The terms for using DDClear

1. Who these terms are between

“DDClear” is the service at www.getddclear.com, run by its founder, Matt Rusin. “You” means the business using DDClear — a drayage motor carrier or the company whose invoices you are checking — and the person using it on that business's behalf.

By checking an invoice, creating an account, or saving a dispute file, you accept these terms. If you are using DDClear for a company, you confirm that you are allowed to accept them for it. If you do not accept them, do not use DDClear.

DDClear is built for businesses in the United States. It is not offered to consumers, and it is not directed at anyone under 18.

2. What DDClear is — and what it is not

DDClear reads an invoice, checks it against the Federal Maritime Commission's billing rule (46 CFR Part 541) and the UIIA's contract terms using fixed, deterministic code, shows you what it found with the rule each finding came from, and drafts a dispute letter from those findings. That is the whole product.

DDClear provides invoice-compliance analysis, not legal advice. Dispute outcomes depend on facts and forum. Consult a maritime attorney for case-specific guidance. DDClear is not a law firm, is not your attorney, and nothing you send it is protected by attorney–client privilege. Using DDClear does not create an attorney–client relationship with anyone.

A DDClear result is a reading of one invoice against the text of a rule. It is not a prediction of what a carrier, an equipment provider, the FMC, an arbitrator or a court will do with your dispute, and nothing on this site should be read as one. Dispute outcomes depend on facts DDClear cannot see and on the forum you end up in.

A result is only as good as what DDClear read and what you told it. The reading is done by AI and can be wrong; DDClear shows you every field it read so you can correct it, and asks you when its two readers disagree. Every deadline DDClear computes is labelled with the basis it used — a provider's own published terms can close a window earlier than the industry default, and you are the one who has to check.

3. Do not leave an invoice unpaid because of a result

Do not simply withhold payment. Use the formal dispute options below — under the UIIA, unpaid undisputed invoices can lead to suspension of your interchange privileges.

A DDClear finding is a reason to dispute an invoice in writing, inside the window that applies to you. It is never a reason to ignore one. DDClear shows you the deadlines it could compute; it does not watch them for you and sends no reminders. The diary is yours.

4. Using DDClear

DDClear is free today. No account or card needed to check an invoice. There is no payment to make and no card to enter, and DDClear will not start charging for anything you already have without telling you first.

You need an account only to save a dispute file. Saving a dispute file to an account is a separate, opt-in choice. If you create one, keep your sign-in to yourself, give DDClear a real email address, and understand that anyone you add to your organisation can see and change its dispute files. What you do under your account is your responsibility.

You agree not to:

• use DDClear for anything unlawful, or to check an invoice you have no business checking;
• upload an invoice you are not permitted to share with an outside service — it is usually a customer's document, and the manual form exists for exactly that case;
• try to overload DDClear, get around its usage limits, or drive it with scripts — the free checker is metered so that it stays free for people;
• upload anything designed to damage DDClear or anyone using it;
• copy DDClear's code, text or design to build something that competes with it, or take the site apart to learn how it works beyond what it tells you itself;
• present DDClear as your lawyer, as a party to your dispute, or as having said anything it did not.

5. Your invoices, your dispute files

Everything you give DDClear stays yours: the invoice, the fields DDClear read from it, the result, the letter, and any dispute file you save. DDClear claims no ownership of any of it.

To do its job, DDClear needs your permission to handle that material — to send an uploaded invoice to the two AI reading services that turn it into fields, to run the rules over it, and to store what you choose to save. You give DDClear that permission for that purpose and no other. What DDClear does with it, step by step, is on the privacy page, which is part of these terms.

You are responsible for having the right to give DDClear what you give it, and for what is in it. DDClear does not need, and does not want, anyone's Social Security number, bank details or other sensitive personal information — an invoice does not carry them, and DDClear is not built to hold them.

6. The dispute letter

The letter DDClear drafts is a starting point, generated in your browser from the result on screen. You review it, you change what needs changing, and you send it in your own name. DDClear does not send it, does not receive a copy, and is not a party to the dispute. What you send, and what happens next, is between you and the party that billed you.

7. Availability and change

DDClear is built and run by one person. It may be unavailable, it may change without notice, features may be added or removed, and it may one day be paused or shut down. DDClear makes no promise about uptime.

If DDClear is shut down, account holders will be told first and given time to export their dispute files before anything is purged. If you cancel, DDClear keeps your dispute files and evidence for 90 days so you can export them, then purges them automatically.

8. Ending things

You can stop using DDClear whenever you like. You can delete a dispute file at any time: DDClear removes it immediately and purges it within 7 days. You can delete your account from the account menu on any signed-in page, or by emailing the address at the bottom of this page.

DDClear may suspend or close an account, or refuse a request, if you break these terms or if your use puts DDClear or the people using it at risk. Where it is practical to warn you first, DDClear will. Sections 2, 3, 5, 9, 10, 11 and 12 keep applying after an account is closed, for as long as they have anything to apply to.

9. No warranty

DDClear is provided “as is” and “as available”, with no warranty of any kind, express or implied — including no implied warranty of merchantability, of fitness for a particular purpose, or of non-infringement. DDClear does not promise that it is accurate, complete or free of errors; that it will read your invoice correctly; that every defect in an invoice will be found; or that any result, letter or deadline will be accepted by a carrier, an equipment provider, the FMC, an arbitrator or a court. Where the law does not allow a warranty to be excluded, it is limited to the shortest period and the smallest scope that law allows.

10. Limits on liability

To the fullest extent the law allows, DDClear is not liable to you for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive loss, or for any loss of profit, revenue, business or goodwill, however it arises — including an invoice you paid or did not pay, a dispute window you missed, a charge that turned out to be owed, or a suspension of your interchange privileges.

DDClear's total liability to you for everything connected with the service, added together, is limited to the amount you paid DDClear in the twelve months before the claim arose or one hundred US dollars, whichever is greater. While DDClear is free, that amount is one hundred US dollars.

Nothing in these terms limits liability that the law does not allow to be limited — including liability for fraud, or for death or personal injury caused by negligence.

11. Your responsibility to DDClear

If someone makes a claim against DDClear because of something you uploaded without the right to, because of how you used a result or a letter, or because you broke these terms, you will cover the reasonable costs DDClear incurs dealing with it, including reasonable legal fees. DDClear will tell you promptly about any such claim and will not settle it in your name without asking you.

12. Who owns what

DDClear's code, design, text and name belong to DDClear. The regulation it checks against is public law, and DDClear links to it so you can read it yourself. You may use the results and letters DDClear produces for your own business, including in a dispute; you get no other rights in DDClear.

If you send DDClear a suggestion, DDClear may use it without owing you anything for it.

13. Governing law, and talking first

If you have a problem with DDClear, email matt@ddclearapp.com before anything else. One person reads it, and most problems are quicker to fix than to litigate.

These terms are governed by the laws of the United States and of the state in which DDClear's operator is based, without regard to conflict-of-law rules. Any dispute that cannot be resolved by talking will be heard in the state or federal courts located in that state, and you agree to their jurisdiction.

14. Changes to these terms

When these terms change, the review date at the top changes with them and the new text is published here. If a change matters to a saved dispute file, DDClear puts it in front of you in the app before it applies. Using DDClear after a change means you accept it; if you do not, stop using DDClear and delete anything you have saved.

15. The rest

These terms and the privacy page are the whole agreement between you and DDClear about the service. If a court finds part of them unenforceable, the rest still applies. If DDClear does not enforce a term once, it can still enforce it later. You may not hand these terms to someone else without DDClear's agreement; DDClear may transfer them to whoever takes over running the service, with notice to you.