General Terms and Conditions (GTC)
Last updated: 1 August 2026
§ 1 Scope and exclusive business status
(1) These General Terms and Conditions apply to all contracts for managed-hosting services between Dominik Schimpf (Sophistication.io), c/o IP-Management #2918, Ludwig-Erhard-Str. 18, 20459 Hamburg (hereinafter "Provider") and the Customer.
(2) The offer is directed exclusively at businesses (entrepreneurs) within the meaning of § 14 BGB, i.e. natural or legal persons or partnerships with legal capacity who, when concluding the contract, act in the exercise of their commercial or independent professional activity. By placing an order, the Customer confirms that it is acting as a business (entrepreneur). The conclusion of a contract with consumers (§ 13 BGB) is excluded.
(3) Since the contract is concluded exclusively with businesses (entrepreneurs), there is no statutory right of withdrawal. Conflicting terms of the Customer or terms deviating from these GTC shall only become part of the contract if the Provider expressly consents to their application in text form. This shall also apply where the Provider, being aware of conflicting terms, renders performance without reservation.
§ 2 Scope of services
(1) The Provider makes available to the Customer hosted websites/landing pages on a cloud infrastructure (including Cloudflare), comprising delivery, TLS encryption, domain connection and ongoing technical support within the respectively booked scope of services. Depending on the booked plan, the services also include software functions for the AI-assisted creation and editing of page content (§§ 7a, 7b).
(2) The specific scope of services results from the service tier (plan) selected when placing the order. The Provider is entitled to further develop and adapt the technical implementation (e.g. the upstream providers and infrastructure used), as long as the owed scope of services is not thereby materially restricted.
(3) The Provider renders its services using upstream providers (in particular Cloudflare as infrastructure, Stripe for payment processing). The Customer agrees that the Provider uses such upstream providers.
§ 3 Conclusion of contract
The presentation of the plans constitutes a binding offer by the Provider. The contract is concluded when the Customer selects a plan in the order process, confirms its business status as well as these GTC, and completes the paid order process via the payment service provider.
§ 4 Prices and payment
(1) The prices stated at the time of the order apply. Paid plans begin with a 14-day free trial, for which a valid means of payment is required. Unless the Customer terminates before the end of the trial, the plan converts into a paid subscription and the first charge is made at the end of the trial. Thereafter, billing takes place recurrently in advance for the chosen billing period (every four weeks or annually).
(2) Payment is processed via the payment service provider Stripe. The Customer authorizes the Provider or Stripe to collect the amounts due on the respective due date via the stored means of payment, and keeps a valid means of payment on file.
(3) Pursuant to § 19 UStG (small-business scheme), no value-added tax is charged and therefore not shown on invoices.
(4) The Provider is entitled to adjust prices with effect for future billing periods. A price change will be communicated to the Customer in text form with reasonable notice before the start of the next billing period. If the Customer does not agree with the change, it may terminate the contract with effect from the point at which the change takes effect.
§ 5 Default of payment
If the Customer defaults on a payment due, the Provider is entitled, after prior notice in text form and the unsuccessful expiry of a reasonable period, to temporarily suspend the services (e.g. to deactivate the hosted page) and, in the event of continued default, to terminate the contract for good cause. The Customer's obligation to pay the fees accrued up to termination remains unaffected.
§ 6 Term and termination
(1) The contract runs for an indefinite period. In the case of recurring four-weekly billing, it may be terminated at any time with effect from the end of the current billing period. In the case of annual billing, the period paid in advance (12 months) is decisive; a termination takes effect at the end of the period already paid, and the term already paid for remains in place. During the free trial, the Customer may terminate at any time with immediate effect and without charge.
(2) The Customer may manage its plan as well as termination independently at any time via the customer portal; terminations require at least text form. The right of both parties to extraordinary termination for good cause remains unaffected.
§ 7 Customer obligations and permitted use
(1) The Customer is responsible for the content it provides as well as for the cooperation required for the domain connection (e.g. setting DNS records or nameservers).
(2) The Customer ensures that the content it publishes does not violate applicable law or the rights of third parties. In particular, it is not permitted to make available unlawful, criminal, youth-endangering or infringing content, nor to send spam, distribute malware, or engage in any use which endangers the security or availability of the Provider's infrastructure or that of third parties.
(3) The Customer shall indemnify the Provider against claims by third parties based on unlawful content or a use in breach of contract by the Customer, including reasonable costs of legal defense. In the event of serious or obvious legal violations, the Provider is entitled to temporarily block the affected content.
§ 7a Generated content and drafts
(1) The services include functions that generate page content automatically or with AI assistance (in particular texts, layouts, and typical marketing elements such as example testimonials, ratings, social-proof figures, offer, discount and scarcity elements including countdowns). All such generated content constitutes non-binding drafts and placeholder content intended for review and editing by the Customer. Generated content is not a statement of fact by the Provider about the Customer, its products, or its customers.
(2) Before any publication, the Customer is solely responsible for reviewing all content of its pages, whether generated or self-provided, for accuracy, truthfulness, completeness and legal permissibility, and for adapting or removing it where required. This applies in particular to statutory requirements regarding unfair commercial practices (UWG), price indications (PAngV), the authenticity and labeling of customer reviews and testimonials, advertising and health-related claims, and the factual basis of discount, availability and deadline statements. Placeholder content (e.g. example testimonials) must be replaced with genuine material or removed before publication. Publication takes place exclusively on the Customer's initiative and under the Customer's responsibility as publisher of the pages.
(3) The Provider does not warrant that generated content is accurate, complete, free of third-party rights, or suitable for the Customer's intended commercial purpose. § 7 (2) and (3) apply accordingly to published content that originated as generated drafts; the indemnity under § 7 (3) covers in particular claims arising from the publication of unreviewed or unedited generated content.
§ 7b Replication of third-party reference pages
(1) The services include functions with which the Customer can designate an existing third-party web page ("reference") whose page structure and visual design serve as the technical starting point for a page of the Customer's own ("replica"). Text content of a replica is newly generated (§ 7a applies); images of the reference are not adopted. The selection of the reference is made solely by the Customer. The Provider owes the technical implementation only and does not review the reference or the resulting replica for legal permissibility.
(2) The Customer is aware that adopting the structure or design of a third-party page may in individual cases infringe the rights of third parties or unfair-competition law, in particular where the replica creates an avoidable deception as to the commercial origin of the offer, unfairly exploits or impairs the reputation of the imitated offer (§ 4 no. 3 UWG), or adopts elements protected by copyright, design or trademark law. The Customer is solely responsible for ensuring that the creation, use and publication of a replica are lawful in its specific business context and, where legally required, for obtaining the consent of the operator of the reference page before publication.
(3) § 7 (2) and (3) as well as § 7a (2) and (3) apply accordingly to replicas. The indemnity under § 7 (3) covers in particular claims of the operator of the reference page or of other third parties which are based on the Customer's selection of the reference or on the publication of the replica. It does not apply insofar as the Customer is not responsible for the infringement.
(4) In the event of a substantiated complaint by a third party, or of other concrete indications of a legal infringement, the Provider is entitled to temporarily block the affected replica (§ 7 (3) sentence 2). The Customer's obligation to pay remains unaffected insofar as the blocking is based on circumstances for which the Customer is responsible.
§ 8 Availability and maintenance
The Provider endeavors to achieve the highest possible availability of the services. A particular availability is not guaranteed, unless expressly agreed separately in text form. Necessary maintenance and security work, as well as disruptions outside the Provider's area of responsibility (e.g. at upstream providers, registrars or network operators), are excluded from any availability consideration.
§ 9 Data protection and commissioned processing
(1) Information on the processing of personal data by the Provider can be found in our Privacy Policy.
(2) Insofar as the Provider processes personal data in the course of hosting for which the Customer is the controller under data protection law (e.g. data of the Customer's website visitors), this is carried out on behalf of and in accordance with the instructions of the Customer. To this end, the parties conclude a data processing agreement pursuant to Art. 28 GDPR. The Provider makes a corresponding data processing agreement available to the Customer on request (support@sophistication.io).
(3) The Customer is itself responsible for the lawfulness of the processing of the data for which it is responsible as well as for fulfilling the obligations incumbent on it as controller.
§ 10 Liability
(1) The Provider is liable without limitation in cases of intent and gross negligence as well as for injury to life, body or health and within the scope of a guarantee assumed.
(2) In cases of simple negligence, the Provider is liable only for the breach of a material contractual obligation (cardinal obligation), the fulfillment of which makes the proper performance of the contract possible in the first place and on the observance of which the Customer regularly relies, and limited to the foreseeable damage typical of the contract. Otherwise, liability for simple negligence is excluded.
(3) The Customer is itself responsible for backing up its data and content, unless a backup scope of services has been expressly agreed. The Provider's liability for the loss of data is limited to the effort that would have been required for restoration in the case of proper and regular data backup by the Customer.
(4) The foregoing limitations of liability also apply in favor of the Provider's legal representatives and vicarious agents. Any mandatory statutory liability, in particular under the German Product Liability Act (ProdHaftG), remains unaffected.
§ 11 Force majeure
Events of force majeure which materially impede the Provider's owed performance or make it impossible (e.g. large-scale outages of upstream providers, natural disasters, official measures, strikes or wide-ranging disruptions of the internet) release the Provider from the obligation to perform for the duration of the disruption. Any liability for delays or outages caused thereby is excluded.
§ 12 Set-off and retention
The Customer may only set off against undisputed claims or claims established by final and binding judgment. The Customer is only entitled to a right of retention on account of counterclaims arising from the same contractual relationship.
§ 13 Assignment of the contract
The Provider is entitled to transfer the rights and obligations arising from this contract in whole or in part to a third party; it will inform the Customer thereof in text form. An assignment of the contract by the Customer requires the prior consent of the Provider in text form.
§ 14 Termination and data deletion
Upon termination of the contract, the provision of the hosted page ends. The Customer is responsible for backing up its content in good time before the end of the contract. The Provider is entitled to delete the content and data stored for the provision of services after the end of the contract, insofar as no statutory retention obligations preclude this.
§ 15 Changes to the GTC
The Provider may amend these GTC with effect for the future. Changes will be communicated to the Customer in text form; they shall be deemed approved if the Customer does not object in text form within six weeks of receipt. The notice shall separately draw attention to the possibility of objection and its consequences. If the Customer objects, either party may terminate the contract with effect from the point at which the change takes effect.
§ 16 Final provisions
(1) Declarations within the scope of this contract require at least text form, unless expressly provided otherwise.
(2) The law of the Federal Republic of Germany applies, to the exclusion of the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG).
(3) The exclusive place of jurisdiction for all disputes arising from this contract is Karlsruhe, insofar as the Customer is a merchant, a legal person under public law or a special fund under public law.
(4) Should a provision of these GTC be or become invalid, the validity of the remaining provisions remains unaffected. The invalid provision shall be replaced by the statutory rule.