These terms form part of the Terms of Service (Section 8.7). Where the two differ on gifting, this document governs.
A gift subscription is a prepaid, one-time purchase of a fixed number of months of a paid Dropstone plan, bought by one person (the purchaser) for another (the recipient).
A gift is not a subscription in the purchaser's name. Nothing recurs, nothing renews, and no payment method is collected from the recipient at any point. When the gifted months run out, access simply ends unless the recipient chooses to subscribe.
A gift must be claimed within 12 months of purchase. The exact date is shown on the gift, on the purchase confirmation, and in the purchaser's dashboard.
The gifted months begin on the day the gift is claimed, not the day it was bought. Claiming late costs the recipient nothing.
A gift can be claimed once. Once claimed, the link stops working.
We send reminders before a gift expires: to the recipient 30 days and 7 days beforehand, and to the purchaser 30 days beforehand. These are a courtesy, not a condition — a gift still expires on schedule whether or not a reminder was delivered.
This depends on the delivery method chosen at purchase, and the difference matters:
The gift is permanently bound to the recipient email address entered at checkout. It can only be claimed by a Dropstone account registered to that address. Forwarding the email or the link to anyone else does not transfer the gift. This address cannot be changed after purchase.
A share link is a bearer instrument. ANY PERSON WHO HOLDS THE LINK CAN CLAIM THE GIFT, AND THE FIRST TO DO SO RECEIVES IT. We cannot determine whether the person claiming is the one you intended. By choosing this delivery method you accept that risk and you are responsible for who you send the link to. We are unable to reverse a claim made by someone who obtained the link.
A purchaser cannot claim a gift they bought themselves. To upgrade your own account, use the pricing page.
A gift cannot be applied on top of an active paid subscription, because the subscription's next renewal would overwrite the gifted time. If the recipient has one, the gift remains valid and unclaimed until they cancel auto-renewal or their plan ends.
If the recipient already holds gifted time on the same plan, a further gift of that plan extends it. If the gift is for a higher plan than the one they currently hold, the higher plan applies and their access is never shortened as a result.
If a gift is not claimed before it expires, the full amount paid is returned to the purchaser as Dropstone account credit.
Account credit does not expire and is applied automatically against usage on that account. It has no cash value and cannot be transferred or withdrawn.
Why credit rather than a refund to your card: our payment processor only permits refunds for 180 days after a charge, and a gift stays claimable for 12 months. By the time a gift expires, the original payment can no longer be reversed. Credit is the only mechanism that still returns the full value to you.
If you would prefer a refund to your original payment method and you are still within the processor's 180-day window, contact [email protected] before the gift expires and we will arrange it where possible.
A gift can be cancelled and refunded while it is unclaimed and within our payment processor's refund window. Contact support with your order reference.
Once a gift has been claimed, it cannot be refunded, cancelled, or reversed. The recipient has received access and keeps it.
If a purchase is refunded or a chargeback is raised before the gift is claimed, the gift is revoked immediately and the link stops working. If a chargeback is raised after a gift has been claimed, we will not remove access from the recipient, who is not party to the dispute; we may instead suspend the purchaser's account or recover the amount from it.
Gift links are secrets. Treat a share link the way you would treat a gift card number: anyone who sees it can use it.
We may refuse, revoke, or withhold a gift where we reasonably suspect fraud, payment abuse, or attempted resale, and where a purchase is reversed by the payment provider.
Gift subscriptions are for personal gifting. They may not be resold, bartered, auctioned, or used as consideration in a promotion or sweepstake without our written permission.
The price shown at checkout is the price charged, in the currency shown. A twelve-month gift is priced at the annual rate for the plan, so it costs less than twelve individual months.
Where a gift is purchased in a currency other than US dollars, any account credit issued under Section 05 is calculated from the US dollar equivalent of the purchase, because account credit is denominated in US dollars.
Prices are exclusive of applicable taxes, which are calculated at checkout.
We may change these terms. The terms that apply to a gift are the ones in effect on the date it was purchased. We will not shorten the claim window of a gift already sold.
Questions about a gift, including refunds and misdirected gifts: [email protected]. Quote the order reference (it looks like GFT-XXXX-XXXX) from your confirmation email — never the claim link itself.