UMADE POLICY

 Umade is a marketplace where you can shop the widest selection of custom made, handmade crafts, and authentic products made in Africa by remarkable business owners and designers and have them shipped directly to your home or office at your convenience!

1. Selling Basics

Keeping in mind these basic requirements will set you up for success on Umade.

a. What Can be Sold on Umade

U-made is a unique marketplace. Buyers come here to purchase items locally made in any part of Africa and not imported goods. Everything listed for sale on Umade must be handmade, vintage or a craft supply locally made in Africa.

Handmade items are items that are made and/or designed by you, the seller. 

If you sell handmade items, you agree that:

1. All handmade items are made or designed by you. 

2. You accurately describe every person involved in the making of an item in your shop in your About section.

3. You are using your own photographs or video content —not stock photos, artistic renderings, or photos used by other sellers or sites. Listing photos should be of the finished product made by you. Different handmade techniques produce different results, and it’s important that your images accurately reflect the product that a buyer will receive. Mockups may be used for digital items because they correctly depict the item.

4. If you are selling personalised or made-to-order items in the Handmade category, you agree that: All listings are available for purchase at a set price.

5. If you are using photographs of previous work with options for customisation (like colour choices) included in the listing, it is clear in your description that the photos shown are just examples.

Vintage items must be at least 5 years old. 

b. What Cannot be Sold on Umade

Even if they otherwise meet our marketplace criteria, prohibited items, services, and items that violate our intellectual property policies  and any product not made in Africa are not allowed to be sold on Umade.

Umade may remove any listings that violate our policies. Note that welcome package on Umade only allow the seller to be able to list 100 products, other packages comes with non-refundable listing fee. Umade may also suspend or terminate your account for any violations. You’ll still be on the hook to pay any outstanding fees on your Umade statement. 

c. Managing your Umade Shop

Your shop represents you and your business to the Umade community. It’s important that you, your items and your shop are honestly and accurately represented.

By selling on Umade, you agree that you will:

1. Provide honest, accurate information in your About section.

2. Honour your Shop Policies.

3. Ensure your shop content, such as any text, photos or videos used to represent yourself, your shop or your listings, abide by Umade’s policies, including our Anti-Discrimination policy.

4. Accurately represent your items in listings and listing photos.

5. Respect the intellectual property of others. If you feel someone has violated your intellectual property rights, you can report it to Umade.

6. Not engage in fee avoidance.

7. Not create duplicate shops or take any other action (such as manipulating clicks, baskets or sales) for the purpose of shilling, manipulating search or circumventing Umade’s policies.

8. Not coordinate pricing with other sellers.

d. Seller Standards By listing a product for sale on Umade you understand and agree that you are responsible for complying with all applicable laws and regulations for the products you list for sale, including any required labels and warnings. Umade assumes no responsibility for the accuracy, labelling, or content of your listings.

Meeting Service Level Standards

As a seller, you must provide great customer service and maintain trust with your buyers. These requirements are called our Seller Service Level Standards. Umade may reach out to you if your shop fails to meet Umade’s Seller Service Level Standards. 

By selling on Umade, you agree to:

1. Respond to Messages in a timely manner.

2. Honour the commitments you make in your shop policies.

3. Resolve disagreements or disputes directly with the buyer. In the unlikely event that you can’t reach a resolution, our Dispute Resolution team can help through our case system. 

4. If you are unable to complete an order, you must notify the buyer and cancel the order. 

2. Being a Member of the Umade Community

At Umade, everyone is expected to treat fellow members of the Umade community with respect. As a seller, you have additional responsibilities to safeguard personal information and communicate promptly with buyers in order to provide a great customer experience.

a. Creating and Uploading Content

As a member of Umade, you have the opportunity to create and upload a variety of content, like listings, Messages, text, photos, and videos. In order to keep our community safe and respectful, you agree that you will not upload content that is:

1. Abusive, threatening, defamatory, harassing, or otherwise in violation of our Anti-Discrimination Policy;

2. Obscene or vulgar;

3. In violation of someone else’s privacy or intellectual property rights; or

4. False, deceptive, or misleading.

b. Privacy and Protecting Personal Information

You are responsible for protecting members’ personal information you receive or process, and you must comply with all relevant legal requirements. This includes applicable data protection and privacy laws that govern the ways in which you can use Umade user information. These laws may require that you post and comply with your own privacy policy, which must be accessible to Umade users with whom you interact. Your privacy policy must be compatible with this policy and Umade’s Terms of Use.

In particular, when you sell using our Services (subject to this Policy), you may receive and determine what to do with certain personal information, such as when communicating with users and entering into transactions with buyers. This means you process personal information (for example, buyer name, email address, and delivery address) and, to the extent you do so,  you are an independent controller of data relating to other users that you may have obtained through the Services. As a data controller (that is someone who decides what personal data is collected and the purpose you’ll use the data for) to the extent that you process user personal information outside of the Services, you may be required under applicable data protection and privacy laws to honour requests received from such users for data access, portability, correction, deletion, and objections to processing. Also, if you disclose personal information without the buyer’s proper consent, you are responsible for that unauthorised disclosure. This includes, for example, disclosures you make or unintentional data breaches. For example, you may receive a buyer’s email address or other information as a result of entering into a transaction with that buyer. This information may only be used for Umade-related communications or for Umade-facilitated transactions. You may not use this information for unsolicited commercial messages or unauthorised transactions. Without the buyer’s consent, and subject to other applicable Umade policies and laws, you may not add any Umade member to your email or physical mailing list, use that buyer’s identity for marketing, or obtain or retain any payment information. Please bear in mind that you're responsible for knowing the standard of consent required in any given instance. If Umade and you are found to be joint data controllers of personal information, and if Umade is sued, fined, or otherwise incurs expenses because of something that you did in your capacity as a joint data controller of buyer personal information, you agree to indemnify Umade for the expenses it occurs in connection with your processing of buyer personal information.

c. Communication Standards

i. Messages

With Umade Messages, you have the ability to communicate directly with your buyers or other Umade members. Messages are a great way for buyers to ask you questions about an item or an order.

Messages may not be used for the following activities:

1. Sending unsolicited advertising or promotions, requests for donations or spam;

2. Harassing or abusing another member or violating our Anti-Discrimination Policy;

3. Contacting someone after they have explicitly asked you not to; or

4. Interfering with a transaction or the business of another member.

Interference Interference occurs when a member intentionally interferes with another member’s shop in order to drive away their business. Interference is strictly prohibited on Umade. Examples of interference include:

1. Contacting another member via Umade Messages to warn them away from a particular member, shop, or item;

2. Posting in public areas to demonstrate or discuss a dispute with another member;

3. Purchasing from a seller for the sole purpose of leaving a negative review;

4. Maliciously clicking on a competitor's Promoted Listings ads in order to drain that member's advertising budget, also known as 'click fraud'.

5. Creating or using an independent buyer account to maliciously up-vote another shop’s negative reviews in order to position those reviews more prominently.

Harassment Any use of Umade Messages to harass other members is strictly prohibited. Similarly, Messages may not be used to support or glorify hatred or otherwise violate our Anti-Discrimination Policy. If you receive a Message that violates this policy, please let us know right away.

ii. Forums and Teams

High level overview that Forums and Teams are public spaces provided by Umade where sellers can connect, but there are communication standards that must be followed. More information can be found in the Umade Community Policy.

Please be aware that in addition to this policy, each country has its own laws surrounding delivery, cancellations, returns and exchanges. Please familiarise yourself with the laws of your own country and those of your buyers’ countries.

3. Feedback, Disputes and Your Success

a. Reviews

Reviews are a great way for you to build a reputation on Umade. Buyers can leave a review, including a one to five star rating and a photograph of their purchase, within 100 days after their item’s estimated delivery date. 

Reviews and your response to reviews may not:

1. Contain private information;

2. Contain obscene, racist, or harassing language or imagery;

3. Violate our Anti-Discrimination Policy;

4. Contain prohibited medical drug claims;

5. Contain advertising or spam;

6. Be about things outside the seller’s control, such as a delivery carrier, Umade or a third party;

7. Contain threats or extortion;

8. Include shilling or otherwise falsely inflate a shop’s review score; or

9. Undermine the integrity of the Reviews system.

b. Umade’s Case System

The Case system is how order disputes are resolved at Umade. We ask buyers to contact sellers directly and attempt to resolve any outstanding issues before opening a case on Umade. For this reason, it is important that you fill out your shop policies and regularly respond to Messages from your buyers. However, sometimes a case may be necessary, and Umade will work with you and the buyer to resolve it as quickly as possible.

Umade may request your assistance in resolving a case opened against your shop. Umade reserves the right to escalate a case early for circumstances such as seller inactivity, harassment, refusal of service, case manipulation, and undermining the integrity of the case system.

By using Umade’s case system, you understand that Umade may use your personal information for the purpose of resolving disputes with other members.

 If Umade determines that an item is not as described, you will be required to refund the order, including original postage and return postage.

c. Your Seller Account and Umade’s Terms

In order to keep Umade safe and improve our Services, we may take actions that limit the visibility of your shop, listings or ads, or that impact your payment account. In the event a shop sees unusual order activity, or we otherwise believe that your actions or shop may result in buyer disputes, chargebacks, increased risk of fraud, counterfeiting, or other claims, Umade may take actions such as limiting visibility of your account, or placing restrictions or reserves on your payments account, in accordance with our Terms of Service, including this Policy and our Umade Payments Policy. When appropriate and permitted by law, Umade will communicate information to the affected seller about the issue.

In the event a shop sees an unusual spike in orders, particularly in a high demand category, a shop may see an increase or decrease in its search ranking. Often, if a shop sees an increase in fulfilled orders and good reviews, this may result in higher visibility and search rank. However, sometimes a rapid increase in orders can reduce visibility. 

In addition, we may limit the visibility of listings or ads in the interest of keeping Umade safe, and improving our Services. For example, listings or ads may have decreased visibility because they include terms that represent a prohibited item or based on third party policies. These listings or ads may also be restricted from appearing in one or more features of the Umade Services. While these listings or ads may have limited visibility, they are still discoverable in search.

If Umade has reason to believe you, Your Content, or your use of the Services violate our Terms, including this Seller Policy, we may deactivate Your Content or suspend or terminate your account (and any accounts Umade determines is related to your account) and your access to the Services.  Generally, Umade will notify you that Your Content or account has been suspended or terminated, unless you’ve repeatedly violated our Terms or we have legal or regulatory reasons preventing us from notifying you.

d. Seller Protection

Umade also provides limited protection to sellers who meet the requirements of our Seller Protection Programme. 

1. Selling Handmade Items

Handmade on Umade is a spectrum. On one end, we have makers — sellers who are literally making their items with their own hands (or tools). On the other end, we have designers — sellers who design their items but rely entirely on outside assistance or another business to help physically produce them. Many handmade sellers fall in the middle of the spectrum because they are both making and designing their items.

Regardless of where you fall on this spectrum, you must be transparent about who is helping you and how your items are being made. Everything listed as handmade must be made and/or designed by you, the seller. You may also have shop members who help you run your business, as long as you, the seller, are making and/or designing your items.

Makers

A maker is a seller who is physically making the items listed for sale in their Umade shop. A maker might design their items in addition to making them, or they might follow a pattern or template that they did not design. Regardless, makers must be creating their items with their own hands (or tools).

Designers

A designer is a seller who has come up with an original design, pattern, sketch, template, prototype, or plan to be produced by in-house shop members or a production partner. 

If you are a designer and you are using a production partner to help make your items, you must also disclose information about your production partner in your listings. A production partner is anyone (who’s not a part of your Umade shop) who helps you physically produce your items.