Cairn

Cairn — Terms & Conditions

Effective date: 3 June 2026 Last updated: 3 June 2026

These Terms & Conditions ("Terms") are a contract between you and Life's Echo Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales (company number 15901980), with its registered office at 1 Pargate Chase, Rochdale, England, OL11 5DZ. We trade as Cairn ("Cairn", "we", "us", "our"). You can reach us at hello@ourcairn.com.

Cairn is a service available at ourcairn.com that lets you record voice stories by phone, have them transcribed, and store them so that you and the people you choose can listen to and read them over time.

By creating an account, buying a subscription or gift, or otherwise using Cairn, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, please do not use the service.

1. Who can use Cairn

You must be at least 18 years old to open and hold a Cairn account and to agree to these Terms. If you are not 18, you may not create an account or purchase a subscription. There is no minimum age for the people whose stories are recorded on Cairn — the account holder is responsible for having the necessary consents (see Section 6).

You are responsible for keeping your account login secure and for everything that happens under your account. Tell us promptly at hello@ourcairn.com if you think your account has been accessed without your permission.

2. What Cairn provides

When you subscribe, we provide tools to:

  • record voice stories by phone;
  • have those recordings transcribed into text;
  • store your recordings and transcripts in your account; and
  • play back, read, and (where your plan allows) export your stored stories.

The exact features and any limits included in your plan are described on our pricing page and within the service. We may improve, change, add or remove features over time. If we make a change that materially reduces the core functionality you have paid for, we will give you reasonable notice and, where required, the ability to cancel (see Section 12).

The service is provided on an "as is" and "as available" basis. We do our best to keep it running reliably, but we do not guarantee that it will be uninterrupted or error-free (see Section 10).

3. Subscriptions, billing and automatic renewal

Plans. Cairn is offered on monthly and annual subscription plans. We also offer a gift option (currently sold as a year's subscription at a discounted price). Current prices are shown at the point of purchase and on our pricing page. Prices may include or exclude applicable taxes as indicated at checkout.

Payment. You authorise us (and our payment processor) to charge your chosen payment method for the plan you select. You confirm that you are authorised to use that payment method.

Automatic renewal. Subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each billing period (monthly or annual) at the then-current price, using your payment method on file, until you cancel. By subscribing, you consent to these recurring charges. Gift subscriptions do not auto-renew.

Cancelling renewal. You can cancel at any time through your account settings or by contacting hello@ourcairn.com. Cancellation stops the next renewal; it does not, by itself, end your current paid period — you keep access until the end of the period you have already paid for, subject to Section 4.

Price changes. If we change the price of your plan, we will give you advance notice before it takes effect. Where the law requires your renewed consent to a price increase (which is the case for many subscribers, including in parts of the US), we will not apply the increase until you agree, and you will be free to cancel instead.

4. Refunds and cancellation

Statutory rights. Nothing in these Terms removes any cancellation or refund rights you have by law. UK consumers generally have a 14-day cancellation right for distance contracts (subject to exceptions for digital content/services you ask us to start immediately), and consumers elsewhere may have additional local rights. Your statutory rights always come first.

Standard subscriptions (monthly and annual). Outside your statutory rights, you may cancel at any time to stop future renewals. We do not provide refunds for the portion of a billing period already started, and annual plans are not refunded on a pro-rata basis on cancellation. You keep access until the end of your current paid period, and then your account moves into the post-cancellation access window described in Section 7.

Gift subscriptions. If you buy a gift subscription, you may request a full refund if, within 30 days of the gift being redeemed by the recipient, the recipient has not recorded at least two stories. To request this, the purchaser must contact hello@ourcairn.com within 45 days of purchase. After 45 days, the gift is non-refundable except where your statutory rights require otherwise.

5. Fair use of recording

We want everyone using Cairn to capture their stories without watching a meter. Your plan includes a generous amount of recording each period — enough for the way individuals and families normally use the service. It is not, however, unlimited.

To keep Cairn running smoothly for everyone and to guard against misuse, we may set, change, or apply limits to how much you can record in a given period. The current allowances for your plan are shown on our pricing page and within the service, and we will give you advance notice of any material change to them. We may also temporarily slow down ("throttle") recording or processing if usage on an account is unusually high.

Cairn is built for personal, human storytelling. Use that is automated, generated by bots or software, resold, or otherwise well outside normal personal use may be paused or limited, and in serious cases may lead us to suspend the account (see Section 11).

Any limit on new recording does not affect what you have already created. Stories you have recorded, together with their transcripts, remain available in your account — you can listen to, read, and (where your plan allows) export them — even during a period when new recording is paused or limited.

6. Your content, and recording other people

Your content. You keep ownership of the stories you record and the transcripts created from them ("Your Content").

Licence to us (limited, service-only). So that we can actually provide the service, you grant us a limited, non-exclusive licence to host, store, process, transcribe, back up, and play back Your Content solely to operate and provide Cairn to you and the people you authorise. This licence is limited to providing the service. We do not use Your Content to train AI models, and we do not use it for advertising or marketing. The licence ends when Your Content is deleted, except for backups we are clearing on our normal schedule or are required to keep by law.

Recording other people. Cairn is designed for recording family members and others. You confirm that, for anyone you record or whose voice or personal details appear in Your Content, you have the right and the necessary consent to record them and to store their recording on Cairn, including the consent of a parent or guardian where the person is a child. Some places (including parts of the United States) require the consent of all parties to a recording — by using Cairn you confirm that you are responsible for obtaining whatever consent the law of your jurisdiction requires. You agree to indemnify us (see Section 9) for claims arising from recordings made without the proper consent.

7. Stored content, account closure, and access after death

While your account is active. Your stored stories and transcripts remain accessible to you for as long as your account is active, subject to these Terms and the Fair Use section.

If you cancel or close your account. When your current paid period ends (or if you close your account directly), your stored stories and transcripts enter a 30-day post-cancellation access window. During those 30 days you can still log in to listen to, read, and (where your plan allowed) export your stored content. After 30 days, your stored content is permanently deleted from our active systems. Copies may remain in our routine backups for a further period (typically up to 90 days) before being overwritten in the normal course of backup rotation, after which they are gone.

If you would like to resume your subscription within the 30-day window, your content is restored to a fully active account. After deletion, content cannot be recovered.

Access after the account holder dies. Cairn is intended to preserve stories for the future. If an account holder dies, a next of kin or authorised representative may contact us at hello@ourcairn.com to request access to or a copy of the stored content. We will handle such requests case by case, will require reasonable proof of identity and authority, and will act in line with applicable law. To prevent loss of content while a request is being processed, the 30-day post-cancellation deletion clock can be paused on receipt of a credible request.

8. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

  • use the service for anything unlawful, or to record or store content that is unlawful, infringing, or that you have no right to record;
  • upload content that is harmful, harassing, or violates someone else's rights;
  • use bots, scripts, or automated means to access or use the service except as we expressly allow;
  • attempt to break, overload, reverse-engineer, or gain unauthorised access to the service; or
  • resell or commercially exploit the service without our written permission.

9. Indemnity

You agree to indemnify and hold harmless Life's Echo Ltd (trading as Cairn) from claims, losses and reasonable costs arising from (a) content you record or store without the necessary rights or consents, (b) your breach of these Terms, or (c) your misuse of the service. This does not apply to the extent a claim results from our own breach, negligence or wrongdoing, and it does not limit your statutory consumer rights.

10. Service availability and disclaimers

We work hard to keep Cairn available and to keep your content safe, but we cannot guarantee that the service will always be available, uninterrupted, or free of errors, or that transcripts will be perfectly accurate. We recommend you do not treat Cairn as your only copy of irreplaceable recordings.

Except for the warranties we cannot exclude by law, the service is provided "as is" and "as available".

11. Suspension and termination

By you. You may stop using the service and cancel at any time as described in Sections 3 and 4.

By us. We may suspend or end your access if you seriously or repeatedly breach these Terms, if we are required to by law, or if your use poses a security or stability risk to the service. Where it is reasonable and lawful to do so, we will give you notice and a chance to put things right first, and we will tell you how to retrieve your content where possible.

12. Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. If a change is material, we will give you reasonable advance notice (for example, by email or in the service). If you do not agree to a material change, you may cancel before it takes effect. Continued use after the change takes effect means you accept the updated Terms.

13. Liability

Nothing in these Terms limits or excludes our liability where it would be unlawful to do so — including liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that cannot be limited under applicable law, and including your non-excludable statutory consumer rights.

Subject to that, we are not liable for losses that were not reasonably foreseeable, for business losses, or for loss arising from your failure to keep your own copies of important recordings. Our total liability to you arising under or in connection with these Terms is limited to the total amount you paid us in the 12 months immediately before the event giving rise to the claim.

14. Governing law and disputes

These Terms are governed by the laws of England and Wales, and the courts of England and Wales have jurisdiction, except that if you are a consumer resident elsewhere, you keep the benefit of any mandatory consumer-protection rights and any right to bring proceedings in your home country that the law of that country gives you.

We have not included a binding arbitration clause or class-action waiver. Consumers retain their statutory rights to bring proceedings in the appropriate court in their home country.

15. General

  • Entire agreement. These Terms, our pricing page, and our Privacy Policy together form the agreement between us.
  • Severability. If any part of these Terms is found unenforceable, the rest continues to apply.
  • Assignment. You may not transfer your rights under these Terms without our consent. We may transfer ours, for example if our business is sold, without reducing your rights.
  • No waiver. If we do not enforce a right, that is not a waiver of it.
  • Notices. We will contact you by email or in the service. You can contact us at hello@ourcairn.com.

Our Privacy Policy is published as a separate document at ourcairn.com and forms part of your agreement with us. Please read it.