Terms & Conditions

1. About This Arrangement

The mentorship is provided personally by Sarath G, an individual, of Souparnika, Karakkad PO, Chengannur, Alappuzha, Kerala, India – 689504. It is not operated through a registered company, LLP, or other business entity: I provide it in my individual capacity, and I am personally responsible for it.

Folio (folio.sarathg.me) is a platform I built and operate, similar to a learning-management system, that I use to run this mentorship: scheduling, class/session materials, assignments, labs, invoicing, and progress tracking all happen through it. Folio is a tool for delivering the mentorship, not a separate service in its own right, and it is not offered to or operated on behalf of any other mentor or business.

For any questions about these terms, contact: sarathg.alp@gmail.com

In this document, “I,” “me,” and “we” refer to Sarath G, personally, as the provider of the mentorship; “Folio” refers to the platform described above; “you” refers to the student or applicant (or, where Section 3 applies, your parent or legal guardian).

Acceptance. You accept these terms by submitting the application form, by making any payment toward the mentorship, or by using your Folio account, whichever happens first. This electronic acceptance is valid and binding under Section 10A of the Information Technology Act, 2000, and you should not proceed with any of these steps unless you agree to these terms in full.

2. The Service & the Platform

The Service is personalised, 1:1 cybersecurity mentorship that I provide directly: live sessions, guided assignments, labs, research activities, feedback, and learning materials.

Folio is the portal through which the Service is organised and delivered: it hosts your class materials, assignments, session schedule, hour balance, and invoices, and is how we communicate about your mentorship. Using Folio is part of receiving the Service, not a separate product.

The Service is educational. I do not guarantee any specific outcome, including certification results, employment, promotions, or income, since these depend substantially on your own effort and on factors outside my control.

3. Eligibility

You must provide accurate and current information when applying and throughout the mentorship.

If you are under 18: a minor cannot personally enter into a binding contract under Indian law (Section 11, Indian Contract Act, 1872). In that case, your parent or legal guardian must apply, enrol, and agree to these terms on your behalf, and is the contracting party responsible for all obligations under these terms, including payment, the acceptable-use commitments in Section 8, and compliance generally. You may use the mentorship and Folio as the named student, but the agreement itself is between me and your parent or guardian.

4. Enrolment & Accounts

There is no public sign-up on Folio. Enrolment begins with an application; if I accept it, I create your student account on Folio and send you login credentials.

You are responsible for:

• keeping your login credentials confidential, and
• all activity that occurs under your account.

Notify me immediately at sarathg.alp@gmail.com if you suspect unauthorised access to your account.

5. Fees, Invoices & Payments

Your fee arrangement, either a Monthly Retainer (an open-ended, recurring monthly fee) or a Fixed-Term Package (a bounded engagement with one total fee, which I may invoice to you in instalments), is agreed with you individually before your mentorship begins, and is payable to me personally. Full detail on how each arrangement works is set out in the Mentorship Service & Enrolment Agreement provided to you separately; where that document and this section overlap, both apply, and I will tell you if I ever need to treat one as taking precedence over the other.

• Invoices are issued through Folio and by email, with a stated due date.
• I may also raise a one-off, itemised custom invoice for anything else agreed with you outside your standing fee arrangement (for example, a lab-platform subscription or a one-time material cost). When I raise a custom invoice, I decide whether it also counts toward your hour balance once paid, or is unrelated to mentoring hours entirely; this is stated on the invoice.
• You may, at any time, make an additional top-up payment toward your account (for example to add hours ahead of schedule, or pay down a Fixed-Term balance faster), subject to a minimum of ₹1,000 per top-up.
• Payments are processed online through my payment provider, Razorpay. I do not receive or store your card, UPI, or bank account details; these are handled directly by Razorpay under its own terms and security practices.
• Continued access to sessions and materials on Folio is conditional on invoices being paid by their due date. I may pause the mentorship for overdue accounts after reasonable notice.

6. Sessions, Hours & Scheduling

Your mentorship time is tracked on Folio as an hour balance. Hours are added to your balance only once a corresponding payment is actually received (not simply because an invoice is issued, a session is scheduled, or a billing period begins) and are drawn down as sessions are held. If you pay only part of an invoice, you receive a proportional share of the hours it represents; the remainder is added once the balance is paid.

• Sessions are scheduled by mutual agreement and are typically held over Google Meet.
• You will receive reminders in advance of each session.
• Cancellation policy: cancelling or rescheduling a session requires at least 48 hours' notice. If you cancel, reschedule, or fail to attend with less than 48 hours' notice, that session's hours are treated as delivered; this reflects the time that was reserved for you and that I am unable to reallocate on short notice, not a penalty for cancelling. Cancellations made 48 hours or more in advance do not consume hours.
• I may need to reschedule a session on reasonable notice; I will always try to find a mutually workable alternative time, and such a reschedule initiated by me never consumes your hours.
• Hour expiry (Monthly Retainer): hours credited under a Monthly Retainer are valid for that retainer period (one month) plus a 15-day grace period from the date they are credited, after which unused hours lapse. For example, hours credited on 12 September remain valid for live sessions through 27 October.
• Hour expiry (Fixed-Term Package): hours credited under a Fixed-Term Package are valid for the remainder of that package's engagement period plus a 15-day grace period after it ends, rather than a fixed one-month window; this reflects that a Fixed-Term Package covers a longer, bounded span of time agreed up front.
• Ask me if you're unsure how much time you have left; your balance is always visible on Folio.

7. Refunds

Fees already paid for sessions actually delivered, or hours actually consumed under Section 6, are non-refundable in all cases. Any refund is always limited to the genuinely unused portion of what you paid for; delivered sessions or consumed hours are deducted from any refund before it is calculated, regardless of which payment structure applies below. A fuller, standalone Refund & Cancellation Policy is also provided to you separately and goes into more detail than this section; where the two differ, ask me and I will clarify which applies.

7.1 Monthly Retainer

Retainer payments credit you with hours to be used for live sessions, on the terms set out in Section 6 (including the 48-hour cancellation rule and the one-month-plus-15-day expiry). Because a retainer is priced for a recurring, open-ended monthly entitlement rather than a fixed one-time deliverable:

• a refund of any unused hour balance from a retainer period is at my reasonable discretion, assessed case by case (for example, where I am unable to continue providing sessions);
• hours that have lapsed under the expiry rule in Section 6 are not refundable, as they represent entitlement you did not use within the agreed validity window, not a service failure on my part.

7.2 Fixed-Term Package

Where you are on a Fixed-Term Package, refunds are handled as follows:

• Within 15 days of your first payment toward the package: if you request a refund within 15 days of the first payment you made toward that Fixed-Term Package (even if the total fee is being paid in instalments across several invoices), I will refund the unused portion without requiring a reason, calculated according to Section 7.3 below. This 15-day window runs once, from that first payment; it does not restart with each later instalment of the same package.
• After that 15-day window: any refund request made after that point is considered at my reasonable discretion, on a case-by-case basis, and is not guaranteed.

7.3 How a refund amount is calculated

Where a refund is due or agreed under 7.1 or 7.2, it is calculated as: the amount you paid, less the value of every session already held or hour already consumed (including any session or hour treated as consumed under the 48-hour cancellation rule in Section 6), less any payment gateway or transaction fees actually incurred by me in processing the original payment and the refund, which are not refundable.

7.4 How a refund is issued

Where a refund is agreed, the related invoice is voided on Folio and the refund is processed through Razorpay to your original payment method, in accordance with Razorpay's own processing timelines.

8. Acceptable Use & Ethics

Cybersecurity skills carry real-world responsibility. By enrolling in the mentorship, you agree that:

• you will apply everything you learn (techniques, tools, and knowledge) only against systems you own or are explicitly and lawfully authorised to test;
• you will never use anything learned through the mentorship for illegal, harmful, unauthorised, or malicious activity;
• you are solely responsible for how you apply what you learn, including any legal consequences of misuse; I am not liable for your actions after the mentorship.

I reserve the right to suspend or end the mentorship immediately, without refund, and to suspend your Folio account, if I reasonably believe you have used or intend to use the mentorship for unlawful purposes.

9. Materials & Intellectual Property

All learning materials, session plans, assignments, and resources made available to you on Folio remain my intellectual property (or that of my licensors) and are provided to you for your personal, non-commercial learning only.

You may not copy, resell, publish, sublicense, or redistribute any of these materials, in whole or in part, without my prior written permission.

10. Confidentiality

I treat information you share during sessions, about yourself, your work, or your goals, as confidential, and I expect the same courtesy regarding any non-public materials, methods, or information I share with you.

This clause does not prevent either party from disclosing information where required by law.

11. Data Protection

I collect and use your personal data (such as your name, contact details, and session records) only as needed to deliver and administer the mentorship through Folio, including scheduling, invoicing, and communication, in accordance with the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023, and my separate Privacy Policy. I do not sell your personal data. Where you are under 18, I process your data only with your parent or guardian's consent, given on enrolment under Section 3, and I do not track your behaviour or use your data for targeted advertising.

If you have questions about how your data is handled, contact sarathg.alp@gmail.com.

12. Limitation of Liability

The mentorship is provided on a reasonable-efforts, professional basis, by me personally. To the extent permitted by law:

• I am not liable for indirect, incidental, or consequential losses;
• I am not liable for outcomes that depend on your own effort, actions, or circumstances beyond my control;
• I am not liable for any downtime, data loss, or interruption of the Folio platform itself, beyond using reasonable efforts to restore it promptly;
• my total liability arising from the mentorship or your use of Folio is limited to the fees you paid in the 3 months preceding the event giving rise to the claim.

Because the mentorship is provided by me as an individual rather than through a registered company, this liability is mine personally; there is no separate corporate entity behind it. Nothing in these terms limits or excludes any liability that cannot lawfully be limited or excluded.

13. Force Majeure

Neither party is liable for delay or failure to perform obligations (such as holding a scheduled session or keeping Folio available) caused by circumstances beyond reasonable control, including illness, internet or platform outages, or other unforeseeable events. Affected sessions will be rescheduled where reasonably possible.

14. Termination

Either party may end the mentorship with reasonable notice to the other. Upon termination:

• any outstanding dues remain payable;
• your access to Folio and its materials ends, other than any refund handled under Section 7;
• Sections 8 (Acceptable Use & Ethics), 9 (Materials & IP), 10 (Confidentiality), and 12 (Limitation of Liability) survive termination.

15. Changes to These Terms

I may update these terms from time to time to reflect changes in the mentorship, Folio, or applicable law. I will notify active students of any material change by email or through Folio before it takes effect. Continuing in the mentorship or using Folio after a change takes effect constitutes acceptance of the updated terms.

16. General

• Entire agreement: these terms, together with any fee arrangement agreed with you individually, form the entire agreement between you and me regarding the mentorship and your use of Folio.
• Severability: if any provision of these terms is found unenforceable, the remaining provisions continue in full force.
• No waiver: my failure to enforce any provision is not a waiver of my right to do so later.
• Assignment: you may not assign or transfer your rights under these terms without my written consent.

17. Notices

Any notice to me under these terms must be sent to sarathg.alp@gmail.com. Any notice to you may be sent to the email address registered on your Folio account, or delivered through Folio itself, and is treated as received when sent.

18. Governing Law & Disputes

These terms are governed by the laws of India. Before either of us begins court proceedings, we agree to first try in good faith to resolve the dispute directly, by email or a call, for a reasonable period. This does not apply where urgent interim relief is needed, or to the acceptable-use obligations in Section 8.

Subject to any statutory consumer protection rights you may have, the courts at Alappuzha, Kerala, India (the district where the mentorship is based and operated) have exclusive jurisdiction over any dispute arising from these terms, the mentorship, or your use of Folio.

19. Contact

Questions about these terms? Email sarathg.alp@gmail.com.