1. Acceptance
These Terms of Use ("Terms") are an agreement between you and Cory Hoover, sole proprietor, doing business as Foster Companion ("Foster Companion", "we", "us"), covering the Foster Companion iOS application and the website at fostercompanion.com (together, the "Service").
By installing or using the app, or by using the website, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, please do not use the Service. If your agency, county, or employer prohibits or restricts tools like this, follow their direction rather than these Terms.
2. Eligibility and adult caregiver use
The Service is intended for adults — foster parents, resource parents, kinship caregivers, and other adult caregivers — who are at least 18 years old and legally able to enter into this agreement. It is not directed to children and is not designed for use by the children whose records it holds.
You are responsible for ensuring that your use of the Service is consistent with the authority you have as a caregiver and with the rules of any agency, county, or court involved in a child's placement.
3. What the Service is
Foster Companion is an organizational and reporting tool. It helps you record and review information you already keep: child profiles, clothing inventory and monthly clothing purchases, medication schedules and logs, allowance records, and monthly reports you can compile and email to recipients you choose.
App data is stored locally on your device. There is no Foster Companion account, no cloud database, and no Foster Companion backup service. See the privacy policy for details.
4. Permitted use
Subject to these Terms, you may use the app for your own caregiving recordkeeping, including recording information about children in your care and sharing reports with people you designate. This is a personal, revocable, non-exclusive, non-transferable permission to use the app as it is provided; it does not transfer ownership of anything.
Your use of the app through Apple's App Store is also subject to Apple's applicable terms.
5. Sensitive information is your responsibility
The app may contain highly sensitive information about children, including profile details, photographs, allergies, medications, clothing, allowance, and report history. Because that information lives on your device and is shared only when you send it, you are responsible for:
- keeping your device secured with a passcode or biometric lock;
- controlling who can access your unlocked device;
- deciding what information is appropriate to enter, and following any confidentiality rules that apply to a child's records;
- choosing recipients carefully before emailing a report, and confirming addresses;
- managing your own backups, and understanding that app data may be included in them.
You confirm that you have the authority to record and share the information you enter and send.
6. Accuracy and report review
You are responsible for the accuracy and completeness of everything you enter, and for reviewing any report before you send it. The app helps you assemble and check reports; it does not verify that your entries are correct, complete, timely, or sufficient for your agency's requirements.
Submission status, resubmission flags, reminders, and totals are conveniences based on the data you have entered. They are not confirmation that anything was received, accepted, or approved by a recipient, and they do not replace your own follow-up.
7. Email and recipients
When you send a report, the app hands the message to your device's email capability and your email provider. From that point, transmission, delivery, storage, and any further sharing are handled by your provider, the recipients, and their providers — outside our control.
We do not guarantee that any message will be delivered, delivered on time, delivered securely, or received by the person you intended. We make no claim about how recipients handle what you send them. Sending a report to the wrong address is a consequence you are responsible for, so check before sending.
8. Prohibited use
You agree not to:
- use the Service in any way that violates applicable law, a court order, or the rules of an agency, county, or placement;
- record or share information about a child that you are not authorized to record or share;
- use the Service to harass, endanger, surveil inappropriately, or harm any person, including any child;
- attempt to reverse engineer, decompile, tamper with, or interfere with the app or the website beyond what applicable law permits;
- copy, redistribute, resell, sublicense, or present the Service as your own product;
- use automated means to disrupt the website or attempt to gain unauthorized access to any system related to the Service.
9. Intellectual property
Foster Companion, including the app software, the website, the name, the logo, and the text and design of both, is owned by Cory Hoover and protected by intellectual property laws. These Terms do not grant you any right to use the Foster Companion name or logo except to refer to the Service accurately.
The records you enter are yours. We claim no ownership of your content, and because it stays on your device, we have no access to it.
10. Third-party services
The Service depends on things we do not operate: your device and its operating system, the App Store, your email provider, your backup provider, and the hosting and network provider that serves this website. Those services have their own terms and privacy practices, and we are not responsible for how they operate or for changes they make.
11. No professional, medical, or legal advice
Foster Companion does not provide medical, clinical, legal, financial, or social work advice. Nothing in the app or on this website is professional advice, and nothing here should be relied on as a substitute for the judgment of a physician, pharmacist, attorney, social worker, or your agency.
Medication reminders and logs are organizational aids only. They can fail — a device can be off, out of battery, silenced, or updated — and they are not a medication-safety system. Always follow the prescribing physician's directions, the pharmacy label, and your agency's medication policies. In an emergency, call 911 or your local emergency number, or go to the nearest emergency department; the app is not for emergencies.
The app is also not an official recordkeeping system. Where a county, court, or agency requires a specific form, format, signature, or retention period, that requirement governs. Using Foster Companion does not satisfy your obligations on its own.
12. No agency affiliation
Foster Companion is independently developed. It is not affiliated with, sponsored by, endorsed by, certified by, or acting on behalf of any government agency, county department, court, licensing body, or foster family agency. References to common recordkeeping categories are descriptive only and do not imply any approval.
13. Price and availability
The Service is currently provided free of charge, with no subscriptions and no in-app purchases. We do not promise that it will remain free or remain available. We may change, suspend, or discontinue features, or the Service as a whole, and we may release updates that alter how it works.
If a material change is planned and we can reasonably give notice, we will try to do so. Keeping your own copies of anything you need to retain is always sensible.
14. Disclaimers
The Service is provided "as is" and "as available", without warranties of any kind, whether express, implied, or statutory. To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, we disclaim all implied warranties, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, accuracy, and non-infringement.
We do not warrant that the Service will be uninterrupted, error-free, or free of data loss; that reminders will fire; that reports will send or arrive; or that the Service will meet the requirements of any agency, county, or court. Some jurisdictions do not allow certain warranty exclusions, so parts of this section may not apply to you.
15. Limitation of liability
To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, Foster Companion and Cory Hoover will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for lost data, lost records, or lost opportunities, arising out of or relating to your use of the Service.
Because the Service is provided free of charge, our total aggregate liability for all claims relating to the Service is limited to the greater of the amount you paid for the Service in the twelve months before the claim (which will ordinarily be zero) or one hundred United States dollars (US$100).
Nothing in these Terms limits liability that cannot be limited under applicable law, including liability for fraud, gross negligence, willful misconduct, or personal injury where the law does not permit exclusion. Some jurisdictions do not allow some of these limitations, so parts of this section may not apply to you.
16. Indemnity
You agree to indemnify and hold harmless Cory Hoover and Foster Companion from third-party claims, losses, and reasonable expenses arising out of your use of the Service in breach of these Terms or applicable law — for example, recording or sending information you were not authorized to record or send. This does not apply to claims arising from our own wrongdoing, and it applies only to the extent permitted by applicable law.
17. Termination
You may stop using the Service at any time by deleting your records and uninstalling the app. We may suspend or end your permission to use the Service if you use it in breach of these Terms or in a way that harms others or the Service.
Sections that by their nature should survive — intellectual property, disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnity, governing law, and interpretation — survive termination.
18. Changes to these Terms
We may update these Terms as the Service changes. When we do, we will revise the effective date at the top of this page and publish the updated Terms here. Continuing to use the Service after an update means you accept the updated Terms. If you do not accept them, stop using the Service.
19. Governing law
These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of California and applicable United States federal law, without regard to conflict-of-laws rules. Any dispute that is not resolved informally will be brought in the state or federal courts located in San Diego County, California, and you and we consent to the jurisdiction of those courts — except where applicable law gives you the right to bring a claim elsewhere, such as in a local small-claims court or in the courts of your place of residence.
We would much rather sort out a problem by email first. Please write to us before filing anything.
20. Severability and interpretation
If any provision of these Terms is found unenforceable, it will be limited or removed to the minimum extent necessary, and the rest will remain in effect. A delay in enforcing a provision is not a waiver of it.
These Terms, together with the privacy policy, are the entire agreement between you and us about the Service. They are written in plain language on purpose; they are not legal advice to you, and how they apply in a given situation depends on the facts and the law where you are.
21. Contact
Cory Hoover, sole proprietor · Foster Companion · California, United States
For help using the app, see the support page.