The agreement for using Alto

These terms are an agreement between you and Alto Tech LLC (“Alto”, “we”) for using the Alto website and app. By creating an account or using Alto, you accept them and our Privacy Policy. If you use Alto for a school or district, you confirm you may accept these terms for it.

If your school or district signs a separate agreement with Alto (an order form, a data privacy agreement or the National Data Privacy Agreement), that agreement controls wherever it differs from these terms.

Alto is for adults who teach or support K-12 students in the United States: teachers, coaches, administrators and other school staff. You must be at least 18. Alto has no student accounts, and students may not use it.

• Give accurate information and keep it current.
• Keep your password private and don’t share your account. We strongly recommend turning on two-step sign-in in Settings.
• Tell us right away at privacy@altotechservices.com if you think someone else has used your account.
• You are responsible for what happens under your account.

You own what you put into Alto (classes, units, documents, uploads, conversations) and what Alto drafts for you. You give us permission to store, copy, process and display your work only as needed to provide Alto to you and to the people you share it with. That includes sending it to the service providers named in our Privacy Policy, such as our AI provider, to carry out what you ask.

This permission ends when you delete the work, except for backup copies, which are gone within 30 days. We never use your work to train AI models, and we never sell it.

Make sure you have the right to upload what you upload. If you share a document or notebook, the people you share it with can see it and, where you allow, copy it into their own Alto. If you share a class, the people you invite can see it and, if you let them edit, change it and draft in it with Alto; what they add stays in your class, also after they leave it. Work you add to a class someone shared with you stays in their class.

• Alto uses AI to draft and edit. Drafts can contain mistakes, including wrong facts, unsuitable content, or standards that don’t fit. Review and edit everything before you use it with students. You are the final authority on what you teach.
• Standards come from the official catalog and every draft names its exact codes, but check them against your curriculum.
• IEP goals and supports Alto drafts are starting points for the IEP team, not decisions. Alto does not write IEPs, 504 plans or other legal documents, and nothing Alto produces is legal, medical or psychological advice.
• Similar requests can produce similar drafts for different teachers.

How Alto uses AI, and what it never does with your work, is on How Alto uses AI.

Don’t enter student names, ID numbers, photos or anything else that identifies a student. Describe class needs in general terms, and use Alto’s letters (Student A) in the IEP section. You are responsible for following your school’s policies and the law, including FERPA, when you use Alto.

Don’t use Alto to:

• break the law or anyone’s rights, including copyright and privacy;
• create harassing, hateful, sexual or violent material, or material unsuitable for school;
• get around Alto’s security, usage allowances or access controls, or probe them without our written permission;
• scrape Alto, access it by automated means, or overload it;
• resell Alto or share one account among several people;
• copy Alto, or use it or its drafts to build a competing service or train AI models.

We may remove content or limit an account that breaks these rules.

• Free trial. A one-time allowance to try Alto. No card needed.
• Monthly plans. Standard and Plus are billed monthly through Stripe at the price shown before you subscribe, plus any tax that applies.
• Automatic renewal. Your plan renews every month and charges your card on the same day each month until you cancel.
• Cancel anytime in Settings, Plan and usage. Cancelling stops the next renewal; your plan keeps working until the end of the month you paid for, and then the account returns to the free plan it started from.
• No refunds. Payments are not refunded, including for part of a month, except where the law requires.
• Changing plans. Moving up takes effect right away and charges the difference for the rest of the month. Moving down takes effect at your next renewal.
• Monthly allowance. Each plan includes a monthly amount of Alto use that renews on your billing date. When it runs out, drafting pauses until then; everything you made stays available.
• Failed payments. If a renewal can’t be charged, drafting pauses until your card is updated. Your work stays available.
• Price changes. We email you at least 30 days before a new price applies to your plan, and you can cancel before it does.
• Beta access. Beta testers draft free until the date we announce. After it, choosing a plan keeps drafting on.
• Schools and districts buy seats on an annual invoice under their order form, which sets their price, term and payment terms.

If you sign in with Google or publish to Google Drive, Google’s own terms apply to your Google account and files. Alto isn’t responsible for services it doesn’t run, and you can disconnect them in Settings.

You can close your account at any time in Settings. You can delete your work right away, or close without deleting, which keeps your work for 60 days in case you want it back. Closing cancels any paid plan with no further charges.

We may suspend or close an account that breaks these terms, puts others at risk, or doesn’t pay. Unless the problem is serious or the law prevents it, we’ll tell you first and give you a chance to fix it and to export your work. If we ever stop offering Alto, we’ll give at least 30 days’ notice so you can export your work.

Alto will change as we improve it. If we change these terms in a way that matters, we’ll email you and show a notice in Alto at least 30 days before the change takes effect. Using Alto after that date means you accept the new terms; if you don’t, you can cancel and close your account.

We work hard to keep Alto accurate, available and secure, but it is provided “as is” and “as available”. To the extent the law allows, we disclaim all warranties, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement, and we don’t promise that Alto or its drafts will be error-free or uninterrupted.

To the extent the law allows, Alto is not liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages, or for lost profits or lost data. Our total liability for any claim about Alto is limited to the greater of what you paid us in the 12 months before the claim, or $100. These limits don’t apply where the law doesn’t allow them.

If someone makes a claim against Alto because of content you uploaded or your breaking these terms, you agree to cover the reasonable costs of that claim, to the extent the law allows. This doesn’t apply to public schools or districts where the law forbids it.

If something goes wrong, email us first at privacy@altotechservices.com, and we’ll try to resolve it informally within 30 days. These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Georgia, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules. Any dispute that we can’t resolve informally goes to the state or federal courts located in Georgia, and both sides agree to their jurisdiction. Nothing here prevents either side from using small claims court.

• These terms, the Privacy Policy and any signed agreement with your school are the whole agreement between us about Alto.
• If part of these terms can’t be enforced, the rest still applies.
• Not enforcing a term right away doesn’t waive it.
• You may not transfer these terms without our consent. We may transfer them to a successor that keeps their promises.
• We send notices to your account’s email address. Send notices to us at privacy@altotechservices.com.