Terms of Service

1. What marchmello is

marchmello is a marketplace connecting customers with independent shops and restaurants (“Shops”) in the UK. Customers browse Shops, place orders, pay, and earn loyalty points. Shops list products and fulfil orders.

We are an intermediary and payment facilitator — we are not the seller or producer of any food or goods. The contract for each order is between the customer and the Shop. Shops are solely responsible for their food, its safety, hygiene, allergen information, description, and fulfilment — including delivery, which Shops carry out with their own drivers. marchmello does not deliver orders or employ couriers.

2. Eligibility & accounts

• You can browse Shops and menus without an account. You need an account to place an order, earn or spend points, or leave a review.
• You must be 18 or over to use the Service (it involves card payments).
• You must provide accurate information and keep your login secure. You're responsible for activity under your account.
• Authentication is provided by Clerk; payments and payouts by Stripe. Your use of those is also subject to their terms.
• We may suspend or close accounts that breach these Terms, are fraudulent, or create risk to other users or us.

3. Orders, prices & payment

• Prices are set by Shops and shown in the app. A service fee may be added at checkout (waived for eligible subscribers, and never charged on orders you pay for at the counter or on an order with nothing to pay).
• Paying online: payment is taken at checkout via Stripe. Placing an order authorises us to charge your chosen payment method the total shown.
• Paying at the counter: you may instead choose to pay the Shop directly when you collect. We take no payment for these orders and are not party to it — the order still reaches the Shop and is accepted in the same way, and the Shop can refuse to hand it over until you have paid. Cancellation and refund handling for counter orders is a matter between you and the Shop; section 4 explains how a refund affects your points.
• Ordering at a Shop’s till. Some Shops take orders in person on the marchmello till. If you give staff your MELLO code (your friend code), the order is added to your account and earns points when it’s served, and we notify you that your code was added. To use points or vouchers at the till, or buy a voucher there, you also give staff the 4-digit till PIN shown on your Points tab. It changes every 5 minutes and works once. After 5 wrong PINs at one Shop within 24 hours, your points and vouchers can’t be used at that Shop’s till for 24 hours (you can still pay and earn points). Only give your PIN to staff at the till — we will never ask you for it. You pay the Shop directly for a till order, as with a counter order, and it can’t be cancelled from the app; ask the Shop.
• Delivery. Some Shops deliver, using their own drivers. Each sets its own delivery fee and how far it delivers, and both are shown on the Shop’s page and in your basket before you check out. The fee is added to your total and goes to the Shop in full; points are earned on your food, not on the delivery fee. Delivery orders are paid online, or — where the Shop offers it — in cash to the driver when the order arrives (cash on delivery, with no service fee). You enter the address each time you order; the Shop can only deliver within its area, and we check your postcode before you order.
• A delivery order is the Shop’s responsibility until it reaches you. You’ll get a notification when the Shop sends it out and when it’s delivered. There is no live tracking, and any delivery time a Shop gives is an estimate. Some Shops deliver only (for example cloud kitchens), in which case every order is a delivery.
• When you reach the Shop you can press “I’ve arrived”, which asks your device to confirm you are nearby and tells the Shop you’re there. Location is only checked at that moment and only if you allow it; you can still collect if you decline.
• An order is a request to the Shop; the Shop may accept or reject it. If a Shop rejects your order, you are refunded in full automatically.
• For orders paid online we are merchant of record for the payment and split each payment between the Shop and our platform commission. We are not merchant of record for counter payments, which never pass through us.
• Age-restricted items (alcohol). Shops may flag products that contain alcohol. An order containing one cannot be paid for in the app — it is a counter order, so that staff see you in person. Before the Shop takes payment or hands it over, it must check you are 18 or over and record that check in the app. If you cannot show that you are old enough, the Shop will refuse the order. For the same reason, orders containing alcohol can’t be delivered. It is an offence to buy or attempt to buy alcohol for anyone under 18.

4. Cancellations & refunds

• Shop rejects an order: you receive a full refund to your original payment method (refunds can take 5–10 days to appear).
• You cancel: if the Shop hasn't accepted yet, you're refunded in full; once the Shop has accepted and may be preparing your order, a partial refund applies. Once an order is served or completed it can't be cancelled.
• Delivery orders: you can cancel until the Shop sends your order out for delivery, on the same terms as above — and the delivery fee is always refunded in full. Once it’s on its way it can’t be cancelled. If your order doesn’t arrive, or arrives damaged or incomplete, contact the Shop or us: if the Shop can’t put it right it cancels the order and you’re refunded in full, delivery fee included.
• Refunds are returned to the original payment method only.
• These rules cover orders paid online. Because we take no money for a counter order or a cash-on-delivery order, there is nothing for us to refund — cancelling one simply withdraws the request, and anything already paid to the Shop is between you and the Shop.
• Refunds of orders paid at the counter. Once an order you paid the Shop for directly — at the counter, at its till or in cash on delivery — has been served, the Shop can refund all or part of it and record the refund on marchmello: on its till on the day it was served, or in the app within 180 days of serving it. The Shop gives you the money back itself; we take no money for these orders and return none. We notify you of each refund recorded. Orders paid online are not refunded this way.
• A recorded refund takes back the points the order earned, in proportion to the money refunded. A refund of everything left on the order also gives back any points, voucher, reward card or stamp-card free item you used on it (a voucher or reward card only if it is still valid), and takes back the stamps it earned, along with any free item they completed that you haven’t claimed. If you have already spent the points the order earned, converted them to another Shop or sent them to a friend, the refund can’t be recorded through marchmello, or only for the part your remaining points cover — unless it is a refund of everything left and the points you spent on the order, which come back, make up the difference. A full refund may also not be possible once the order’s stamps have gone towards a free item you have claimed, or while money from the order has gone towards a Spending Reward you have since used on another order; a part refund still can.

Full details, including the refund due at each stage, are in our Refund & Cancellation Policy.

5. Loyalty points & vouchers

• You earn points on spending at a Shop (roughly £1 = 1 point), credited when the order is served. If the Shop refunds an order you paid for at the counter, the points it earned are taken back in step with the money refunded (see section 4). Points are a promotional loyalty benefit, have no cash value, cannot be exchanged for cash, and are not transferable except as the app allows.
• Points are held per Shop. You may convert points between Shops; conversions incur a conversion charge (a percentage of the points converted, shown in the app before you confirm), waived for eligible subscribers.
• If a Shop closes. Points are held with each Shop, so if a Shop closes on marchmello or is removed from it, you lose the points you hold with that Shop, along with any vouchers, reward cards and stamps for it. They can’t be converted, sent or exchanged for anything once the Shop has gone. A Shop can close at any time, and you may not be told in advance.
• Shops set their own point-based discounts and vouchers. Vouchers have an expiry set by the Shop and can only be used as described.
• Reward cards. A Shop may also sell reward cards for points — for example “buy one, get one free”, “buy two, get the next one 25% off”, or “spend £25, get a free item”. Buying a card spends the points immediately. The card’s terms are fixed at the moment you buy it, so a Shop later editing or withdrawing the offer does not change a card you already hold. Cards have an expiry set by the Shop, and only one card can be used per order.
• Stamp cards. A Shop may run a stamp card — for example “buy 6 coffees, get the 7th free”. You earn one stamp for each eligible item you pay for, credited when the order is served. A full card earns a free item, chosen from the items on the card, which costs nothing at checkout. One free item can be claimed per order, and a free item does not earn a stamp itself. The Shop decides which items count and how many stamps earn a free item, and may change or pause its card at any time. Free items you have already earned are kept, and if the Shop raises the number of stamps needed, a card you have already started is completed at the number it started on. A full refund of an order you paid for at the counter takes back the stamps it earned, and any free item they completed that you haven’t claimed (see section 4). Stamps and free items have no cash value.
• If the Shop takes every item on a card off its menu or sells out of them, you can either keep the card and use it on whatever is still eligible, or ask for the points you spent to be returned. Reward cards are otherwise non-refundable, and like all points they have no cash value.
• Spending Reward. A Shop may offer a Spending Reward — for example “spend £30 within 30 days, get 25% off one order”. Your spend counts when each order is served, for what you paid (not delivery or service fees), for 30 days. Once you reach the Shop’s target, the reward can be used on one order, until enough of the spend behind it is more than 30 days old (the app shows the time). It can’t be combined with a voucher, a reward card or point deals; a stamp-card free item can be. Using it starts your spend again from £0, and the order you use it on doesn’t count toward the next one. If that order is cancelled, or refunded in full at the counter, the reward comes back with any spend still within 30 days. The Shop sets the target and the discount and may change them. It has no cash value.
• We may adjust, expire, or remove points and vouchers obtained through error, fraud, or abuse, and may change the points and loyalty rules with notice.

6. marchmello+ subscriptions

marchmello+ is an optional paid membership. It is not required to use the Service. An active membership removes the service fee from your orders, removes the points-conversion fee, and unlocks member-only deals offered by Shops. Two tiers are available, with identical benefits:

• Subscriptions auto-renew for the same period at the same price until cancelled or changed. There is no free trial.
• On iOS, subscriptions are sold as Apple In-App Purchases. Payment is charged to your Apple ID account at confirmation of purchase, and the account is charged for renewal within 24 hours before the end of the current period. Auto-renewal can be turned off at any time in your Apple ID account settings, at least 24 hours before the end of the current period.
• Elsewhere, subscriptions are billed via Stripe and can be cancelled, or switched to another plan or billing period, from your profile in the app. A switch takes effect at your next renewal, when the new plan's price is charged; nothing is charged before then, and the current period isn't refunded or pro-rated.
• Your right to cancel. If you buy marchmello+ on Android (billed by us through Stripe), you can cancel within 14 days of the day you buy it: reply to the confirmation email we send you, or email contact@marchmello.co.uk. When you buy, you tick a box asking us to start your membership straight away, so its benefits are yours from that moment. If you then cancel within those 14 days, we refund what you paid minus the days of membership you’ve had: the price of your billing period divided by the number of days in it, for each day from the day you bought it up to and including the day you tell us you’re cancelling. If you bought without asking us to start straight away, we refund you in full. We refund you within 14 days, to the payment method you used, and your membership ends when we do. After those 14 days you can still cancel at any time, as below. On iOS, Apple handles cancellations and refunds of In-App Purchases.
• The Student plan requires verification of a valid .ac.uk email. Student status must be re-verified periodically; if it lapses, student benefits end and your points and order history are kept.
• You can cancel any time; your benefits continue until the end of the paid period, after which the plan does not renew. We do not provide pro-rata refunds for partial periods unless required by law. Refunds for Apple purchases are handled by Apple.
• We email you about your marchmello+ membership: a confirmation when you join, a receipt for each payment we take (on iPhone, a note when Apple renews it), a confirmation when you book or drop a plan change in the app (Android), and a confirmation when you cancel.
• We may change plan prices or benefits with reasonable notice; changes apply from your next renewal.

7. Shop owner terms

If you register a Shop, in addition to the above:

• You must provide accurate business and verification details (e.g. business type, company or registration numbers, food business registration, food hygiene, insurance). We may verify these (including via Companies House and the FSA) and reject or remove Shops that fail verification. Until we approve your Shop, it can’t take orders or use the till, and customers can’t convert points to it.
• Shared loyalty. When you register a Shop, it joins marchmello’s shared loyalty network. Customers can convert points they hold with you to any other Shop that is live on marchmello, at the conversion charge shown in the app, and send them to friends where the app allows. Points that reach your Shop from other Shops, whether converted or sent by a friend, are spent with you exactly like points earned with you, on the rewards you set. No money changes hands when points move between Shops: no Shop pays or is paid for them, and no Shop receives the conversion charge. You can’t opt out of shared loyalty while your Shop is on marchmello; closing your Shop is how you leave, and when it closes the points customers hold with you are lost (see section 5). These terms apply from 18 October 2026; section 5 already lets customers convert points between Shops.
• You are solely responsible for legal compliance for your food business — food safety, hygiene, allergens, labelling, licensing, and consumer law.
• Payouts are handled by Stripe Connect (Express). You must complete Stripe onboarding to receive funds. We deduct a platform commission from each order; the remainder is transferred to your connected account.
• If you reject an order after payment, the customer is refunded from our platform balance and the service fee for that order is charged to you (deducted from your payouts). Repeatedly rejecting orders may lead to removal.
• Each Shop gets a kitchen access code for the web kitchen board at marchmello.co.uk/kitchen, where your staff can see live orders and mark them finished, and a POS code for the web till at marchmello.co.uk/pos, where they take orders in person. You can also give managers their own 5-digit code, which lets them change your menu from the till; we record which manager made each change. These codes grant access to your Shop, so treat them as credentials: share them only with staff who need them, regenerate your POS code or remove a manager’s code in the app if one is exposed, and ask us to reissue your kitchen code. You are responsible for what is done under them.
• If you flag a product as containing alcohol, you are responsible for holding the correct premises and personal licences, for checking the customer’s age in person before taking payment or handing the order over, and for recording that check in the app. The app will not let you take payment for or serve such an order until you do. Selling alcohol to a person under 18 is a criminal offence and is yours alone to answer for.
• Counter orders reach you unpaid. It is your responsibility to take payment before handing the order over.
• Till sales. Orders you ring up on the till are counter orders: we take no payment, commission or service fee on them, and you take payment your own way. Mark an order paid only once you have been paid; the customer’s points are credited when you mark it served. Add a customer’s MELLO code only when that customer is at your counter and buying, and only to what they bought, and ask for their till PIN only when they choose to use points or vouchers. Recording sales that didn’t happen, or crediting points to yourself, your staff or anyone other than the real customer, is fraud against marchmello and the other Shops in the network. We check counter sales for signs of it, and may reverse points, suspend your till or remove your Shop.
• Refunds of counter orders. Once an order paid at the counter or in cash on delivery has been served, you can refund all or part of it and record the refund: on the till on the day it was served (except a delivery), or in the app within 180 days of serving it. You give the money back yourself, and recording the refund adjusts the customer’s points, vouchers, reward cards and stamps as set out in section 4. Only record a refund for money you actually give back. Anyone with your POS code can refund at the till, and we notify you of each refund made there. These refund terms apply from 18 October 2026.
• Delivery. If you offer delivery, you do so with your own drivers and you are responsible for the order until it reaches the customer. Before you start, and for as long as you deliver, you must: make sure your drivers are legally allowed to drive and are insured for food delivery (hire and reward cover); keep food at safe temperatures on the way (hot food above 63°C, chilled food at or below 8°C) in suitable packaging; make allergen information available when the order is handed over; and never deliver alcohol through marchmello. You set your delivery fee and area; the fee is shown to customers before they check out and is paid to you in full, with no commission taken on it. You agree to these responsibilities in the app when you turn delivery on, and we record when you did.
• Customer delivery details. You receive a customer’s name, address, postcode, phone number and driver instructions only to deliver that order. You must not use them for anything else (including marketing), share them with anyone other than the driver delivering the order, or keep copies after the order is complete. The app deletes them from the order after 30 days.
• If you cancel a delivery order — including because it couldn’t be delivered, or arrived damaged — the customer is refunded in full, delivery fee included, and the rejection terms above apply. If you choose delivery only (for example as a cloud kitchen), every order is delivered and customers can’t collect or pay at the counter; your Shop page must still show your real trading name and address.
• Cash on delivery. If you accept it, your driver collects the amount shown in the app (the food plus your delivery fee) at the door, and you mark it received in the app before marking the order delivered. Cash orders never pass through us, so we take no commission or service fee on them — and a customer who isn’t in, or doesn’t pay, is at your risk. You can switch cash on delivery off at any time.
• You grant us a licence to display your Shop name, logo, product information and images within the Service.

8. Acceptable use

You agree not to: break the law; upload false, infringing, or harmful content; attempt to defraud the points or payment system; interfere with or probe the Service's security; scrape or misuse data; or use the Service to harass others.

9. Reviews and content you post

After a Shop serves your order you can leave a review — a star rating, a food rating, a happiness rating and an optional written comment. This section covers reviews and anything else you submit, such as your profile photo and the notes you send to a Shop with an order (“Your Content”).

• Reviews are public. Your rating, your comment and the name on your profile are shown on that Shop's page to anyone browsing the app. Please don't put anything in a review that you wouldn't want shown publicly.
• Reviews are tied to an order you actually placed. They must be honest and reflect your own experience, and must not contain false statements, abuse, discriminatory or unlawful content, someone else's personal information, or advertising.
• You keep ownership of Your Content. You grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to host, store, display, reproduce and distribute it within the Service and to promote the Service, for as long as you choose to keep it posted.
• You confirm you have the right to grant that licence and that Your Content does not infringe anyone else's rights.
• We may remove or decline to publish any content that breaches these Terms or the law, and may suspend accounts that repeatedly do so. We do not review content before it appears and we are not obliged to monitor it.
• If you believe a review or other content breaches these Terms — including a Shop owner who believes a review of their Shop does — contact us at contact@marchmello.co.uk and we'll look into it.
• To remove Your Content, email us at the address above, or delete your account (Profile → Delete account).

10. Intellectual property

The Service, including its software, branding and design, is owned by MARCHMELLO LTD and protected by law. You may not copy, modify, or reverse-engineer it except as permitted by law. Shops retain rights in the content they upload but licence it to us to operate the Service.

11. Disclaimers & liability

• The Service is provided “as is”. We do not guarantee it will be uninterrupted or error-free.
• We are not responsible for the food or goods provided by Shops, their quality, safety or accuracy, or for their delivery — that is the Shop's responsibility.
• Nothing in these Terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law (including for death or personal injury caused by negligence, or fraud). To the extent permitted by law, we are not liable for indirect or consequential loss, and our total liability to you for any claim is limited to the amount you paid us in the 12 months before the claim.
• Your statutory rights as a consumer are not affected.

12. Termination

You may stop using the Service and delete your account at any time (Profile → Delete account). We may suspend or terminate access for breach of these Terms or where required by law. Some data may be retained as described in the Privacy Policy.

13. Changes

We may update these Terms. We'll update the date above and, for significant changes, notify you in the app or by email. Continued use after changes means you accept them. If you run a Shop, we'll give you at least 15 days' notice of changes to the terms that apply to Shops before they take effect (unless the law or a security risk requires a faster change), and you can close your Shop before then if you don't accept them.

14. Governing law

These Terms are governed by the laws of England and Wales, and disputes are subject to the courts of England and Wales.

15. Contact

contact@marchmello.co.uk
MARCHMELLO LTD (Company No. 17317814), 66 Paul Street, London, England, EC2A 4NA, United Kingdom.