Terms of use

• You need an email address at a university we support. We use it to place you in your university.
• One account per person, in your own name. No shared or club logins: committees each use their own account.
• Keep your sign-in codes to yourself. We will never ask you for one.
• Some of our users are 17. Some things (18+ events, nightlife, some recaps) are only for people we know are 18 or over.

We never charge students to use StudentSoc. If you buy something through it, like a ticket or club merch, any booking fee is shown before you pay.

• A club page belongs to the club, not to whoever runs it this year. Members, events, photos and history stay with the club when the committee hands over.
• Committees are responsible for what their club posts and for running their events safely and lawfully, including Students' Union rules.
• New clubs are reviewed before they go live. We can suspend a club that breaks these terms.
• If a club has no committee here, a student can claim it. We check claims by hand before making anyone an owner.

Committees look after their own club's space. They approve photos members add to a Recap, and they can delete comments, lock a thread, turn comments off or limit them to members, slow a thread down, and mute someone in their club for a while.

Committees are volunteers and they follow our committee moderation guide. They are not the last word: our moderators can review anything a committee does, and you can appeal it. Anything that might be illegal, or that puts someone at risk, goes straight to our moderators.

You keep ownership of what you post: posts, comments, photos and reactions. You give us permission to store it and show it to the people it's meant for on StudentSoc, for as long as it's up.

You must not post or share anything that:

• is illegal in the UK, or promotes or helps with something illegal (for example drugs, weapons, fraud, scams or terrorism);
• sexualises anyone under 18 in any way. We report this to the National Crime Agency;
• is sexual or nude, or shares an intimate image of someone without their consent;
• harasses, bullies, threatens or stalks anyone, or joins in a pile-on;
• attacks people because of race, ethnicity, religion, disability, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation or age;
• encourages suicide, self-harm, eating disorders, dangerous stunts or drinking dangerous amounts;
• outs someone or shares their private details, messages or location without permission;
• pretends to be someone else, another club or the Students' Union;
• is spam, a scam, a fake event or ticket resale outside StudentSoc.

Everything you post must also follow the community guidelines and the photo policy.

If you delete your account, your comments are deleted. Club posts and photos you added as a committee member stay with the club with your name removed. Photos you added to a Recap as a member are removed.

• How: use Report on any post, comment, photo, event, club or profile. If you're in a photo, use “I'm in this photo” instead (see the photo policy).
• Who sees it: reports go to our moderators. We never tell the person you reported, or the club, who reported them.
• What you hear back: when you report, we show you what happens next and roughly how long it takes. When we've decided, we tell you the outcome (removed, account or club suspended, or no action). We don't tell you who made the decision.

How quickly we aim to look (these are targets, and busy weeks like Freshers can be slower):

• Anything that might be illegal, or that involves the safety of a child: within 24 hours.
• Everything else: within 3 days.

If someone is in immediate danger, call 999. If you're struggling, Samaritans are there day or night on 116 123.

You can complain to us if:

• you think something on StudentSoc is illegal or breaks these terms and we haven't dealt with it;
• we've removed your content, or limited your account, and you think that was wrong (see appeals);
• you think we're not doing what these terms promise, or you're worried about how we're keeping people safe.

You don't need an account. Parents, guardians, people from other universities and anyone affected by something on StudentSoc can email [safety contact email — to be confirmed before launch]. If it's about a photo of you, the public removal form is quickest.

We aim to reply within 7 days and tell you what we've done. If you'd rather not get emails about your complaint after that first reply, just tell us. We may not respond to complaints that are clearly abusive or repeat one we've already answered, but we still read them.

You can appeal once against each of these decisions:

• we or a committee removed your post, comment or photo;
• a committee muted you in their club;
• we suspended your account or your club;
• we got your age wrong, for example you're 18 or over but can't see 18+ events or recaps. Tell us and we'll explain how to fix it. If your date of birth is wrong, you can correct it in Settings.

Use the appeal link in the notification we send you, or email [safety contact email — to be confirmed before launch]. A platform moderator looks at it fresh, with your reasons in front of them, and tells you the outcome and why. We aim to decide within 7 days. If we got it wrong we'll put the content back or lift the restriction. Muted people are never told which committee member muted them.

A suspended account can still sign in, download its data and be deleted while an appeal is open.

• “Sponsored · Ad” means a business paid us to show it. Ads follow our advertising policy: no tracking cookies, nothing based on which clubs you're in, and no nightlife ads for under-18s.
• “Promoted” means a club used one of its free boosts to appear in Explore for a few days. Nobody paid.
• If a club is paid or gets something in return for a post (a sponsor, a discount, free kit), it must be marked as sponsored, and StudentSoc labels it clearly. Hiding a paid promotion breaks these terms and UK advertising rules.

• Clubs organise their own events. We list them; we don't run them.
• Tickets sold through another site are covered by that site's terms.
• Events with alcohol must follow the nightlife guidelines.

When you buy club merch on StudentSoc, you're buying from your Students' Union, which is the seller. Its terms of sale apply alongside these. StudentSoc runs the shop page and takes the payment for the SU. Your committee organises the order and hands items out.

• Price: the full price, including our booking fee (charged once per order), is shown before you pay.
• Pre-order drops have a deadline and a minimum number of orders (for example “23 of 30 needed”). You pay when you order. If the minimum isn't reached by the deadline, the committee has 48 hours to either order anyway or cancel. If they cancel, or don't decide in time, everyone is refunded in full automatically, booking fee included.
• Collecting: items are collected in person (we don't take postal addresses). The page shows when items are expected. If it doesn't, the law says they must be provided within 30 days of your order.
• Changing your mind: you can cancel any time before a pre-order deadline for a full refund. After that, for plain items you have 14 days from the day you collect them to cancel and return them unused.
• Personalised items (a name or number on the back) are made just for you, so they can't be returned because you changed your mind once the deadline has passed.
• Faulty or not as described: you always keep your legal rights to a repair, replacement or refund, personalised or not.

You can delete your account at any time in Settings, Your data, with a 14-day window to change your mind. We may close accounts that seriously or repeatedly break these terms.

Under the Online Safety Act, a named person at StudentSoc is accountable for how we deal with illegal content, reports and complaints: [owner's name, to be confirmed before launch]. You can reach them at [safety contact email — to be confirmed before launch].

We work hard to keep StudentSoc running and safe, but we can't promise it will always be available or error-free. Nothing in these terms limits your rights as a consumer, or our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, or for fraud.

These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales. If you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland, you can also bring a claim in your local courts.