Legal

Cancellation, Withdrawal and Refunds

Three separate rights, and how to use each one. Cancelling stops the next payment; withdrawing reverses the last one; a refund can be due for other reasons entirely.

Last updated 17 September 2026

This document is a draft

It was written against how StreetShape actually works, and every factual claim in it is checkable against the code. What it does not yet have is the operator’s address, several retention periods, confirmation of which provider agreements are actually signed, or a review by a lawyer. Those gaps are marked in the text rather than filled with a guess.

35 outstanding items— show

serviceable postal address — the address the Impressum, the Terms and the withdrawal notice are all served at
commercial-register entry — whether registration as a Kaufmann applies, and the court and HRB number if it does
VAT identification number — whether one is assigned at all under the Kleinunternehmer rule, and the number if it is
second direct contact channel under §5 DDG — a telephone number, or another channel a person actually answers quickly
how the current-month refund promise applies to an annual plan — a twelfth, the unused remainder, or not at all. Decide before an annual plan is sold
the refund window on a founding lifetime purchase — 30 days from payment is the reading this draft assumes, and it needs confirming rather than inheriting subscription wording
languages the DSA contact point is answered in — the ones a person can actually handle, not the ones the interface is translated into
the seller for a paid contract — for a Paddle purchase, the Paddle entity named at checkout and on the invoice, with its postal address and email
Review of all ten documents, the Impressum and the implementation-fund rules by a lawyer in Germany — after the operator's address and registration position are settled, because that is half of what counsel checks.
Whether a data protection officer has to be appointed despite the headcount, which turns on whether location-linked consultation and survey responses amount to processing that requires a data protection impact assessment.
The roles in each institutional feature — whether a municipality is a controller, our controller, or a joint controller for consultations, residency registers and street reports — and the agreement that follows from each answer.
Which provider arrangements are actually signed, in which regions, and under which transfer mechanism. The provider table states what the code configures, which is not the same as a countersigned contract.
Whether the service is an online platform under the Digital Services Act rather than only a hosting service, and which of the platform duties the micro and small enterprise exemption removes.
Whether direct access to the production database is logged, and whether a backup restore has ever actually been run.
which accounting records fall in the 10, 8 and 6-year tiers of §147 AO — the periods differ by document class and run from the end of the calendar year, and the old ten-years-for-everything line was over-retention
when an invitation that is never accepted expires — it is an access grant sitting open, and "until somebody revokes it" is not a period
a period per category for correspondence — handling, then a justified follow-up or claims window. "Until somebody asks us to remove it" is not a retention period, it is the absence of one
how long verification evidence is kept after the thing it verified is decided — the decision has to outlast it, the document usually does not
when a waiting-list subscription expires if the list is never used — it survives account deletion, because it was left without needing an account
how long the identifiers that survive a webhook payload are kept — they are what stops a duplicate, and they are still linkable to a transaction
whether attribution should expire before the account does — it answers a question about a signup that stops being asked long before the account closes
the purpose and lawful ground for keeping a country code on the signup record. It is written whether or not attribution was accepted, which the privacy policy used to deny, and currency presentation does not need it stored
the retention configured on the analytics project, and whether an erasure here propagates to it
how long the evidence of a rights request is kept after it is met — a justified period, rather than "kept"
a schedule per civic feature, and the controller each one belongs to. A municipality running a consultation sets its own period; where we set it, it has to be written down
each provider's own log retention, and the maximum age of a backup before it expires
a justified maximum for the staff audit log, and the rule that reviews it. The 180-day expiry of the identifying half is enforced; the row itself has no end
a justified maximum for the record of a support session — somebody here opening your account to help — on the same footing as the staff audit log above
where the Photon instance we call actually runs, and who operates it
where the Nominatim instance we fall back to is hosted — the Foundation's establishment and its servers are separate questions
the session cookie's lifetime in production, and how it refreshes — a provider default is not an inventory
the `__client_uat` cookie's lifetime in production — the same question as the session cookie above, and the same answer is not safe to assume
a production cookie and storage inventory — signed out, signed in, on the map and through checkout. The lists on this page come from the code, which cannot see what a provider sets
whether the preference keys are exempt as part of a service you expressly requested, or have to be gated by consent
a persistent control for reviewing or withdrawing cookie consent — the banner does not come back once a choice is stored, and clearing site data in the browser is not the same thing

1. Three rights, and how to ask

Cancelling stops future renewals. Withdrawing reverses a qualifying purchase inside the statutory period. A refund can also be due under the voluntary policy below, or because the service was not what it should have been. Using one of these does not give up the others.

Write to hello@streetshape.org or use the contact form. Tell us the email address on the account and enough to identify the payment. Never send full card details. You do not have to justify a request that falls inside a no-reason window.

2. What we refund voluntarily

The voluntary refund windows, by what you bought
What you bought	What we do
A first subscription payment	Ask within 30 days from a first subscription payment, no reason needed and we refund it in full and cancel the subscription.
A renewal you meant to cancel	Ask within 14 days from the charge and we refund that renewal in full and cancel.
A monthly subscription, after the first 30 days	When you cancel you may ask for the current subscription month, refunded on request when you cancel. Cancelling does not submit that request — asking does.
An annual or other non-monthly subscription	[how the current-month refund promise applies to an annual plan — a twelfth, the unused remainder, or not at all. Decide before an annual plan is sold]
A founding lifetime purchase	[the refund window on a founding lifetime purchase — 30 days from payment is the reading this draft assumes, and it needs confirming rather than inheriting subscription wording]

An approved refund ends the paid access it refunded, from the date in the confirmation. It does not delete your plans. We do not refund the same charge twice.

These are voluntary, and they sit on top of your statutory rights rather than in place of them. Nothing here shortens a withdrawal period or a remedy for a service that was not as agreed, and if a more generous term already applies to your purchase, it still applies.

3. Cancelling a subscription

Cancel through the billing controls in your account or in Paddle, or write to us if you cannot reach them. Cancelling normally takes effect at the end of the period you have paid for, and paid access continues until then. An earlier date can apply after a withdrawal, a refund, an extraordinary termination or another statutory right.

Where the law requires an online cancellation function, it stays directly and easily reachable and gives you the confirmation the law requires. You never have to accept an extra condition in order to exercise a statutory right to cancel.

Cancelling or downgrading does not delete plans just because you now have more of them than the plan allows. Deleting your account is a different act — save anything you want first.

4. Your right of withdrawal

Withdrawal notice

The trader for your purchase: [the seller for a paid contract — for a Paddle purchase, the Paddle entity named at checkout and on the invoice, with its postal address and email]

You have the right to withdraw from a qualifying distance contract for services within 14 days of it being concluded, without giving a reason. To exercise it, send the trader an unequivocal statement identifying the contract and saying that you are withdrawing. You may use the form below, but you do not have to. Sending it before the deadline is enough.

After a valid withdrawal, payments are returned within the statutory deadline — normally 14 days from the withdrawal reaching the trader — using the payment method you originally used, unless you expressly agree to another one that costs you nothing. Where the law allows a proportionate charge for services already supplied at your express request, that charge depends on the prescribed information having been given beforehand and on the other statutory conditions being met. Our voluntary full refund, where it applies, is the better of the two.

If defective information made the period longer, the longer period applies.

Using the service does not waive it

Opening the editor, saving a plan or using a paid feature does not end your right of withdrawal. An ongoing online service and separately supplied digital content expire under different statutory conditions, and neither is satisfied by these terms alone or by signing in. Any valid early-performance request, acknowledgement and contract confirmation has to be obtained for the specific transaction.

Where an electronic withdrawal function is required, it is provided in addition to this notice, not instead of it. It does not replace your ability to withdraw by any other permitted means.

Model withdrawal form

Optional. Complete and return it only if you want to withdraw.

To: the trader named above, at its postal address and email.
I hereby give notice that I withdraw from my contract for the following service:
Service or subscription:
Order or transaction number, if any:
Date of the contract:
Your name:
Your address:
The email address on the account:
Date:
Signature, only if you send it on paper:

5. If the service is defective, changes, or we end it

Your statutory rights for a service we failed to supply, or supplied in a state it should not have been in, are unaffected: performance, correction, a price reduction, termination and damages, where their conditions are met. A voluntary refund deadline does not shorten any of them.

If we remove or materially reduce a paid feature you contracted for, or end your paid access without a breach on your side, we refund the unused paid period. A lifetime grant does not get assigned an invented monthly value in order to make that number smaller.

Breaching the acceptable use policy does not automatically entitle us to keep everything you prepaid. Any refund, compensation or set-off needs a lawful basis, and we will explain the calculation.

6. The founding lifetime plan

A founding lifetime purchase has no renewal, so “the current month” means nothing on it and the subscription wording above does not carry over. What it refunds is [the refund window on a founding lifetime purchase — 30 days from payment is the reading this draft assumes, and it needs confirming rather than inheriting subscription wording].

Ending new sales of the offer does not cancel a grant already bought. What happens if the included tier is materially changed, discontinued or terminated is in the terms, and the repayment that follows is decided by the contract and by consumer law.

7. How a refund is paid

A Paddle purchase is refunded through Paddle, normally to the method you paid with. How long a bank takes to post it varies and does not extend a statutory repayment deadline. If the original method cannot receive a refund, the seller arranges a lawful alternative.

8. What this policy does not cover

Free access and grants — there is no payment to refund.
Municipal and separately invoiced agreements, which have their own termination provisions. Mandatory law still applies to them.
Implementation-fund contributions, which are governed by the recipient agreement for that campaign and by the programme rules, not by the subscription rules above.

Daniel Halabi, [serviceable postal address — the address the Impressum, the Terms and the withdrawal notice are all served at] · hello@streetshape.org