, or overloading the service.
• Reselling — running a resale operation on food ordered through Pal, or sharing one account between multiple people.

We investigate with the order timelines, audit logs and device records we keep (see the Privacy Policy) and act on what we find.

Pal is a live service: menus, features and zones change with the campus. We may add, change, suspend or remove any part of the platform (including features like group buys, loyalty or specific payment methods) as the service evolves. Kitchens open and close; the marketplace reflects reality, and neither is a breach of these terms.

The platform is provided on a reasonable-effort basis — we work hard to keep it up, especially during meal hours, but we do not promise uninterrupted service. Pal can be installed as an app (PWA) on your phone; the installed app and the website are the same service under the same terms.

Ownership is simple: Pal owns the platform — the software, code, design, brand and marketplace experience. Vendors own their menu content — photos, descriptions and prices — and licence Pal to display them while they sell on the platform. Everything you upload or publish through Pal must be yours to publish.

Pal is a marketplace, and responsibility follows the work: vendors are responsible for the food — its safety, hygiene, quality and honesty — because they cook it; riders are responsible for carrying it carefully once it leaves the kitchen; Pal is responsible for the platform — the ordering, coordination, payment and confirmation systems.

The platform is provided "as is" and "as available". To the fullest extent permitted by the laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Pal's total liability for any claim arising from or connected to a single order is limited to the value of that order. Pal is not liable for indirect or consequential losses (for example, missed meals leading to other costs) to the extent Nigerian law allows such limits.

Nothing in this section limits liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, or any liability that cannot lawfully be limited.

If you break the rules, we may warn you, suspend your account, or close it — with notice where practical, and immediately where safety, fraud or payment abuse is involved. Suspended vendors and riders stop receiving new orders; payouts owed for completed work are still paid out. Where a suspension looks wrong, support reviews it — email [email protected].

If you want to leave, you can stop using Pal at any time, and registered users can close their account and have their personal data deleted via the data deletion page. Closing an account expires any wallet balance, promo credits and referral rewards, per the refunds section. Guests simply stop ordering — their data fades out under the retention schedule in the Privacy Policy.

Termination does not undo the past: completed orders, payments made or owed, refunds in flight and investigations already open survive the end of the account.

These terms are governed by the laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and any dispute connected to them or to the service is handled the civilised way first: raise it with us — through the in-app support ticket (an admin calls you back) or [email protected] — and give both sides a genuine chance to sort it out before escalating to any competent forum.

Questions about anything in these terms — an order, a refund, a code, a clause — go to the same place: [email protected], or the support form inside the app. We usually reply within a day.