Terms of use

Art. 1 · Operator, definitions and acceptance

The website CHdata.ch, its exports, company contacts, the API and related services (the "service") are operated by Data Holdings OÜ, registry code 17512052, Sepapaja tn 6, 15551 Tallinn, Estonia (the "operator"). Contact: info@chdata.ch or the contact form.

In these terms, a "user" is anyone who accesses the service and, when acting for a business, that business too; a "customer" is a user with a paid plan, credits or a licence; "data" is any information the service shows or delivers; the "database" is the service's data as a whole; a "record" is the information on one legal entity (one row of an export or one entity in an API response); an "export" is any bulk delivery of data, in particular a CSV or Excel file; a "data layer" is a group of columns a plan includes; a "contact" is the company contact details of one entity under art. 10; "credits" are the right, bought once, to unlock contacts; the "API" is the service's programming interface, used with a key.

By using the service you accept these terms. For an export and an order you accept them expressly; the operator records which version you accepted and when. Whoever accepts for a business confirms they may bind it. Whoever does not accept may not use the service.

Art. 2 · The service

The service makes available information on companies and on people in companies taken from public registers and sources of Switzerland (in particular the commercial register/Zefix, the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce SOGC, the UID register and the other sources named on the "About" page), together with its processing (linking, corrections, derived figures and analyses) and company contact details.

The data is for information. The service is not an official register extract; only the official registers and publications are authoritative for legal acts. Derived figures and indications are produced automatically and are neither a recommendation nor a credit or trustworthiness rating.

Art. 3 · Permitted use; who may buy paid services

You may view company and person pages free of charge and use them one by one: to check business partners, suppliers or employers, and for journalistic, academic and similar usual purposes.

Paid plans, contacts, credits, the API and exports beyond the free volume are for businesses only: persons acting in the course of their trade, business or profession (sole traders and the liberal professions included). By ordering you confirm this. The operator may ask for company details and refuse or cancel orders that do not meet this condition.

Every person and every business may have one free account. Several accounts or e-mail addresses to obtain further free exports, disposable addresses and sharing an account, plan or key between unrelated persons are prohibited. The customer is responsible for everything done in their account, including by persons they give access to, and keeps their billing details true and current. The right of use is personal and non-transferable and grants no right in the database or in a substantial part of it.

Art. 4 · Protection of the database

The database is the result of a substantial investment by the operator in obtaining, verifying and processing the data. It is a marketable work product within the meaning of art. 5 lit. c of the Swiss Unfair Competition Act (UWG); its selection and arrangement are also protected by copyright where art. 4 of the Swiss Copyright Act (URG) applies. Where applicable, the operator, as a maker established in the European Union, also holds the sui generis database right under Directive 96/9/EC. This applies even where individual items come from public sources, and also to the collection of contact details.

Independently of statutory protection, the restrictions of these terms apply by contract.

Art. 5 · Prohibited conduct

Without the operator's prior written consent it is in particular prohibited to: (a) extract or re-use the whole content of the database or a part of it that is substantial in kind or volume; (b) repeatedly and systematically extract even insubstantial parts, in particular to export the database step by step by region, industry or other parts; (c) access the service by automated means (bots, scrapers, scripts, automated browsers), except search engines and AI services reading public pages within robots.txt, link previews and the API within a paid plan; (d) circumvent technical restrictions and limits, in particular with several accounts, addresses, keys, rotating IP addresses, proxies or VPNs; (e) publish, sell, rent out, sublicense or make available to third parties data including contacts, or build or supplement a competing database, directory or service with it; (f) make an account, plan, credits or API key available to third parties or use them for third parties (for example as an agency for several clients) without a written licence; (g) use data to train or fine-tune artificial-intelligence or machine-learning models; (h) remove or alter indications of the data's origin, including the control records and marks under art. 9; (i) embed content of the service in another website (frames, mirroring) or store and archive it beyond your own needs; (j) access non-public parts and interfaces of the service other than through the visitor pages and the documented API, or investigate how they work in order to obtain data or circumvent protection; (k) use data for unsolicited advertising, spam, fraud or phishing, or otherwise in breach of data-protection and unfair-competition law; (l) disrupt operation, overload the service or attempt unauthorised access to its systems.

Whoever operates a database or service with information on companies, persons or contacts that competes with the service, or acts for one, may use the service only to check a specific entity. Exports, contacts, the API and paid plans are not available to them without a written licence.

Art. 6 · Exports and licence

The free export is for checking a smaller number of companies and is limited to the number of records per export named on the pricing page (currently 100) and to a reasonable number of exports per day. For every export you give your business e-mail address and expressly accept these terms.

With an export the operator grants you a non-exclusive, non-transferable and revocable licence to use the exported data solely for your own internal needs, in particular for checks, analyses and your own B2B sales and B2B marketing. You may not redistribute, publish or sell the data, or combine it into a database intended for third parties.

The licence ends on a breach of these terms and when a paid plan or licence ends, if the data was delivered under it (for unlocked contacts art. 10 applies). You must then delete within 7 days all data obtained from the service, including copies, and confirm the deletion to the operator in writing. We do not deliver the whole database or a substantial part of it in any plan.

The operator may refuse to grant a paid plan, contacts, the API or a licence, in particular to persons under art. 5 para. 2, and end them if this comes to light later.

Art. 7 · Plans, orders and payment

Plans, prices, the monthly volume of records, the largest number of records per export, the data layers included and the API volume are those on the pricing page at the time of the order. A higher plan includes more data layers on each entity; exports and API responses contain only the columns of the paid layers. A data licence for businesses is agreed in writing; that contract takes precedence over these terms.

Volume is drawn per record: every record in an export or API response counts, even if you export the same entity repeatedly. Volume renews at the start of every paid period; unused volume is neither carried over nor compensated.

Payment is in advance, by card via Stripe, or by invoice where the operator offers it. A monthly subscription renews for one month at a time until the customer cancels it; cancellation in the account takes effect at the end of the paid period. A higher plan applies once it is paid, a lower one from the next period.

Prices are in Swiss francs plus any VAT. The operator notifies existing customers of price changes at least 30 days in advance; they apply to periods starting afterwards, and the customer may cancel until then.

Prices paid are not refunded, including for unused time, undrawn volume, unused credits or a partly used period, except in the cases of arts. 12 and 14 and where mandatory law requires a refund. A voluntary refund in one case creates no entitlement in others.

If an invoice is not paid on time, the operator may suspend the plan until payment, charge default interest of 5 % per year (art. 104 of the Swiss Code of Obligations, CO) and terminate the contract after more than 30 days of default.

Art. 8 · API

The API is available to customers whose plan includes it, within the monthly record volume on the pricing page; the operator may limit the number of requests per minute (documentation: chdata.ch/en/api). Higher use requires a higher plan.

The API key is confidential and tied to the customer. The customer may not make it available to third parties or use it for them, is liable for all calls made with their key and reports misuse or leakage without delay. The operator may revoke a key at any time and issue a new one.

The licence under art. 6 applies to data from the API. The customer may store API responses only for their own internal needs and deletes them within 7 days after the plan ends, unless a licence provides otherwise.

The operator may change and extend the API. Changes that are not backward compatible are announced at least 30 days in advance, unless they are needed at once for security or legal reasons.

Art. 9 · Control records and logging

Exports, contacts and API responses may contain control records and marks that show unambiguously from which export or key and from which user the data originates. Control records do not represent real entities and serve solely to protect the database.

To protect its rights, the operator logs access, exports, unlocked contacts and API calls (in particular time, IP address, volume and filters used). It may use these records as evidence.

Businesses accept the operator's records of access, exports, contacts and API calls and the control records and marks under this article as correct until they prove otherwise. At the operator's request they disclose in writing within 14 days how they have used data from the service, to whom they made it available and where it is stored.

Art. 10 · Contacts

What a contact is. A contact is the company contact details of one legal entity: all telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and the website the operator holds, but at most 10 per company. We do not offer contact details of sole proprietorships. Unlocking a company's contacts draws one unit of the plan or credits, even if the company has several contacts; if none is found, nothing is drawn.

Monthly subscriptions and credits. A monthly contacts subscription renews every paid month; undrawn contacts lapse. Credits are bought once, are not refunded and are valid for 12 months from payment; then they lapse. Bulk contact exports are included only in packs for which the pricing page says so.

Accuracy. We check contacts but do not warrant that each is accurate, complete or current; the customer checks them before use. Report a wrong contact to us: we correct it; this creates no entitlement to a refund of price or credits.

Outreach and advertising. For contacts that are personal data (for example the e-mail address of a specific person in a company), the customer is a controller in their own right under the Swiss Data Protection Act. The customer alone is responsible for the lawfulness of their outreach, for informing the persons contacted where the law requires it, for identifying the sender correctly and for an easy, free unsubscribe. In particular they comply with unfair-competition law: bulk advertising by e-mail, SMS or similar means only with prior consent, towards companies too (art. 3 para. 1 lit. o UWG); no advertising calls to numbers marked with an asterisk in the telephone directory or not listed in it (lit. u); no advertising calls from numbers not listed in the directory (lit. v). On first contact they state where the data comes from (CHdata.ch) and the right to object. They honour every objection and unsubscribe without delay.

Objection and deletion. A company or person may object to the operator to the use of a contact; the operator then stops providing it. If the operator informs the customer that a contact they obtained has been objected to, the customer stops using it for outreach within 7 days and removes it from their lists.

The customer may use unlocked contacts only for their own B2B sales and B2B marketing under the licence of art. 6; they may not sell, publish or make them available to third parties. If they comply with these terms they may continue to use them in this way after the plan ends or the credits are used up; on a breach this right ends and the duty to delete under art. 6 applies.

Art. 11 · Breaches and contractual penalties

On a breach of these terms the operator may restrict or block access without warning, demand the deletion of unlawfully obtained data and claim damages and other statutory remedies, in particular under the UWG.

If a business, or a person acting for a business, breaches art. 5, 6, 8 or 10, the business owes the operator a contractual penalty (arts. 160 ff. CO) of CHF 0.50 for every record unlawfully extracted, distributed or otherwise used and CHF 2.00 for every contact so used, but at least CHF 10,000 per breach. Paying the penalty releases neither from the duty to delete nor from compliance with these terms; the operator reserves compensation for greater damage.

If a business does not delete data within 7 days of receiving the request, does not confirm the deletion in writing or does not answer a request under art. 9, it owes a further contractual penalty of CHF 500 for every day or part of a day of delay, up to CHF 100,000.

In addition to the penalty, the business reimburses the operator in full for the costs of establishing and proving the breach (in particular technical analyses and expert reports) and the costs of legal representation, including out of court, even if the matter is settled without a court.

Art. 12 · Suspension and termination

The operator may suspend or end a user's access to the service, exports, contacts, the API or a plan if they breach these terms, do not pay, there is reasonable suspicion of a breach, for security reasons or where the law requires it; in serious cases (in particular passing data to third parties, spam, fraud or several accounts) without warning. On termination for a breach neither the price nor credits are refunded.

The customer may cancel a plan under art. 7. The operator may cancel a plan without giving reasons on 30 days' notice; it then refunds the pro rata price for the unused period and the value of unused credits.

Art. 13 · Liability and indemnity

We take the data from public registers as they publish it and update it continuously. We warrant neither completeness, accuracy nor currency. The service is provided as it is and as available. Decisions based on the data are the user's own responsibility.

The operator's liability for damage from use of the service or the data, from errors or from interruptions is excluded to the extent permitted by law, in particular for slight negligence, for auxiliary persons (art. 101 para. 2 CO) and for lost profit, revenue, business opportunities, loss of data, indirect damage and measures third parties take against the user (for example e-mail providers or supervisory authorities). If a paid service is defective, the customer's only remedy is correction or redelivery of the affected export or contact; this creates no entitlement to a refund of price or credits or to damages.

Where liability cannot be excluded, it is limited to the amount the customer paid for the affected service in the calendar month in which the damage occurred (so zero for free use). Liability for unlawful intent and gross negligence (art. 100 para. 1 CO) and under mandatory law is unaffected.

Businesses indemnify the operator against damage, fines and costs, including legal representation, arising from third-party claims or proceedings by authorities due to the user's breach of these terms or their further use of the data, in particular unlawful advertising and complaints by persons contacted.

Art. 14 · Availability, changes to the service and force majeure

The operator aims for uninterrupted availability but does not warrant it. Maintenance that significantly restricts paid functions is announced in advance where possible.

The operator may develop the service, change its scope, design and functions and add or remove data sources. If a change significantly worsens the performance of a paid plan, the customer may cancel the plan and receives the pro rata price for the unused period.

The operator is not liable for non-performance or delay caused by events beyond its reasonable control (force majeure), in particular outages of the registers the data comes from, of hosting, network and e-mail providers, attacks, measures by authorities or natural events.

Art. 15 · Intellectual property

The name and mark CHdata, the design of the service, its source code, texts, graphics and documentation belong to the operator or its licensors and are protected by law. Their use without the operator's consent is prohibited, except for the usual quotation with a source reference. These terms transfer no ownership rights to the user.

If the user publishes information from the service to the extent these terms allow, they name CHdata.ch as the source.

Art. 16 · Personal data

The processing of personal data, including the logging of access, IP addresses, exports, contacts and API calls, is governed by the privacy policy.

If the user further processes personal data from the service, they are a controller in their own right under the Swiss Data Protection Act (and, where applicable, the GDPR) and alone responsible for the lawfulness of that processing, including their obligations towards the data subjects.

Art. 17 · Consumers and complaints

Viewing the pages free of charge is open to consumers too. We do not provide paid services to consumers (art. 3). If mandatory consumer-protection rules nevertheless apply to a user, they expressly request that the service be provided at once; mandatory rights remain reserved.

Send complaints via the contact form or to info@chdata.ch. The operator handles them without undue delay, at the latest within 30 days.

Art. 18 · Governing law and jurisdiction

Swiss law applies, excluding the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG) and the conflict-of-laws rules.

The exclusive place of jurisdiction for disputes with businesses is Zurich. The operator may also sue the user at their seat or domicile. Mandatory places of jurisdiction remain reserved.

Art. 19 · Changes and final provisions

The operator may change these terms. The new version applies to new use and orders from its publication. The operator notifies existing customers of material changes at least 30 days in advance by e-mail; they are deemed accepted if the customer does not cancel the plan before they take effect.

If a provision is wholly or partly invalid, the others remain valid; it is replaced by a rule that comes closest to the economic purpose of the invalid provision. An excessive contractual penalty applies to the extent set by the court (art. 163 para. 3 CO).

These terms exist in German, French, Italian and English; the German version governs.