Terms of service

The short version

This summary helps you read the terms. The full terms below are what count.

• Hostler is software for carriers that haul Amazon Relay freight. You, the carrier, sign up as a business.
• You own your data, including your drivers’ information. We use it only to run Hostler for you. We never sell it, and we never use it to train AI.
• For your workers’ information, you are the employer in charge and we are your service provider. Notices to your workers, consents, and your DOT and FCRA duties stay with you.
• The first 30 days are free, once per company. You enter a card at the start. Cancel before the trial ends and you pay nothing. After that we bill monthly. Dispatch is billed yearly.
• Cancel any time. Cancelling takes effect at the end of the period you have paid for. We don’t refund part of a month.
• If a payment fails, you keep everything for 7 days while it is retried.
• We email you at least 30 days before we change a price.
• When your subscription ends, you have 30 days to export your data. Then we delete it.
• Most changes Hostler makes in Amazon Relay, ADP and other systems happen because one of your people pressed a button. A few automations act on their own: delay filing, if you switch it on, and the dispatch desk, if you have Dispatch (section 9.5). Check the results.
• The AI dispatch desk can be wrong. You are responsible for what it does and sends in your name.
• Hostler is independent. It isn’t made, approved or endorsed by Amazon or by any other company it works with.
• There’s no uptime guarantee unless we sign one with you. Support is by email.
• If something goes wrong, each side’s liability is limited, mostly to what you paid us in the past 12 months.
• California law applies. Court cases go to Fresno County.

1. About these terms

1.1 Who we are. “Hostler”, “we”, “us” and “our” mean the business that provides Hostler: a sole proprietorship based in Fresno County, California, doing business as Hostler.

Email: info@gethostler.com

1.2 Where Hostler came from. Hostler was built at United Interstate Group LLC (“UIG”), an Amazon Freight Partner in Fresno County, California, which uses it every day. UIG is a Hostler customer. UIG is not a party to these terms, does not provide the service to you, and cannot see your data. Hostler’s owner also works at UIG. Section 6.3 says how we keep your data away from UIG.

1.3 Who you are. “You” and “Customer” mean the company that signs up for Hostler, for example by starting a trial, completing checkout or signing an order form. If you accept these terms for a company, you promise that you are allowed to bind that company. If you are not, don’t accept them.

1.4 How you accept. You accept these terms when you do any of these:

• tick the box or click to agree at sign-up or checkout;
• sign an order form that refers to them;
• use the service.

1.5 Businesses only. Hostler is for motor carriers and other businesses, for business use. It is not for personal, family or household use. You must be a business based in the United States. We may ask for your USDOT number.

1.6 What makes up our agreement. Our agreement with you is made of:

1. these terms;
2. any order form we both sign; and
3. any data processing addendum (“DPA”) we both sign.

If they disagree, a signed order form wins, then a signed DPA (for personal data), then these terms. Terms printed on your purchase order don’t apply.

Our Privacy Policy explains how we handle personal information. That includes information we are in charge of ourselves, such as your billing contact’s email and visits to our website.

2. Words we use

• Service or Hostler: the Hostler office app, the Hostler Assistant browser extension, the driver app, the dispatch desk, and any other software, setup help or support we provide under these terms. It does not include Connected Systems.
• Module: a part of the service you subscribe to, such as Fleet & Safety, Coverage, People, Payroll, Recruiting or Dispatch.
• Plan: the modules, prices and billing period you chose at checkout or in an order form.
• User: anyone you let use the service under your account. That means your office staff and any drivers who use the driver app.
• Customer Data: everything that you, your users or your Connected Systems put into the service, or that the service reads for you, plus what the service produces from it for you, such as reports, exports and dispatch desk answers.
• Personal Data: Customer Data about an identifiable person, such as a driver, employee, job applicant or office user.
• Connected System: a system outside Hostler that you use and connect to the service, such as Amazon Relay, Geotab, ADP Workforce Now, Netradyne, J.J. Keller DataSense, Slack or Fountain.
• Order form: a document we both sign that lists your modules, prices and term.
• Documentation: the help pages and in-app instructions we publish for the service.

3. Your subscription and your users

3.1 Your right to use Hostler. While your subscription or trial is active and you follow these terms, you and your users may use the modules on your plan to run your own company. This right is not exclusive. You may not sublicense it or transfer it, except as section 23.2 allows.

3.2 Accounts and roles. Each user signs in with their own email and password. You choose each office user’s role. The roles today are:

• Owner and Operations Manager: everything, including payroll, pay rates, billing, managing your team, and revealing a full Social Security number.
• Driver Team Lead: messaging drivers, and editing people, the roster and the schedule. A team lead can see driver files, including dates of birth, home addresses, license and CDL numbers, medical card dates, I-9 and E-Verify status, drug and alcohol test results, and MVRs. A team lead cannot see full Social Security numbers, pay rates, payroll or billing.
• Driver: the driver app only. A driver sees only their own messages, timecard corrections and profile.

Choose roles with care, and give each person only the access they need. Give the Driver Team Lead role only to people your drug and alcohol testing program allows to see test results.

3.3 You are responsible for your users. You are responsible for everything your users do in the service and for making sure they follow these terms. Anything done under your account counts as done by you.

3.4 Keep sign-ins safe. Each user must keep their password secret and must not share their login. Hostler does not offer two-step sign-in yet. If you think someone has used an account without permission, tell us straight away at info@gethostler.com.

3.5 When someone leaves. Remove access for anyone who leaves your company or no longer needs it.

• Office users: your owner emails support@gethostler.com and we close the login, normally within one business day.
• Drivers: a driver can delete their own login in the app (section 11.6). To unlink a driver’s login from your company, email us.
• Archiving a person or taking them off the roster does not close their login on its own.

3.6 Your contractors. You may let contractors, such as an outside safety consultant, use the service for your company only. You are responsible for them as you are for your own staff.

4. Free trial, prices and billing

4.1 Prices. Prices are flat per company, not per truck or per driver. They are in US dollars and don’t include tax. You pay the price shown on gethostler.com/pricing, in Hostler, or on your order form when you buy. On the date of these terms, the published prices are:

Payroll, Recruiting and Dispatch are set up with you, and their prices are agreed in an order form. Payroll and Dispatch need Fleet & Safety. Dispatch is sold by the year. Features not listed here are not for sale unless an order form says so.

4.2 Add-ons that need Fleet & Safety. Coverage, Payroll and Dispatch work only with an active Fleet & Safety plan. If Fleet & Safety ends, they stop working at the same time. We won’t knowingly keep charging you for an add-on that can’t work. If it happens by mistake, tell us, and we’ll refund it or take it off your bill.

4.3 The free trial.

1. Each company gets one free 30-day trial, ever. It covers the plan you start with.
2. You enter a card at the start. We charge nothing during the trial.
3. The trial lasts 30 days from when it starts. Hostler and Stripe show you the exact end, and we email you a reminder before it ends.
4. If you cancel before the trial ends, you pay nothing.
5. If you don’t cancel, your paid subscription starts when the trial ends, and we charge your first period then.
6. An add-on you add during the trial is free until that same trial ends. An add-on you buy after the trial has no free period.
7. A company that has had a free month doesn’t get another. That includes a free month we set up for you by hand, for example on your onboarding call. If you cancel and come back, you pay from day one.
8. A free month we set up by hand ends at midnight Pacific time at the end of its 30th day, counting the start day as day one. Nothing is charged automatically when it ends. Your modules stop until you subscribe.

4.4 Billing and renewal. After the trial:

• monthly modules are billed in advance each month, on the same day of the month your paid subscription started;
• Dispatch is billed in advance each year;
• your subscription renews automatically for another month (or year, for Dispatch) until you cancel.

By subscribing, you allow us, through our payment processor Stripe, to charge your payment method for each period’s fees and taxes until you cancel.

4.5 Stripe handles payment details. Stripe processes payments and keeps your card or bank details. We never see or store your full card number. Stripe’s own terms apply to payment processing. You can update your payment method, see invoices and cancel in Stripe’s Customer Portal, which you open from Hostler.

4.6 Adding or removing an add-on partway through a period.

• When you add an add-on partway through a billing period, you pay for the rest of that period, worked out by the day, on your next bill.
• When you remove one partway through, the unused part becomes a credit toward your next bill. Credits are not paid out in cash.

4.7 Failed payments and the 7-day grace period. If a payment fails:

1. You keep full use of the service for a 7-day grace period. It ends at midnight Pacific time at the end of the seventh day after the first failed charge. A declined card never switches you off in the middle of a shift.
2. Stripe retries the charge and emails you, and Hostler shows a notice.
3. If you still haven’t paid when the grace period ends, your paid modules stop working. Your data is kept.
4. If all of Stripe’s retries fail, your subscription is cancelled, and section 5.6 applies.
5. To get back on, pay what you owe, or subscribe again.

4.8 Invoices. If an order form says we will invoice you instead of charging a card, pay each invoice within 30 days of its date, in US dollars.

4.9 Taxes. Prices don’t include taxes. Where we must collect sales or similar taxes, we add them to your bill, and you pay them. We pay the taxes on our own income. If you are exempt, send us your exemption certificate.

4.10 No refunds for part of a period. Fees are not refundable, and we don’t refund unused days in a month or year. These are the only exceptions:

• a charge we made by mistake, such as a duplicate charge or a wrong amount;
• an add-on charged when it couldn’t work (section 4.2);
• you end the agreement because of our breach (section 5.4);
• we stop offering Hostler or a module (section 5.5);
• you cancel after objecting to a new subprocessor (section 7.8);
• a change materially reduces a module you pay for (section 13.2);
• the service doesn’t work as described and we can’t fix it (section 17.2);
• we end part of the service because of an infringement claim (section 19.1);
• you cancel after a material change to these terms (section 21.2);
• the law requires a refund.

For a mistaken charge, we refund the amount charged in error. In the other cases, we refund the fees you prepaid for the time after the service ends.

4.11 Price changes. We may change our prices.

• We’ll email your owner and your billing contact at least 30 days before a new price applies to you.
• The new price starts with your first billing period that begins after those 30 days.
• For Dispatch, a new price applies only from your next yearly renewal.
• If you don’t want the new price, cancel before it applies.

4.12 Questions about a charge. If you think a charge is wrong, email billing@gethostler.com within 60 days of the charge, and we’ll look into it in good faith. Please talk to us before you dispute a charge with your bank.

5. Cancelling, suspension and ending

5.1 You can cancel at any time. Cancel in the Customer Portal (open Billing in Hostler), or email billing@gethostler.com from your owner’s email address.

• Cancelling takes effect at the end of the period you’ve already paid for, or at the end of the trial if you cancel during it.
• You keep access until then, and you won’t be charged again.

5.2 Dispatch is yearly. Dispatch renews for another year automatically unless you cancel before the renewal date. We’ll email you between 15 and 30 days before each renewal. If you cancel, Dispatch keeps working until the end of the year you’ve paid for. We don’t refund the rest of that year.

5.3 When we may suspend. We may suspend some or all of your access, or switch off a feature or an automation, if:

1. your payment is still overdue after the grace period (section 4.7);
2. we reasonably believe your account, a user or a device is being used in a way that threatens the service, other customers or anyone’s data;
3. you or your users seriously break section 12 (acceptable use);
4. a Connected System’s provider tells us or you that the way the service uses it must stop, or a law or court order requires us to stop; or
5. a feature is behaving in a way that could cause harm, for example by writing wrong information into a Connected System.

Where we reasonably can, we’ll tell you first and say why. We’ll suspend only what we need to, and restore it as soon as the problem is fixed. Suspension does not delete your data.

5.4 Ending for a serious breach. Either of us may end this agreement by written notice if the other seriously breaks it and doesn’t fix the problem within 30 days of being told in writing. We may end it at once if you use the service for something illegal or to attack the service. If you end it because of our breach, we refund the fees you prepaid for the time after it ends.

5.5 If we stop offering Hostler or a module. We may stop offering the service or a module.

• We’ll give you at least 60 days’ notice by email, and keep it running for you until then.
• We’ll refund the fees you prepaid for any time after it stops.
• If Hostler shuts down or is sold, you’ll be able to export your data before anything changes for you (section 6.7).

5.6 When your subscription ends. When your subscription ends for any reason:

1. your users lose access, except your owner’s access to export data during the export window (section 6.7);
2. you pay any fees you owe up to the end; and
3. the parts of these terms that should naturally continue keep applying. They include: fees owed (section 4), this section, your data (section 6), our data protection duties for as long as we hold your data (section 7), confidentiality (section 14), ownership (section 16), the disclaimers (sections 17.4 and 17.5), sections 18 to 20, and sections 22 and 23.

6. Your data

6.1 You own your Customer Data. Between you and us, you own all Customer Data. You also own what the service produces for you from it, including dispatch desk answers. Our own rights in the service itself are in section 16.

6.2 What we may do with it. You let us host, copy, process, send and display Customer Data, without paying you for it, but only to:

1. provide, secure and support the service for you;
2. follow your instructions, including your settings and what your users do in the service;
3. find and fix problems, and prevent misuse; and
4. meet our legal obligations.

This permission lasts for as long as we hold Customer Data under these terms.

6.3 What we never do with it.

• We don’t sell or rent Customer Data.
• We don’t share it for advertising.
• We don’t use it to train AI models, and our AI provider may not train on it (section 10.2). That includes the AI coding tools we use to fix problems you ask us to fix.
• We don’t use one customer’s data to provide the service to another customer.
• We keep your data away from UIG. Hostler’s owner also works at UIG, which is an Amazon Freight Partner like you. We never share your Customer Data with UIG, and we never use it for UIG, including for hiring, pay or bidding for freight.
• We look at your Customer Data only to provide the service, to give support you asked for, to keep the service secure, or when the law requires. If a law, subpoena or court order demands your Customer Data, we’ll tell you first unless the law forbids it (section 14.4).

6.4 Information about how the service runs. We may collect and use information about how the service performs and is used, such as error records, counts of features used and request logs, to run, secure and improve Hostler. When we use it beyond your account, we use it only in a combined or de-identified form that doesn’t identify you, your users or any driver, and we won’t try to re-identify it. We don’t use your data to compare carriers against each other or to build benchmarks across carriers, such as pay benchmarks.

6.5 Your responsibility for Customer Data. You are responsible for whether Customer Data is accurate and lawful. You are also responsible for having every right, notice and consent needed for us to process it as these terms describe (section 7.4).

6.6 Export at any time. While your subscription is active you can export:

• the main fields of your People records as a spreadsheet (CSV). Social Security numbers show only their last four digits, and pay rates are included only when an Owner or Operations Manager exports. Drug-test entries, notes and J.J. Keller files are not included; ask us for those;
• your Relay trips (upcoming, in transit and history) as spreadsheets.

We are building a fuller export. Until it exists, ask us and we’ll send you a copy of your Customer Data from our database in CSV or JSON, at no charge, within 30 days.

6.7 After your subscription ends: export, then deletion.

1. Export window. For 30 days after your subscription ends, your owner can export your data, or ask us for a copy (section 6.6).
2. Deletion. After the export window, we delete your Customer Data from the service within 30 more days, and we email your owner when it’s done.
3. Backups. Copies in our providers’ backups expire within 7 days after that. Until then, they stay protected under these terms.
4. More time. If you need more time, ask before the export window closes and we’ll try to agree on an extension.
5. Sooner. You can ask us to delete Customer Data sooner.

6.8 What we may keep after deletion.

• Billing and tax records, such as invoices and payment history, for as long as tax and accounting law requires.
• Anything the law requires us to keep, or that we need to keep for an existing legal claim.
• Backup copies, until they expire (section 6.7).

Anything we keep stays confidential and protected under these terms.

6.9 Hostler is not your official records archive. Laws make carriers keep many records for years. Examples include:

• driver qualification files, and drug and alcohol testing records, under FMCSA rules;
• consumer reports and adverse-action records, under the Fair Credit Reporting Act;
• payroll and time records, under federal and California law;
• records about automated tools used in employment decisions, which California asks employers to keep.

Those duties stay with you. Keep your own copies of records you must keep, and export what you need before you leave. While you subscribe, Hostler doesn’t delete records on a timer. But we don’t promise to keep any record for a legal retention period.

6.10 Data on your own computers and phones. Some data lives on your devices and stays under your control.

• The office page and the extension keep copies of what they read from Amazon Relay, Netradyne and J.J. Keller in your browser’s storage.
• Signing out of Hostler clears most of what the page keeps, but not all of it. Our Privacy Policy lists what stays.
• Signing out doesn’t clear the extension’s storage. Removing the extension from Chrome removes what it keeps.

Protect the computers and phones your users use (section 15.3).

7. Driver and employee data: how we process it for you

This section is our data processing terms. It covers Personal Data in Customer Data. That is mostly information about your drivers, other employees, job applicants and office users.

7.1 Who is in charge. You are the employer. You decide why and how Personal Data is processed.

• Under California’s privacy law (the CCPA, as amended by the CPRA), where it applies, you are the “business” and we are your “service provider”.
• Under other privacy laws that use these words, you are the “controller” and we are your “processor”.

We process Personal Data only for you.

7.2 Your instructions. We process Personal Data only to provide the service, and as you instruct. Your instructions are these terms, your order form, your settings, and what your users do in the service. The business purposes are:

• providing the modules on your plan;
• reading from, and writing to, the Connected Systems you connect, at your direction;
• storing and showing your records;
• sending the messages and notifications you or your settings ask for;
• running the dispatch desk, if you use it;
• support, security, preventing fraud, and fixing problems; and
• complying with the law.

If we think an instruction breaks the law, we’ll tell you, and we may refuse it.

7.3 Our service-provider promises. We will:

1. not sell or share Personal Data, as the CCPA uses those words;
2. not keep, use or disclose Personal Data for any purpose other than the business purposes in section 7.2, or outside our direct business relationship with you, except as the CCPA allows a service provider;
3. not combine Personal Data with personal information we get from anyone else, or collect from our own dealings with people, except as the CCPA allows a service provider;
4. follow the CCPA’s rules for service providers, and protect Personal Data at least as well as the CCPA requires you to;
5. tell you if we decide we can no longer meet these promises;
6. let you take reasonable steps to stop and fix any unauthorized use of Personal Data, and to check that we use it as these terms say (section 7.12);
7. make sure everyone who works on Hostler with access to Personal Data is bound to keep it confidential; and
8. bind every subprocessor to written terms that protect Personal Data at least as well as this section does.

7.4 Your duties as the employer. You are responsible for:

1. Notices. Giving your employees, drivers, job applicants and office users every notice the law requires, including California’s notice at collection for employees and applicants. Some states, such as New York, Connecticut and Delaware, require written notice, and sometimes a signed acknowledgment, before an employer monitors electronic messages. Tell your people how you use Hostler, including:
   • that Hostler copies every Slack channel your connected Slack account belongs to, photos included, if you connect Slack;
   • that truck locations are tracked through your ELD provider;
   • that dispatch uses an AI assistant, if you use the dispatch desk (section 10.5).
2. Lawful basis and consent. Having a lawful basis, and any consent or authorization the law requires, before you put Personal Data into Hostler, connect a Connected System, or monitor work messages or locations.
3. Requests. Answering your workers’ requests about their data. We’ll help (section 7.9).
4. Your decisions. Your own employment decisions, and following employment, wage-and-hour, anti-discrimination and privacy laws.

7.5 Background checks, MVRs and the FCRA. Hostler is a tool you use. It is not a consumer reporting agency. It doesn’t gather or sell consumer reports, and it doesn’t decide whether anyone gets a job. If you get consumer reports, such as motor vehicle records from J.J. Keller or another provider, and keep them in Hostler, you are responsible under the Fair Credit Reporting Act and state law for:

• having a permissible purpose;
• giving the disclosures and getting the authorizations;
• the pre-adverse and adverse action steps; and
• using reports only as the law allows.

Any notice templates or steps in Hostler’s Recruiting module are a starting point. Have your employment lawyer approve them before you use them.

7.6 DOT and FMCSA duties. You remain responsible for FMCSA rules. These include driver qualification files, medical certification, hours of service and records of duty status, drug and alcohol testing, the Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse, and keeping records for as long as those rules require.

• Hostler’s flags and verdicts are aids built from your data and your Connected Systems. Examples are a license or medical card “expiring in 60 days”, a driver shown as able or unable to take a block, and a qualification file shown as complete. They are not compliance decisions, and they can be wrong or out of date.
• Hostler is not an electronic logging device (ELD). It reads hours of service from your ELD provider. It is not your record of duty status.
• If you keep drug and alcohol testing information in Hostler, you are responsible for the confidentiality and access rules in 49 CFR Parts 40 and 382. Today every office seat, including Driver Team Lead, can see test results and MVRs (section 3.2). Give office seats only to people your testing program allows to see them.

7.7 Sensitive information: only what you need. The service can hold sensitive information, including:

• Social Security numbers, driver’s license and CDL numbers, and dates of birth;
• home addresses;
• citizenship or immigration status (I-9 and E-Verify records);
• drug and alcohol testing pool membership and test results, MVR results, and medical card dates;
• pay rates and hours;
• truck locations.

Put in only what you need. Full Social Security numbers are hidden by default. Only an Owner or Operations Manager can reveal one. Every reveal is logged, and the number hides itself again after 15 seconds. Hostler’s administrator can also reach the database directly to run and repair the service, and does so only as section 6.3 allows.

7.8 Our subprocessors. These companies run parts of the service for us. Each one gets only what it needs for its job, under written terms that protect it.

Our map and weather features also ask outside services for data. Our server sends truck coordinates, with no driver names, to the U.S. National Weather Service for weather alerts, and asks Esri and OpenStreetMap for map images of the area being viewed.

Your Connected Systems are your providers, not our subprocessors (section 8).

Changes. The current list is in our Privacy Policy. We’ll email your owner at least 30 days before we add or replace a subprocessor that handles Personal Data. If we must act faster for security or to keep the service running, we’ll tell you as soon as we can. If you object on reasonable data-protection grounds, tell us within that time, and we’ll try to find a solution. If we can’t, you may cancel the affected module, and we’ll refund the fees you prepaid for the time after you cancel.

7.9 People asking about their data. If one of your workers asks us about their data, we’ll pass the request to you within 5 business days. We won’t answer it ourselves unless you ask us to or the law requires it. We’ll help you respond, for example by finding, exporting, correcting or deleting a person’s data, within a reasonable time.

7.10 Security incidents. A “Security Incident” means Personal Data in our care was, or is reasonably believed to have been, accessed, acquired or disclosed without permission.

• We’ll tell your owner without unreasonable delay after we discover one, and in any case within 72 hours of discovering it, by email and by phone if we have a number.
• We’ll tell you what we know, what we’re doing, and what you may need to do, and we’ll keep you updated.
• We’ll help you meet your duties to notify people and regulators. Unless the law says otherwise, you decide whether and how to notify your workers.

7.11 Where data is stored. Hostler is for U.S. carriers. We store Customer Data in the United States. Our AI provider stores what we send in the United States, but may run the model on servers in other countries. Some providers, such as Apple and Google for notifications, may handle data in other countries under their own safeguards.

7.12 Checking our practices. On request, once a year or after a Security Incident:

• we’ll answer a reasonable written security questionnaire; and
• we’ll give you our providers’ security reports where they let us share them, such as Supabase’s SOC 2 report.

Hostler has no SOC 2 report of its own. We’ll allow an on-site audit only if a law or regulator requires one. It would be at your cost, with reasonable notice, and under confidentiality.

7.13 A signed DPA. If you need a signed DPA, ask us. If we both sign one, it wins over this section.

8. Connected systems

8.1 What they are. Hostler works with systems you already use, such as Amazon Relay, Geotab, ADP Workforce Now, Netradyne, J.J. Keller DataSense, Slack and Fountain. We don’t provide those systems. Your own agreements with their providers govern your use of them.

8.2 Your right to connect them. You promise that:

1. you have your own account with each Connected System, and the right to use it and connect it to Hostler;
2. using Hostler with it is allowed under your agreements with that provider and its terms. That includes reading data from it and making changes in it at your direction;
3. you’ll follow those terms; and
4. the logins, keys and permissions you give Hostler, or use with Hostler, are yours to give.

You pay any fees those providers charge you.

8.3 Amazon Relay. Hostler reads Amazon Relay, and makes the changes your users direct, through your own users’ signed-in browser, using the Hostler Assistant extension. Hostler never asks for, sees or stores your Amazon password.

• You confirm that you run your Amazon Relay account under your own agreements with Amazon, and that using Hostler with it is your decision.
• Amazon may change Relay, its rules, or its view of tools like Hostler at any time.
• If Amazon objects to how you use Hostler, or limits, suspends or ends your Relay access or your carrier relationship, that is between you and Amazon, and we aren’t responsible for it.
• If Amazon raises a concern, tell us, and stop using the feature it is about until we’ve talked.

8.4 How we connect.

• Amazon Relay, Netradyne and J.J. Keller are read in your users’ signed-in browser, through the extension.
• Others, such as Geotab, ADP, Slack and Fountain, connect with a login, key or app install you set up for Hostler. We keep those keys on our servers, use them only to connect for you, and never show them on a page.
• Where the provider allows, use a login made just for Hostler with only the access it needs, for example a view-only Geotab login.

Some connections are not yet available to every customer. Today these are set up only for our first customer: the ELD tab in Fleet & Safety (Geotab), the J.J. Keller files in People, and the Payroll, Recruiting, Messages and Dispatch modules, with the driver app. Another carrier on Fleet & Safety gets Score, the Block scheduler and Safety, and its ELD tab shows “not connected” until we can connect it. We’ll tell you before you buy which connections are available to you, and an order form lists them.

8.5 When Connected Systems change. Connected Systems change their screens, data and rules without telling us. When they do, a Hostler feature may stop working, show stale or wrong data, or need work. We’ll try to fix it within a reasonable time, but we can’t promise that any Connected System will keep working with Hostler. Data Hostler shows from a Connected System is only as accurate as that system, and only as current as Hostler’s last read.

8.6 Hostler is independent. Hostler is not affiliated with, sponsored by, or approved or endorsed by Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates (including Amazon Freight and Amazon Relay). The same goes for Geotab, ADP, Netradyne, J.J. Keller, Slack, Fountain, Anthropic, Google, Apple and every other company named in these terms. Their names and trademarks belong to them. We use them only to say what Hostler works with.

9. Actions in Connected Systems

9.1 What Hostler can do for you. Hostler can make changes in Connected Systems, including:

• assigning drivers to blocks and legs in Amazon Relay;
• filing delay reports and adding trip notes in Relay;
• sending a question to Amazon’s Relay Assistant about a load, with the load, the issue and a callback phone number your user enters (normally your dispatch office’s line);
• writing timecard corrections (clock punches) into ADP;
• posting messages to drivers in Slack, through the Slack account you connect;
• sending messages and notifications to the driver app.

9.2 You decide, and you are responsible. Each change happens because one of your users pressed the button or confirmed it, or because an automation acted (section 9.5).

• Hostler acts as your tool, using your access.
• Every such change counts as made by you, as if your user had made it directly in that system.
• Your people make the operational decisions: who drives what, when to report a delay, what to tell Amazon, and what a driver is paid. Hostler helps carry them out, and its automations act only within the limits in section 9.5.

9.3 Check before and after. Before your user confirms a change, check what Hostler shows. Afterward, where it matters, check the result in the Connected System. Examples are the driver on a Relay block, Relay’s audit log for a delay report, and the timecard in ADP. Hostler checks its own work where it can, for example by reading an ADP timecard back after writing it. But it can’t guarantee that every change landed, or landed correctly. If a change looks wrong, tell us straight away. We keep a record of the changes Hostler makes for you, and if one is wrong because of Hostler, we’ll help you reverse it at no charge.

9.4 What Hostler is built not to do. Hostler is built not to accept or reject loads or tenders, bid in auctions, change rates, or accept penalties in Amazon Relay. It never answers Amazon’s sign-in or verification checks. Don’t try to make it.

9.5 Automations. Some features act without a person confirming each step:

• Automatic delay filing in Relay. It is off until you switch it on.
• The dispatch desk’s automatic cycle, if you have Dispatch. It can reply to drivers in Slack, send shift confirmations and trailer numbers, send questions to Amazon’s Relay Assistant (up to 6 a day), and assign an open bobtail leg to a named office user (up to 6 a day). The cycle runs by default while Dispatch is on and a Hostler office tab is open, and an office user can pause it. Messages to drivers go to a review channel until live sending is switched on (section 10.3). Relay actions don’t wait for that switch.

For automations:

• Leaving one running, or switching one on, is your instruction for every action it takes.
• You can pause or switch one off at any time. We may switch one off if it misbehaves (section 5.3).

9.6 ADP timecards and pay. Payroll can suggest timecard corrections and send them to drivers to accept. After an Owner or Operations Manager approves a correction, or enters one directly with a reason, Hostler writes the corrected punches into ADP.

• Hostler won’t write to a timecard a manager has already approved in ADP.
• It won’t write if the timecard has changed since the driver saw it.
• It never sends hours as pay.
• Hostler keeps each timecard as it was before a change, with the reason for the change.
• Changes that reduce a driver’s paid time should have the driver’s agreement. Send them to the driver rather than entering them directly.

You remain responsible for your timecards, your payroll, and paying wages correctly, including meal and rest break rules under California law. Review timecards in ADP before you approve payroll. Hostler’s suggestions are based on a built-in meal-break rule (a 30-minute lunch before the 8th hour) and your ELD data, and both can be wrong or incomplete for a given day.

9.7 What you tell Amazon. Delay reports, notes and messages Hostler sends to Amazon for you, including by an automation, are your statements to Amazon. Make sure each one is true.

10. The AI dispatch desk

10.1 What it is. If you subscribe to Dispatch, the dispatch desk uses an AI model (Claude, made by Anthropic) to:

• answer your office’s questions;
• draft and send replies to drivers;
• help prepare delay reports, and send questions to Amazon’s Relay Assistant;
• assign an open bobtail leg to a named office user in Relay; and
• write a daily report.

10.2 What the desk sends to the AI. To answer, the desk sends Anthropic the context it needs. That can include:

• driver names and phone numbers;
• schedules and trips;
• truck positions and hours-of-service standing;
• safety alerts, Relay load notes and problems in drivers’ files;
• the last 12 hours of messages in the Slack channels Hostler copies, from drivers and office staff, including recent photos;
• your dispatch playbook and your office’s notes on past cases;
• your question or instruction.

Hostler doesn’t add Social Security numbers, dates of birth or home addresses, but anything typed or photographed in a copied Slack channel is sent as written. Messages drivers write in the Hostler driver app are not sent to the AI. Our Privacy Policy lists everything that is sent, and when.

Anthropic’s commercial terms don’t allow it to train its models on what we send. Anthropic generally deletes it within 30 days, but may keep it longer where its usage policy or the law requires. We have no zero-retention agreement with Anthropic.

10.3 What it sends to drivers. The desk’s messages to drivers go to a review channel until you switch on live sending. With live sending on, it can send replies to drivers in Slack within fixed daily limits. Messages it sends through your connected Slack account appear under that account, and every message the desk sends to a driver on its own is marked as sent by the dispatch desk. The desk’s Relay actions (section 9.5) don’t wait for live sending.

10.4 AI can be wrong. AI output can be wrong, incomplete, out of date or inappropriate, even when it sounds sure. Check it before you rely on it. You are responsible for every message sent, every action taken and every decision made in your name, whether a person or the desk did it. The desk has safety limits. It refuses messages that pressure drivers on hours of service or ask them to get around safety devices, and it hands crisis messages to the people you list as on call. Those limits can fail too.

10.5 Tell your drivers. You must tell your drivers that your dispatch uses an AI assistant and that some messages may be written or sent by it, and give any other notice the law requires. Don’t present AI-written messages as written by a person, or lead anyone to believe they are talking to a person when they are not.

10.6 Not for emergencies or for decisions about people. The desk is not an emergency service. A driver in danger should call 911 and follow your safety procedures. Don’t use AI output on its own to decide on hiring, discipline, firing, pay or who gets work. A person must review those decisions.

10.7 Fair use. Dispatch includes a fair amount of desk use for one carrier. We limit how fast questions can be asked, to protect the service. If your use is far above normal, we’ll talk to you before we slow it down or change your price.

10.8 Anthropic’s rules. You and your users must follow Anthropic’s Usage Policy (anthropic.com/legal/aup) when you use the desk.

11. The extension and the driver app

11.1 The Hostler Assistant extension. The extension runs in Google Chrome on your computers.

• It reads the Amazon Relay, Netradyne and J.J. Keller DataSense pages your signed-in users open, and passes that data to your Hostler page. On Relay and J.J. Keller it can also ask the site for more of the same information, as your signed-in user.
• It makes changes in Relay when your users direct, and when an automation acts (section 9). To make clicks Relay will accept, it uses Chrome’s “debugger” permission on those pages.
• The extension itself talks only to Relay, Netradyne and J.J. Keller, as your signed-in user, and to your Hostler page on the same computer. That page sends some of what it reads to our servers and, if you use Dispatch, to our AI provider.
• Install it only on computers your company controls, for your users.
• Keep it up to date. Older versions may stop working.
• If you install it from the Chrome Web Store, Google’s terms for the store also apply.

11.2 The optional companion. We may set up an optional companion that runs Relay in a separate browser on your own computer, so changes don’t take over a user’s screen. It uses your own Relay sign-in on your machine, and the same rules apply.

11.3 The driver app. Your drivers use the driver app to answer timecard corrections and to message your office. Its thread needs the Messages module and its Pay tab needs Payroll. Both are set up with you (section 8.4).

• You decide who to invite.
• A driver creates their own login. It opens their messages and pay information only after your office links it to them.
• The app doesn’t use a phone’s location, camera, photos, contacts or microphone.
• A notification can show the first words of a message on the phone’s lock screen.

11.4 Your duties for the driver app. You set your own policies for the app. That includes whether time drivers spend in it is paid work time, and paying drivers back for using their personal phones where the law requires it, as California law does.

11.5 App stores and the app’s privacy policy. Drivers get the app from Apple’s App Store or Google Play, and those stores’ standard terms apply to their use of it. The app’s privacy policy is part of our Privacy Policy. It says the same thing as these terms: you are the employer in charge, and Hostler is your service provider.

11.6 Deleting a driver login. A driver can delete their own login in the app, under Account, then Delete my account. That deletes their login and the phones registered for notifications. Their messages and timecard records stay with you as your work and payroll records, under section 6.

12. Acceptable use

You and your users must not:

1. break any law using Hostler. That includes privacy, employment, wage-and-hour, anti-discrimination, consumer reporting, monitoring and recording, and transportation safety laws;
2. use Hostler to pressure a driver to break hours-of-service rules, to drive when not qualified or not fit, or to disable or get around a safety or logging device;
3. use Hostler to harass, threaten, discriminate against or deceive anyone;
4. put in data you don’t have the right to use, or anything harmful, such as malware;
5. try to get into another customer’s data, or any account or system you’re not allowed to use;
6. probe, scan or test Hostler’s security, or overload or disrupt it, without our written permission. If you find a security problem, please tell us at info@gethostler.com;
7. get around limits in the service, such as rate limits, roles or module checks;
8. copy, change, reverse engineer or decompile Hostler, except where the law allows it despite this rule;
9. resell, rent, lend or share Hostler with anyone outside your company, or use it to run a service for others;
10. use Hostler to build a competing product, or copy its features or design;
11. use automated tools to scrape or bulk-download the service, other than its export features;
12. use Hostler as a consumer reporting agency, or to supply consumer reports to anyone; or
13. use Hostler in breach of a Connected System’s terms or of Anthropic’s Usage Policy.

13. Availability, changes and support

13.1 No uptime guarantee. We work to keep Hostler running and to fix problems quickly. But unless we sign a service level agreement with you in an order form, we don’t promise that it will be available at any particular time or free of errors. Hostler depends on internet services and Connected Systems we don’t control. We may take it down for maintenance. We’ll try to do that outside working hours, and to warn you about planned work.

13.2 Changes to the service. We improve Hostler all the time, and we may add, change or remove features. We won’t materially reduce what a module you pay for does during a period you’ve already paid for. If a change materially reduces a module you pay for, you may cancel that module within 30 days of the change, and we’ll refund the fees you prepaid for the time after you cancel.

13.3 Early features. We may offer features marked beta, preview or early. Using them is your choice. They may change or stop, and the promise in section 17.2 doesn’t cover them.

13.4 Support.

• Support is by email at support@gethostler.com.
• We aim to answer within one business day: Monday to Friday, Pacific time, not counting U.S. federal holidays.
• We’ll help you get set up on an onboarding call.
• Phone or on-site support is available only if an order form says so.
• To help you, we may need to look at your account or Customer Data. We do that only for the support you asked for.

13.5 What you need. You need a modern web browser and an internet connection. The extension needs Google Chrome on a desktop or laptop computer. The driver app needs a supported iPhone or Android phone.

14. Confidentiality

14.1 What is confidential. “Confidential Information” means information one of us shares with the other under this agreement that isn’t public, and that is marked confidential or that a reasonable person would understand to be confidential.

• Your Customer Data is your Confidential Information.
• Hostler’s software, designs and security details that aren’t public, and the prices in your order form, are ours.

14.2 What isn’t confidential. Information is not confidential if it:

• is or becomes public through no fault of the one who received it;
• was already known to the receiver without a duty to keep it confidential;
• comes to the receiver from someone else without a duty to keep it confidential; or
• is developed by the receiver on its own.

14.3 Our duties to each other. The receiver will:

• use the other’s Confidential Information only for this agreement;
• protect it with at least reasonable care; and
• share it only with its own people, contractors and advisers who need to know it and are bound to keep it confidential. Our subprocessors (section 7.8) count as such contractors.

14.4 When the law requires disclosure. If a law, subpoena or court order requires the receiver to disclose the other’s Confidential Information, it may. It must first tell the other, where the law allows, so the other can try to protect it, and it may disclose only what is required.

14.5 How long. These duties last while this agreement runs and for 3 years after it ends. For trade secrets and Personal Data, they last for as long as the information stays a trade secret or Personal Data.

15. Security

15.1 What we do. We use reasonable safeguards, suited to the sensitive information Hostler holds. Today they include:

• Each company’s data walled off in the database, so one company’s users can’t read another’s.
• Roles that limit what each user can see and do (section 3.2).
• Social Security numbers that can’t be read through the app except by an Owner’s or Operations Manager’s logged reveal. Pay rates visible only to Owners and Operations Managers.
• An audit log of sensitive actions, which can’t be edited.
• Encryption in transit (HTTPS) on our website and Hostler’s hosted service, and at rest by our database provider.
• Rate limits, security headers, and keys kept on the server, never in the page.

We won’t lower the overall level of protection during your subscription.

15.2 What we don’t offer yet. Hostler doesn’t yet offer two-step sign-in, and it has no independent security audit such as SOC 2. We’ll tell you when that changes.

15.3 Your part.

• Use strong, different passwords.
• Keep your users’ computers and phones locked, up to date and protected. They hold copies of Relay and other data in the browser (section 6.10).
• Remove access quickly when people leave (section 3.5).
• Install the extension only on your company’s computers.
• Tell us straight away about any security problem you notice.

15.4 Where we keep your data. We keep your Customer Data with the providers in section 7.8. The one exception is our first customer, UIG: Hostler also runs on a computer in UIG’s office, and some of UIG’s records are kept as files there. No other customer’s data is kept on that computer.

16. Ownership, license and feedback

16.1 What is ours. Hostler belongs to us and our licensors. That means the software, the extension, the driver app, the designs, the documentation, and everything we develop, including improvements. These terms give you no rights in it except the right to use it in sections 3.1 and 16.2. We keep all other rights.

16.2 The extension and the app. While your subscription is active, you and your users may install and use the extension and the driver app, but only to use the service under these terms.

16.3 What is yours. You keep all rights in your Customer Data (section 6.1).

16.4 Feedback. If you send us ideas or suggestions, we may use them freely, without paying you or owing you anything. We won’t name you as the source without your permission.

16.5 Your name. We won’t use your company’s name or logo in our marketing without your written permission. An email is enough.

16.6 Open-source software. Hostler includes open-source software, which comes under its own license terms.

17. Promises and disclaimers

17.1 What we both promise. Each of us promises that it has the right to enter this agreement.

17.2 What we promise. During a paid subscription, the service will work materially as the documentation describes. If it doesn’t, tell us and we’ll try to fix it. If we can’t fix it within 30 days, either of us may end the affected module, and we’ll refund the fees you prepaid for the time after it ends. That is your only remedy if we break this promise. The promise doesn’t cover problems caused by Connected Systems, your devices, misuse, early features (section 13.3), or changes someone other than us made.

17.3 What you promise. You promise that you have the rights, notices and consents described in sections 6.5, 7.4 and 8.2.

17.4 Disclaimer. Except for the promises in this section 17, the service is provided “as is” and “as available”. As far as the law allows, we disclaim all other warranties, whether express or implied, including warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, non-infringement and accuracy, and any warranty arising from a course of dealing or usage of trade. We don’t promise that the service will be uninterrupted, error-free or secure against every attack, that data from Connected Systems is correct or current, or that any action in a Connected System will succeed.

17.5 Not advice. A person decides. Hostler gives you information and tools. Scores, flags, eligibility checks, rankings such as “who can take it”, hours, safety alerts, payroll suggestions, compliance verdicts and AI output are aids. They are not legal, safety, employment, tax or payroll advice, and they don’t replace your judgment. Your people make the operational, safety and employment decisions. Hostler is software. It doesn’t arrange, broker or carry freight, and it isn’t responsible for loads, cargo, equipment or how any vehicle is driven.

18. Limits on liability

18.1 No indirect losses. Neither of us is liable to the other for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary or punitive damages. Neither of us is liable for lost profits, revenue or business; lost or cancelled loads, blocks or tenders; harm to an Amazon scorecard or carrier relationship; or the cost of replacement services. This applies however the loss is caused, even if we were told it was possible.

18.2 The cap. Each party’s total liability arising out of or relating to this agreement, for all claims together, is limited to the fees you paid or owe us for the service in the 12 months before the first event that gave rise to liability, or $100 if that is more.

18.3 What the limits don’t cover. Sections 18.1 and 18.2 don’t limit:

1. your duty to pay fees;
2. liability for fraud, gross negligence or willful misconduct;
3. your liability for breaking section 12 (acceptable use), or for infringing or misusing our intellectual property; or
4. any liability that the law does not allow to be limited.

18.4 Why these limits exist. These limits are part of how we set our prices. They apply even if a remedy fails of its essential purpose.

19. Indemnities

19.1 Our indemnity. We’ll defend you against any claim by a third party that the service, as we provide it, infringes their U.S. patent, copyright or trademark, or misappropriates their trade secret. We’ll pay the amounts finally awarded, or agreed in a settlement we approve.

• We don’t cover claims caused by: Customer Data; Connected Systems; changes someone other than us made; combining the service with something we didn’t provide; or use that breaks these terms.
• If the service is, or may become, the subject of such a claim, we may get you the right to keep using it, change it so it no longer infringes, or end the affected part and refund the fees you prepaid for the time after.
• This section is your only remedy for infringement claims.

19.2 Your indemnity. You’ll defend us against any claim by a third party arising from any of the following, and pay the amounts finally awarded, or agreed in a settlement you approve:

1. Customer Data, or how you collect or use it, including any missing notice, consent or authorization;
2. your use of a Connected System in breach of your agreements with its provider;
3. your employment, pay, safety or operational decisions, or the actions your users take or direct in Connected Systems; or
4. your breach of section 12 (acceptable use).

A third party includes your employees, drivers and job applicants, a Connected System’s provider, and a government agency. This section doesn’t apply to the extent the claim was caused by our breach of these terms, our gross negligence or our willful misconduct.

19.3 How it works. The party asking to be defended must:

• tell the other promptly in writing. A delay matters only to the extent it hurts the defense;
• let the other control the defense and any settlement; and
• help, at the other’s cost.

No settlement may admit fault for the protected party, or place duties on it, without its consent. That consent may not be unreasonably refused. The protected party may take part with its own lawyer, at its own cost.

20. Disputes, governing law and courts

20.1 Talk first. Before starting a court case, the party with the problem emails the other a written description of it. Both of us then try in good faith to resolve it for 30 days. This doesn’t stop either of us from going to court for urgent orders to protect data, Confidential Information or intellectual property, or from filing to protect a claim before a deadline passes.

20.2 California law. California law governs this agreement and any dispute about it, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules. The United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods does not apply.

20.3 Courts in Fresno County. Any court case must be brought in the state courts for Fresno County, California, or in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California, in Fresno. Both of us agree to those courts’ jurisdiction and venue.

21. Changes to these terms

21.1 Updates. We may update these terms. We’ll post the new version at gethostler.com/terms with its date.

21.2 Material changes. For a change that materially affects your rights, we’ll email your owner at least 30 days before it takes effect.

• If you don’t agree, you can cancel before it takes effect. If you prepaid for Dispatch, we’ll refund the fees you prepaid for the time after you cancel.
• If you keep using Hostler after the change takes effect, you accept it.

21.3 Faster changes. Changes needed for legal or security reasons may take effect sooner. We’ll give as much notice as we reasonably can.

21.4 What changes can’t do. A change doesn’t apply to a dispute that has already started. A signed order form can be changed only in a writing we both sign.

22. Notices

22.1 To us. Email info@gethostler.com. For billing, use billing@gethostler.com; for support, support@gethostler.com. Send legal notices, such as a notice of breach, of ending this agreement or of a claim, by email to info@gethostler.com.

22.2 To you. We’ll email your owner’s address, plus your billing contact for billing matters, or tell you in Hostler. Keep these addresses up to date.

22.3 When a notice counts as received. An email notice counts as received on the next business day after it is sent, unless it bounces. A notice by mail or courier counts as received when it is delivered.

22.4 Electronic notices. You agree to receive notices, agreements and invoices electronically.

23. General

23.1 Entire agreement. The documents in section 1.6 are our whole agreement about the service. They replace anything said or written before about the same subject.

23.2 Transfers. You may not transfer this agreement without our written consent. The one exception is a transfer to a company that takes over all, or nearly all, of your business or assets that use Hostler, if you tell us and it isn’t our competitor. We may transfer this agreement to a company we form to run Hostler, or to anyone who buys or takes over the Hostler business, if they agree to be bound by these terms. We’ll tell you by email. Customer Data goes with it only under these terms. Any other attempt to transfer is void.

23.3 Independent parties. We are independent businesses. Nothing in this agreement makes us partners, joint venturers, employer and employee, or principal and agent. Neither of us can bind the other.

23.4 Events outside our control. Neither of us is responsible for a delay or failure caused by events beyond our reasonable control. Examples are natural disasters, war, terrorism, government action, labor disputes (other than our own staff’s), and failures of the internet, utilities, our hosting providers or a Connected System, or an attack on any of them. This doesn’t excuse paying fees.

23.5 If part is invalid. If a court finds part of these terms invalid, that part is changed only as much as needed to make it valid, and the rest stays in force.

23.6 No waiver. If one of us doesn’t enforce a right at once, that doesn’t mean we give it up.

23.7 No third-party rights. Only you and we have rights under this agreement. Your users, drivers and employees do not.

23.8 Reading these terms. Headings and the short version at the top are only there to help you read. “Including” means “including, but not limited to”.

23.9 Export and sanctions. You may not use Hostler in, or for anyone in, a country under U.S. embargo, and you confirm you are not on a U.S. government list of restricted parties.

23.10 Signatures. Clicking to agree, and electronic signatures on order forms, are as binding as signatures on paper.

24. Our website, gethostler.com

24.1 Who this covers. This section applies to anyone who uses gethostler.com, whether or not they are a customer.

24.2 What the website is for. The website describes Hostler. What it says, including prices, may change, and it is not an offer you can accept. What you buy is set at checkout or in an order form. We correct mistakes when we find them.

24.3 Cookies and bookings. The website sets no cookies, runs no analytics and has no forms. “Book a demo” opens a Google Calendar booking page. What you enter there goes to Google and to us, and Google’s terms and privacy policy apply. Our Privacy Policy explains how we handle it.

24.4 Fair use of the website. Don’t attack or overload the website, scrape it in a way that harms it, or copy its content for commercial use without our permission.

24.5 Our name and content. The website’s text and design, and the Hostler name and logo, belong to us. Other names belong to their owners (section 8.6).

24.6 Links. Links to other websites are not endorsements, and we are not responsible for those websites.

24.7 Visitors who aren’t customers. The website is provided “as is”. Sections 17.4, 18 and 20 apply to your use of it. If you are not a customer, our total liability to you for the website is limited to $100.

25. Contact

Hostler
Email: info@gethostler.com
Support: support@gethostler.com
Billing: billing@gethostler.com