Terms of Service

Effective September 17, 2026

1. Agreement and operator

These Terms of Service govern access to and use of the Vessel Star websites, marketplace, applications, communications, and related services (collectively, the “Service”). The Service is operated by TecSentra Inc. under the Vessel Star name (“Vessel Star,” “we,” “us,” or “our”). By creating an account, submitting information, posting or claiming a listing, using an AI-assisted feature, or otherwise using the Service, you agree to these Terms and our Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.

2. Eligibility and accounts

You must have legal capacity to agree to these Terms. To list a vessel, represent a business, contact a seller for a commercial purpose, or enter a transaction, you must have reached the age of majority where you live. You must provide accurate and current information, protect your credentials, and promptly notify us of suspected unauthorized use. You are responsible for activity under your account.

3. Vessel Star’s marketplace role

Vessel Star provides tools that help buyers, sellers, brokers, dealers, marine-service providers, and other participants find and communicate with one another. Unless expressly stated for a particular service, Vessel Star is not the buyer, seller, broker, dealer, appraiser, surveyor, inspector, lender, insurer, carrier, escrow provider, payment processor, or other party to a transaction.

Users are responsible for investigating listings and counterparties; confirming identity, ownership, title, liens, condition, specifications, taxes, registration, insurance, import/export status, and legal compliance; arranging inspections or surveys; and obtaining independent professional advice. Never send funds or sensitive information until you have independently verified the transaction.

4. Listings and business profiles

You may submit content only where you have authority to do so. Listing and profile information must be accurate, current, lawful, and not misleading. You must disclose known material facts where required by law and may use only text, photographs, video, trademarks, contact details, and other material that you own or are authorized to use and disclose.

We may format, categorize, translate, resize, crop, enhance, correct obvious typographical errors in, or add standardized data to content for presentation and operation of the Service, without changing its substantive meaning. You remain responsible for reviewing the published result.

By uploading content, you represent and warrant that its use through the Service as authorized by these Terms will not infringe copyright, trademark, privacy, publicity, confidentiality, moral, contractual, or other rights. You must promptly remove or correct content if you no longer have the required rights.

Business directory profiles. By applying for, creating, claiming, or managing a business profile, you confirm that you are authorized to act for and bind the business to these Terms. You are responsible for obtaining permission to provide its information, logos, photographs, and other content, including any personal information about other people.

The business is responsible for keeping its profile accurate, complete, current, and not misleading, including its name, contact information, location, services, service area, operating hours, and operating status. You must promptly correct material errors and notify Vessel Star if the business ceases operating or you no longer have authority to represent it.

The business is solely responsible for obtaining and maintaining all licences, registrations, certifications, permits, and insurance legally required for its activities in the jurisdictions where it operates. Claims about qualifications, professional memberships, credentials, coverage, and experience must be accurate and current. Vessel Star may request supporting information; a review does not transfer these responsibilities to Vessel Star.

Choose business categories that reasonably describe the services actually offered. Vessel Star may correct or change categories, service classifications, and directory placement to improve relevance, accuracy, and the operation of the Service.

Inclusion in the directory, acceptance of an application, verification, badges, or placement does not mean that Vessel Star endorses, certifies, licenses, insures, or recommends the business or its services. Any verification or badge refers only to the checks or criteria described for that feature, not to a guarantee of quality, safety, qualifications, or performance. Customers must make their own assessments.

Vessel Star does not guarantee any ranking, placement, exposure, views, enquiries, leads, customers, sales, or other results for a business profile, whether free, enhanced, featured, or paid.

Quotes, advice, work, services, contracts, payments, taxes, warranties, refunds, complaints, and disputes between a business and a customer remain their responsibility. Unless we expressly agree otherwise for a particular service, Vessel Star is not a party to those arrangements and does not supervise or guarantee the work or resolve contractual obligations on their behalf.

Vessel Star may refuse, suspend, unpublish, or remove a business profile for inaccurate or misleading information, misrepresented qualifications, violations of these Terms, credible concerns about fraud or unlawful activity, or a business that has ceased operating. We may request corrections or supporting information and take action reasonably necessary to protect users, comply with law, or maintain the directory.

5. User content licence and retained listing records

You retain ownership of content you submit. You grant Vessel Star and its affiliates a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, transferable and sublicensable licence to host, store, reproduce, format, adapt for technical delivery, translate, display, distribute, communicate, and promote that content as reasonably necessary to operate, secure, improve, market, syndicate, and provide the Service and your listing or profile.

Vessel Star may reproduce, format, crop, resize, caption, watermark, and publish or promote all or part of a public listing—including its photographs, videos, vessel details, asking price, seller type, general location, and a link to the listing—through Vessel Star’s websites, mobile applications, social-media accounts, advertising campaigns, email communications, and third-party distribution channels. We will not include a seller’s non-public telephone number, email address, street address, or other non-public contact information in promotional material unless the seller separately chooses or authorizes that disclosure.

This promotional permission continues while the listing is active and afterward only for promotional material already published, reasonable archival or marketplace-history purposes, or as otherwise permitted by these Terms and applicable law. If a listing is removed, withdrawn, expires, or is marked sold, Vessel Star may stop creating new promotional posts but is not required to remove every post already published. Copies, shares, reposts, cached content, comments, and other material controlled by social-media platforms or third parties may remain available outside Vessel Star’s control. Vessel Star may remove, edit, or discontinue its own promotional posts at its discretion.

The licence continues while content is available through the Service and afterward to the extent reasonably necessary for backups, legal and audit records, fraud prevention, dispute resolution, prior promotional materials, and the preservation and use of listing history, marketplace records, sale outcomes, and derived or de-identified data. We will not continue publicly advertising a vessel as available after we know it is no longer available.

After a vessel is marked sold, Vessel Star may retain and publicly display the listing, including vessel details and listing media, as a historical sold record for as long as it remains reasonably necessary and relevant for marketplace history, research, valuation, fraud prevention, or related legitimate purposes. We may periodically review, remove, restrict, or anonymize archived listings. The archived listing will be identified as sold and will no longer function as an active sale listing. Vessel Star will remove or hide the seller’s personal contact information from the public archived listing and disable its buyer-to-seller inquiry or contact functionality, unless the seller separately requests otherwise and applicable law permits it.

You authorize Vessel Star to retain and use non-personal or properly de-identified listing records—including specifications, asking-price history, status changes, time on market, media attributes, general location, inquiry and engagement statistics, and sale outcomes—to build search tools, market statistics, valuation insights, fraud controls, reports, products, and services. Personal information remains subject to the Privacy Policy and applicable law.

For clarity, this licence also covers business profiles: the business name, logos, photographs, descriptions, categories, services, service area, operating hours, public business contact information, and links may appear in Vessel Star’s public, searchable directory and may be reproduced or distributed to promote the profile through Vessel Star’s websites, social-media accounts, email communications, advertising, and other distribution channels. Business administrator or applicant contact details supplied for administration, identity or authority checks, and other non-public information are not made public or included in promotion unless separately designated for publication or authorized. The existing limits on promotional use, retained materials, third-party copies, personal information, and applicable law in these Terms and the Privacy Policy continue to apply.

6. Sale outcomes and market information

When a listing is marked sold, expired, withdrawn, or otherwise closed, we may request the actual sold price, sale date, transaction type, and related outcome information. You agree to provide accurate information if you choose or are required as part of a specific program to provide it.

Vessel Star may retain, analyze, combine, commercialize, and use listing and transaction information to develop marketplace statistics, pricing and valuation tools, reports, products, and services. We may share aggregated or properly de-identified information with affiliates and marine-industry participants, including brokers, dealers, manufacturers, lenders, insurers, appraisers, analysts, and research organizations. We will not include account contact details or listing-level confidential sold prices in those market-data products unless we disclose that use and obtain any consent required by law.

7. AI-assisted and automated features

Vessel Star may offer experimental artificial-intelligence, machine-learning, or automated features, including suggested listing descriptions, classifications, pricing ranges, media, search results, responses, translations, or service matches. These features are tools for suggestions only. Output may be incomplete, inaccurate, outdated, misleading, or unsuitable for a particular vessel or purpose.

AI output is not a valuation, appraisal, survey, inspection, condition report, safety determination, legal or tax opinion, financing decision, or other professional advice. You must independently review, verify, and edit all output before relying on or publishing it. You remain responsible for your listing, decisions, communications, and compliance with law. Do not submit confidential, sensitive, or unnecessary personal information to an AI feature.

To the extent permitted by law, Vessel Star does not warrant the accuracy, originality, availability, or fitness of AI output and is not responsible for losses caused by reliance on it. We may change, suspend, label, test, or discontinue AI features at any time.

8. Seller inquiries, broker matching, affiliates, and third parties

Buyers and other users may contact a seller through the methods the seller makes available for genuine marketplace inquiries. Commercial solicitation, harvesting contact information, and unrelated marketing are prohibited unless expressly authorized by Vessel Star and permitted by law.

If a private listing remains unsold for a period selected by Vessel Star, such as 90 days, Vessel Star may contact the seller to ask whether the seller would like to be introduced to an approved broker. Receiving this invitation does not enroll the seller in broker marketing and does not authorize Vessel Star to disclose the seller’s contact information.

Vessel Star will share a seller’s name, contact information, listing details, and relevant preferences with a selected broker only after the seller actively requests or expressly accepts the introduction. The broker may then contact the seller solely about the requested potential sale or brokerage service. Vessel Star may receive a referral fee, share of commission, or other compensation if the introduction results in services or a transaction; any material disclosure required by law will be made.

A seller may decline the invitation or withdraw a pending matching request before information is shared. Once an introduction has been made at the seller’s request, the broker provides its brokerage services independently and its own privacy notice and service terms may apply. Vessel Star requires participating brokers, through contractual or other measures appropriate to the relationship, to use disclosed information only for the requested introduction or service; maintain reasonable administrative, technical, and organizational safeguards; restrict unauthorized disclosure; comply with applicable privacy and anti-spam laws; notify Vessel Star of a suspected privacy or security incident affecting referred users; securely delete or anonymize the information when it is no longer reasonably required, subject to applicable law; and provide any legally required unsubscribe method.

A seller may ask the broker directly to stop contacting them or may notify Vessel Star at contact@vesselstar.com. Vessel Star will promptly transmit the request to the participating broker and may suspend further matching while the request is addressed. Vessel Star cannot retract information already lawfully disclosed or control communications independently sent by the broker, but may investigate complaints and enforce its broker-participation requirements. Vessel Star may request information reasonably necessary to assess compliance, investigate complaints or incidents, require corrective action, and suspend or terminate matching privileges for non-compliance.

The terms “approved,” “participating,” “trusted,” “verified,” or similar labels mean only that Vessel Star applied the participation criteria described at the time. They do not mean that Vessel Star guarantees, endorses, supervises, licenses, insures, or accepts responsibility for the broker, its advice, services, conduct, solvency, or transaction results. Users must conduct their own due diligence and enter any brokerage agreement directly with the broker.

9. Prohibited conduct

You may not post fraudulent, stolen, unlawful, unavailable, or misleading inventory; misrepresent identity, affiliation, ownership, qualifications, condition, history, specifications, or price; harass others; send spam; scrape or harvest data or personal information; evade controls; upload malware; interfere with security or availability; reverse engineer or resell the Service except as permitted by law; use automated access without approval; or use the Service for unlawful, deceptive, or harmful activity.

10. Moderation, verification, and enforcement

We may review, verify, refuse, edit formatting, limit distribution, unpublish, preserve, or remove content, and may restrict, suspend, or terminate accounts, where reasonably necessary to operate the Service, enforce these Terms, protect users or the Service, comply with law, investigate a concern, or prevent harm. We are not obligated to pre-screen every listing or communication. Verification, badges, moderation, or approval do not constitute an endorsement, guarantee, inspection, or warranty.

A copyright owner or authorized representative may send a written infringement notice to contact@vesselstar.com identifying the claimant, protected work, claimant’s interest or right, exact URL or other location of the content, nature of the claimed infringement, relevant date and time, and reliable contact information. We may request missing information, forward a compliant notice to the uploader, preserve identifying records for the period required by law, restrict or remove content, and suspend or terminate repeat or serious infringers. Forwarding or acting on a notice is not an admission that infringement occurred, and we may restore content where appropriate after review or resolution.

11. Third-party services, advertising, and links

The Service may include or rely on third-party maps, authentication, video, payment, communications, advertising, data, finance, insurance, transport, or other services. Third-party terms and privacy practices may apply. Vessel Star does not control and is not responsible for third-party content, availability, acts, omissions, offers, or transactions. References to or links for a third party do not constitute an endorsement unless expressly stated.

12. Fees, promotions, and taxes

Under the Vessel Star launch offer, an eligible private seller may publish one basic listing for a boat that the seller owns, free of charge until that boat is sold. The offer applies only to genuine non-commercial private sales. It is non-transferable and does not apply to brokers, dealers, manufacturers, agents, persons listing boats for others, commercial inventory, duplicate listings, or a materially different replacement boat. Optional upgrades, featured placement, advertising, media production, or other additional services are not included and may be offered for a fee.

A qualifying private listing may remain free until the boat is sold, provided that the listing remains accurate, available, compliant with these Terms, and periodically confirmed when requested. The free-listing offer ends when the boat is sold, withdrawn, replaced, duplicated, materially changed to advertise another boat, or used for commercial activity. We may unpublish an abandoned listing or a listing that is fraudulent, misleading, unlawful, unavailable, or otherwise violates these Terms. We will not impose a basic listing fee on an existing qualifying private listing merely because the launch promotion later closes to new listings.

Brokers, dealers, manufacturers and other commercial sellers may be subject to separate eligibility requirements, inventory limits, services, pricing, account terms or written commercial agreements established when they contact or enroll with Vessel Star. Applicable charges and material conditions will be disclosed before a charge is imposed and agreement will be obtained where required.

Except for an offer expressly stated to apply for a defined duration, features that are free may later become paid. Before charging a new fee, we will disclose the applicable price, renewal terms, taxes, and material conditions and obtain agreement where required. Promotional pricing or credits may be changed or withdrawn according to their stated conditions. Users are responsible for taxes, fees, commissions, and costs arising from their listings, services, and transactions.

Featured placement, sponsorship, advertising, referral relationships, and other paid visibility or compensation arrangements will be identified or disclosed where required by law. Payment does not constitute Vessel Star verification, endorsement, or a guarantee of quality, safety, availability, value, or transaction outcome.

A free business-directory profile is not guaranteed to remain free indefinitely. Vessel Star may introduce paid, enhanced, featured, or other business options or change the availability of free profiles. We will disclose applicable prices and material conditions and obtain the business’s agreement before charging it; submitting an application or holding a free profile does not by itself authorize a charge. This business-directory provision does not change the separate qualifying private-seller free-until-sold offer described above.

13. Intellectual property

Vessel Star and its licensors own the Service, software, design, databases, branding, trademarks, and content supplied by us. Except for the limited right to use the Service for its intended purpose, these Terms do not grant you ownership or any licence to our intellectual property. “Vessel Star” is two words and may not be used in a manner that suggests sponsorship or affiliation without permission.

14. Disclaimers

To the maximum extent permitted by law, the Service is provided “as is” and “as available.” Vessel Star does not guarantee uninterrupted availability or that listings, users, businesses, credentials, vessel information, prices, locations, matches, AI output, or third-party content are accurate, complete, current, lawful, safe, or suitable. You use the Service and transact at your own risk. Nothing in these Terms excludes a warranty, statutory right, or remedy that cannot lawfully be excluded.

15. Limitation of liability

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Vessel Star, TecSentra Inc., their affiliates, and their respective directors, officers, employees, contractors, and service providers will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages; loss of profit, revenue, opportunity, goodwill, or data; or losses arising from user transactions, unauthorized access, fraud, third-party conduct, communications, listing content, or reliance on marketplace or AI-generated information.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, aggregate liability arising from the Service will not exceed the greater of the amount you paid Vessel Star in the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim and five hundred Canadian dollars (CAD $500). These exclusions and limits do not apply where prohibited by law.

16. Indemnity

To the extent permitted by law, you agree to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless Vessel Star, TecSentra Inc., their affiliates, and their respective personnel from third-party claims and reasonable costs arising from your content, transaction, business activity, misuse of the Service, breach of these Terms, or violation of law or another person’s rights.

17. Changes, suspension, and termination

We may change, suspend, or discontinue features and may update these Terms. We will post revised Terms with a new effective date. For a material change, we will provide reasonably prominent advance notice and obtain renewed agreement or consent where required by law; a material change will not be applied retroactively where prohibited. Continued use will constitute acceptance only where that method is legally effective. You may stop using the Service at any time. Provisions that by their nature should survive—including content licences, retained records, intellectual property, disclaimers, liability limits, indemnity, and dispute terms—will survive termination.

18. Governing law and general terms

Vessel Star is a Canadian service operated from Ontario, Canada. Users who access or use the Service from outside Canada do so on their own initiative and are responsible for complying with laws that apply to them. Availability of the Service in another country or jurisdiction does not mean that Vessel Star submits generally to that jurisdiction or represents that the Service is lawful, licensed, registered, or suitable in every location.

Except where mandatory law provides otherwise, these Terms and every dispute relating to the Service are governed exclusively by the laws of Ontario and the federal laws of Canada applicable there, without regard to conflict-of-law rules, and must be brought before the courts located in Ontario. No foreign law, forum, or remedy applies merely because a user accesses the Service from outside Canada. Nothing in this paragraph excludes a statutory right, consumer protection, privacy right, or other remedy that cannot lawfully be waived or limited.

If a provision is unenforceable, it will be limited or removed only to the extent necessary and the remainder will continue. Failure to enforce a provision is not a waiver. You may not assign these Terms without our consent. We may assign them in connection with an affiliate, financing, reorganization, merger, acquisition, or sale. These Terms and policies expressly incorporated into them are the entire agreement concerning the Service.

19. Language and French services

Vessel Star provides English and French versions of its customer-facing Service, Terms, Privacy Policy, and core marketplace communications. Content independently supplied by users—including free-form listing descriptions, photographs, and messages—is displayed in the language chosen by the user and is not necessarily translated or verified by Vessel Star. Professional sellers remain responsible for meeting any language requirements applicable to their own advertising.

Where applicable law requires a French version of these Terms or related documents to be provided first, Vessel Star will make the complete French version available before a user may expressly choose to enter into the agreement in English. The user’s language choice does not waive rights that cannot lawfully be waived. If the English and French versions conflict, applicable law determines which version may be relied upon.

20. Contact

Questions about these Terms may be sent to contact@vesselstar.com.