Terms and Conditions
These terms are an agreement between you and The Locals Weekly LLC ("The Locals Weekly," "we," "us"). By creating an account or using thelocalsweekly.com (the "Service"), you agree to them. If you don't agree, please don't use the Service.
What The Locals Weekly is
The Locals Weekly is a printed publication of personal ads for people in the Washington, DC, Maryland and Virginia area. Ads appear only in the printed issue, not online. A reader who sees an ad in print can enter its code on our website to send a letter to the person who placed it. Messages pass through our system so that neither person sees the other's real identity or contact details unless they choose to share them.
Who can use it
- You must be at least 18 years old.
- You must give accurate information and complete our identity verification before you place an ad or write to one. Verification is carried out by a third-party provider. We keep the result of that check and a scrambled identifier used to prevent duplicate accounts. We don't keep images of your ID documents. See our Privacy page.
- One person, one account. You may not create more than one account, share your account, or use someone else's identity.
- You are responsible for keeping your password secure.
Ads
- An ad is a headline and a short text body of up to 120 words. There are no photos.
- An account can have up to two active ads at a time.
- Ads run for a set period and then end. They appear in the printed issue. Once an ad has gone to print, we can't recall copies already printed.
- You give us permission to print, edit for length and format, and distribute your ad in the publication. You keep ownership of what you write.
- We may decline, edit or remove any ad at our discretion, including ads that break these terms.
What isn't allowed
You may not use the Service to:
- advertise or arrange sexual services, escort services, or any sexually explicit content, or post anything that is sexually explicit;
- post anything involving people under 18, or anything illegal;
- harass, threaten, deceive, impersonate, or discriminate against anyone, or send hateful or abusive messages;
- advertise a business, sell products or services, or ask for money, donations or financial information;
- share another person's personal information without their permission;
- scrape, copy or compile ads or codes, guess codes, or try to get around our rate limits, credit system, verification, or security;
- use the Service for any purpose other than meeting people in good faith.
We may suspend or close accounts that break these rules, and we may report unlawful conduct to the authorities.
Letters and credits
- Writing to an ad uses one letter from your balance. When the person who placed the ad replies, one conversation from your balance is used to open it; after that, messages in that conversation are unlimited.
- Purchases of ad slots and credits are one-time, added to your balance, and don't expire. Prices are shown on our Pricing page. Our Refund Policy explains what can be refunded.
- Payments are processed by a third-party payment provider. We don't see or store your full card number.
Meeting people: safety
We can't guarantee who anyone is or how they'll behave. Verification confirms that an account is tied to a real person, but it is not a background check. Use your own judgment: meet in a public place the first time, tell a friend where you're going, and leave if you feel uncomfortable. Report anyone who makes you feel unsafe to hello@thelocalsweekly.com. You are responsible for your own interactions with other users, online and in person.
Closing your account
You can close your account at any time from your desk. We can suspend or close an account that breaks these terms. See our Refund Policy for what happens to unused credits.
Disclaimers and limits
The Service is provided "as is," and we don't promise it will be uninterrupted, error-free, or that you will meet anyone. To the fullest extent the law allows, we are not liable for the conduct of users, for meetings between users, or for indirect or consequential losses, and our total liability to you for any claim is limited to the amount you paid us in the 12 months before the claim.
Disputes and governing law
These terms are governed by the laws of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
Changes
We may update these terms. If we make a significant change, we'll tell you through the Service or by email. Using the Service after a change means you accept it.
Contact
The Locals Weekly LLC · P.O. Box 151, Herndon, VA 20172 · hello@thelocalsweekly.com · (703) 278-2966