Terms of Service
These terms govern the use of eFirma by an organisation or a person. They are written to be read — where a clause is doing something unusual, it says so in the summary above it. They are a contract, not legal advice about your own agreements.
1Who this is between
This is a contract between your organisation and ours. Accepting it commits the organisation, so the person accepting needs the authority to do that.
The parties
These terms are an agreement between Habeshaware PLC, trading as eFirma ("eFirma", "we", "us"), a company registered in Ethiopia with its office in Addis Ababa, and the organisation or individual accepting them ("you").
When it starts
The agreement begins when you create a workspace, accept these terms in the product, or sign an order form — whichever happens first — and continues until it is ended under section 8.
Authority to accept
If you accept on behalf of an organisation, you confirm you are authorised to bind it. If you are not, do not accept, and ask someone who is.
2What eFirma provides
A service for sending, signing, sealing and verifying documents electronically, together with the evidence behind each signature.
The service
eFirma lets you send documents for signature, collect signatures electronically, seal the completed document so later changes are detectable, and keep an audit trail of what happened. What each plan includes is set out on the pricing page.
What an eFirma signature is
Signatures made through eFirma are electronic signatures under Electronic Transactions Proclamation No. 1205/2020. Their weight comes from evidence: the identity check performed before signing, the audit trail recorded during it, and the tamper-evident seal applied afterwards. eFirma is not a licensed certificate provider and does not issue certificates to signers, and nothing here should be read as claiming otherwise.
Whether a document is valid
Whether any particular agreement may be signed electronically, and whether it is enforceable, depends on the agreement and on the law that applies to it. That judgement is yours to make, or your lawyer's. We provide the means to sign and the evidence that it happened.
Changes to the service
We improve the service continuously, and some changes remove or replace features. Where a change materially reduces what a paid plan does, we will tell you at least 30 days beforehand by email to the workspace administrators.
3Your workspace and the people in it
You control who is in your workspace and what they can do. What they do there is treated as done by you.
Accounts and credentials
Keep your account details accurate and your credentials to yourself. Tell us promptly if you believe an account, an API key or a signing link has been misused.
Members, roles and keys
You decide who joins your workspace, what role they hold, and which API keys exist. Actions taken by your members and your keys are your responsibility, and are recorded against them in the audit trail.
What you send
You are responsible for the documents you send, for having the right to send them, and for the accuracy of the signer details you give us — particularly the phone numbers and email addresses that passcodes are delivered to.
4Your documents and your data
Your documents remain yours. We process them to run the service and for nothing else.
Ownership
You keep all rights in the documents and content you put into eFirma. You grant us only the permission needed to host, process, transmit, seal and display them in order to provide the service you asked for.
What we will not do with them
We do not sell your documents or the data in them, we do not use them to train models, and we do not read them except where it is necessary to provide support you have asked for, to keep the service running, or where the law requires it. Support access is granted for a named reason, limited in time, and logged.
Privacy
How personal data is handled — including the data of signers who have no account with us — is set out in the privacy notice, which forms part of these terms.
Security
We protect the service with the controls described on the security page. You must tell us without undue delay if you suspect a security incident affecting your workspace.
5Acceptable use
There is a short list of things you must not do with eFirma. It is a separate document because it changes more often than this one.
The policy applies
Your use of eFirma is subject to the acceptable use policy, which forms part of these terms.
If it is breached
Where use breaches that policy, creates legal risk, or threatens the service for other customers, we may throttle or suspend the account. Except where the risk is immediate, we will contact you first and give you the chance to put it right.
6Plans, fees and payment
Plans are billed in birr, in advance. The free plan stays free, and no plan buys a stronger signature.
Fees
Fees are those shown on the pricing page or in your order form, stated in Ethiopian birr and exclusive of VAT and any other applicable tax. Paid plans are billed in advance, monthly or annually as you choose.
Changing plan
You may move up or down at any time. Moving up takes effect immediately and is charged pro rata; moving down takes effect at the end of the paid period. We do not refund part-used periods except where the law requires it.
Late payment
If an invoice is unpaid we will tell you and give at least 14 days to settle it before restricting the account. Restriction limits new sending; it does not delete documents already signed, and it does not disable verification of them.
What paying more buys
Volume, seats, controls and support. It does not buy stronger evidence: the identity checks, the seal, the audit trail and public verification are the same on every plan, including the free one.
7Availability and support
We aim to keep the service up and to tell you honestly when it is not. Availability commitments are contractual only where an order form says so.
Availability
We work to keep eFirma continuously available and monitor it around the clock. A specific availability commitment, with the remedies attached to it, applies only where it is written into an order form or enterprise agreement.
Maintenance
Planned maintenance that will interrupt service is announced in advance where we can and scheduled outside Ethiopian business hours where practical.
Support
Support is available by email to every plan and by telephone on plans that include it. Security reports are handled on the timescales published on the security page, regardless of plan.
8Ending the agreement
Either of us can end it. If we do, you get your documents out — and documents already signed keep working.
By you
You may close your workspace at any time from the settings, or by writing to us. Closing takes effect at the end of the period you have paid for.
By us
We may end this agreement on 30 days' notice, or immediately where you materially breach it, where payment remains outstanding after the notice in section 6, or where continuing would break the law.
Getting your data out
For 90 days after the agreement ends you may export your documents, their evidence and the audit trail. After that we delete them in line with your retention setting and our own retention obligations.
What survives
Sections 4, 9, 10 and 11 survive the end of this agreement, as does anything else that by its nature is meant to.
9Documents outlive the account
A signed document does not stop being signed because the workspace closed.
Legal effect
A document signed through eFirma keeps whatever legal effect it had when it was signed, whether or not the workspace that sent it still exists.
Verification
Anyone holding a completed document can verify it — the fingerprint, the seal and the trail — without an account and without our involvement. We intend to keep that verification available, and it is not conditional on you remaining a customer.
10Liability
We stand behind the service we operate. We are not liable for the content of your agreements, and there is a cap.
What we are not responsible for
We are not responsible for the content, legality or enforceability of the documents you send, for the decisions you take on the strength of them, or for a signer's own conduct. We are not your legal adviser.
The cap
Except for liability that cannot be limited by law, and except for either party's liability for fraud, each party's total liability under this agreement is limited to the fees you paid in the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim.
Indirect loss
Neither party is liable for indirect or consequential loss, loss of profit, or loss of business opportunity, however it arises.
11Changes, law and disputes
Material changes come with notice. Ethiopian law governs, and we would much rather talk first.
Changes to these terms
We may update these terms. Material changes are notified to workspace administrators by email at least 30 days before they take effect, and the date at the top of this document always tells you when it last changed. Continuing to use eFirma after that date means the updated terms apply.
Governing law
This agreement is governed by the laws of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia.
Disputes
If something goes wrong, write to [email protected] first and we will try to resolve it within 30 days. Failing that, the courts of Addis Ababa have jurisdiction.
Language
These terms are published in English. An Amharic copy is available on request; if the two ever conflict, the English version governs.
Questions about this document, a signed copy on letterhead, or an Amharic version: [email protected]. Published in English; where an Amharic copy differs, the English version governs.