Terms of Service

1. Definitions

1.1. Agreement — this Terms of Service document, together with all referenced policies, including the Privacy Policy, the Acceptable Use Policy, and the Recurring Payments Agreement.

1.2. Akenai — Akenai Host, the provider of hosting, cloud computing, and related technical services accessible at akenai.host.

1.3. Client — any natural or legal person that has accepted this Agreement and uses any Services.

1.4. Services — virtual servers and any other technical or hosting services offered by Akenai.

1.5. Client Area — the online portal at akenai.host through which the Client manages account, orders, and billing.

1.6. SLA — the Service Level Agreement set out in Section 9 of this Agreement.

2. General Provisions

2.1. By accepting this Agreement you represent and warrant that (a) you have the legal capacity and authority to enter into it; (b) if accepting on behalf of an entity, you have authority to bind that entity; (c) you are at least 18 years old; and (d) the information you provide to us is accurate and complete.

2.2. This Agreement, together with the Privacy Policy and any service-specific terms, constitutes the entire agreement between the parties and supersedes any prior agreements, oral or written.

2.3. Akenai reserves the right to amend these Terms at any time. Amendments take effect fourteen (14) days after they are published on our website. Continued use of the Services after that period constitutes acceptance of the updated Agreement.

2.4. Section headings are for navigation only and do not affect interpretation.

2.5. If any provision of this Agreement is held to be invalid or unenforceable, the remaining provisions remain in full force, and the invalid provision shall be modified only to the minimum extent necessary to make it enforceable.

2.6. Failure to enforce any provision is not a waiver of that or any other provision. Waivers must be in writing.

2.7. Provisions relating to payment, limitation of liability, intellectual property, dispute resolution, and data protection survive termination.

2.8. Nothing in this Agreement limits any non-waivable consumer rights that you may have under applicable law. Where a provision of this Agreement conflicts with such rights, the mandatory consumer-protection rule prevails.

2.9. All support, billing, and other communications with Akenai are conducted in English. Communications submitted in other languages may go unanswered or be subject to significant delay. You are responsible for keeping your contact email current and capable of receiving notices.

2.10. Accounts and Services are not transferable by default. You may not sell, assign, or transfer your account or any Service to a third party without our prior written consent. Transfer between accounts may be requested via support tickets from both the source and destination accounts; we may approve or reject such requests at our discretion.

2.11. Business clients processing third-party personal data using the Services may request a Data Processing Agreement (DPA) by contacting support.

3. Payment Terms

3.1. All Services are provided on a prepaid basis. Services are activated only after payment has been received and confirmed by Akenai or its payment processor.

3.2. Payment is made through the Client Area in the currency selected at checkout.

3.3. Currency conversion, where applicable, is handled by the payment processor and may be subject to exchange rates and fees.

3.4. Prices are exclusive of any taxes, duties, or levies imposed by your jurisdiction. You are responsible for any such taxes.

3.5. If a renewal payment fails, the Service is suspended immediately. A data-retention fee equal to 50% of the daily Service rate applies for each day of overdue payment, reflecting the cost of reserving disk space and IPv4/IPv6 addresses while the Service is suspended.

3.6. A 7-day grace period applies after a failed payment. During this period you may restore the Service by paying the standard renewal price plus accrued data-retention fees. After 7 days, the Service and all associated data are permanently deleted.

3.7. We will notify you by email and/or via the Client Area at least 3 days before any automatic renewal charge. You may disable auto-renewal or remove your payment method at any time through the Client Area. When auto-renewal is disabled, the Service remains active until the end of the current billing period; no cancellation fees apply and no advance notice is required.

3.8. Plan upgrades are processed automatically and require payment of the prorated difference for the remaining current billing period. Upgrades typically take effect within minutes of payment confirmation.

3.9. Plan downgrades are not technically supported. If you need a smaller plan, place a new order at the desired plan, migrate your data, and cancel the original Service per the Refund Policy.

3.10. Billing errors must be reported within thirty (30) days of the charge via a support ticket. Confirmed billing errors will be corrected within ten (10) business days.

3.11. Before initiating any chargeback or payment dispute you must submit a support ticket describing the issue and allow Akenai five (5) business days to respond. Initiating a chargeback without this prior step may result in immediate suspension or termination of Services without refund, and you may be permanently barred from using Akenai.

3.12. Suspension is triggered approximately at the same time of day as the original activation timestamp of the Service.

3.13. Details about storage and handling of payment-card data are available in our Privacy Policy.

4. Refund Policy

4.1. Refunds are calculated only for full, unused months of Service, excluding any partially used months or periods during which the Service was suspended. Refunds may be requested at any time, including after 14 days, but cover only full unused months.

4.2. Refunds are issued to the original payment method or to the Client Area account balance, at our discretion and subject to payment processor capability.

4.3. Refunds are processed within 14 business days of the request. Actual processing time may vary based on payment-processor requirements.

4.4. To process a refund, you must inform us of the reason. For situations outside our control or responsibility, refunds are not guaranteed and remain at our discretion.

4.5. The refunded amount may be reduced by: (a) payment-processor fees; (b) damages caused to Akenai (for example, if you cause our IP addresses to be blacklisted); and (c) any sums you owe us.

4.6. The following are non-refundable: (a) software licenses; (b) any Services flagged as non-refundable at the time of purchase.

4.7. We may refuse refunds in cases of: (a) breach of this Agreement; (b) fraud or suspicious activity; (c) more than three (3) refund requests in any rolling 30-day period; (d) Services used in violation of this Agreement. This does not limit your statutory consumer rights.

4.8. We may request identity verification before processing a refund.

4.9. Cryptocurrency transactions are irreversible on the blockchain. For valid refunds of crypto payments, we refund the fiat equivalent actually received at the time of the original transaction. Refunds may be issued in crypto or fiat at our discretion.

4.10. If you disagree with a refund decision, you may contact support to request a review. We will investigate and respond in writing within 14 business days. For consumers, this does not affect your right to pursue remedies through applicable consumer-protection bodies.

5. Client Rights and Obligations

5.1. You are fully responsible for your server and all software running on it, including operating systems, applications, and third-party software.

5.2. You may install and use any software that complies with this Agreement and applicable law of the European Union and any other jurisdiction relevant to the Services.

5.3. You may migrate virtual servers between plans and physical servers within Akenai infrastructure, subject to technical feasibility and capacity.

5.4. Detailed rules on prohibited content, software licensing, content legality, and bulk email are set out in our Acceptable Use Policy.

5.5. You must cooperate with reasonable requests for information during incident investigations. Refusal to cooperate may affect our ability to resolve issues and may be considered when handling SLA claims.

5.6. You must promptly notify Akenai of any known or suspected security breach, unauthorized access, or compromise of your Services. This is critical because a single compromised service can affect other clients on shared infrastructure.

6. Akenai Rights and Obligations

6.1. We will provide the Services within our technical capabilities and in line with the SLA, but we do not guarantee 100% uptime or uninterrupted availability.

6.2. Virtual server orders are activated within three (3) business days of payment confirmation, unless otherwise stated in the plan description. If we fail to activate a Service within the stated timeframe, you are entitled to a full refund on request, or you may wait for activation. The billing period starts on the activation date, not the payment date.

6.3. If your ordered plan is unavailable due to lack of slots or IP addresses, we will, at your request, offer a comparable plan in an alternative location. Any price difference will be refunded or charged accordingly.

6.4. Akenai acts as a passive intermediary for your data and does not proactively monitor content. Upon receipt of a substantiated abuse complaint we will acknowledge receipt and begin investigation, generally within 24 hours for network-level abuse and 48 hours for content-related issues. We will take appropriate action — including removal or blocking access — in line with applicable law. If you do not respond within the investigation window, the affected Service or your entire account may be suspended depending on severity.

6.5. We will cooperate with law-enforcement and regulatory authorities where required by law and on receipt of a valid request from a competent body.

6.6. We are not responsible for your software or for access problems caused by third parties, including software vendors, ISPs, or external factors.

6.7. We do not guarantee accurate geolocation in third-party databases such as IP2Location, DB-IP, or MaxMind.

7. Termination of Services

7.1. We may terminate Services immediately, without refund, for serious breaches, including but not limited to:

• Violation of any provision of our Acceptable Use Policy, including prohibited content, network abuse, or sanctions violations.
• Provision of fraudulent or misleading information in breach of the warranty given in the preamble.
• Systematic abusive conduct toward our staff or other clients — including threats of violence, discriminatory slurs, hate speech, or prolonged harassment across multiple interactions. A single instance of rude or sharply worded communication is not grounds for termination. For non-severe conduct issues we will issue a written warning before any termination. Immediate termination without prior warning applies only to genuine threats of violence or unlawful conduct.

7.2. For breaches that do not pose immediate security or legal risk, we will make reasonable efforts to notify you before termination. We reserve the right to terminate without prior notice in serious cases.

7.3. For non-urgent breaches, we may grant 24 hours to remedy the breach before termination.

7.4. We may retain specific data that is the subject of a valid legal complaint or law-enforcement request. All other Client data remains available during the retention window stated in this Agreement.

7.5. If you believe your account was suspended in error, you may appeal through the support ticket system. We will review the appeal and, if the investigation shows no breach, may reinstate the account and/or issue a prorated refund. Our decision on appeals is final, without prejudice to your right to pursue remedies under Section 14.

7.6. Termination by Client

You may terminate any Service at any time via the Client Area or by submitting a support ticket. Refunds are available only for full unused months of Service, per the Refund Policy. Alternatively you may disable auto-renewal as described in Section 3.7, in which case the Service remains active until the end of the current billing period with no cancellation fee. No prior notice is required for Client-initiated termination unless required by applicable law or the plan terms.

7.7. Data Retention After Termination

After termination, your data is retained for 3 days before final deletion. You are responsible for backing up any data you wish to keep before terminating. Data recovery after termination may incur additional fees; recovery beyond the 3-day retention window is not guaranteed.

7.8. Account Reinstatement

Accounts suspended for breach may be reinstated only at our sole discretion, subject to review, additional verification requirements, and possible reinstatement fees.

8. Governing Law and Jurisdiction

Akenai operates servers located in Germany. We provide Services to clients worldwide and recognize that multiple legal regimes may apply.

8.1. Our technical infrastructure in Germany is subject to applicable EU and German law, including the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) where it applies to the processing of personal data.

8.2. Where local consumer-protection law provides greater protection than this Agreement, such law applies to the necessary extent.

8.3. Akenai fully complies with applicable EU, US, UN, and international sanctions regimes, including those administered by the EU Council, US OFAC, and the UN Security Council.

8.4. Sanctioned persons and entities are strictly prohibited from creating accounts, placing orders, or otherwise accessing the Services. Any attempt to bypass this requirement, and any subsequent identification of a sanctioned party, will result in immediate account suspension and removal of all Services without notice or refund.

8.5. We screen registrations and account activity against EU, US, UN, and international sanctions databases to prevent access by sanctioned parties.

8.6. We do not provide Services to persons or entities located, ordinarily resident, or organized under the laws of any country, territory, or region subject to comprehensive sanctions under applicable EU or US trade restrictions. Breach of this provision results in immediate termination without refund.

8.7. We cooperate with the relevant regulatory and enforcement authorities to maintain compliance with applicable sanctions and anti-money-laundering requirements.

9. Service Level Agreement (SLA)

9.1. We target service availability of 99.9% per calendar month, excluding scheduled maintenance and force-majeure events.

9.2. Uptime is calculated using our monitoring systems, available to you on request, and is measured monthly. Our determination of uptime and downtime is based on this objective monitoring data.

9.3. If the Service is unavailable due to our fault, you are entitled to compensation under the SLA.

9.4. Compensation for unplanned downtime is provided as an extension of the Service equal to twice the duration of the downtime. SLA claims must be filed within thirty (30) days of the downtime event. Claims filed after this deadline will not be honored.

9.5. The SLA does not apply to: (a) free trials; (b) beta or “Test” products; (c) scheduled maintenance; (d) downtime caused by your actions, third-party services, or force majeure; (e) Services suspended for non-payment or breach.

9.6. Scheduled maintenance is announced at least forty-eight (48) hours in advance by email and via the Client Area. Scheduled maintenance is excluded from downtime calculations and will normally not exceed twenty-four (24) hours per calendar month. Compensation for extended maintenance may be granted at our discretion.

9.7. Technical support is available 24/7 via the ticket system in the Client Area and via Telegram (@akenai_support). Target response times are: Client Area tickets — first response within 8 working hours, with updates every 2 working hours during working hours; Telegram support — within 30 minutes during working hours. These targets are not contractual guarantees and may vary with volume and complexity. We may rate-limit support for clients sending excessive repeated requests not tied to genuine service issues.

9.8. You may request verification of uptime calculations against our monitoring data via a support ticket. We will provide reasonable access to the relevant data.

9.9. We may replace the IP address assigned to a Service on request. Whether the replacement is free or carries a fee is determined at our discretion based on the reason. Replacements caused by circumstances under our control (e.g., an inherited blacklisting) are free. Replacements requested for reasons attributable to you (e.g., blacklisting due to your own activity) are charged. IP availability is not guaranteed.

9.10. All IP addresses assigned to your Services remain our property and must be returned on termination. You have no ownership interest in any IP address provided for the duration of the Service.

10. Liability and Warranties

A. Client liability

10.1. You are fully responsible for hosted content and software. Akenai is not responsible for your applications, websites, or other content hosted on our infrastructure. You alone ensure the security, correct configuration, and legal compliance of your applications.

10.2. If you cause us damages or losses, you must compensate us. You agree to indemnify, defend, and hold Akenai harmless from any claims, losses, liabilities, and expenses (including legal fees) arising out of (a) your use of the Services; (b) your breach of this Agreement; (c) your violation of any third-party right; or (d) any content or data uploaded or transmitted by you.

B. Akenai liability and limitations

10.3. Except as expressly stated in this Agreement, the Services are provided “as is” and “as available”, without warranties of any kind, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, or non-infringement.

10.4. We are not liable for local or regional restrictions on use of our Services imposed by third parties, including ISP filtering, protocol restrictions, or IP-address blocks. See Section 9.10 for IP replacement options and pricing.

10.5. We may be liable for direct damages caused by negligence, gross negligence, or wilful misconduct, within the limits set in this section. For consumers, liability for ordinary negligence in the provision of services applies as required by applicable consumer-protection law.

10.6. We are not liable for indirect, consequential, or incidental damages, including loss of profits, business interruption, data loss, reputational harm, or other economic loss, regardless of legal theory. This includes data loss from any cause — hardware failure, software bugs, misconfiguration, security breaches, or third-party action. You are solely responsible for backups under Section 12.

10.7. Our aggregate liability, regardless of theory, is capped at the amount you paid for Services in the 12 months preceding the claim.

10.8. We implement reasonable security measures but do not guarantee absolute security or uninterrupted service. We are not liable for damages caused by factors outside our reasonable control, including third-party services, software, or hardware; software vulnerabilities or malware; security breaches; force majeure; or your actions.

10.9. Any claim against Akenai must be brought within six (6) months of the date the claim arose or the date you knew (or should have known) the underlying facts, whichever is earlier. Claims filed later will not be accepted.

11. Intellectual Property

11.1. All content, trademarks, logos, software, and Services of Akenai are our exclusive property or the property of our licensors and are protected by copyright, trademark, and other intellectual-property laws.

11.2. You retain all rights to your own content hosted on our servers. You warrant that you hold all rights, licenses, and permissions necessary to use, host, and distribute the content you upload.

11.3. We grant you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to use our Services and software for the term of the Agreement.

11.4. By uploading content, you grant Akenai a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to store, process, transmit, cache, replicate, and perform technical operations on that content as reasonably necessary to provide the Services for the term of this Agreement. This includes replication across data centers for resilience, temporary copies during migration, and automated security scanning. The license terminates automatically on termination of this Agreement, except for archival backups retained for a limited period as required by law.

11.5. You may not reverse-engineer, decompile, modify, reproduce, distribute, or create derivative works of our software, Services, or intellectual property without our explicit written consent.

11.6. We may ask permission to use your name and logo in our marketing materials, client lists, and website. We will not use such materials without your explicit written consent. Reviews from public sites such as Trustpilot may be quoted or displayed without prior consent but will be removed on request. Use of client testimonials in paid advertising requires prior explicit consent.

12. Backup Responsibility

12.1. You are fully responsible for backing up your data — all content, databases, files, configurations, and any other information stored on our infrastructure.

12.2. Our liability for data loss is excluded under Section 10. Backups are your sole responsibility.

12.3. We strongly recommend keeping multiple backups of critical data in locations separate from your primary hosting environment.

12.4. While we may assist with data recovery where possible, successful recovery is not guaranteed. Recovery services may incur additional fees.

13. Force Majeure

13.1. Neither party is liable for any failure or delay in performance to the extent it is caused by circumstances beyond its reasonable control.

13.2. Such events include but are not limited to acts of God, government action, war, terrorism, civil unrest, power failures, ISP or data-center outages, DDoS attacks, catastrophic hardware failures affecting multiple systems simultaneously, third-party service failures, and pandemics or public-health emergencies. Single-component hardware failure (e.g., a single drive or PSU) is considered ordinary operational risk and is not force majeure.

13.3. During a force-majeure event, Akenai will make reasonable efforts to maintain service availability and data integrity but cannot guarantee full performance. SLA obligations are suspended for the duration of such events.

13.4. We will make reasonable efforts to notify clients of force-majeure events affecting Services and to provide recovery timelines where available.

13.5. If a force-majeure event continues for more than fourteen (14) consecutive days, either party may terminate this Agreement on written notice, with a prorated refund of any prepaid but undelivered Services.

14. Dispute Resolution

14.1. Before initiating any formal dispute-resolution process, you agree to contact Akenai first to seek an informal resolution. Both parties will attempt in good faith to resolve the matter through direct communication.

14.2. Any dispute that cannot be resolved through negotiation will be governed by the applicable law of the jurisdiction where our infrastructure is located, without prejudice to mandatory consumer-protection rules of your jurisdiction. Consumers may bring claims in their local courts as permitted by applicable law.

14.3. Each Client’s claims are handled independently, on the basis of their own circumstances.

14.4. Notwithstanding the above, either party may seek relief in small-claims court for disputes within that court’s jurisdictional limits.

14.5. All claims under this section are subject to the limitation period set in Section 10.9. No proceedings may be commenced after that period.

15. Final Provisions

15.1. By using our Services, you confirm that you have read, understood, and agree to be bound by this Agreement. If you do not agree, stop using the Services and close your account.

15.2. For any questions about this Agreement, contact us through the support system in your Client Area or via support@akenai.host.