Introductions

Mbuelo is a brand of Mbuelo (Pty) Ltd trading under the registration number 2023/534792/07.

These terms govern your use of the Mbuelo marketplace platform and is published in accordance with the provisions as defined in terms of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act, Act No. 25 of 2002 (ECT Act) that require publishing the rules and regulations, privacy policy and Terms of Use for access or usage of domain name (“Website”), including the related mobile site and mobile application (hereinafter referred to as “Platform”)

  1. Your use of the Platform and services and tools are governed by the following terms and conditions as applicable to the Platform including the applicable policies which are incorporated herein by way of reference.
  2. If You transact on the Platform, You shall be subject to the policies that are applicable to the Platform for such transaction. By using the Platform, You shall be contracting with Mbuelo and these terms and conditions including the policies constitute your binding obligations, with Mbuelo.

ACCESSING, BROWSING OR OTHERWISE USING THE SITE INDICATES YOUR AGREEMENT TO ALL THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS, SO PLEASE READ THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE PROCEEDING.

Definitions

For the purpose of these Terms and Conditons, wherever the context so requires “You” or “User” shall mean any natural or legal person who has agreed to become a buyer on the Platform by providing Registration Data while registering on the Platform as Registered User using the computer systems. Mbuelo allows the User to browse the Platform or make purchases without registering on the Platform. The term “We”, “Us”, “Our” shall mean Mbuelo.

Eligibility

You may only use the Platform if, in terms of South African law, you have the legal capacity to agree.

If you are a minor i.e. under the age of 18 years, you may use the Platform or access content on the Platform only under the supervision and prior consent/ permission of a parent or legal guardian.

As a minor if you wish to transact on the Platform, such transaction on the Platform may be made by your legal guardian or parents.

We reserves the right to terminate your membership and / or refuse to provide you with access to the Platform if it is brought to Mbuelo’s attention or if it is discovered that You are under the age of 18 years and transacting on the Platform.

Registration and Your Account on the Platform

  1. If You use the Platform, You shall be responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your UserName and Password and You shall be responsible for all activities that occur under your UserName and Password.
  2. You agree that if You provide any information that is untrue, inaccurate, not current or incomplete or We have reasonable grounds to suspect that such information is untrue, inaccurate, not current or incomplete, or not in accordance with the this Terms and Conditions, We shall have the right to indefinitely suspend or terminate or block access of your membership on the Platform and refuse to provide You with access to the Platform.
  3. Your mobile phone number and/or e-mail address is treated as Your primary identifier on the Platform. It is your responsibility to ensure that Your mobile phone number and your email address is up to date on the Platform at all times. You agree to notify Us promptly if your mobile phone number or e-mail address changes by updating the same on the Platform through a One-Time Password (OTP) verification.
  4. You agree that Mbuelo shall not be liable or responsible for the activities or consequences of use or misuse of any information that occurs under your Account in cases, including, where You have failed to update Your revised mobile phone number and/or e-mail address on the Website Platform.
  5. If You share or allow others to have access to Your account on the Platform (“Account”), by creating separate profiles under Your Account, or otherwise, they will be able to view and access Your Account information. You shall be solely liable and responsible for all the activities undertaken under Your Account, and any consequences there from.
  6. You must maintain confidentiality of the account information and for all the activities that occur under Your account.
  7. You must not share your login details, ie, username and password of Your account with any other person, else it would be considered breach of this Terms and Conditions.
  8. You agree to:
  • ensure that You successfully log out from Your account at the end of each session; and
  • immediately notify Mbuelo of any unauthorized use of Your account. If there is reason to believe that there is likely to be a breach of security or misuse of Your account, We may request You to change the password or we may suspend Your account without any liability to Mbuelo, for such period of time as we deem appropriate in the circumstances. We shall not be liable for any loss or damage arising from Your failure to comply with this provision.

Communications

When You use the Platform or send emails or other data, information or communication to us, You agree and understand that You are communicating with Us through electronic records and You consent to receive communications via electronic records from Us periodically and as and when required. We may communicate with you by email or by such other mode of communication, electronic or otherwise.

Platform for Transaction and Communication

The Platform enables the Buyer and Seller to transact on the Platform. Mbuelo is not and cannot be a party to or control in any manner any transaction between the Platform’s Users.

Henceforward:

  • All commercial/contractual terms are offered by and agreed to between Buyers and Sellers alone. The commercial/contractual terms include without limitation price, shipping costs, payment methods, payment terms, date, period and mode of delivery, warranties related to products and services and after sales services related to products and services.
  • Mbuelo does not have any control or does not determine or advise or in any way involve itself in the offering or acceptance of such commercial/contractual terms between the Buyers and Sellers. All discounts, offers (including exchange offers) are by the Seller/Brand and not by Mbuelo.
  • Placement of order by a Buyer with Seller on the Platform is an offer to buy the product(s) in by the Buyer to the Seller and it shall not be construed as Seller’s acceptance of Buyer’s offer to buy the product(s) ordered.
  • The Seller retains the right to cancel any such order placed by the Buyer, at its sole discretion and the Buyer shall be notify of the same by way of an email/SMS.
  • Any transaction price paid by Buyer in case of such cancellation by Seller, shall be refunded to the Buyer. Further, the Seller may cancel an order wherein the quantities exceed the typical individual consumption. This applies both to the number of products ordered within a single order and the placing of several orders for the same product where the individual orders comprise a quantity that exceeds the typical individual consumption. What comprises a typical individual’s consumption quantity limit shall be based on various factors and at the sole discretion of the Seller and may vary from individual to individual.
  • Mbuelo does not make any representation or Warranty as to specifics (such as quality, value, saleability, etc) of the products or services proposed to be sold or offered to be sold or purchased on the Platform.
  • Mbuelo does not implicitly or explicitly support or endorse the sale or purchase of any products or services on the Platform.
  • Mbuelo accepts no liability for any errors or omissions, whether on behalf of itself or third parties.
  • Mbuelo is not responsible for any non-performance or breach of any contract entered into between Buyers and Sellers.
  • Mbuelo cannot and does not guarantee that the concerned Buyers and/or Sellers will perform any transaction concluded on the Platform. Mbuelo shall not and is not required to mediate or resolve any dispute or disagreement between Buyers and Sellers.
  • Mbuelo does not make any representation or warranty as to the item-specifics (such as legal title, creditworthiness, identity, etc) of any of its Users. You are advised to independently verify the bona fides of any particular User that You choose to deal with on the Platform and use Your best judgment in that behalf.
  • Mbuelo does not at any point of time during any transaction between Buyer and Seller on the Platform come into or take possession of any of the products or services offered by Seller nor does it at any point gain title to or have any rights or claims over the products or services offered by Seller to Buyer.
  • At no time shall Mbuelo hold any right, title or interest over the products nor shall Mbuelo have any obligations or liabilities in respect of such contract entered into between Buyers and Sellers.
  • Mbuelo is not responsible for unsatisfactory or delayed performance of services or damages or delays as a result of products which are out of stock, unavailable or back ordered.
  • The Platform is only a platform that can be utilized by Users to reach a larger base to buy and sell products or services.
  • Mbuelo is only providing a platform for communication and it is agreed that the contract for sale of any of the products or services shall be a strictly bipartite contract between the Seller and the Buyer.

Products that are offered by sellers that may be eligible for business purchases on the Platform.

  • Upon Your purchase of product(s) eligible for business purchases, You may be request, an invoice containing the VAT number as provided by You (“Tax Invoice”) and shall be issued to You by the Seller(s) selling such products.
  • Vat invoice will have, inter alia, the following details printed on it: -Vat number associated with your registered business, as provided by you.
  • Entity name of your registered business, as provided by you.
  • Not all products are eligible for business purchases on the Platform and the same is solely at the discretion of the Sellers. You will be able to view the eligibility of Tax Invoice on the product page on the Platform.
  • Purchases on the Platform must only be for end consumption. Users must not use products purchased on the Platform for any commercial, promotional, resale or further distribution purposes.
  • For seamless availment of input tax credit, kindly mention the delivery address as the address which is mentioned as the registered place of business as per the records of SARS authority. Please note that availment of input tax credit is subject to provisions of SARS Act and rules.
  • If Vat number and/or business entity details are not provided by You, it will be presumed that it is a personal purchase and not a business purchase.
  • Mbuelo is not responsible to verify the correctness of the Vat number and/or entity name provided by You and You shall be entirely responsible to provide the accurate details.
  • Mbuelo and Seller shall not entertain any request for any revision in the Vat Invoice. Mbuelo and Seller shall not be liable for Your default including for reasons associated with details provided by You.
  • Mbuelo will not be liable in case You are not able to avail input tax credit or if input tax credit is denied to You for any reason whatsoever.
  • You shall be solely liable for all compliances required under applicable laws.
  • You agree to indemnify and hold Mbuelo and Seller harmless from all losses, claims, costs, expenses, suits, proceedings, or any other liability including any third-party claims (including any penalties imposed by governmental authorities) arising out of or in connection with (1) the Vat numner and/or entity name provided by you or the input tax credit claimed by you or your use or misuse of the Vat Invoice and (2) your non-compliance with the applicable laws or (3) your use or misuse of any third-party’s details including Vat number.
  • Mbuelo has the right to not allow business purchases on the Platform to You if a fraudulent activity is identified.
  • Seller reserves the right to not issue Tax Invoice or issue a credit note against an already issued Tax Invoice to cancel the transaction, if any fraudulent activity is identified.
  • You shall independently agree upon the manner and terms and conditions of delivery, payment, insurance etc. with the seller(s) that You transact with.

Disclaimer: Pricing on any product(s) as is reflected on the Platform may be due to some technical issue, typographical error or product information published by seller may be incorrectly reflected and in such an event seller may cancel such your order(s).

  • You release and indemnify Mbuelo and/or any of its officers and representatives from any cost, damage, liability or other consequence of any of the actions of the Users of the Platform and specifically waive any claims that you may have in this behalf under any applicable law. Notwithstanding its reasonable efforts in that behalf, Mbuelo cannot take responsibility or control the information provided by other Users which is made available on the Platform. You may find other User’s information to be offensive, harmful, inconsistent, inaccurate, or deceptive. Please use caution and practice safe trading when using the Platform.

Please note that there could be risks in dealing with underage persons or people acting under false pretense.

Charges

Mbuelo may charge a nominal fee for browsing and buying on the Platform. We reserves the right to change our Fee Policy from time to time. In particular, We may at our sole discretion introduce new services/fees and modify some or all of the existing services/fees offered on the Platform. In such an event, We reserves the right to introduce fees for the new services offered or amend/introduce fees for existing/new services, as the case may be. Changes to the Fee Policy shall be posted on the Platform and such changes shall automatically become effective immediately after they are posted on the Platform. Unless otherwise stated, all fees shall be quoted in South African Rand. You shall be solely responsible for compliance of all applicable laws for making payments to Mbuelo.

What are platform fee?

Fee levied by Mbuelo to sustain the efficient operations and continuous improvement of the platform, for a hassle-free experience.

Refund of Platform Fee

a) If the order is lost or undelivered to the preferred location, the complete order amount will be refunded if paid online, including the platform fee.

b) If a customer cancels an order partially or returns part of an order, platform charges will be refunded as allocated to the item being returned/canceled.

c) Platform charges will be refunded in case of a full order cancellation

Use of the Platform

You agree, undertake and confirm that Your use of Platform shall be strictly governed by the following binding principles:

You shall not host, display, upload, modify, publish, transmit, update or share any information which:
(a) belongs to another person and to which You do not have any right to;

(b) is grossly harmful, harassing, blasphemous, defamatory, obscene, pornographic, paedophilic, libelous, invasive of another’s privacy, hateful, or racially, ethnically objectionable, disparaging, relating or encouraging money laundering or gambling, or otherwise unlawful in any manner whatever; or unlawfully threatening or unlawfully harassing;

(c) is misleading in any way;

(d) is patently offensive to the online community, such as sexually explicit content, or content that promotes obscenity, paedophilia, racism, bigotry, hatred or physical harm of any kind against any group or individual;

(e) harasses or advocates harassment of another person;

(f) involves the transmission of “junk mail”, “chain letters”, or unsolicited mass mailing or “spamming”;

(g) promotes illegal activities or conduct that is abusive, threatening, obscene, defamatory or libellous;

(h) infringes upon or violates any third party’s rights including, but not limited to, intellectual property rights, rights of privacy (including without limitation unauthorized disclosure of a person’s name, email address, physical address or phone number) or rights of publicity;

(i) promotes an illegal or unauthorized copy of another person’s copyrighted work (see “Copyright complaint” below for instructions on how to lodge a complaint about uploaded copyrighted material), such as providing pirated computer programs or links to them, providing information to circumvent manufacture-installed copy-protect devices;

(j) contains restricted or password-only access pages, or hidden pages or images (those not linked to or from another accessible page);

(k) provides material that exploits people in a sexual, violent or otherwise inappropriate manner or solicits personal information from anyone;

(l) provides instructional information about illegal activities such as making or buying illegal weapons, violating someone’s privacy, or providing or creating computer viruses;

(m) contains video, photographs, or images of another person (with a minor or an adult).

(n) tries to gain unauthorized access or exceeds the scope of authorized access to the Platform or to profiles, blogs, communities, account information, bulletins, friend request, or other areas of the Platform or solicits passwords or personal identifying information for commercial or unlawful purposes from other users;

(o) engages in commercial activities and/or sales without Mbuelo prior written consent such as contests, sweepstakes, barter, advertising and pyramid schemes, or the buying or selling of “virtual” products related to the Platform. Throughout this Terms and Conditions, Mbuelo’s prior written consent means a communication coming from Mbuelo’s Legal Department, specifically in response to Your request, and specifically addressing the activity or conduct for which You seek authorization;

(p) solicits gambling or engages in any gambling activity which We, in Our sole discretion, believes is or could be construed as being illegal;

(q) interferes with another USER’s use and enjoyment of the Platform or any other individual’s User and enjoyment of similar services;

(r) refers to any Platform or URL that, in Our sole discretion, contains material that is inappropriate for the Platform or any other Platform, contains content that would be prohibited or violates the letter or spirit of these Terms and Conditions.

(s) harm minors in any way;

(t) infringes any patent, trademark, copyright or other proprietary rights or third party’s trade secrets or rights of publicity or privacy or shall not be fraudulent or involve the sale of counterfeit or stolen products;

(u) violates any law for the time being in force;

(v) deceives or misleads the addressee/ users about the origin of such messages or communicates any information which is grossly offensive or menacing in nature;

(w) impersonate another person;

(x) contains software viruses or any other computer code, files or programs designed to interrupt, destroy or limit the functionality of any computer resource; or contains any trojan horses, worms, time bombs, cancelbots, easter eggs or other computer programming routines that may damage, detrimentally interfere with, diminish value of, surreptitiously intercept or expropriate any system, data or personal information;

(y) threatens the unity, integrity, defence, security or sovereignty of South Africa, friendly relations with foreign states, or public order or causes incitement to the commission of any cognizable offence or prevents investigation of any offence or is insulting any other nation.

(z) shall not be false, inaccurate or misleading;

(aa) shall not, directly or indirectly, offer, attempt to offer, trade or attempt to trade in any item, the dealing of which is prohibited or restricted in any manner under the provisions of any applicable law, rule, regulation or guideline for the time being in force.

(ab) shall not create liability for Us or cause Us to lose (in whole or in part) Our services or other suppliers;

  • You shall not use any “deep-link”, “page-scrape”, “robot”, “spider” or other automatic device, program, algorithm or methodology, or any similar or equivalent manual process, to access, acquire, copy or monitor any portion of the Platform or any Content, or in any way reproduce or circumvent the navigational structure or presentation of the Platform or any Content, to obtain or attempt to obtain any materials, documents or information through any means not purposely made available through the Platform. We reserve Our right to bar any such activity.
  • You shall not attempt to gain unauthorized access to any portion or feature of the Platform, or any other systems or networks connected to the Platform or to any server, computer, network, or to any of the services offered on or through the Platform, by hacking, password “mining” or any other illegitimate means.
  • You shall not probe, scan or test the vulnerability of the Platform or any network connected to the Platform nor breach the security or authentication measures on the Platform or any network connected to the Platform. You may not reverse look-up, trace or seek to trace any information on any other User of or visitor to Platform, or any other customer, including any account on the Platform not owned by You, to its source, or exploit the Platform or any service or information made available or offered by or through the Platform, in any way where the purpose is to reveal any information, including but not limited to personal identification or information, other than Your own information, as provided for by the Platform.
  • You shall not make any negative, denigrating or defamatory statement(s) or comment(s) about Us or the brand name or domain name used by Us including the terms Mbuelo, mbuelo.haulx.co.za, or otherwise engage in any conduct or action that might tarnish the image or reputation, of Mbuelo or sellers on platform or otherwise tarnish or dilute any Mbuelo’s trade or service marks, trade name and/or goodwill associated with such trade or service marks, trade name as may be owned or used by us. You agree that You will not take any action that imposes an unreasonable or disproportionately large load on the infrastructure of the Platform or Mbuelo’s systems or networks, or any systems or networks connected to Mbuelo.
  • You agree not to use any device, software or routine to interfere or attempt to interfere with the proper working of the Platform or any transaction being conducted on the Platform, or with any other person’s use of the Platform.
  • You may not forge headers or otherwise manipulate identifiers in order to disguise the origin of any message or transmittal You send to Us on or through the Platform or any service offered on or through the Platform. You may not pretend that You are, or that You represent, someone else, or impersonate any other individual or entity.
  • You may not use the Platform or any content for any purpose that is unlawful or prohibited by these Terms and Conditions, or to solicit the performance of any illegal activity or other activity which infringes the rights of Mbuelo and / or others.
  • You shall at all times ensure full compliance with the applicable provisions of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act, Act No. 25 of 2002 and rules thereunder as applicable and as amended from time to time and also the National Credit Act of 2005 and the Consumer Protection Act and/or any other applicable legislation regarding Your use of Our service and Your listing, purchase, solicitation of offers to purchase, and sale of products or services. You shall not engage in any transaction in an item or service, which is prohibited by the provisions of any applicable law including exchange control laws or regulations for the time being in force.
  • Solely to enable Us to use the information You supply Us with, so that we are not violating any rights You might have in Your Information, You agree to grant Us a non-exclusive, worldwide, perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free, sub-licensable (through multiple tiers) right to exercise the copyright, publicity, database rights or any other rights You have in Your Information, in any media now known or not currently known, with respect to Your Information. We will only use Your information in accordance with the Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy applicable to use of the Platform.
  • From time to time, You shall be responsible for providing information relating to the products or services proposed to be sold by You. In this connection, You undertake that all such information shall be accurate in all respects. You shall not exaggerate or over emphasize the attributes of such products or services so as to mislead other Users in any manner.
  • You shall not engage in advertising to, or solicitation of, other Users of the Platform to buy or sell any products or services, including, but not limited to, products or services related to that being displayed on the Platform or related to us. You may not transmit any chain letters or unsolicited commercial or junk email to other Users via the Platform. It shall be a violation of these Terms and Conditions to use any information obtained from the Platform in order to harass, abuse, or harm another person, or in order to contact, advertise to, solicit, or sell to another person other than Us without Our prior explicit consent. In order to protect Our Users from such advertising or solicitation, We reserve the right to restrict the number of messages or emails which a user may send to other Users in any 24-hour period which We deems appropriate in its sole discretion. You understand that We have the right at all times to disclose any information (including the identity of the persons providing information or materials on the Platform) as necessary to satisfy any law, regulation or valid governmental request. This may include, without limitation, disclosure of the information in connection with investigation of alleged illegal activity or solicitation of illegal activity or in response to a lawful court order or subpoena. In addition, We can (and You hereby expressly authorize Us to) disclose any information about You to law enforcement or other government officials, as we, in Our sole discretion, believe necessary or appropriate in connection with the investigation and/or resolution of possible crimes, especially those that may involve personal injury.

Contents Posted on Platform

All text, graphics, user interfaces, visual interfaces, photographs, trademarks, logos, sounds, music and artwork (collectively, “Content”), is a third party user generated content and Mbuelo has no control over such third party user generated content as Mbuelo is merely an intermediary for the purposes of this Terms and Conditions.

Except as expressly provided in these Terms and Conditions, no part of the Platform and no Content may be copied, reproduced, republished, uploaded, posted, publicly displayed, encoded, translated, transmitted or distributed in any way (including “mirroring”) to any other computer, server, Platform or other medium for publication or distribution or for any commercial enterprise, without Mbuelo’s express prior written consent.

You may use information on the products and services purposely made available on the Platform for downloading, provided that You:

  • do not remove any proprietary notice language in all copies of such documents,
  • use such information only for your personal, non-commercial informational purpose and do not copy or post such information on any networked computer or broadcast it in any media,
  • make no modifications to any such information, and
  • do not make any additional representations or warranties relating to such documents.

You shall be responsible for any notes, messages, emails, reviews, ratings, billboard postings, photos, drawings, profiles, opinions, ideas, images, videos, audio files or other materials or information posted or transmitted to the Platform (collectively, “Content”). Such Content will become Our property and You grant Us the worldwide, perpetual and transferable rights in such Content. We shall be entitled to, consistent with Our Privacy Policy as adopted in accordance with applicable law, use the Content or any of its elements for any type of use forever, including but not limited to promotional and advertising purposes and in any media whether now known or hereafter devised, including the creation of derivative works that may include the Content You provide. You agree that any Content You post may be used by us, consistent with Our Privacy Policy and Rules of Conduct on Site as mentioned herein, and You are not entitled to any payment or other compensation for such use.

SOME CONTENT OFFERED ON THE PLATFORM MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR SOME VIEWERS AND THEREFORE VIEWER DISCRETION IS ADVISED. ALSO, SOME CONTENT OFFERED ON THE PLATFORM MAY NOT BE APPROPRIATE FOR VIEWERSHIP BY CHILDREN. PARENTS AND/OR LEGAL GUARDIANS ARE ADVISED TO EXERCISE DISCRETION BEFORE ALLOWING THEIR CHILDREN AND/OR WARDS TO ACCESS CONTENT ON THE PLATFORM.

Privacy

We view protection of Your privacy as a very important principle. We understand clearly that You and Your Personal Information is one of Our most important assets. We store and process Your Information including any sensitive financial information collected (as defined under the the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA), if any, on computers that may be protected by physical as well as reasonable technological security measures and procedures in accordance with the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act, Act No. 25 of 2002 and Rules there under. Our current Privacy Policy is available at Privacy Policy. if You object to Your Information being transferred or used in this way please do not use the Platform.

We may share personal information with our other corporate entities and affiliates. These entities and affiliates may market to you as a result of such sharing unless you explicitly opt-out.

We may disclose personal information to third parties. This disclosure may be required for us to provide you access to our Services, to comply with our legal obligations, to enforce our User Agreement, to facilitate our marketing and advertising activities, or to prevent, detect, mitigate, and investigate fraudulent or illegal activities related to our Services. We do not disclose your personal information to third parties for their marketing and advertising purposes without your explicit consent.

We may disclose personal information if required to do so by law or in the good faith belief that such disclosure is reasonably necessary to respond to subpoenas, court orders, or other legal process. We may disclose personal information to law enforcement offices, third party rights owners, or others in the good faith belief that such disclosure is reasonably necessary to: enforce our Terms or Privacy Policy; respond to claims that an advertisement, posting or other content violates the rights of a third party; or protect the rights, property or personal safety of our users or the general public.

We and our affiliates will share / sell some or all of your personal information with another business entity should we (or our assets) plan to merge with, or be acquired by that business entity, or re-organization, amalgamation, restructuring of business. Should such a transaction occur that other business entity (or the new combined entity) will be required to follow this privacy policy with respect to your personal information.

Disclaimer of Warranties and Liability

This Platform, all the materials and products (including but not limited to software) and services, included on or otherwise made available to You through this site are provided on “as is” and “as available” basis without any representation or warranties, express or implied except otherwise specified in writing. Without prejudice to the forgoing paragraph, Mbuelo does not warrant that:

  • This Platform will be constantly available, or available at all; or
  • The information on this Platform is complete, true, accurate or non-misleading.

Mbuelo will not be liable to You in any way or in relation to the Contents of, or use of, or otherwise in connection with, the Platform. Mbuelo does not warrant that this site; information, Content, materials, product (including software) or services included on or otherwise made available to You through the Platform; their servers; or electronic communication sent from Us are free of viruses or other harmful components.

You will be required to enter a valid phone number while placing an order on the Platform. By registering Your phone number with us, You consent to be contacted by Us via phone calls, SMS notifications, mobile applications and/or any other electronic mode of communication in case of any order or shipment or delivery related updates.

Services

Order Fulfillment

Your purchases on the Platform include fulfillment and delivery services. Upon order confirmation, the Company will aim to facilitate delivery of your products within the timeframe communicated through the Platform. While we strive to provide accurate estimated delivery times, these may vary based on factors including third-party delivery partner availability, order volume, traffic conditions, weather, and unforeseen circumstances. We/Company will not be held liable for any delay in delivery of the Order.

For your convenience, the estimated time of arrival (ETA) is displayed on the Website’s homepage before placing an order, allowing you to make informed purchasing decisions.

Please be aware that additional delivery fees may apply based on factors such as severe weather, peak hours, high demand periods, late-night deliveries, packing and handling, platform maintenance, or small order fulfillment. These fees will be transparently displayed in the “Basket” section before place the order.

Payment

While availing any of the payment method/s available on the Platform, we will not be responsible or assume any liability, whatsoever in respect of any loss or damage arising directly or indirectly to You due to:

  • Lack of authorization for any transaction/s, or
  • Exceeding the preset limit mutually agreed by You and between “Bank/s”, or
  • Any payment issues arising out of the transaction, or
  • Decline of transaction for any other reason/s.

All payments made against the purchases/services on Platform by you shall be compulsorily in South African Rands acceptable in the Republic of South Africa. Platform will not facilitate transaction with respect to any other form of currency with respect to the purchases made on Platform.

Before shipping / delivering your order to you, Seller may request you to provide supporting documents (including but not limited to Govt. issued ID and address proof) to establish the ownership of the payment instrument used by you for your purchase. This is done in the interest of providing a safe online shopping environment to Our Users.

Further:

  • Transactions, Transaction Price and all commercial terms such as Delivery, Dispatch of products and/or services are as per principal to principal bipartite contractual obligations between Buyer and Seller and payment facility is merely used by the Buyer and Seller to facilitate the completion of the Transaction. Use of the payment facility shall not render Mbuelo liable or responsible for the non-delivery, non-receipt, non-payment, damage, breach of representations and warranties, non-provision of after sales or warranty services or fraud as regards the products and /or services listed on Mbuelo’s Platform.
  • You have specifically authorized Mbuelo or its service providers to collect, process, facilitate and remit payments and / or the Transaction Price electronically or through Cash on Delivery to and from other Users in respect of transactions through Payment Facility. Your relationship with Mbuelo is on a principal to principal basis and by accepting these Terms and Conditions you agree that Mbuelo is an independent contractor for all purposes, and does not have control of or liability for the products or services that are listed on Mbuelo’s Platform that are paid for by using the Payment Facility. Mbuelo does not guarantee the identity of any User nor does it ensure that a Buyer or a Seller will complete a transaction.
  • You understand, accept and agree that the payment facility provided by Muelo is neither a banking nor financial service but is merely a facilitator providing an electronic, automated online electronic payment, receiving payment through Cash-on delivery, collection and remittance facility for the Transactions on the Mbuelo Platform using the existing authorized banking infrastructure and Credit Card payment gateway networks. Further, by providing Payment Facility, Mbuelo is neither acting as trustees nor acting in a fiduciary capacity with respect to the Transaction or the Transaction Price.

Payment Facility for Buyers:

  • You, as a Buyer, understand that upon initiating a Transaction You are entering into a legally binding and enforceable contract with the Seller to purchase the products and /or services from the Seller using the Payment Facility, and You shall pay the Transaction Price through Your Issuing Bank to the Seller using Payment Facility.
  • You, as a Buyer, may agree with the Seller through electronic communication and electronic records and using the automated features as may be provided by Payment Facility on any extension / increase in the Dispatch and/or Delivery time and the Transaction shall stand amended to such extent. Any such extension / increase of Dispatch / Delivery time or subsequent novation / variation of the Transaction should be in compliance with Payment Facility Rules and Policies.
  • You, as a Buyer, shall electronically notify Payment Facility using the appropriate Mbuelo Platform features immediately upon Delivery or non- Delivery within the time period as provided in Policies. Non notification by You of Delivery or non- Delivery within the time period specified in the Policies shall be construed as a deemed Delivery in respect of that Transaction. In case of Cash- On Delivery transactions, Buyer is not required to confirm the receipt of products or services.
  • You, as a Buyer, shall be entitled to claim a refund of the Transaction Price (as Your sole and exclusive remedy) in case You do not receive the Delivery within the time period agreed in the Transaction or within the time period as provided in the Policies, whichever is earlier. In case you do not raise a refund claim using Platform features within the stipulated time than this would make You ineligible for a refund.
  • You, as a Buyer, understand that the Payment Facility may not be available in full or in part for certain category of products and/or services and/or Transactions as mentioned in the Policies and hence You may not be entitled to a refund in respect of the Transactions for those products and /or services.
  • Except for Cash On Delivery transaction, refund, if any, shall be made at the same Issuing Bank from where Transaction Price was received, or through any other method available on the Platform, as chosen by You.
  • For Cash On Delivery transactions, refunds, if any, will be made via electronic payment transfers.
  • Refund shall be made in South African Rands only and shall be equivalent to the Transaction Price received in South African Rands.
  • For electronics payments, refund shall be made through payment facility using any other online banking / electronic funds transfer system approved by Reserve Bank of South Africa.
  • Refunds may be supported for select banks. Where a bank is not supported for processing refunds, You will be required to share alternate bank account details with us for processing the refund.
  • In case of refunds, you would be provided an option to choose if the refund has to be credited back to source, bank account or would like to receive a gift voucher. In case you choose gift voucher, Seller would provide you with gift voucher which may be delivered to you electronically by Mbuelo.
  • Refund shall be conditional and shall be with recourse available to Mbuelo in case of any misuse by Buyer.
  • We may also request you for additional documents for verification.
  • Refund shall be subject to Buyer complying with Policies.
  • Mbuelo reserves the right to impose limits on the number of Transactions or Transaction Price which Mbuelo may receive from on an individual Valid Credit/Debit/ Cash Card / Valid Bank Account/ and such other infrastructure or any other financial instrument directly or indirectly through payment aggregator or through any such facility authorized by Reserve Bank of South Africa to provide enabling support facility for collection and remittance of payment or by an individual Buyer during any time period, and reserves the right to refuse to process Transactions exceeding such limit.
  • Mbuelo reserves the right to refuse to process Transactions by Buyers with a prior history of questionable charges including without limitation breach of any agreements by Buyer with Mbuelo or breach/violation of any law or any charges imposed by Issuing Bank or breach of any policy.
  • Mbuelo may do such checks as it deems fit before approving the receipt of/Buyers commitment to pay (for Cash On Delivery transactions) Transaction Price from the Buyer for security or other reasons at the discretion of Mbuelo. As a result of such check if Mbuelo is not satisfied with the creditability of the Buyer or genuineness of the Transaction or other reasons at its sole discretion, Flipkart shall have the right to reject the receipt of / Buyers commitment to pay Transaction Price. For avoidance of doubt, it is hereby clarified that the ‘Cash on Delivery’ feature for payment, may be disabled for certain account users, at the sole discretion of Mbuelo.
  • Mbuelo may delay notifying the payment confirmation i.e. informing Seller to dispatch, if Mbuelo deems suspicious or for Buyers conducting high transaction volumes to ensure safety of the Transaction and Transaction Price. In addition, Mbuelo may hold Transaction Price and Mbuelo may not inform Seller to Dispatch or remit Transaction Price to law enforcement officials (instead of refunding the same to Buyer) at the request of law enforcement officials or in the event the Buyer is engaged in any form of illegal activity.
  • The Buyer and Seller acknowledge that Mbuelo will not be liable for any damages, interests or claims etc. resulting from not processing a Transaction/Transaction Price or any delay in processing a Transaction/Transaction Price which is beyond control of Mbuelo.

Buyer’s arrangement with Issuing Bank:

  • All valid Credit / Debit/ Cash Card/ and other payment instruments are processed using a Credit Card payment gateway or appropriate payment system infrastructure and the same will also be governed by the terms and conditions agreed between the Buyer and the respective Issuing Bank and payment instrument issuing company.
  • All Online Bank Transfers from Valid Bank Accounts are processed using the gateway provided by the respective Issuing Bank which support Payment Facility to provide these services to the Users. All such Online Bank Transfers on Payment Facility are also governed by the terms and conditions agreed to between Buyer and the respective Issuing Bank.

Customer Conduct

Terms:

  1. Mbuelo fosters diversity, inclusion, equity and protect the individuals who are engaged with us as delivery partners from any discrimination on grounds such as race, social origin, caste, ethnicity, nationality, gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, religion or belief, age or any other grounds.
  2. Mbuelo prohibits discrimination against delivery partners under any circumstances and on any grounds including on the basis of race, religion, caste, place of origin, disability, sexual orientation, sex, marital status, gender identity, age, or any other characteristics that may be protected under applicable law.
  3. We reserve the right to withhold access to the Platform and otherwise limit Your access to the Platform at Our absolute discretion if You behave towards any delivery partner working with Mbuelo in a manner which is discourteous, disrespectful, or abusive, or which otherwise may be deemed to be inappropriate or unlawful.
  4. You are expected to treat all delivery partners with courtesy and respect.

Mbuelo’s Replacement Guarantee

Mbuelo’s Replacement Guarantee seeks to assist Buyers who have been defrauded by qualified sellers on the Platform. The return policy period (Mbuelo’s Replacement Guarantee) depends on the product category and the seller. If at the time of delivery and/or within the applicable return policy period, if any defect is found, then the buyer of the product/s can ask for replacement of the product/s from the seller subject to the following terms and conditions

  • Notify seller of any defects in the product/s at the time of delivery of the product/s and/or within the applicable return policy period and the same product/s will be replaced in return of the defective product/s.
  • Replacement can be for the entire product/s or part/s of the product subject to availability of the same with the seller.

Following products shall not be eligible for return or replacement:

  1. Damages due to misuse of product;
  2. Incidental damage due to malfunctioning of product;
  3. Any consumable item which has been used/installed;
  4. Products with tampered or missing serial/UPC numbers;
  5. Digital products/services;
  6. Any damage/defect which are not covered under the manufacturer’s warranty;
  7. Any product that is returned without all original packaging and accessories, including the box, manufacturer’s packaging if any, and all other items originally included with the product/s delivered;
  8. Jewelry which is ‘made to order’ on customer’s request.

On Clothing and Footwear, qualified sellers accept 30 day exchange subject to the following conditions:

  • Clothes and footwear are not used (other than for trial), altered, washed, soiled or damaged in any way.
  • Original tags and packaging should be intact. For items that come in branded packaging, the box should be undamaged.
  • Returns are not applicable for ‘Made to order’ jewellary, innerwear, lingerie, socks, clothing freebies, etc.
  • Damaged or defective or ‘Not as described’ products in Lifestyle category (includes clothing, footwear, etc.) are meanwhile covered by the 30 Day Replacement Guarantee. 

If Mbuelo has any suspicion or knowledge that any of its buyers and sellers are involved in any activity that is intended to provide claims or information that is false or not genuine, Mbuelo may also, while reserving its rights to initiate civil and/or criminal proceedings against such member buyers and sellers, at its sole discretion, suspend, block, restrict, cancel the Display Name of such buyers and sellers and/or disqualify that user and any related users from availing protection through this program. Customers who have been blocked for any suspicious or fraudulent activity on Mbuelo will not be allowed to return their products.

Mbuelo reserves its right to initiate civil and/or criminal proceedings against a user who, files a invalid and/or false claims or provides false, incomplete, or misleading information. In addition to the legal proceedings as aforesaid, Mbuelo may at its sole discretion suspend, block, restrict, cancel the Display Name and its related Display Names of such user and/or disqualify that user and any related users from availing protection through this program. Any person who, knowingly and with intent to injure, defraud or deceive, files a Fraudulent Complaint containing false, incomplete, or misleading information may be guilty of a criminal offence and will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Indemnity

You shall indemnify and hold harmless Mbuelo, its owner, licensee, affiliates, subsidiaries, group companies (as applicable) and their respective officers, directors, agents, and employees, from any claim or demand, or actions including reasonable attorneys’ fees, made by any third party or penalty imposed due to or arising out of Your breach of this Terms and Conditions, privacy Policy and other Policies, or Your violation of any law, rules or regulations or the rights (including infringement of intellectual property rights) of a third party.

Applicable Law

Terms and Conditions shall be governed by and interpreted and construed in accordance with the laws of South Africa. The place of jurisdiction shall be exclusively in Gauteng.

Jurisdictional Issues/Sale in South Africa Only

Unless otherwise specified, the material on the Platform is presented solely for the purpose of sale in South Africa. Mbuelo make no representation that materials in the Platform are appropriate or available for use in other locations/Countries other than South Africa. Those who choose to access this site from other locations/Countries other than South Africa do so on their own initiative and Mbuelo is not responsible for supply of products/refund for the products ordered from other locations/Countries other than South Africa, compliance with local laws, if and to the extent local laws are applicable.

Trademark, Copyright and Restriction

This site is controlled and operated by Mbuelo and products are sold by respective Sellers. All material on this site, including images, illustrations, audio clips, and video clips, are protected by copyrights, trademarks, and other intellectual property rights. Material on Platform is solely for Your personal, non-commercial use. You must not copy, reproduce, republish, upload, post, transmit or distribute such material in any way, including by email or other electronic means and whether directly or indirectly and You must not assist any other person to do so. Without the prior written consent of the owner, modification of the materials, use of the materials on any other Platform or networked computer environment or use of the materials for any purpose other than personal, non-commercial use is a violation of the copyrights, trademarks and other proprietary rights, and is prohibited. Any use for which You receive any remuneration, whether in money or otherwise, is a commercial use for the purposes of this clause.

Intellectual Property Rights: It is hereby specifically recorded that the copyright and other Intellectual Property in the e-book is available with the Seller and it is Seller’s exclusive property. Seller represents and warrants that Sellers are authorized by such third parties to sell the e-book on the Platform for license of use to the end customers. Intellectual Property Rights for the purpose of this Terms and Conditions shall always mean and include copyrights whether registered or not, patents including rights of filing patents, trademarks, trade names, trade dresses, house marks, collective marks, associate marks and the right to register them, designs both industrial and layout, geographical indicators, moral rights, broadcasting rights, displaying rights, distribution rights, selling rights, abridged rights, translating rights, reproducing rights, performing rights, communicating rights, adapting rights, circulating rights, protected rights, joint rights, reciprocating rights, infringement rights. All those Intellectual Property rights arising as a result of domain names, internet or any other right available under applicable law shall vest in the domain of Mbuelo as the owner of such domain name. The Parties hereto agree and confirm that no part of any Intellectual Property rights mentioned hereinabove is transferred in the name of User and any intellectual property rights arising as a result of these presents shall also be in the absolute ownership, possession and Mbuelo’s control or control of its licensors, as the case may be.

Trademark complaint

Mbuelo respects the intellectual property of others. In case You feel that Your Trademark has been infringed, You can write to Mbuelo at [email protected].

Product Description

Mbuelo do not warrant that Product description or other content of this Platform is accurate, complete, reliable, current, or error-free and assumes no liability in this regard.

Limitation of Liability

IN NO EVENT SHALL MBUELO BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, INDIRECT OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OF ANY KIND IN CONNECTION WITH THESE TERMS OF USE, EVEN IF USER HAS BEEN INFORMED IN ADVANCE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.

Contact Us

Please contact us for any questions or comments (including all inquiries unrelated to copyright infringement) regarding this platform through the link: https://mbuelo.haulx.co.za/contact

Customer Support: You can reach our customer support team to address any of your queries or complaints by clicking the link, selecting your order and choosing ‘Need Help’ option: https://mbuelo.haulx.co.za/contact

POLICIES

Profanity Policy

Mbuelo prohibits the use of language that is racist, hateful, sexual or obscene in nature in a public area.

This policy extends to text within listings, on Seller pages and all other areas of the site that another User may view. If the profane words are part of a title for the item being sold, we allow Sellers to ‘blur’ out the bulk of the offending word with asterisks (i.e., s*** or f***).

Please report any violations of this policy to the correct area for review:

* Report offensive Display Names

* Report offensive language in a listing or otherwise

If a feedback comment; or any communication made between Users on the Platform; or email communication between Users in relation to transactions conducted on Platform contain profanity, please review Our feedback removal policy and submit a request for action/removal.

Disciplinary action may result in the indefinite suspension of a User’s account, temporary suspension, or a formal warning.

Mbuelo will consider the circumstances of an alleged policy violation and the user’s trading records before taking action.

Violations of this policy may result in a range of actions, including:

  • Limits placed on account privileges;
  • Loss of special status;
  • Account suspension.

Mbuelo shall have the right to delete a product review posted by the customer at its sole discretion, if it is of the opinion that the review contains offensive language as stated above. Further, if Mbuelo is of the opinion that the review unfairly either: (i) causes disadvantage to a product; or (ii) increases the popularity of the product, Mbuelo shall have the right to delete the customer review. Mbuelo shall also, at its sole discretion have the right to blacklist the customer from posting any further customer reviews.

Rating and Review Process

  • Reviews must be genuine and based on your actual experience with the product.
  • Reviews must comply with the Platform’s T&C and content policies, including those prohibiting offensive, abusive, or inappropriate content.
  • Reviews must not contain any personal information, such as your name, address, phone number, or email address.
  • Reviews must not promote any other products or services.
  • All reviews and ratings will be subject to moderation by the Platform.

What all is allowed in Mbuelo Ratings and Reviews

  • Product Ratings
  • Product Reviews
  • Aspect Ratings (Rating for Battery, Camera etc.)
  • Image Reviews
  • Video Reviews

Only Buyers with Verified Purchases can leave reviews:

  • Ratings & Reviews are solicited from users post-delivery of their product.
  • This happens across multiple touch points – both inside the Mbuelo Application (Notifications, Home Page, My Orders, Order Details) and outside the Application (Email, SMSs,)
  • In case someone who has not purchased a particular product on Mbuelo, attempts to review/rate a product on Mbuelo, we do not allow it under any circumstances. These users see an error.

Crowd-sourced Review Feedback

  • We allow users to give Thumbs-up & Thumbs-down against every review. This is used in calculation of Wilson Score that is one of the factors in the ranking the reviews
  • Flag as abusive: Users are allowed to flag reviews as abusive in case they find content that they find as abusive. These are then manually moderated and taken down in case they violate any guidelines.

Moderation of Reviews

  • Auto-moderation (Algorithmic pipeline): Mbuelo does auto-moderation of text reviews via an algorithmic pipeline. We check for the below and remove the reviews in case they breach one of the below conditions.
  • Text: Profanity, Personal or sensitive information, Religious and political comments , Emojis, Other mixed languages (detection and rejection), Competitor/Competitive Brand mentions (ex. Mentioning Brand B in a review of Brand A’s products), Price/Offer related information, URLs for external websites, Service related reviews for the product, Future plan for multi-seller listings, Poorly formatted content, Irrelevant content
  • Image & Video: All images are manually moderated. Only images & videos that have completed moderation go live on the platform and are visible to other users.
  • Manual moderation: If the auto-moderation model is not confident enough (above a threshold) to categorize the text review in any of the categories, then it sends for manual moderation. All profane reviews go for manual moderation, even when auto-moderation model is able to categorize them.

Image & Video components directly go for manual moderation.

Text Reviews can be rejected for the following reasons: Profanity, Spam/HTML, Irrelevant Content, Price/Offer Related Content, Misleading joke review, Unintelligible Text/Very Bad Formatting, Product Related Query, Fake/Duplicate Product, Seller-attributable R&R such as fake, Future plan for multi-seller listings, Contains Personal Information, Rating & Review Mismatch (ex. Rating is 1*, but very good review), Delivery Related/Installation Related Review, Regional Language Content, Missing Product Related Review, Service Centre Related (Post Sale Related), Damaged/wrong Product Received, Packaging Related Review, Payment/Return/Refund/Cancellation Related Review, Promoting Other Retailers.

Images can be rejected for the following reasons: Profanity, Product Mismatch, Screen Shot from Online Platform, Blur/Pixelated Images, Image Contains Personal Or Sensitive Information, Promoting Other Retailers, Fake/damaged Product Received, Brand Mismatch, Partial/Cropped image, Image with Unwanted Objects

Videos can be rejected for the following reasons: Contains profane/abusive content in the video, Video does not match the product being reviewed, Video is not meeting length specifications, Video contains user audio (Background), Video lacks focus on the product purchased, Not a user captured image in the video(screenshots), Video does not match with thumbnail image, Poor quality video, Poor quality audio, Contains reference to other platforms/retailers, Contains comparison with other competitor products, Contains service related feedback (about shipment), Video does not match the product purchased (brand mismatch), Contains vernacular content, Contains sarcastic content, Contains irrelevant content, Contains offers, deals related content, Contains personal or sensitive information

In addition to these, we also take down reviews from based on the below profile checks.

Profile based checks

  • If a buyer has been blacklisted by Flipkart Trust & Safety Systems for one or more frauds and the customer has remained blacklisted for more than 30 days (accounting for false positives), then the Ratings and Reviews given by the user are not reliable, and are taken down.
  • If a buyer is linked to a seller and the seller has been blacklisted by TnS for selling fake products or doing SPF fraud, then the Ratings and Reviews given by the buyer are not reliable and are taken down.
  • If a buyer is linked to a seller and is giving good ratings (4 star or 5 star) to the seller’s products, then such ratings are be marked as spam and taken down.
  • If buyer is linked to a seller and is giving bad ratings (1 star, 2 star) to products sold by other sellers in the same vertical, then the ratings are marked as spam and taken down. 5. If a buyer has returned the product with return reason set which signifies dissatisfaction with the product and is still giving 4 star and 5 star rating, then the rating is marked as spam and taken down.
  • If majority of a buyer’s ratings are 1 stars (> 48% – number was arrived at by using outlier detection techniques) and > 50% of such 1 star ratings are anomalies, then the buyer is not reliable, and their ratings are taken down. Anomaly definition: if (average rating – 2*standard deviation > 1).
  • If majority of a buyer’s ratings are 5 stars (> 75% – number was arrived at by using outlier detection techniques) and > 50% of such 5 star ratings are anomalies, then the buyer is not reliable. Anomaly definition: if (average rating + 2*standard deviation <5)

Model / algorithm we use for reviews

Rating of a product is the plain average of all valid ratings that have been received by the product since the very first rating it received. There are no other considerations/weights here.

Replacement Guarantee

The Replacement Guarantee seeks to assist Buyers who have been defrauded by qualified sellers on the Platform. If at the time of delivery and/or within specified days from the date of delivery of the product/s, if any defect is found, then the buyer of the product/s can ask for replacement of the product/s from the seller.

If Mbuelo has suspicion or knowledge, that any of its buyers and sellers are involved in any activity that is intended to provide claims or information that is false, misleading or not genuine, then Mbuelo may while reserving its rights to initiate civil and/or criminal proceedings against User may also at its sole discretion suspend, block, restrict, cancel the Display Name of such buyer and seller and /or disqualify that User and any related Users from availing protection through this program.

Mbuelo reserves its right to initiate civil and/or criminal proceedings against a User who, files a invalid and/or false claims or provides false, incomplete, or misleading information. In addition to the legal proceedings as aforesaid, Mbuelo may at its sole discretion suspend, block, restrict, cancel the Display Name and its related Display Names of such User and/or disqualify that User and any related Users from availing protection through this program. Any person who, knowingly and with intent to injure, defraud or deceive, files a Fraudulent Complaint containing false, incomplete, or misleading information may be guilty of a criminal offence and will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Returns Policy

Definition: ‘Return’ is defined as the action of giving back the item purchased by the Buyer to the Seller on the Mbuelo Platform. Following situations may arise:

  • Item was defective
  • Item was damaged during the Shipping
  • Products was / were missing
  • Wrong item was sent by the Seller.

Return could also result in refund of money in most of the cases.

Points to be noted:

  • Seller can always accept the return irrespective of the policy.
  • If Seller disagrees a return request, Buyer can file a dispute under the Buyer Protection Program.

We encourage the Buyer to review the listing before making the purchase decision. In case Buyer orders a wrong item, Buyer shall not be entitled to any return/refund.

Buyer needs to raise the return request within the return period applicable to the respective product. Once Buyer has raised a return request by contacting Us, Seller while closing the return ticket can select one of the following:

  • Replace after shipment collection – Seller has agreed to wait for the logistics team to collect the shipment from the buyer before replacing it)
  • Refund after shipment collection – Seller has agreed to wait for the logistics team to collect the shipment from the buyer before refunding)
  • Refund without shipment collection – Seller has agreed to refund the buyer without expecting the original shipment back)
  • Replace without shipment collection – Seller has agreed to replace the order without expecting the original shipment back).

In the event the Seller accepts the return request raised by the Buyer, Buyer will have to return the product and then the refund shall be credited to the Buyers account.

In case the Seller doesn’t close the ticket in 3 days from the date of intimation to the Seller about the refund request, the refund request shall be settled in favor of the Buyer.

Further for returns being made by Buyer to the Seller of the product, the following parameters needs to be ensured by the Buyer:

Category           Condition

Electronics – Should be included

Clothing and Footwear – Should be “New & Unworn” (other than for trial)

Beauty, Health & Personal Care – Should be “New & Unopened”

Sports & Equipment – Should be “New” and returned with original packaging

Office Products – Should be “New” and returned with original packaging

If the product being returned is not in accordance with the above parameters, then Buyer shall not be entitled to any refund of money from the Seller.

Shipping cost for returning the product shall be borne and incurred by the Seller.

Replacement

Definition: Replacement is the action or process of replacing something in place of another. A Buyer can request for replacement whenever he is not happy with the item, reason being Damaged in shipping, Defective item, Item(s) missing, wrong item shipped and the like.

Points to be noted:

  • Seller can always accept the return irrespective of the policy.
  • If Seller disagrees for a return request, Buyer can file a dispute under Buyer Protection Program.

Buyer needs to raise the replacement request within the return period applicable to the respective product. Once Buyer has raised a replacement request by contacting Us on the Number provided on the Platform. Once the replacement request has been raised, the following steps shall be followed:

Buyer is asked for “Reason for Return”. Among others, the following are the leading reasons:

  • Shipping was damaged
  • Item was defective
  • Item Dead on Arrival
  • Item(s) were missing
  • Wrong item sent

An intimation shall be provided to Seller seeking either “approval” or “rejection” of the replacement request.

In case the Seller accepts the replacement request, Buyer shall be required to return the product to the Seller and only after return of the product, Seller shall be obliged to provide the replacement product to the Buyer.

Incase Seller rejects the replacement request, Buyer can choose to raise a dispute by contacting us.

In case the Seller doesn’t have the product at all, Seller can provide the refund to the Buyer and Buyer shall be obligated to accept the refund in lieu of replacement. All the product parameters shall be required to be complied with in cases of replacement.

If the Seller doesn’t respond to the Buyer’s replacement request, within three (3) days from the date of replacement request placed by the Buyer, refund shall be processed in favour of Buyer and Seller shall be liable to refund amount paid to the Seller.

All shipping and other replacement charges shall be borne and incurred by the Seller.

Once a transaction is completed, the following fees become non-refundable in case of cancellations or returns:

  • Platform fee
  • Offer Handling Fee
  • Payment Handling Fee
  • Corporate Credit Card Fee
  • Disputes (Resolutions) Policy

Overview

Generally, transactions are conducted smoothly on Mbuelo. However, there may be some cases where both the Buyers and Sellers may face issues. At Mbuelo, we have a Dispute Resolution process in order to resolve disputes between Buyers and Sellers.

What is a ‘dispute’?

A ‘Dispute’ can be defined as a disagreement between a Buyer and a Seller in connection with a transaction on the Platform.

How does a ‘dispute’ occur in the Marketplace?

Disputes are filed as a result of a disagreement between the Buyer and the Seller. Disputes arise out of an issue that is raised by either party not being completely satisfied with the resolution of their complaint/issue.

It is important that before a Buyer/Seller raises a dispute, they should attempt to solve the issue. Please note that whenever a Buyer raises a dispute, the Seller’s payment for that order is put on hold immediately until the issue is resolved.

How is a ‘dispute’ created?

Whenever there is a disagreement, the Buyer can contact us, while the Seller can write to us, in order to raise a dispute. Disputes can be raised at a particular transaction level.

What are the various types of ‘disputes’?

Following are the indicative examples of potential disputes:

  • Wrong item received;
  • Item not as described;
  • Damaged or seal broken on Product;
  • Part/accessory missing;
  • Item not compatible;
  • Seller description/specification wrong;;
  • Defective (functional issues)
  • Product not working and manufacturer claims invalid Invoice.

In case the Seller rejects the return request of the Buyer, and Buyer raises a dispute, then Mbuelo will try to mediate and resolve the dispute between both the parties. If the dispute is resolved in favour of the Buyer, a refund is provided once the product is returned to the Seller. If the dispute is settled in favour of the Seller, Buyer is entitled to any refund.

Buyer Protection Program

In case of a dispute where the Seller is unable to provide a refund or a replacement, Mbuelo will actively work towards reaching a resolution.

The Buyer Protection Program covers Buyers who are unable to successfully resolve their dispute with the Seller or are not satisfied the resolution provided by the Seller.

The buyer can contact us if the issue with the Seller is not resolved. Mbuelo’s Customer Support (CS) team will look into the case to check for possible fraud and if the Buyer has been blacklisted/blocked from making purchases on the Platform. Only after verifying these facts, a dispute can be registered.

CS team will not facilitate a conference call, CS team acts as the bridge between customer and seller.

When a dispute has been raised, Mbuelo may provide both the parties access to each others Display Names, contact details including email addresses and other details pertaining to the dispute. Buyers and Sellers are subject to final consent from Mbuelo for settling the dispute.

Buyer Eligibility and Restrictions

Only the Buyers who have purchased the product on Mbuelo are eligible for the Buyer Protection Program.

Buyers can file a dispute within 45 days from the date of delivery of the product

Any damage or loss to the product after delivery will not be covered under this program and will completely be the Buyer’s responsibility. Buyers should refuse to accept delivery if the item is damaged.

To be able to take advantage of the Buyer Protection Program, Buyers should first contact the Seller and attempt to resolve the issue. If the Buyer doesn’t hear from the Seller or is unable to resolve the issue with the Seller even after contact, a dispute can be raised with Mbuelo by contacting us.

Fraudulent charges and claims are not covered under Buyer Protection Program

If the Buyer has already initiated chargeback through the credit card issuing bank, it will not be covered under Buyer Protection Program, though in such cases a Seller can file a claim through the Seller Protection Program.

Blacklisted and Blocked Buyers are not covered by the Buyer Protection Program.

Buyers who have reached their maximum lifetime limit for claims are also not eligible. Buyers can make a maximum of 5 claims per year on Mbuelo. If the claim was withdrawn, it is not counted. The coverage amount will be limited.

Through the Buyer Protection program, Mbuelo does not provide any guarantee/warranty to Buyers for products sold on Mbuelo against technical/manufacturing defects.

Raising disputes against Sellers does not automatically entitle the Buyer to a refund or replacement for the product purchased. Mbuelo shall verify the disputes so raised and may process only such claims that are valid and genuine.

Mbuelo shall at no point be responsible for any direct or indirect losses, expenses, costs of any nature whatsoever that may be incurred by any Buyer/Seller.

Claims of the nature of ‘Buyer remorse’ (i.e. instances where products are bought by the Buyer by mistake or where the Buyer chooses to change his/her mind with regard to the product purchased by him) will not be entertained through this program.

Mbuelo reserves its right to initiate civil and/or criminal proceedings against a User who, files an invalid and/or false claims or provides false, incomplete, or misleading information. In addition to the legal proceedings as aforesaid, Mbuelo may at its sole discretion suspend, block, restrict, cancel the Display Name [and its related Display Names] of such User and/or disqualify that user and any related users from availing protection through this program.

Decisions made by Mbuelo under the Buyer Protection Program shall be final and binding on its Users.

Mbuelo reserves the right to modify / discontinue Buyer Protection Program without any prior notice period to its Users.

Through this program, Mbuelo shall not entertain claims of Buyers who have incurred loss due to delayed shipment or delivery of the item by the Seller.

Mbuelo Customer Support Team may seek additional information / clarification from Buyer to facilitate resolution of the dispute. In the event Buyer does not respond with information / clarification sought within 10 days of such request, the dispute shall be auto-closed in favour of the Seller.

Disputes via Chargeback

Whenever a chargeback (CB) comes from a payment gateway/bank, following situations may arise:

  • Item not received CB – Buyer hasn’t received the item. Refund will be created in accordance with the dispute policies
  • Unauthorized CB – Buyer hasn’t made this particular transaction. Refund will be created in accordance with the dispute policies.

Seller expressly agrees that issuing the correct and complete invoice is the sole and primary responsibility of the Seller. Furthermore, Seller shall ensure that invoices state “Powered by Mbuelo” and failing to do so Seller will be liable for chargebacks (as applicable).

  • Item not as described – meaning item is not what Buyer expected. Dispute will be decided in accordance with the dispute policies.

Email Abuse & Threat Policy

Private communication, including email correspondence, is not regulated by Mbuelo. Mbuelo encourages its Users to be professional, courteous and respectful when communicating by email.

However, Mbuelo will investigate and can take action on certain types of unwanted emails that violate Mbuelo policies.

Such instances:

Threats of Bodily Harm – Mbuelo does not permit Users to send explicit threats of bodily harm.

Misuse of Mbuelo System – Mbuelo allows Users to facilitate transactions through the Mbuelo system, but will investigate any misuse of this service.

Spoof (Fake) email – Mbuelo will never ask you to provide sensitive information through email. In case you receive any spoof (fake) email, you are requested to report the same to Us through ‘Contact Us’ tab.

Spam (Unsolicited Commercial email) – Mbuelo’s spam policy applies only to unsolicited commercial messages sent by Mbuelo Users. Mbuelo Users are not allowed to send spam messages to other Users.

Offers to Buy or Sell Outside of Mbuelo – Mbuelo prohibits email offers to buy or sell listed products outside of the Mbuelo Platform. Offers of this nature are a potential fraud risk for both Buyers and Sellers.

Mbuelo policy prohibits user-to-user threats of physical harm via any method including, phone, email and on Our public message boards.

Violations of this policy may result in a range of actions, including:

  • Limits on account privileges
  • Account suspension
  • Cancellation of listings
  • Loss of special status

Other Businesses

Mbuelo does not take responsibility or liability for the actions, products, content and services on the Platform, which are linked to Affiliates and / or third party Platforms using Platform’s APIs or otherwise. In addition, the Platform may provide links to the third party Platforms of Our affiliated companies and certain other businesses for which, Mbuelo assumes no responsibility for examining or evaluating the products and services offered by them. Mbuelo do not warrant the offerings of, any of these businesses or individuals or the content of such third party Platform(s). Mbuelo does not endorse, in any way, any third party Platform(s) or content thereof.

Mbuelo does not and cannot verify that Sellers have the right or ability to sell or distribute their listed products. However, Mbuelo is committed to removing infringing or unlicensed products once an authorized representative of the rights owner properly reports them to Mbuelo.

Notice of Infringement:

List of Allegedly Infringing Listings, Products, or Materials

A Note on Reason Codes: When identifying item numbers please use the reasons below. When removing products from the site, Mbuelo will inform Sellers of the specific reason for the removal of their products.

Select the most appropriate reason. Please associate each item you report with only one reason code.

Trademark-infringement

  • Trademark owner doesn’t make this type of product or has discontinued the production of the product.
  • Item(s) is an unlawful replica of a product made by the trademark owner or is counterfeit

Trademark-listing description infringement

  • Listing(s) has unlawful comparison to trademark owner’s brand or product
  • Listing(s) contains unlawful use of trademark owner’s logo

Copyright-item infringement

  • Software is being offered without any license or in violation of a license
  • Item(s) is a bootleg recording;
  • Item(s) is an unlawful copy (software, games, movies, etc.);
  • Item(s) is unlawful duplication of printed material
  • Item(s) is an unlawful copy of other copyrighted work (paintings, sculptures, etc.)

Copyright-listing content infringement

  • Listing(s) comprises unauthorized copy of copyrighted text
  • Listing(s) comprises unauthorized copy of copyrighted image
  • Listing(s) comprises unauthorized copy of copyrighted image and text

Reason Code:

_

Work(s): 

infringed:

_

Item Number(s):

Note:

Please provide the ownership of Trademark (Trademark Registration Certificate should be in the name of applicant). Please provide the evidence as to the ownership of copyright. All such Notices of Infringement shall be sent to [email protected];