Terms of Service

Last updated October 27, 2026 (version 2026-10-27.3)

These terms are an agreement between you and Gopher Boss ("we", "us"), the operator of Gopher Boss, on which James Street Chateau is provided (the "service"). By creating an account, accepting an invitation, signing in, or using it through a link we send you, you agree to them and to our Privacy Policy. If you use the service for a business, you agree on its behalf and confirm you're allowed to. You must be at least 18.

They are one set of terms for every business that uses Gopher Boss, whatever its type (a landlord business, a trade business such as a fire inspection company, or a business that uses only the books, Gopher Boss Books), and for the people a business invites. Parts marked for one type of business apply only to that type.

1. The service

James Street Chateau helps Canadian small businesses keep their records. Landlord businesses keep rent records, issue receipts, prepare, sign and deliver documents, manage repairs and contractors, and produce statements and tax summaries. Trade and Books businesses keep their customers, invoices, payments, expenses and books, and (for fire inspection) their buildings, equipment and visits. Tenants, applicants, property owners, contractors and a business's team members use it free of charge at a business's invitation. We may improve, change or stop features; if we remove something important to a paid plan, we'll tell you in advance.

2. Not legal, tax or financial advice; you review everything

The service builds in the tenancy rules and official forms of the provinces it supports (Ontario, British Columbia, Alberta and Quebec, where new properties are coming soon; where a province has no official form, the document is written from its published law, and Quebec's mandatory lease, which can't be reproduced, isn't prepared) and the CRA's rental-income layout to help you avoid common mistakes. For trade and Books businesses, it builds in the sales-tax rules behind its invoices, worksheets and reports. It is a tool, not a lawyer, paralegal or accountant, and it doesn't know every fact of your situation. The rules, dates, amounts and wording it uses come from official government sources; they haven't been reviewed by a lawyer for your situation, laws change, and they may contain errors.

• You must review every document before you sign, send, serve or file it. That includes leases, notices, applications, receipts, statements and tax summaries, invoices, sales-tax worksheets and reports, and anything the AI assistant writes. When you sign or send a notice or lease you prepared in the service, it asks you to confirm that you reviewed and accept it; it can't be signed or sent without that confirmation, and the time is kept with your signature.
• By signing, sending, serving or filing a document, you accept it as your own. You are responsible for its contents and its consequences, for what you enter, and for following the tenancy, human rights and other laws that apply where your property is. A trade or Books business is responsible for what it records and sends through the service, including its invoices and the sales taxes it charges and reports, and for keeping its books as the CRA and, in Quebec, Revenu Québec require.
• Check notices, applications to a tenancy board or branch, and tax figures with a lawyer, paralegal or accountant when in doubt.

3. Fees, free trial and taxes

Landlord businesses

• New landlord accounts get 30 days free. No credit card is needed to start.
• After the trial, the service costs $4 (Canadian) per active unit per month, plus applicable taxes such as HST. A unit is active while it has a current tenancy, with a minimum of one unit. When a tenancy starts or ends, the new count applies from your next monthly bill.
• A lower price, charged now. We already charge less than the price above, from your next bill: never more than $39 a month, nothing for the plan with one active unit (or none), and 30% less for founding members (landlord accounts that sign up by January 31, 2027, Toronto time): $2.80 per active unit, at most $27.30 a month for the plan, and 30% off the AI assistant, for the life of the account. You never pay more than the price above. As section 13 requires, we'll email account holders on a paid plan at least 30 days before these terms change; from Dec 15, 2026, the price above will read: "After the trial, the service costs $4 (Canadian) per active unit per month, and never more than $39 a month, plus applicable taxes such as HST. A unit is active while it has a current tenancy. With one active unit (or none), the plan is free, and no card is needed; paying starts at the second active unit (two cost $8). Founding members (landlord accounts that sign up by January 31, 2027, Toronto time) pay 30% less on everything they pay us, for the life of the account."
• The optional AI assistant costs $4 (Canadian) more per active unit per month, plus applicable taxes. You turn it on and off in the app; it stops at your next bill. It makes suggestions and routine follow-ups only: you stay responsible for decisions, and it never signs, serves notices, pays or deletes anything.
• You won't be charged unless you choose a paid plan. Paid plans renew monthly and are billed in advance by our payment processor, Stripe.
• If your trial ends and you don't choose a plan, you keep access to view and download your records, but some features may be paused until you do.
• Referral program. When a landlord you refer signs up with your link or code and has paid for the number of months shown on your Referrals page, you earn the credit shown there, and they get the extra free days shown when they sign up. Credits come off your next bills, have no cash value, can't be transferred, and are limited to the yearly number shown. Referrals of yourself or your own organisation don't count. Only invite people you know; we may void referrals that break these terms or Canada's anti-spam law, and we may change or end the program for new referrals at any time (credits already earned stay).

Cancelling and refunds for a landlord plan are covered in our Billing and refund policy, which is part of these terms.

Trade and Books businesses

• Gopher Boss for trade and Books businesses is in a free beta, open only to businesses we invite. It's free; for a business that uses only the books, until paying for Gopher Boss Books opens, as described below. If we introduce a price, we'll tell you first, and nothing is charged without your agreement.
• Once paying for Gopher Boss Books opens (this part doesn't apply until then; before it does, we'll email the business's owner with the price and the date their free trial ends): a business that uses only the books can choose the paid plan on its Your plan page. That page shows the price and all the plan's details, and asks the owner to agree, before anything is charged. Payment is by card through our payment processor, Stripe, in advance each month or each year (the owner chooses), until you cancel. The plan details you agree to there, and the copy we email you, are part of these terms. The price: $19.00 (Canadian) a month, or $190.00 a year, for one business, before GST/HST; founding members (businesses that sign up by the end of January 31, 2027, Toronto time) get 30% off for life, so $13.30 a month or $133.00 a year. The price includes 2 users. On the monthly plan, each further user costs $10.00 a month ($7.00 for founding members): everyone who can sign in to the business counts, except its bookkeepers and accountants, invitations not yet accepted and logins turned off or closed; we count each night, and a change is charged from the next monthly bill. How further users are charged on the yearly plan isn't set yet: a business with 2 users or fewer can choose it, users added later aren't charged on it until then, and we'll email the owner before charging for them, as section 13 says. A 30-day free trial comes first, counted from sign-up or from the day paying first opens, whichever is later; it doesn't start again if we stop taking payments for Books for a while and open them again. If you choose the plan when 2 days or fewer of the trial are left, the first charge is that day; otherwise it's the day the trial ends. Your card is entered on Stripe's secure page, never on ours. You can cancel any time with "Manage billing or cancel" on the Your plan page, or by telling us any way you like (email, phone, the Contact page or a reply to one of our emails); the plan stays active to the end of the period you've paid for, and you aren't charged again. Monthly fees aren't refunded for part of a month. Except as section 13 of the Terms of service provides, the yearly fee isn't refunded for part of a year: if you cancel, the plan stays active to the end of the year you've paid for. A charge made by mistake, twice, or after you cancelled is refunded in full. If the law gives you a right to cancel, we refund what it requires within 15 days. Closing the business cancels the plan at once; the rest of a month or year already paid isn't refunded. If the free trial ends and the plan isn't chosen, the business keeps everything it has, and 14 days after the trial ends these pause until the plan is paid: creating or sending new invoices and estimates, new bills and expenses, imports (from another app or a bank file), connecting new bank feeds, and the AI assistant. These never pause: recording payments on invoices already sent, reminders for them, your customers' own links, e-Transfer matching, closing the books, every report and download, your team's access, paying, and closing the account. Before we first pause anything for any business, we'll email every Books business's owner at least 30 days ahead. If a plan lapses, the business also keeps everything it has. The same things pause, until the plan is paid again, 14 days after a payment for the plan still hasn't gone through on our payment processor's last try, or 14 days after a cancelled plan's paid time ends (or the free trial, if it ends later), and the same things never pause. Before we first do this for any business, we'll email every Books business's owner at least 30 days ahead.
• A business with a trade module stays free until paying for that module opens, and we'll tell you before anything changes.

Every paid plan

• We may change prices, at most twice a year. We'll email you at least 30 and no more than 90 days before a change, with the new price and wording, all the plan's details as they'll be, the date it starts, what happens if you do nothing (the new price applies from that date) and a free, easy way to cancel before then (in the app or by replying). Until the change, you pay the current price.
• Before you choose the plan, the service shows its details and asks you to agree. We then email you a copy of this agreement with those details: who we are, what the service is, what you pay and when, how to cancel, refunds and limits.

4. Your account

• Give accurate information and keep it up to date.
• Keep your password private. Turn on two-step sign-in if you can. Tell us right away if you think someone else has used your account.
• You are responsible for what happens under your account and for the people you invite to it. Give each team member only the role they need.

5. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

• use the service for anything unlawful, deceptive or harassing, or to send notices you know are false;
• discriminate against applicants or tenants on grounds protected by the Ontario Human Rights Code, such as race, family status, disability, age, or receipt of public assistance;
• add someone's personal information without their consent or another lawful basis;
• send messages through the service without the consent Canada's anti-spam law (CASL) requires;
• enter Social Insurance Numbers, bank or card numbers, or government ID numbers;
• try to get into accounts or data that aren't yours, test or overload the service's security, or copy the service.

6. Your data

You own the records you put in. You let us store, copy and process them only to run the service for you, as our Privacy Policy describes. You can download all your records at any time: a landlord from Settings, a trade or Books business's owner as CSV files from Money → Download for your accountant.

Information about your tenants, customers and others. Your account holds personal information about other people: for a landlord business, its tenants, applicants, owners and contractors; for a trade or Books business, its customers, team members and lenders. That's true whether you add it or they enter it through the service (for example an application or a repair request). You're responsible for that information to them. We handle it for you, on your instructions. That means:

• You collect and use only what you need for your business, with their consent or another lawful basis, and you tell them how it's handled, for example by pointing them to our Privacy Policy.
• We use it only to run the service for you. We don't sell it, use it for marketing, or use it for any purpose of our own, except what our Privacy Policy describes for keeping the service secure and working (such as sign-in and error records).
• We protect it to at least the level Canada's privacy law (PIPEDA) requires, with the safeguards our Privacy Policy describes, and we'll give you reasonable information about them if you ask.
• We use only the service providers listed in our Privacy Policy, each bound by contract to protect it. Some store information outside Canada. We'll update that list before we add one.
• If a breach of our safeguards affects it, we'll tell you promptly, give you the details you need to assess it and tell the people affected, and keep a record.
• If one of them asks us to see, correct or delete their information, we'll pass the request to you, and make the corrections or deletions you ask for in time for you to answer within the 30 days the law allows.
• When you close your account, you can download everything first. For a landlord business, we delete it 30 days later; for a trade or Books business, at once. It's gone from our own backups within 90 days. For a landlord business, the billing records the law requires are kept.

We're responsible ourselves for the information people give us directly to use the service: their sign-in details, the choices and consents they make in their own settings, and our security records, as our Privacy Policy explains.

Keep a copy of your books in Canada (trade and Books businesses)

Gopher Boss's servers are in the United States. The CRA requires business records to be kept in Canada unless it authorizes another place in writing, and records kept outside Canada that are reached electronically from Canada aren't considered kept in Canada. The CRA may accept a complete copy kept in Canada, and it recommends keeping backups in Canada. So download your books each month (Money → Download for your accountant) and keep that complete copy in Canada, for example on your own computer. We can't promise the CRA will accept it in your case: ask your accountant. The app reminds owners each month. CRA, IC05-1 Electronic Record Keeping

7. Electronic signatures and notices

• When you sign in the service by typing your name and confirming, you agree that this is your signature and has the same effect as signing on paper, under Ontario's Electronic Commerce Act, 2000.
• The service records each signature (name, time, internet address, browser) and fingerprints the signed document, so either side can show what was signed and when.
• Landlord businesses: notices are emailed to a tenant only if the tenant has agreed in writing to receive notices by email (Ontario) or given an email address for service (British Columbia), as those provinces' rules require; Alberta and Quebec notices are never served by email. Otherwise, the service tells you to deliver the notice another way. You are responsible for choosing a valid way to serve each notice and for keeping proof of service.

8. Payments between a business and its tenants or customers

Tenants pay their landlord directly, for example by Interac e-Transfer, and a trade or Books business's customers pay the business directly. We are not a party to those payments, never receive or hold rent or a customer's payment, and aren't responsible for payments between a business and its tenants or customers. The service records the payments you enter or confirm, and those it reads from e-Transfer notices or bank lines where you turn that on, and issues receipts and statements based on those records. Check them, and correct anything wrong.

9. Availability and support

We work to keep the service running and your data backed up, but we can't promise it will always be available or error-free. We may pause it briefly for maintenance. Features in a beta may change, be added or be removed. Keep your own copy of your records. For help, use our Contact page, or write to Gopher Boss, 11-100 Bronte Rd, Oakville, Ontario, L6L 3B3.

10. Suspension and closing an account

• You can stop using the service and close your account at any time: landlords from Settings, a trade or Books business's owner from Team → Close this account, and everyone else (tenants, owners, contractors and team members) their own login from their own details page. Download your records first: before a trade or Books business is closed, the owner is offered every record to download and warned plainly; then everything is deleted at once, and it can't be recovered.
• We may suspend or close an account that breaks these terms, puts others at risk, or isn't paid. Unless the risk is urgent or the law prevents it, we'll give notice first and a chance to fix the problem and download your records.
• If a beta ends, we'll tell you ahead of time so you can download your records.
• After an account closes, we delete its records as described in section 6 and the Privacy Policy.

11. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent the law allows: the service is provided "as is"; we are not liable for errors or omissions in forms, notices, calculations, dates, amounts or other output of the service, or for any loss that comes from a document you signed, sent, served or filed; we are not liable for indirect, special or consequential losses, lost rent or lost profits; and our total liability for any claim relating to the service is limited to the fees you paid us in the 12 months before the claim arose, or $100, whichever is greater. Nothing in these terms limits any right you have that the law doesn't allow to be limited, including under Ontario's Consumer Protection Act, 2002, or our liability for fraud or for harm we cause deliberately or through gross negligence.

12. Indemnity

If someone makes a claim against us because of information you added, a notice or document you sent, or your breach of these terms or the law, you agree to cover our reasonable costs of that claim, to the extent the law allows.

13. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms: what the service includes, its price (see section 3) and this wording, at most twice a year for changes that affect a paid plan. We'll post the new version here. For any change that affects a paid plan, and any other significant change, we'll email account holders at least 30 and no more than 90 days before it takes effect. The email shows the changed wording, the plan's details as they'll be, the date it takes effect, what happens if you do nothing (the new terms apply from that date) and a free, easy way to say no: cancel your plan (or close your account) before then, and any prepaid fees for the time after the change are refunded.

While Gopher Boss is in beta, we may change these Terms and the Privacy Policy at any time, and changes take effect when posted, except changes to your plan or its price, which keep the notice described above. We'll ask for your consent before using your personal information for a new purpose. Once Gopher Boss is out of beta, the notice described above applies.

14. General

• These terms are governed by the laws of Ontario and the federal laws of Canada that apply there. The courts of Ontario decide any dispute.
• If part of these terms can't be enforced, the rest still applies.
• Nothing in these terms limits any right you have under consumer protection law.
• These terms, the Privacy Policy, the Billing and refund policy and the plan details you agree to are the whole agreement between us about the service.
• We may transfer this agreement to a company that takes over the service, and we'll tell you if we do.

15. If you are a tenant

Your landlord uses James Street Chateau to manage your tenancy, and invited you to it. It's free for you. When you accept the invitation, and in your portal, you agree to these terms and the Privacy Policy, and the service records when you agreed. For tenants:

• We provide the service to your landlord and handle your information on their behalf, as the Privacy Policy explains. We are not a party to your tenancy agreement, and we don't give you or your landlord legal advice.
• Notices, leases, receipts and statements you get through the service come from your landlord, who prepares them, checks them and is responsible for them. They aren't legal advice to you. If a notice affects your rights (for example, ending your tenancy or raising your rent), read it carefully and get advice, for example from your province's residential tenancy board or a legal clinic.
• Documents you prepare and give through the service (for example, your notice to end the tenancy) are yours: the service asks you to review and accept each one first. When you sign a document your landlord prepared (for example, a lease), you are agreeing to it with your landlord; your landlord stays responsible for what it says.
• Your records are kept by your landlord. Ask your landlord to correct anything wrong. The Privacy Policy explains what's kept and for how long.
• Section 11 applies to you too, within what the law allows. Nothing here limits your rights under your province's tenancy or privacy laws.

16. If a business invited you

If a business invited you as a team member, a property owner or a contractor, you use the service free of charge, for that business or for your work with it. You agree to these terms for your own use of the service, and the service records when you agreed.

• The business decides what you can see and do (your role), and is responsible for the records it keeps, including what it records about you. Ask it to correct anything wrong; the Privacy Policy explains what's kept and for how long.
• What you do in the service for the business is done on its behalf; sections 2, 4 and 5 apply to it.
• You can close your own login at any time from your own details page. The business keeps its records.
• Section 11 applies to you too, within what the law allows. Nothing here limits your rights under privacy or consumer protection law.

Contact

Gopher Boss: use our Contact page, or write to Gopher Boss, 11-100 Bronte Rd, Oakville, Ontario, L6L 3B3.