Terms of Service

1. Acceptance of Terms

By creating an account or using any part of VulaJobs, you accept these Terms in full. If you do not agree to them, you must not register or use VulaJobs. These Terms apply to you and to anyone who uses your account.

You confirm that you are at least 18 years old and legally able to employ someone and to enter into this agreement. This applies to you as the account holder. How the information of a worker under 18 is handled is set out in our Data Protection Policy.

2. What VulaJobs Is, and What It Is Not

VulaJobs ("the Platform") is software for employing domestic workers in South Africa. It keeps your workers' details, produces employment contracts, records schedules, leave and shifts, works out pay, produces payslips, timesheets and UIF declaration files, and lets you pay your worker through our payment provider.

VulaJobs is built around the Basic Conditions of Employment Act, 1997, Sectoral Determination 7 (Domestic Worker Sector), the National Minimum Wage Act, 2018 and the related tax and unemployment insurance laws. It checks many of their rules, but not all of them, and the rules it does check depend on what you enter.

VulaJobs is not a law firm, a labour consultant, a payroll bureau or a registered tax practitioner, and nothing on the Platform is legal, tax or financial advice. You remain the employer, and you remain responsible for meeting your obligations as one.

3. Your Responsibilities as an Employer

Using VulaJobs does not move any of your legal duties to us. In particular, you remain responsible for:

• complying with every law that applies to your employment of your worker, whatever VulaJobs does or does not check — see section 4;
• paying your worker the correct amount, on the agreed pay day;
• registering with the Unemployment Insurance Fund and the Compensation Fund (COIDA) where the law requires it, and paying the contributions due. VulaJobs prepares your monthly UIF declaration file for your workers on Pro; you review and submit it, and declare any worker it does not cover (see section 4.4);
• registering for and paying over PAYE where the law requires it. VulaJobs works out PAYE only on the pay runs of workers on Pro, and never submits anything to SARS (see section 4.4);
• giving your worker their written particulars of employment, and making sure they are explained in a language and manner the worker understands where they cannot understand them in writing;
• giving notice, and paying what is due, when an employment ends;
• keeping the records the law requires you to keep, for as long as it requires you to keep them.

4. Compliance

Compliance with labour, tax, unemployment insurance, compensation and data protection law is solely your responsibility as the employer. VulaJobs does not take on, share or accept that responsibility, in whole or in part.

4.1 The laws that apply

They include the Basic Conditions of Employment Act, 1997; Sectoral Determination 7 (Domestic Worker Sector); the National Minimum Wage Act, 2018; the Labour Relations Act, 1995; the Unemployment Insurance Act, 2001 and the Unemployment Insurance Contributions Act, 2002; the Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Act, 1993; the Income Tax Act, 1962 and the Tax Administration Act, 2011; and the Protection of Personal Information Act, 2013 — each as amended, together with the regulations, determinations and notices made under them.

4.2 What VulaJobs's compliance checks are

VulaJobs checks some of the rules in those laws — for example, it refuses a wage below the national minimum wage and a schedule over the maximum ordinary hours, and raises alerts about registrations and deadlines. These checks, alerts and warnings are an aid to help you, not a guarantee and not legal advice:

• they cover some rules, not all of them, and some rules are not modelled at all;
• they work only from the information you enter, so they are only as reliable as that information;
• they may lag behind a change in the law — such as the annual minimum wage increase or new tax tables — however quickly we try to update them;
• the absence of a refusal, alert or warning does not mean that what you did, or what VulaJobs produced, is lawful.

4.3 Where the app allows non-compliance, or a check is bypassed

You remain solely responsible for compliance, and VulaJobs accepts no responsibility or liability, where:

• VulaJobs allows you to record, save, issue, pay or do something that does not comply with the law — because a check does not exist, is incomplete, is wrong, or was not applied;
• a compliance check, warning or alert is bypassed, dismissed, overridden or ignored — including by entering information that does not reflect what was actually agreed or worked in order to get past a check, by recording something outside VulaJobs, or by acting before an alert is resolved;
• a contract, payslip, timesheet, UIF declaration or other document produced by VulaJobs does not meet a legal requirement.

In each case it is for you to identify the requirement and comply with it. VulaJobs is not liable for any consequence of non-compliance, including underpayments and back pay owed to a worker, interest and penalties imposed by the Unemployment Insurance Fund, the Compensation Fund or SARS, awards or orders of the CCMA, the Department of Employment and Labour or a court, fines, and claims by your worker or anyone else. Section 13 (Indemnity) applies to any such claim made against us.

4.4 UIF declarations and PAYE cover workers on Pro only

As section 10 sets out, only workers on Pro are included in the monthly UIF declaration VulaJobs prepares, and only their pay runs have PAYE worked out. The law does not make that distinction: an employer must declare every employee to the Unemployment Insurance Fund every month, whether or not they were paid, and must deduct and pay over PAYE wherever it is due.

• UIF. If any of your workers are not on Pro, the declaration VulaJobs prepares does not cover them. You are advised to declare those workers yourself — for example through the Department of Employment and Labour's uFiling service — and to pay their contributions. Take care not to declare the same worker for the same month twice.
• PAYE. If any of your workers are not on Pro, VulaJobs does not work out their PAYE. You are advised to work it out, deduct it and pay it over yourself, through SARS. For workers on Pro, VulaJobs works out the amount to deduct, but registering with SARS, submitting your monthly returns (EMP201), your reconciliations (EMP501) and your workers' tax certificates (IRP5), and paying the tax over, remain yours to do.

A worker left off a UIF declaration, or PAYE not worked out, deducted or paid over, for a worker not on Pro is your responsibility alone, and section 4.3 applies to it.

4.5 Getting advice

If you are unsure whether something you are doing is lawful, take advice from a labour law practitioner, a tax practitioner or the Department of Employment and Labour before relying on VulaJobs.

This section is subject to section 14.3 (Liability we do not exclude or limit).

5. Accuracy of Information

You are solely responsible for making sure that everything you enter into VulaJobs is accurate, complete and up to date — including your worker's details, their contact number and banking details, their schedule, leave, wage and deductions, and anything you record about shifts and payments. Everything VulaJobs produces is worked out from what you enter. We are not liable for any loss, penalty or other consequence that results from incorrect, incomplete or outdated information entered on your account.

6. Calculations

VulaJobs calculates, among other things, hours, wages, overtime, Sunday and public holiday pay, leave balances, statutory deductions (UIF and PAYE), agreed deductions, wage advances, payment processing fees and subscription charges. We work to keep these calculations correct, but we do not guarantee the correctness of any calculation, and we are not liable for any underpayment, overpayment, tax or contribution liability, penalty or other loss arising from a calculation, rounding difference or other system-generated figure. You must check every figure before you rely on it, issue a payslip or make a payment.

This section is subject to section 14.3 (Liability we do not exclude or limit).

7. Contracts and Electronic Signatures

VulaJobs produces employment contracts from the terms you set up. You are responsible for the content of each contract and for making sure it reflects what you and your worker agreed.

Contracts, contract changes and your worker's confirmation of their own details can be signed electronically — by drawing a signature in the app, or by your worker following a link and confirming with their name. Both of you agree that a signature given this way is an electronic signature under the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act, 2002, and is as valid as a signature on paper. When your worker signs on your device, you confirm that the person signing is your worker and that they signed of their own free will.

A signed contract records the terms as they stood when it was signed. Changing a worker's terms afterwards requires an addendum or a new contract that both of you sign, which VulaJobs takes you through.

8. Messages to Your Worker

VulaJobs sends your worker WhatsApp messages about their employment: links to confirm their details and to sign their contract, their payslip and timesheet, and a link to report a problem with a payment. These messages are sent because of something you did on the Platform and are not marketing.

You confirm that each worker's contact number is correct, that you obtained it lawfully, and that your worker has agreed to receive employment-related messages on it. We are not liable for messages delivered to a wrong number, read by someone other than your worker, or not delivered at all.

9. Paying Your Worker Through VulaJobs

You can pay your worker's wages, wage advances and allowances through VulaJobs. These payments are processed by our payment provider, Paystack, and are subject to Paystack's own terms.

• Before your worker can be paid this way, their bank account is verified with Paystack against their identity number.
• Your worker receives the full amount. Paystack's processing fee, and the VAT on it, is added on top of what your worker is owed, and the total you will be charged is shown before you confirm the payment.
• Each payment is split by Paystack at the moment it is made and settled to your worker's bank account. We do not receive or hold your worker's wages.
• A payment is complete only once Paystack confirms it. Until then the pay run stays unpaid, and you can try again if a payment fails.
• Once a payment has been settled to your worker, we cannot reverse it. If you paid the wrong amount, that is between you and your worker, within what labour law allows. See our Refund Policy.

Where you pay your worker in cash or by your own bank transfer, VulaJobs only records what you tell it. You are responsible for the payment actually being made, and for that record being correct.

Disputes about pay

• After each payment your worker is sent a link on WhatsApp to report a problem with it. Their report reaches you in the app.
• Where your worker has no phone or no WhatsApp, you must raise the dispute for them in the app, with the reason they give you, as soon as they tell you about it.
• A dispute is resolved between you and your worker. You correct the pay run and issue it again, and VulaJobs charges only the difference still owed.

VulaJobs provides the tools to record and resolve a dispute, and is not a party to it. We do not investigate, mediate or decide disputes between you and your worker, and we do not pay any amount found to be owed. A dispute that cannot be resolved between you can be referred to the Department of Employment and Labour or the CCMA, as the law provides.

10. Plans and Fees

The plans

Plans apply per worker:

• Demo worker — every new account includes a fictional sample worker with every feature unlocked, so that you can see how VulaJobs works. It costs nothing, cannot be edited, and must not be used to record a real person.
• Free — no charge, for as long as you like. Covers your worker's details, their employment and its schedule, leave and pay terms, and their contracts and signing.
• Pro — R49 per worker per month. Adds the day-to-day features: recording no-shows, cancelled, moved and overtime shifts, recording leave, running payroll with payslips, timesheets and PAYE, paying through VulaJobs, wage advances and allowance payments, and inclusion in your monthly UIF declaration.

Only workers on Pro are included in the UIF declaration VulaJobs prepares, and only their pay runs have PAYE worked out. For any worker not on Pro, you must declare them to the UIF and deal with their PAYE yourself — see section 4.4.

A piece job — a one-off job of up to seven days — has every Pro feature unlocked on the Free plan, and is treated as being on Pro for UIF declarations and PAYE. The features in each plan may change from time to time; the current position is shown in the app. VulaJobs (Pty) Ltd is not a registered VAT vendor, and no VAT is charged on these prices.

Billing

• Pro is billed monthly in advance, by card, through Paystack, and renews automatically each month until you cancel it. We do not store your card number.
• If a renewal payment fails, that worker's Pro features are paused until the payment is completed. Nothing is deleted, and the Free features keep working.
• We may change the price of Pro on at least 30 days' notice in the app. If you do not accept the change, you can cancel under section 11 before it takes effect.
• Subscription payments are non-refundable, except where a refund is required by law. See our Refund Policy.

Commencement of the service

By registering, and by upgrading a worker to Pro, you request and consent to us making the service available to you immediately, before the end of the seven-day period in section 44 of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act, 2002. Where the service has begun with your consent within that period, the cooling-off right in section 44 does not apply, as contemplated by section 42(2)(d) of that Act. Nothing in this section excludes any right under Chapter VII of that Act that applies despite the service having begun. See our Legal Information page.

11. Cancellation

• You can move a worker from Pro back to Free at any time in the app. No further payments are taken, and the worker keeps Pro until the end of the month you have already paid for, after which they move to Free. No pro-rata refund is issued for the rest of that month.
• You can close your account at any time by emailing us at info@vulajobs.co.za. Any Pro subscriptions are cancelled as above.
• Your employment records are kept after you close your account, for three years after each employment ended, because the Basic Conditions of Employment Act requires those records to be kept for that long. During that time you can ask us for copies. They are then permanently deleted. Tax records may need to be kept for five years under the Tax Administration Act, 2011, so you should export and keep your own copies. Full details are in our Data Protection Policy.
• We may suspend your account immediately where it is reasonably necessary — for example where there is unlawful activity, a threat to the security of the Platform or to other people's information, or where the law requires us to act. We will tell you as soon as reasonably practicable why, and what is needed to restore access.
• In any other case of material breach, we will give you written notice of the breach and a reasonable opportunity to remedy it, and may close your account only if it is not remedied. Where you are a natural person and section 14 of the Consumer Protection Act, 2008 applies, that period will be at least 20 business days.

12. Service Availability, Data and Third Parties

No warranty

VulaJobs is provided "as is" and "as available". To the extent the law allows, we give no warranty, express or implied, including of fitness for a particular purpose, and we do not guarantee that the Platform will be uninterrupted or free of errors. We will try to give reasonable notice of planned maintenance.

Data loss

We take reasonable steps to protect the information stored on VulaJobs, but we cannot guarantee that it will never be lost, corrupted or compromised. Keep your own copies of anything you cannot afford to lose, including signed contracts and payslips.

Third-party services

VulaJobs relies on third-party services, including cloud hosting, Paystack for payments, WhatsApp for messages to workers, and email and push-notification providers. We are not liable for any failure, interruption, pricing change or error caused by them. Their own terms may also apply to your use of them.

Force majeure

We are not liable for any failure or delay caused by circumstances beyond our reasonable control, including natural disasters, pandemics, load shedding or power outages, civil unrest, government action, and failures of internet, telecommunications or third-party providers. Our obligations are suspended for as long as the event lasts.

This section is subject to section 14.3 (Liability we do not exclude or limit).

13. Indemnity

You indemnify VulaJobs (Pty) Ltd and its directors, employees and agents against all claims, liabilities, losses, costs and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising from:

• your use of VulaJobs, and the information you enter;
• your employment of any worker recorded on your account, including any claim by that worker;
• messages sent to your worker at the number you provided;
• your failure to obtain any consent the law requires, or to inform your worker as POPIA requires;
• any failure to comply with the law, as described in section 4;
• your breach of these Terms or of any law.

This indemnity does not apply to the extent that a claim arises from our own gross negligence, wilful misconduct or fraud. This section is subject to section 14.3.

14. Limitation of Liability

14.1 Indirect loss

To the extent the law allows, we are not liable for any indirect, incidental, special or consequential loss, including loss of data, income or profit, arising from your use of VulaJobs.

14.2 Cap on liability

Subject to section 14.3, our total liability to you under or in connection with these Terms will not exceed the subscription fees you paid us in the three calendar months before the event giving rise to the claim. Wages and other amounts you paid to your workers through VulaJobs are not fees paid to us.

14.3 Liability we do not exclude or limit

Nothing in these Terms — including sections 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 12, 13 and 14.2 — excludes or limits any liability that cannot lawfully be excluded or limited under South African law, including the Consumer Protection Act, 2008 and the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act, 2002.

Where an exclusion or limitation in these Terms is unenforceable, it applies only to the extent the law allows, and the rest of these Terms continue in full force. Where these Terms conflict with a right you have under South African law that cannot be excluded, that right prevails.

15. Data Protection

For your workers' personal information, you are the responsible party under the Protection of Personal Information Act, 2013 (POPIA): you decide to collect it, for the purpose of employing them. We process it on your behalf, as your operator, under the Operator Terms in Annex A below. You are responsible for telling your worker that you use VulaJobs, what information you record about them and why, and that they will receive messages on WhatsApp. What that means in practice, for you and for your worker, is set out in our POPIA notice.

For your own account information, we are the responsible party. How we handle it is set out in our Privacy Policy, and how we protect all information on the Platform in our Data Protection Policy.

16. Account Security

You are responsible for keeping your login details confidential and for everything done on your account. Tell us immediately if you become aware of any unauthorised use of it. We are not liable for loss arising from your failure to keep your login details safe.

17. Acceptable Use

You may use VulaJobs only to manage the employment of people you genuinely employ. You must not:

• use it for any unlawful purpose, or to mislead or take advantage of a worker;
• record a person who is not your worker, or declare a fictional worker to the UIF or any other authority;
• try to access another person's account or information;
• interfere with, damage, overload, copy or reverse engineer the Platform.

18. Intellectual Property

All intellectual property in VulaJobs — its software, design, content and branding — belongs to VulaJobs (Pty) Ltd. Nothing in these Terms transfers any of it to you. The contracts, payslips and other documents the Platform produces for you are yours to use for your employment relationship.

19. Changes to These Terms

We may change these Terms from time to time. The current version is always on this page, with its version date. Where a change materially affects you, we will tell you in the app, and you will be asked to accept the revised Terms before you continue using VulaJobs.

20. General

Governing law. These Terms are governed by the laws of the Republic of South Africa, and the South African courts have jurisdiction over any dispute arising from them.

Entire agreement. These Terms, with the documents they refer to, are the entire agreement between you and us about VulaJobs, and replace any earlier agreement or understanding about it.

Severability. If a court finds any provision invalid or unenforceable, it is changed to the minimum extent needed to make it enforceable, or removed if it cannot be, and the rest of these Terms remain in force.

No waiver. If we do not enforce a provision at any time, that does not waive our right to enforce it later. A waiver is only effective in writing.

21. Contact Us

For any questions, disputes or notices about these Terms, contact us at:

Annex A — Operator Terms

This Annex forms part of these Terms and applies whenever we process personal information on your behalf through VulaJobs — chiefly the personal information of your workers. For the purposes of POPIA you are the responsible party and we are the operator.

A.1 Processing on your instructions

We process that personal information only on your instructions — which include how you set up and use the Platform — and only to provide VulaJobs to you. We do not use it for our own purposes and we do not sell it.

A.2 Confidentiality

Everyone we authorise to process it is bound by appropriate obligations of confidentiality.

A.3 Security safeguards

We maintain the appropriate, reasonable technical and organisational measures required by section 19 of POPIA, as described in our Data Protection Policy.

A.4 Sub-operators

You authorise us to use the sub-operators listed in our Data Protection Policy, including for hosting, payments, and messages to workers. We hold each to data-protection obligations substantially similar to these, and we remain responsible to you for their processing.

A.5 Security compromises

We will notify you immediately, and in any event within 24 hours, where there are reasonable grounds to believe that personal information we process for you has been accessed or acquired by an unauthorised person, as section 21(2) of POPIA requires. We will tell you what we know about the compromise, the information affected, and the steps we have taken, and we will help you make the notifications section 22 of POPIA requires of you as the responsible party.

A.6 Requests from your workers

We will help you respond to a worker who asks to see, correct or delete their information, or who objects to its processing. A worker who contacts us directly about information you hold is referred to you, and we will help you both.

A.7 Return and deletion

When your account closes, we keep your workers' employment records for the period set out in section 11 and our Data Protection Policy, and then delete them. During that period you can ask us for copies.

A.8 Cross-border processing

VulaJobs and the information stored in it are hosted in South Africa. Where a sub-operator processes personal information outside South Africa, we rely on section 72(1)(a) of POPIA — a binding agreement requiring protection substantially similar to POPIA, including on onward transfer — and, where the transfer is necessary to perform our contract with you, on section 72(1)(c).

A.9 Precedence

If this Annex conflicts with the rest of these Terms about personal information we process on your behalf, this Annex prevails.