Terms and Conditions of Sale

as of October 4, 2024

Such words and phrases as "North Coast," "we," and "us" refer to North Coast Synthesis Ltd., a company incorporated under the laws of Canada. Such words as "Purchaser" and "you" refer to the person or entity using this Web site or buying our products, through this Web site or otherwise.

Our Privacy Policy is an integral part of these Terms and Conditions and is hereby incorporated by reference.

Sales are CPT ("Carriage Paid To") the address you give us, according to Incoterms 2010, not including THC ("Terminal Handling Charges"). That is a standardized set of commercial sales terms meaning among other things that after billing you for it, we will pay the carrier (such as a courier company) and we are responsible for and hold title to the goods until we transfer them to the carrier in Toronto. After that the title and risk is yours. We pay costs associated with exporting the goods from Canada, but you are responsible for any costs and regulatory requirements associated with importing them into your country. Although some shipping methods we can arrange may include insurance provided by the carrier, in general it is your responsibility to purchase any insurance you desire. Some terms below duplicate those of Incoterms 2010 for greater clarity.

Prices on our Web site do not include taxes unless specified, and we collect sales taxes as and when required by Canadian law. GST/HST number 734397326RT0001. In the case of assembled sound modules shipped to addresses in British Columbia, we collect the British Columbia Environmental Handling Fee. EPRA Steward Number RBC503393.

Starting in November 2019 our Web site offers price display and payment in a variety of currencies, but our Canadian dollar prices remain the authoritative ones in case of substantial disagreement.

You agree to provide your real email address when you place an order - for use in verifying the order, to send you the tracking number for your package, and for any other communications related to your order. We cancel orders placed with fake email addresses or when there is no response to messages sent to the address on the order. You agree that you have solicited the email we send you. You are responsible for configuring your system (in particular, spam filters) so that you will receive our email. The use of cloaked, anonymized, spam-trap, or similarly not real direct email addresses is evidence of hostile intentions and treated as such. See the privacy policy for our commitments regarding how we use your email address.

REFUNDS AND RETURNS

In the case of bare circuit boards without components, and pre-assembled products such as modules: we offer refund of the amount you paid us, for returns initiated within 30 days from purchase in two cases: (i) verifiable defects in materials or manufacturing; or (ii) if you return the product in original condition and packaging and in working order, suitable for resale. For defective products (case (i)) we also offer exchange for an identical product, at your option instead of the refund, but subject to our having a suitable replacement in stock.

In the case of do-it-yourself kits or other products that include unassembled electronic components: sales are final. We do not offer a warranty whether express or implied, returns, or refunds on do-it-yourself products. Once electronic components have been assembled they are in general not reusable, and even if not assembled, many electronic components are easily damaged in ways that are difficult to test (for instance, by electrostatic discharge). It would be prohibitively difficult to test and re-sell returned components or to determine whether they were in fact defective at the time of sale or had subsequently been damaged by the purchaser.

We will issue refunds only in the original currency of the payment and only to the original payment method. For example, a credit card payment will be refunded only to the same credit card that made the payment. In the case of cryptocurrency payments, we reserve the right to deduct network fees from the amount refunded.

We do not charge a restocking fee.

For all returns, contact us by email (mskala@northcoastsynthesis.com) for instructions before shipping the product back. You are responsible for shipping the returned product back to us by a suitable carrier and packed appropriately. Please declare any warranty return shipments as warranty return shipments to avoid any extra Customs fees charged on re-import to Canada; you are responsible for any such fees.

We reserve the right to refuse delivery of products that are not returned according to our directions, including without limitation:

• if not shipped to the address we specify;
• if the value, contents, and the fact of its being a return shipment are not declared to Customs as we specify; or
• if the RMA number we provide is not clearly visible on the outside of the package where it can be read without opening the package.

ISSUES RELATED TO CRYPTOCURRENCY

Cryptocurrency exchange rates fluctuate wildly and holding cryptocurrency as an investment is inappropriate for almost all investors. We are not in the business of buying or selling cryptocurrency as an investment, nor any securities or investments at all; and we do not offer investment advice. We merely accept cryptocurrency as one of several options in payment for our merchandise.

The use of cryptocurrency also poses unique privacy risks which are discussed in our privacy policy.

Prices denominated in cryptocurrency in our storefront reflect, as accurately as practicable, the exchange rates we expect to be offered when we convert cryptocurrency we receive, including a premium for risk, given our hope to make neither a profit nor a loss on the cryptocurrency exchange as such. As such, our offered prices in cryptocurrency will not always match, and may often be worse than, the prices we offer in other currencies, or the exchange rates available from cryptocurrency dealers. You are responsible for evaluating our offered prices and deciding for yourself which, if any, to accept.

As mentioned above, our Canadian dollar prices are authoritative and take precedence over cryptocurrency prices in the case of substantial disagreement. Without limitation, we reserve the right not to honour cryptocurrency prices:

• If the market price of the token moves more than 10% in either direction within 24 hours of your order;
• If your order is not fully paid (i.e. verified on the relevant blockchain) within 24 hours of your placing it; or
• In the event of technical problems that cause significantly incorrect exchange rate quotations.

As mentioned above, we may deduct network fees from the refund when refunding cryptocurrency payments.

NOTES FOR SPECIFIC COUNTRIES

Germany: We will ship to Germany only by courier, such as UPS or DHL, not by post. Notwitstanding that DHL in some sense is the German postal system, for shipments from Canada it functions as a courier company significantly different from postal shipping. Courier shipping is included in our prices with no additional charge. We have had frequent long delays and other problems clearing packages through German Customs when sending by post. The courier companies are much more reliably able to get packages through in reasonable time. Please be aware that courier companies usually expect someone to be present to receive the package during business hours, and give a shipping address where that will be the case if at all possible.

United Kingdom: Starting January 1, 2021, changes to the UK Value Added Tax rules for importation make it impracticable for us to send packages to addresses in the United Kingdom unless they have a declared value of at least £136. VAT will no longer be collected at the border for packages valued up to £135; import is not allowed without collection of the VAT; and the demand that we should become registered collectors of the UK VAT, file UK tax returns for it, and so on, is unrealistic. To our knowledge, the UK is the only jurisdiction in the world to attempt claiming this kind of authority over overseas e-commerce sellers no matter how small; a few others have tax collection requirements that are waived for businesses below a threshold size. As a result, starting January 1, 2021, we enforce a minimum order of £136 (or equivalent, regardless of the payment currency) for orders sent to addresses in the UK. We make reasonable efforts to have our Web site automatically warn you about the minimum order if it is relevant to your case, but we cannot fill orders that fail to meet the minimum even if the Web site accepts the order without giving a warning. We must manually cancel such orders. We can still ship to the UK, at no charge, when the total value of the shipment is at least £136; your local postal service or courier company will collect the VAT in that case.

COMMENTS ON THIS WEB SITE

If you choose to post a publicly-visible comment using the comment feature of this Web site, then you agree that you are granting us an irrevocable worldwide license to publish the comment, including the name or alias you enter on the comment form, and to edit or delete the comment at our sole discretion.

You agree that you will not use the comment feature of this Web site to break any law or regulation, to harass any person or group of persons, nor to promote any political or social agenda.

You agree that you will not post any form of personally identifiable information using the comment feature and that therefore nothing you do choose to post is personally identifiable information.

TECHNICAL SUPPORT

For pre-assembled products, we offer reasonable technical support in English for the lifetime of the product, by email only. Please do send all technical support requests by email to mskala@northcoastsynthesis.com; we do not offer support by telephone, post, Web forums, nor social networking Web sites.

We do not promise to provide any technical support on do-it-yourself products. These products are intended for use by persons with a high level of technical skill, and any training or skills upgrading services we might offer would ordinarily be sold as separate products, not included with the kits. However, we provide on our Web site at no charge detailed technical manuals for all our do-it-yourself products and we encourage everybody (including non-customers) to read those. Most reasonable technical questions are answered in the manuals.

REGULATORY COMPLIANCE

Although we are based in Canada, our contracts with suppliers in the USA require us in many cases to observe US export control regulations, which for example forbid us from selling advanced electronic technology to persons in countries like North Korea and Iran. We reserve the right to cancel any orders that we would not be legally permitted to fulfill, or that in our sole judgment would impose excessive regulatory compliance requirements (whether export-related or otherwise) on us even if we might be legally permitted to fulfill the orders. You agree not to use, re-sell, or re-export any products purchased from us in any way that contravenes any Canadian or US laws or regulations, and you warrant and represent that you are not and are not associated with a person or entity, nor located in a place, subject to any Canadian or US export controls or economic sanctions. You agree that the destination of the shipment is not a freight forwarder.

You are solely responsible for compliance with import, environmental, electromagnetic interference, safety, and all other regulatory matters relevant in the destination country. You must pay any Customs duties, import taxes, brokerage fees, environmental charges, or similar costs related to importing the products. We will not be responsible for, nor refund, shipments that are stopped or seized by Customs authorities.

We will not make false Customs declarations to reduce import costs.

Note that although we make reasonable efforts to ensure that everything we sell complies with the European Union directive on Reduction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS), our do-it-yourself products are meant to be assembled with solder. If you assemble them with lead-based solder, then the result will not be RoHS-compliant and that may limit your ability to re-sell it in the European Union. Similar considerations apply to China, California, and anywhere else with regulations that limit or forbid the use of lead solder. We use RoHS-compliant lead-free solder in all our pre-assembled products.

Our products are not appropriate for life support, military, aerospace, automotive, tattooing, or similar use, and we have no liability for such use. You agree to use reasonable safety precautions and common sense in the use of our products.

WEB ROBOTS

Automated access to this Web site should be done in accordance with the rules given in standardized machine-readable forms, including without limitation the robots.txt files and HTTP responses. We routinely block robots that cause any problems for us or that impose inappropriate administrative costs or resource use on us, even if they technically do not break the robots.txt rules. We also block robots that fail to follow the robots.txt rules even if they did not access the file.

Bulk downloading or mirroring of the entire contents of this site, or significant fractions thereof, is not allowed.

No form of automated compliance auditing against this Web site is permitted under any circumstances whatsoever.