Terms of Use

1. About these Terms

These Terms of Use ("Terms") govern your use of The Dive Journal app and its related services and web pages (the "App"). The App is operated by Otterseas Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales under company number 15701861, whose registered office is at 5 Cannon Court, Institute Street, Bolton, BL1 1PZ, United Kingdom ("Otterseas", "we", "us", "our").

By creating an account or using the App, you agree to these Terms and acknowledge our Privacy Policy, which explains how we process personal data. If you do not agree to these Terms, you must not use the App.

If you use the App as a consumer, nothing in these Terms affects your statutory rights under the law of the country in which you live.

2. Eligibility and accounts

• Age. You must be at least 16 years of age to create an account.
• Your account. You must provide accurate information and keep your password secure. You are responsible for activity on your account, except where it results from our failure to keep the App secure.
• Personal use. Accounts are personal to you and may not be shared or created on behalf of another person.
• Dive professionals. Professionals who sign off dives or join the Otterseas Pro programme are subject to verification of their status. The Otterseas Pro programme terms, presented on application, also apply to them.

3. Diving safety

• Verification. All calculations and information shown in the App, including dive tools, gas, depth and time figures, weights, site details and conditions, are provided for reference and cross-checking only. You must plan and conduct every dive using a dive computer or approved tables, within the limits of your training, certification and experience.
• Use underwater. The App must not be used to manage a dive in progress, decompression or gas switches.
• Responsibility. You are solely responsible for deciding whether, where and how to dive, for checking your equipment, and for following the instructions of your dive centre, guide and training agency.
• Site and species information. Dive-site positions, depths, conditions and species information are derived in part from other users and third-party sources. Positions are often approximate and information may be inaccurate or out of date. You should verify all information locally before diving.
• Scanned information. Where the App reads a logbook page or card on your behalf, you must check every field before saving.
• Records. Logs, badges and sign-offs in the App are personal records. They are not official records of any training agency and do not constitute proof of certification or experience unless accepted by that agency.
• Emergency information. Emergency information displayed by the App depends on your device and the details you provide, and must not be relied upon as your sole emergency plan.
• Medical matters. The App does not provide medical advice. You should follow the guidance of your doctor and training agency regarding fitness to dive.

4. Your content

"Your Content" means any material you add to the App, including dive records, photographs, share videos, notes, sightings, dive-site and species submissions, equipment, Credential Wallet cards and profile information.

• Ownership. You retain ownership of Your Content.
• Privacy. Your records and photographs are private. Other users see only what you choose to share, such as your buddy card when it is scanned, a sign-off request shown to a professional, or an image or video that you export and share yourself.
• Licence. You grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to store, copy, process and display Your Content to the extent necessary to provide the App to you, for as long as it remains in the App.
• Community statistics. Where community data sharing is enabled, information from dives at verified sites contributes to anonymous, aggregated statistics, as described in the Privacy Policy. You may disable this at any time. Aggregated statistics that cannot identify you may be retained after your account is deleted.
• Submissions. Where we verify a dive site or species you submit, you permit us to include its name, position and description in our index permanently and without attribution.
• Rights in content. You may only upload content that you have the right to use. Where other people are identifiable in your photographs, or you add buddies, professionals or emergency contacts, you are responsible for ensuring they consent.

5. Acceptable use

You must not use the App to:

• engage in any unlawful, fraudulent or misleading activity;
• infringe the intellectual property, privacy or other rights of any person;
• submit abusive, hateful, sexually explicit or threatening material;
• knowingly submit false dives, sites, species or sign-offs, or falsify activity to obtain points or rewards;
• attempt to gain unauthorised access to, overload, scrape, copy or reverse-engineer the App or its data; or
• circumvent plan limits or resell codes.

Content or conduct that breaches these Terms may be reported to info@otterseas.com, including by persons without an account. We aim to review reports within 48 hours. We may remove content, restrict features, or suspend or terminate accounts that breach these Terms or the law. Where we take such action, we will inform you of the action and the reasons for it, unless prevented by law, and you may ask us to review the decision.

6. Plans and purchases

The App is free to download and includes a free tier. Paid plans (Basic and Premium, monthly or annual), the Booster, Photo Boost and Scan Packs provide additional features. The features, price and any usage limits of each are displayed in the App before purchase.

• Payment. All purchases are made through the Apple App Store or Google Play, which process payment under their own terms.
• Automatic renewal. Basic, Premium and Photo Boost subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each period at the prevailing price unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period.
• Booster. The Booster is a one-off purchase providing 30 days of Premium features from the date of purchase. It does not renew. Each further purchase adds 30 days. If you elect to continue on Basic after a Booster, that subscription begins with the free month shown and renews monthly thereafter unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the free month ends.
• Scan Packs. Scan Packs are one-off purchases of scan credits. Credits are consumed as scans are made and are neither refundable nor exchangeable for money.
• Free trials and offers. Where you begin a free trial or introductory offer, you will be charged when it ends unless you cancel at least 24 hours beforehand.
• Cancellation. Subscriptions may be cancelled in your Apple ID subscription settings or in Google Play › Payments & subscriptions. Deleting the App or your account does not cancel a subscription. Cancellation takes effect at the end of the current period, and access continues until then.
• Refunds. Refunds are handled by Apple or Google in accordance with their policies, without affecting your statutory rights as a consumer.
• Codes. Codes issued with an Otterseas journal or by an Otterseas Pro provide the plan stated with the code, on one account only, and are not exchangeable for money.
• Changes. We may change prices, plans or included features. The relevant store will notify you of any price increase to an existing subscription, and you may cancel before it takes effect.
• End of a plan. When a paid plan ends, your records remain available on the free tier. Backed-up photographs remain available to download for 45 days, as described in the Privacy Policy.
• Restoring purchases. On a new device, sign in with the same account and select Restore purchases within the App.

7. Account deletion

You may delete your account at any time in the App under Settings › Delete account, or by following the instructions on the Delete your account page.

• A deleted account is retained for 30 days, during which signing in will restore it. Your profile, records, photographs and other personal data are then permanently deleted, as described in the Privacy Policy. You should export any records you wish to keep before deleting your account.
• Certain information may be retained where required by law, or in anonymous form as described in section 4.
• Any subscription must be cancelled separately through your Apple or Google account.

8. Intellectual property, third-party services and app stores

• Our rights. We or our licensors own the App, its design, the journal layout, illustrations, badges, the Otterseas name and logo, and our species and dive-site index. We grant you a personal, non-transferable licence to use the App for your own non-commercial diving.
• Third-party services. Maps are © Mapbox and © OpenStreetMap contributors. Species reference photographs are provided by iNaturalist and remain the property of their photographers under the licences shown on iNaturalist. Open-source software used in the App is listed in Settings › Legal › Open source licences. We are not responsible for third-party services.
• Apple. If you obtained the App from the Apple App Store, Apple's standard Licensed Application End User License Agreement also applies. Apple is not responsible for the App or its content, has no obligation to provide maintenance or support for it, and is a third-party beneficiary of these Terms.
• Google. If you obtained the App from Google Play, the Google Play Terms of Service also apply.
• Changes to the App. We may update, add or remove features. If we remove a significant paid feature during a period for which you have already paid, we will notify you and you may contact us to agree a fair remedy.

9. Liability

• Our responsibility. If we breach these Terms or fail to use reasonable care and skill, we are responsible for loss you suffer that was a foreseeable result of that breach. Loss is foreseeable if it was an obvious consequence of the breach, or if it was contemplated by you and us when you began using the App.
• Liability we do not exclude. Nothing in these Terms limits or excludes our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud, or for any other liability that cannot be limited or excluded by law.
• Diving decisions. As the App is a planning aid and logbook only (section 3), we are not liable for loss or injury resulting from reliance on the App in place of a dive computer, tables, training, a dive centre or your own judgement, except where such liability cannot be excluded by law.
• Community and third-party information. We do not verify every statistic, site or species record and are not liable for errors in them, except where we have been negligent.
• Business losses. The App is provided for personal use only. We are not liable for any business losses.
• Your device and data. If defective digital content supplied by us damages your device or other digital content as a result of our failure to use reasonable care and skill, we will repair the damage or pay you fair compensation. You are advised to export important records periodically.
• Limit of liability. Subject to the exclusions above, our total liability to you is limited to the greater of the amount you paid for the App in the 12 months preceding the claim and £100.

10. Changes to these Terms and termination

• Changes. We may amend these Terms, for example to reflect new features or changes in the law. We will give at least 14 days' notice of material changes in the App or by email. If you do not accept the changes, you may stop using the App, delete your account and cancel your subscription.
• Termination by you. You may stop using the App at any time by deleting your account (section 7).
• Suspension or termination by us. We may suspend or terminate your account if you seriously or repeatedly breach these Terms, misuse the App, or where required by law. Where reasonable, we will give prior notice and explain our reasons. If we terminate your account without good reason, we will refund any unused portion of a subscription you have paid for, where we are able to do so.
• Discontinuation. If we cease to operate the App, we will give at least 30 days' notice and provide a means of exporting your records.

11. Governing law, complaints and contact

These Terms are governed by the law of England and Wales. You may bring proceedings in the courts of England and Wales or, if you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland, in the courts of your home nation. If you live in the European Union or elsewhere, you retain the benefit of any mandatory consumer protections of your country of residence and may be entitled to bring proceedings there.

Please contact us in the first instance if you have a complaint. The address below is also our single point of contact for content reports and enquiries under the EU Digital Services Act (correspondence in English).

Otterseas Ltd
5 Cannon Court, Institute Street
Bolton, BL1 1PZ, United Kingdom
Email: info@otterseas.com