Terms of Service

These terms are an agreement between you and Coach Potato (getcoachpotato.com, “we”, “us”). Coach Potato is a registered business name operated by Areej Shalwani, an Ontario sole proprietor. These terms apply to everyone who uses Coach Potato: students who book lessons and coaches who offer them. By creating an account or booking a lesson, you agree to them.

Students must also sign our participation waiver before their first booking. The waiver is a separate agreement, and nothing in these terms changes it.

Coach Potato is an online marketplace that connects students with independent sports coaches in the Greater Toronto Area. Coaches offer private lessons and, where they offer them, group lessons they create. Coach Potato provides discovery, scheduling, booking, messaging and payment between students and coaches.

• Coaches are independent. They are independent service providers, not our employees or agents. Each coach decides how to teach, and is responsible for the lessons they give.
• Facilities are third parties. Lessons take place at courts and venues that are independently owned or operated, not by Coach Potato. A venue may have its own rules, fees and waivers, and you must follow them.
• We review coaches, but we don’t verify everything. We review each coach’s profile before it is listed. A coach’s playing level, experience and credentials are their own description, and we don’t guarantee them.

• Give accurate information, and keep your sign-in details to yourself.
• You’re responsible for what happens under your account.
• Booking a lesson requires signing the participation waiver, which confirms you are at least 18 years old.

• All prices are in Canadian dollars (CAD).
• Each coach sets their own lesson rate. Coach Potato doesn’t add a booking fee to what students pay. Coaches pay Coach Potato a commission on their coaching fees (section 8).
• Court and facility fees for private lessons are kept separate from the coaching fee. A coach can list a facility fee for a location. It is shown before you book, and it is paid in one of two ways:
  • Collected through Coach Potato: a fixed amount, added to your lesson total and charged with it, then passed to the coach in full.
  • Paid at the venue: an estimate. You pay it to the venue directly, and the venue decides the actual amount. Coach Potato never charges it or refunds it.
• Group lessons, where offered, have one price per student. That price includes court access, which the coach arranges, and nothing is added at checkout.

• Private lessons can be requested from 12 hours to 21 days ahead.
• Request: when you request a lesson, your card is authorized for the total. That is a temporary hold, not a charge. If you don’t finish paying within 15 minutes, the time is released.
• Coach accepts: the coach has 24 hours to respond, and a request always closes 2 hours before the lesson. When the coach accepts, your card is charged and the lesson is confirmed.
• Not accepted: if the coach declines, doesn’t respond in time, or you withdraw the request first, the hold is released and you pay nothing.

Private lessons

• You cancel at least 24 hours before the lesson: full refund.
• You cancel less than 24 hours before the lesson, or don’t attend: no refund, subject to applicable law. That includes any facility fee charged with the lesson, because the coach set the time aside for you. The coach is paid as if the lesson took place.
• The coach cancels a confirmed lesson: full refund, always.

Group lessons, where offered

• Group lessons are created and offered by coaches, where a coach offers them. Coaches publish them 3 to 21 days ahead, for 2 to 8 students, at $15 to $250 per student. Each class shows its minimum number of students.
• You pay the full price when you book your spot. Booking closes 2 hours before the start.
• The minimum: 48 hours before the start, we check whether the class has its minimum number of paid students. If it does, it’s confirmed to run. If it doesn’t, it’s cancelled and everyone is refunded in full.
• You cancel at least 48 hours before the start: full refund.
• You cancel less than 48 hours before the start, or don’t attend: no refund, subject to applicable law. If you book a spot when less than 48 hours remain, it can’t be refunded, and we ask you to confirm that before you pay.
• The coach cancels the class: everyone is refunded in full, including students who had already cancelled late.

How refunds are paid

Refunds go back to the card you paid with, for the amount you paid through Coach Potato. Your bank may take several business days to show it. Facility fees you paid at a venue are between you and the venue.

Your rights under the law

These rules are our cancellation and refund policy. If a law that applies to you, such as Ontario consumer protection law, gives you a right to cancel or to a refund, that right applies even where these rules say otherwise. Nothing in these terms takes away a consumer right that can’t be given up by agreement.

• Private lessons: if a lesson didn’t happen as booked, report it from your Bookings between the start of the lesson and 24 hours after it ends. A report puts the coach’s payout on hold. We review it, and either refund you or release the payout to the coach.
• For a group lesson, or once that window has passed, email getcoachpotato@gmail.com. We’ll look into it, but the coach may already have been paid.
• Card disputes: we encourage you to contact us before disputing a charge with your card issuer, but you don’t have to, and you can dispute a charge at any time. If the coach hasn’t been paid for that lesson yet, their payout may be held while the dispute is open, and isn’t paid if the dispute is lost. We respond to disputes through our payment processor, Stripe.

• To be listed and paid, you must complete payout setup with Stripe and agree to Stripe’s terms for connected accounts. Your profile is reviewed before it is listed.
• Keep your profile, experience, qualifications, rates, locations, facility fees and availability accurate and current.
• Arrange court or facility access for every lesson you accept or publish, and follow the venue’s rules and requirements. Publishing a group lesson doesn’t reserve a court for you.
• Turn up and teach the lessons you accept. If you must cancel, cancel in the app as early as you can. Your student is refunded in full.
• Commission: Coach Potato keeps a commission on the coaching fee of each lesson and group spot, at the rate shown in your coach dashboard. No commission is taken on facility fees collected through Coach Potato. Those reach you in full.
• Payouts: your share is transferred to your Stripe account after the lesson, once a 24-hour window for reporting a problem has passed. Stripe then pays out to your bank. A payout is held while a reported problem about that lesson is open, and may be held while a card dispute about it is open. It isn’t paid if the student is refunded because of either.
• You’re responsible for the requirements that apply to your coaching, including:
  • your taxes, and reporting your income;
  • any qualifications or licences your coaching requires;
  • appropriate insurance, and any insurance a venue requires; and
  • court bookings and the rules of each facility you use.
• Coach Potato doesn’t check or verify every coach’s qualifications, credentials, licences or insurance.

• Arrive on time, ready to play, with suitable clothing, footwear and equipment.
• Follow your coach’s reasonable safety instructions and the venue’s rules.
• Tell your coach about anything that affects your ability to take part safely.

Don’t use Coach Potato to:

• harass, threaten or discriminate against anyone;
• misrepresent who you are, or your experience or qualifications;
• post anything false, misleading or unlawful, or anyone else’s personal information;
• get around the app’s block on sharing contact details in messages before a lesson is confirmed;
• abuse bookings, payments, reviews, reports or disputes; or
• interfere with the site, get around its limits, or access accounts or data that aren’t yours.

We may remove a coach’s listing, or restrict, suspend or close an account, when it’s needed because these terms have been broken, for someone’s safety, or for legal reasons. We take these steps by hand rather than automatically, so they may not take effect immediately. Lessons already paid for are handled under the cancellation and refund rules above. You can stop using Coach Potato at any time. To close your account, email us.

Independent coaches and facilities

Coach Potato operates an online marketplace that connects students with independent sports coaches and facilitates bookings and payments. Coaches are independent service providers, not our employees or agents. They are responsible for the coaching they provide, including their instruction, supervision, professional conduct and meeting the requirements that apply to them. Sports facilities are independently owned or operated by third parties. Coach Potato doesn’t operate or control them or their equipment.

Participation risks and the waiver

Sports and physical activity involve inherent risks, including physical injury, damage to property and other loss. Before their first booking, students must review and electronically sign the Coach Potato Adult Sports Participation Waiver, Assumption of Risk and Release of Liability. The waiver describes the risks participants acknowledge and the claims they release, subject to applicable law. It releases Coach Potato and the coach who provides the session, as it describes. It doesn’t release the owners or operators of courts and facilities. The waiver is a separate agreement, applies according to its own terms, and nothing in these terms narrows or changes it.

Limits on our responsibility

• To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, Coach Potato isn’t responsible for injury, loss or damage caused by the acts or omissions of independent coaches or of facility owners and operators, to the extent those acts or omissions are outside our control.
• We work to keep Coach Potato available and accurate, but we don’t guarantee that the website or booking services will always be available, uninterrupted or error-free.
• To the extent the law allows, if we are responsible to you for a loss connected with a booking, other than personal injury, our total responsibility is limited to the amount you paid, or as a coach received, through Coach Potato for that booking.
• Nothing in these terms excludes or limits any liability that can’t lawfully be excluded or limited, or any consumer right that can’t be given up by agreement.

When we change these terms, we publish a new version here with its effective date at the top. For a material change, we’ll also tell account holders by email before it takes effect. A change applies from its effective date. It doesn’t change the cancellation and refund rules of a lesson that was already confirmed, or a group spot already booked, before that date. If you don’t agree with a change, you can stop using Coach Potato and close your account.

These terms are governed by the laws of Ontario and the federal laws of Canada that apply there. Nothing in these terms limits any right you have under Ontario consumer protection law, or under other consumer protection law that applies to you and can’t be excluded by agreement.

Questions about these terms: getcoachpotato@gmail.com. See also our Privacy Policy and Support page.