The terms for using Writers’ Block Africa

About these terms

These terms are an agreement between you and Gold Mind Resourcery Ltd, a company registered in Nigeria with RC number 896726, which runs Writers’ Block Africa (WBA). By creating an account or using WBA you accept them.

They are read together with our privacy notice and the prohibited-use rules below. The contract you accept for each engagement governs that engagement; where it says something different from these terms about the work, the contract wins.

Words used in these terms

“WBA” and “we” mean Gold Mind Resourcery Ltd as the operator of the Writers’ Block Africa website and services (the “Platform”). A “Client” is a member who commissions services on WBA. A “Professional” is a member who offers services on WBA; an Engagement Contract may call the Professional the Writer. An “Engagement” is a piece of work agreed between a Client and a Professional on WBA, and the “Engagement Contract” is the contract both accept for it, including its stages and signed change orders. The “Professional Fee” is the fee agreed in the Engagement Contract, before WBA’s fees. A “Deliverable” is work delivered under an Engagement Contract.

What WBA is, and is not

WBA is a marketplace where clients find and hire African writing professionals. WBA provides the platform, the contract for the arrangement you choose, the stages and development gates, and the record of the work.

The contract for the work is between the Client and the Professional. WBA is not a party to it, does not employ Professionals, and does not commission work itself. WBA determines whether a stage’s conditions were met when there is a dispute, and instructs the payment partner accordingly.

• The creative outcome. Writing is judgement work. The platform enforces process, and no process guarantees that a book, script or report succeeds.
• Publication. WBA does not publish, and does not place work with publishers.
• Production. WBA does not produce, and does not place scripts with producers or studios.
• Sales. WBA makes no claim about how a finished work will perform commercially.

Your account

• You must be 18 or over, and the information you give us must be true and kept up to date.
• You must verify your email address before you post a brief, bid, accept a contract or pay.
• Keep your sign-in details to yourself. You are responsible for what is done with your account.
• One account per person. If you act for a company, you confirm you have its authority.

Accepting these terms, and our records

In short: You accept these terms by ticking the box or pressing the button we show you. We keep a record of what you accepted and when. Reading the privacy notice is not consent to anything optional; we ask for that separately.

A person accepts these Terms by completing the affirmative acceptance step presented by WBA. WBA may retain an electronic record of the account, the version and cryptographic hash of the accepted text, date and time, IP address, device or browser information reasonably required to evidence the event, and the acceptance action. Electronic records and signatures may be used to the extent permitted by applicable law.

Acknowledging the Privacy Notice is not consent to optional processing. WBA will obtain a separate affirmative choice where it relies on consent, including for optional directory publication or non-essential analytics.

Fees

In short: Clients pay WBA 10% of the agreed fee, added to what they pay. Professionals pay a commission set by their level (Ground 10%, First 9%, Second 8%, Third 7%, Penthouse 6%), taken from the agreed fee before they are paid. Pandascrow’s own fee is 3% of each stage, paid by the client and kept by Pandascrow, not WBA. Every fee is shown before you accept, and the rate is fixed for that contract.

WBA charges the Client a service fee equal to 10% of the Professional Fee for each Engagement Contract. WBA charges the Professional a service fee based on the Professional's WBA level when that Engagement Contract is accepted: Ground 10%; First Floor 9%; Second Floor 8%; Third Floor 7%; Penthouse 6%.

The level and rate shown before acceptance are fixed for that Engagement Contract, including its agreed stages and signed change orders. A later level change applies only to a later Engagement Contract. Before either party accepts, WBA will show the Professional Fee, each WBA fee, each payment-provider fee known to WBA, any tax WBA must charge, and the total payable by that party. A fee not disclosed before acceptance is not payable merely because it appears elsewhere on the Platform.

The payment-provider fee currently known to WBA is Pandascrow’s fee of 3% of each stage, paid by the Client.

WBA and Pandascrow

In short: The client funds each stage before the writer starts it. Payments are processed and conditionally released through Pandascrow and its designated payment partners as each stage is accepted. Each released stage is paid to the writer’s nominated bank account. Transaction funds are not paid into WBA’s operating account. WBA receives only its separately disclosed commission at settlement. Release, refund, dispute, chargeback and provider-control conditions are explained before payment. If the client does not respond within the review window in the agreement of a delivery, the delivery is treated as accepted under the agreement. WBA then instructs the payment partner to release that stage. Releasing the money remains the payment partner’s decision, under its own controls. Pandascrow’s own terms also apply to the payments it processes, and you accept them when you pay or are paid through it.

WBA provides the marketplace, contracting workflow, stage records and instructions that the applicable Engagement Contract authorises. WBA does not receive, hold or safeguard Client money as a bank, escrow provider or payment service provider. Payment is processed and held by Pandascrow or another provider identified before payment under that provider's terms.

The payment provider controls banking, card-scheme, anti-fraud, identity, settlement, hold, reversal and chargeback steps allocated to it by law or its terms. WBA may send an instruction only where the Engagement Contract, the parties' joint instruction, a recorded WBA dispute outcome or law authorises it. WBA does not guarantee provider availability, settlement timing or the final outcome of a bank, card-scheme or regulatory process.

Release, refund and split instructions

In short: Every instruction we send Pandascrow names the engagement, the stage, the amount, who is paid and why, and we keep it with Pandascrow’s answer. If something looks wrong, we may pause a payment and tell you.

A release, refund or split instruction must identify the Engagement, stage, amount, payee, contractual basis, decision-maker and supporting record. WBA will keep the instruction and provider response with the Engagement record. Where the provider has no automated status notice, WBA may obtain the status manually and record it. A delay caused by a provider process does not alter the parties' underlying rights.

WBA may pause a payment instruction or the affected Engagement where there is a reasonable concern about authority, fraud, sanctions, identity, duplication, security or a material inconsistency in the record. WBA will notify the affected parties unless law or an investigation prevents notice.

Chargebacks and payment reversals

In short: A bank or Pandascrow can sometimes reverse a payment, even after it was released. If that happens we tell you, keep the evidence and help with the process. We never take money from another engagement to cover it.

Pandascrow, a bank, a card issuer or a payment scheme may hold, reverse or recover a transaction where its terms or applicable law permit. WBA will notify the affected parties when it receives notice, preserve the relevant Engagement evidence and cooperate reasonably with the provider's process.

WBA will not debit an unrelated Engagement or set off unrelated money to satisfy a chargeback unless the affected user gives a specific written instruction or a binding legal process requires it. A Professional may suspend work that is no longer funded. Allocation of the ultimate loss between Client and Professional depends on the Engagement Contract, the reason for the reversal, the provider's final decision and applicable law. WBA is not a guarantor of payment.

If something goes wrong on an engagement

If you are not satisfied with a delivery, you can ask for changes within the revision rounds in your agreement. If the work still does not meet the agreement, you can raise a dispute about that stage. WBA determines whether the stage’s conditions were met and instructs the payment partner to release the stage to the writer, refund it to you, or keep holding it while the matter is resolved. Refunding the money is the payment partner’s decision, under its own controls.

A named operator determines whether the contract and its gates were met, on the contract and the evidence submitted, and instructs release, refund or continued hold. Releasing the money is a separate decision by the payment provider, who may investigate, delay, block or reverse a payment where fraud controls, chargeback rules, anti-money-laundering checks, sanctions, a court order or regulation require it.

If you disagree with WBA’s determination, the dispute clause in your contract applies, and you keep your right to go to court.

Introductions and working outside WBA

In short: If WBA introduces you to someone, you agree not to take the same work outside WBA for 24 months just to avoid WBA’s fees. You may do it if you first pay a one-time placement fee, shown to you before you sign. It does not apply to people you already knew.

For 24 months after WBA first introduces a Client and a Professional to each other, neither may enter into or perform substantially the same services arising from that introduction outside WBA to avoid the fees disclosed for the relevant WBA service. This restriction does not apply where the parties can show a material pre-existing relationship or an independent introduction unrelated to WBA.

The parties may contract outside WBA during that period if they first pay the one-time placement fee disclosed before the outside contract is signed. No placement fee is implied by these Terms: the amount or calculation and payer must be shown and affirmatively accepted. WBA will not charge both a placement fee and the ordinary WBA service fee on the same consideration. This clause does not restrict a person's general trade, employment or dealings with third parties.

To contract outside WBA within the 24 months, write to hello@writersblockafrica.com and we will tell you the placement fee before you sign anything.

Conduct and prohibited use

In short: Deal honestly and respectfully. No harassment, fake identities, plagiarism, review manipulation, fee evasion or uploading someone else’s confidential work to an AI service. We may restrict an account that breaks these rules, and we tell you why unless we cannot.

A user must not use WBA to break the law; infringe copyright, privacy, confidentiality or other rights; impersonate another person; submit plagiarised or unlawfully obtained material; misrepresent identity, qualifications, payment authority or a project; harass, exploit or endanger a child or vulnerable person; introduce malware; interfere with security; scrape or harvest data; evade a suspension or fee; manipulate reviews; launder money; or upload another person's confidential material to an artificial-intelligence service without authority.

WBA may preserve evidence, restrict functionality, suspend an affected Engagement or account and report conduct where proportionate to the risk and permitted by law. WBA will give notice and a review route unless urgent protection, law or an investigation reasonably requires otherwise.

Reviews

Two-sided reviews from completed funded engagements only. They cannot be bought. A review must be honest and about the engagement. We may remove a review that breaks these terms, and we tell both parties when we do.

Your content and rights

In short: What you upload stays yours. WBA may store and show it only to run the platform: to you, the person you are working with and our service providers. Nothing public unless you choose it, and WBA never publishes, sells or trains AI on your private work.

Each user retains ownership of content that user uploads. The user grants WBA a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free licence, for only so long as reasonably needed, to host, reproduce, format, transmit and display that content to the user, the intended WBA counterparty and WBA's service providers for account administration, matching, contracting, delivery, payment administration, support, security, dispute handling and legal compliance.

Public display of a profile, sample or directory entry occurs only under the user's selected visibility setting or separate consent. WBA may retain a restricted copy after deletion where required for an existing contract, dispute, fraud prevention, legal obligation or establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims. This licence does not give WBA the right to publish, sell, train a general-purpose artificial-intelligence model on, or commercially exploit a private manuscript, sample or Deliverable.

Who owns, and who is credited for, commissioned work is set by the authorship arrangement in the Engagement Contract both sides accept. Manuscripts and scripts are treated as confidential.

You promise that what you upload is yours to share and does not infringe anyone else’s rights or defame anyone.

Complaints

In short: Complain to hello@writersblockafrica.com. We acknowledge it and give you a reasoned answer. You can still go to the consumer or data-protection regulator.

A user may complain through the contact shown on the Platform. WBA will acknowledge the complaint, identify any information needed and give a reasoned response within a reasonable period having regard to urgency and complexity. This process does not remove any right to complain to the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, the Nigeria Data Protection Commission or another competent authority.

Suspension and closing your account

You can close your account at any time by writing to us. Engagements already under way are finished or settled under their contracts first.

We may suspend or close an account that breaks these terms, the prohibited-use rules or the law. We tell you why, and give you a chance to respond, unless the law, safety or an investigation prevents it. Money on stages not yet released is settled under the contract.

Our responsibility to you

In short: We are responsible for loss we directly cause by breaking these terms. Our limit in any 12 months is the WBA fees you paid in that time or ₦500,000, whichever is more, and there is no limit for fraud, data-protection or confidentiality breaches, or anything the law does not let us limit.

Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits liability that applicable law does not permit WBA to exclude or limit, including liability for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, wilful misconduct, death or personal injury caused by negligence, or a consumer right that cannot lawfully be waived.

Subject to that sentence, WBA is liable only for loss that was reasonably foreseeable and directly caused by WBA's breach. WBA is not liable for a party's creative, commercial or production decision, for a user's breach, or for a payment provider's independent act outside WBA's reasonable control. WBA's aggregate liability arising from the Platform in any 12-month period is the greater of the WBA fees paid by the claimant in that period and ₦500,000. This cap does not apply to WBA's breach of confidentiality or data-protection duties, infringement of another person's intellectual-property rights, gross negligence or wilful misconduct.

A risk, exclusion, indemnity or limitation that requires conspicuous notice under applicable consumer law must be presented prominently before acceptance and must not defeat a statutory remedy.

Changes to these terms

In short: We give you 30 days’ notice before a change that works against you. A fee change only ever applies to contracts accepted after it. Contracts you already accepted keep their terms.

WBA will give at least 30 days' notice before a material change that adversely affects an existing member takes effect. The notice will identify the change and effective date. A fee change applies only to an Engagement Contract accepted after the effective date and affirmative acceptance. A change required by law, needed to address an urgent security risk, or administrative and not adverse may take effect sooner if the notice states the reason. Existing Engagement Contracts continue under the terms incorporated when they were accepted unless all affected parties agree otherwise or law requires a change.

Law and courts

In short: Nigerian law applies, and the Lagos State courts hear disputes, without taking away any consumer right you have elsewhere.

These Terms are governed by Nigerian law. The courts of Lagos State have jurisdiction, but this does not prevent a consumer from using a forum or remedy that applicable law makes available and does not permit the parties to exclude. The parties may agree a lawful mediation or arbitration route for an Engagement Contract without restricting a regulator's powers or a non-excludable consumer right.

Questions about these terms: hello@writersblockafrica.com.

Posting a brief

• Describe the work honestly, and post only work that is lawful and within the prohibited-use rules.
• Choose your route: post to the open board, invite a shortlist you name, or hire one professional directly.
• You can open an invited brief to the board, or invite more professionals, before you choose. Those already invited are told.
• If you ask professionals to accept a confidentiality agreement before they see the full brief, its terms bind them.
• On a ghostwriting brief you may ask for a paid sample first. It is stage 1, paid like any stage. Once you approve it, either of you may end the engagement there, and the professional keeps the payment for the sample.

Reading a professional’s private samples

If a professional lets you read their private samples, you accept confidentiality terms first. You may use the samples only to decide whether to hire that professional. You must not copy, share, publish, quote or describe them, or try to find out who they were written for. Access lasts 30 days, the professional can end it sooner, and each opening is recorded. Breaking those terms is a breach of these terms.

Choosing a professional

You choose exactly one bid. That closes the brief, and every other bidder is told the brief was awarded, without the winning price. Bids are blind: no professional sees another’s bid. Both of you then accept the contract generated for your arrangement.

Funding and reviewing stages

• Fund each stage before the professional starts it. Stages you have not reached are not charged.
• Review each delivery within the review window in your contract: approve it, or ask for changes within the revision rounds agreed.
• More revisions than the contract allows need a change order you both accept.
• If you do not respond within the review window, the delivery is treated as accepted.

If a pairing fails

If a pairing fails, you are rematched at no additional platform fee.

Any rematch is subject to availability, the Client's revised brief, Professional capacity, funding and WBA's safety and eligibility checks. WBA does not guarantee that a suitable replacement will be available by a particular date.

Your profile and levels

Writers describe their own skills and credits and confirm they are true, as on Upwork; a profile that misrepresents its owner is removed. Floors are earned from completed work.

Everything on your profile must be true: the skills you claim, the samples you upload, the work you list as published and your role on it. Do not list work you ghostwrote as your own published work; show it as a private sample, and only with the agreement of the client it was written for. A profile that misrepresents its owner breaks these terms, and we may remove it.

Your level sets your commission rate. We may move you between levels based on your record on WBA, and we tell you before a new rate applies; it never changes the rate on a contract already accepted.

Bidding

• Bid only on work you can deliver, with an honest price, timeline and account of your experience.
• Declare any use of AI tools at bid and at every delivery, on the terms in the contract.
• Bids are blind. Do not try to find out what others bid.
• On a brief that starts with a paid sample, price the whole engagement. Once the sample is approved, either side may end there, and you keep the payment for it.

Private samples

• Upload a private sample only if the client it was written for agreed to it being shown privately to prospective clients.
• You decide which clients may read them. Their access ends after 30 days, or sooner if you end it, and you see each time they open one.

Delivering

• Work only on funded stages. You are told the moment a stage is funded.
• Deliver original work that meets the stage, its gate and the contract, and respect the client’s confidentiality.
• Make the revisions the contract allows. Extra revisions need a change order.

Getting paid

• Nominate the bank account your payments go to. It is checked with the payment partner before the client can fund the first stage.
• Each released stage is paid to that account, less your commission.
• A released payment can still be reversed by a bank or the payment provider in the cases set out under “Chargebacks and payment reversals”.
• You are responsible for your own tax on what you earn.

Your directory listing

Your public listing appears only if you agree to it, shows only the fields you choose, and can be withdrawn at any time.

You work for yourself

You are an independent professional, not WBA’s employee, agent or partner. You decide which work to bid on and how to do it, within the contract.