Terms of Service

1. Who we are

PoloniaHub is a brand of Nasi Przodkowie – Marcin Polak, a sole trader registered in the Polish Central Register and Information on Economic Activity (CEIDG), with its registered office at ul. Sienna 9, 70-542 Szczecin, Poland, tax identification number (NIP) 5252912507, EU VAT number PL5252912507. E-mail: info@poloniahub.com. Postal address for complaints and withdrawals: as above. In these terms we call ourselves “PoloniaHub”, “we” or “us”, and we call you “you” or “the client”.

2. Definitions

• Service: searching for the record you specify, identifying the Polish authority that holds it, preparing and filing the application on your behalf, corresponding with the authority, obtaining the document where it exists, and, where ordered, arranging certification, apostille, sworn translation and delivery. The Service is a service of diligent search and application; it is not a promise that the record exists or that the authority will issue it.
• Document: the official record or extract you ask us to obtain, for example a civil status record, a citizenship confirmation, a land register extract or a company register certificate.
• Official fee: a fee set by Polish law and charged by the authority, court or notary that issues the document or performs a step in the procedure. Official fees are not our fees.
• Service fee: our remuneration for the Service, shown on the service page and at checkout.
• Order: your purchase of the Service through the checkout on a service page, or, where a service page has no checkout, through the order form followed by payment of the payment link we send you.
• Order confirmation: the e-mail we send after payment, listing what you ordered, the amounts paid and the documents we need from you.
• Consumer: a natural person who orders the Service for purposes outside their trade, business or profession. Under Polish law, a sole trader who orders the Service outside the field of their professional activity is treated as a Consumer for the purposes of sections 11, 12, 15 and 16.
• Business client: any client who is not a Consumer, for example a law firm, a genealogist or a company.

3. What we do, and what we do not do

PoloniaHub is a document service. We deal with Polish offices on your behalf under a written power of attorney and obtain official documents for you. We do not issue documents ourselves; every Document is issued by the competent Polish authority.

We are not a law firm. We do not give legal advice, we do not represent clients in court or in contentious proceedings, and we do not assess the legal effect of a Document in your country. Where a case requires a Polish advocate (adwokat), legal adviser (radca prawny), notary or sworn translator, we will tell you, and you instruct them directly. Information on this website describes typical procedures and is not advice on your individual situation.

Decisions belong to the authorities. Whether a record exists, whether you are entitled to receive it, whether citizenship is confirmed, and how long an authority takes are decided by the authority, not by us. We prepare complete and correct applications and pursue them diligently, but we cannot promise a particular outcome.

Many documents can be obtained without us. Some Polish records, such as a CEIDG extract, a current KRS excerpt or an online view of a land register, are available free of charge from the official register, and civil status records can be requested by the entitled person directly from any civil registry office. We say so on the page for each service. Our Service fee pays for our work, not for the Document.

4. How an order is placed

1. Choose the service. Each service page states the Service fee, the official fee where one applies, the available add-ons, the typical timeline, and the information and documents we will need from you.
2. Checkout and payment. You enter the details of the record and the person it concerns, choose any add-ons, and pay by card through our payment provider, Stripe. The contract between you and PoloniaHub is concluded when Stripe confirms your payment. Where a service page has no checkout, you send the order form instead and we e-mail you a Stripe payment link; the contract is concluded when you pay it.
3. Order confirmation and documents. Immediately after payment you receive the Order confirmation together with the power of attorney and any declaration the authority requires, for signature. Work on your case starts when we have received the signed documents.
4. Feasibility check. Within 3 business days of receiving your signed documents we review the case. If we conclude that the record is unlikely to exist, that you do not appear to be entitled to receive it, or that the details you gave are not enough to identify it and you cannot supply more, we tell you by e-mail. You then choose either to cancel for a full refund of everything you paid, or to proceed anyway, in which case section 10 applies if the record is not found. If we do not hear from you within 14 days of that e-mail, we cancel and refund. If the check raises no doubt, we file the application without further contact.
5. Delivery. We send you a scan of the Document as soon as we receive it and the original by tracked courier or registered post to the address you gave us, unless you chose digital delivery only.

These terms, the Order confirmation and the power of attorney together form the contract. If they conflict, the Order confirmation prevails over these terms for the matters it covers.

We do not answer questions about individual cases before an order is placed beyond what the service pages and the contact form allow. If your situation is unusual, describe it in the contact form; we will tell you whether and under which service we can help.

5. Prices, official fees and add-ons

Service fee. The Service fee is the price shown on the service page and at checkout at the time you order. Prices are in euro (EUR) and include Polish VAT where it applies. If you are a business registered for VAT in another EU country, enter your VAT number at checkout; the reverse-charge mechanism may then apply and the price is shown without Polish VAT.

Official fees. Official fees are shown separately at checkout, passed on to you at cost, and are not part of our remuneration. Where an official fee cannot be known in advance (for example a court or notary fee that depends on the case), the service page says so and gives our best estimate; we ask for your approval before incurring any amount above what you have paid, and invoice the difference through a separate Stripe payment link. Where a Document is available free of charge, no official fee is charged.

Add-ons. Apostille, sworn translation, express courier and any other add-on are charged only if you select them, at the price shown at checkout.

Delivery. Standard tracked delivery is included in the Service fee unless the service page states otherwise. Customs duties, import taxes or local charges levied in the country of delivery, if any, are your responsibility.

Third-party charges you pay directly. Where a case requires an advocate, legal adviser, notary or sworn translator whom you instruct directly, their fees are agreed between you and them and are not part of our price.

6. Payment

You pay when you place the Order, by card through Stripe. Card payments are processed by Stripe Payments Europe, Ltd.; we never see or store your full card details. Where we send you a payment link, it is valid for 14 days; if it is not paid, no contract is concluded.

Any additional amount that becomes necessary during the case (section 5) is charged only after you approve it, through a separate payment link. If you do not approve it, we complete what can be completed without it and section 10 applies to the rest.

Refunds under these terms are made within 14 days using the same means of payment you used, unless you expressly agree otherwise. We issue an invoice for every payment and send it to you by e-mail.

7. Timelines

Timeframes given on this website and in the Order confirmation are estimates based on typical processing times of the relevant authority. They are not guaranteed. Polish authorities are bound by statutory deadlines, which may be extended in complex cases, and archives, courts and provincial offices work at their own pace. We keep you informed of progress and tell you promptly if a case is taking longer than expected. A delay caused by an authority is not a breach of contract by us and does not entitle you to a refund, except where section 10 or section 11 applies.

8. What we need from you

• accurate and complete information about the record and the person it concerns; if the details you give us are wrong and the authority finds no record as a result, section 10 applies;
• proof that you are entitled to receive the Document where Polish law requires it, for example proof of descent for a civil status record;
• the signed power of attorney and any declarations the authority requires, in the form we indicate; some authorities require a notarised or apostilled signature, which the service page tells you about in advance;
• a copy of your identity document where the authority requires it, sent only when we ask for it and only through the channel we indicate;
• prompt replies to our questions; if we cannot reach you for 60 days after asking for documents or information we need, we may close the case, and section 10 applies as if the record had not been found.

You confirm that you are entitled to request the Document and that you will use it lawfully. We may refuse or stop an Order where we have reason to believe that the request is unlawful, that you are not the person you claim to be, or that the Document would be used to harm the person it concerns; in that case we refund any amount not yet spent on work performed or official fees incurred.

9. Power of attorney

The power of attorney you sign authorises us, and the persons acting for us in Poland, to apply for and collect the Document named in it, to pay official fees on your behalf, to correspond with the authority, to receive decisions and to arrange apostille and translation. It does not authorise us to represent you in court, to make declarations of intent on your behalf beyond what the application requires, or to act in any matter other than the one named. You may revoke it at any time by writing to us; revocation ends our ability to continue the case and section 11 or section 10 applies to the settlement.

10. If the record cannot be found

Some records no longer exist, in particular where registers were destroyed during the wars, and some cannot be located from the details available. The feasibility check in section 4 is there to catch the obvious cases before any work starts. If, despite a diligent search, the authority confirms that it holds no such record or cannot identify it, we:

1. send you a written search report stating which offices, archives and periods were checked and what each of them answered; most foreign authorities accept this as evidence of a diligent search;
2. refund in full any add-on that was not performed (apostille, sworn translation, express courier) and any official fee that was not incurred;
3. retain the Service fee as remuneration for the search performed and the search report. The Service is the search and the application, not the Document, and the fee is earned whether or not the record turns out to exist.

Official fees that an authority has already charged for a search are not refundable by us, because the authority does not return them. The service page tells you which official fees are charged for a search even if it is unsuccessful.

11. Right of withdrawal (Consumers)

If you are a Consumer, you may withdraw from the contract within 14 days of the day it was concluded (the day your payment was confirmed), without giving any reason. To do so, send us a clear statement by e-mail to info@poloniahub.com or by post to the address in section 1. You may use the model form at the end of these terms, but you do not have to. It is enough to send the statement before the 14 days end. We will confirm receipt by e-mail.

Starting work within the 14 days. At checkout you are asked to expressly request that we begin the Service before the withdrawal period ends, and to acknowledge that you will lose the right of withdrawal once the Service has been fully performed. Without that request we would have to wait 14 days before filing anything, which would delay your Document by two weeks.

Withdrawal after work has started. If you made that request and withdraw before the Service is fully performed, you pay for the part of the Service performed up to your withdrawal, in proportion to the Service fee, plus any official fee already incurred, and we refund the rest within 14 days of receiving your statement. If you withdraw before we have filed anything with an authority, we refund everything you paid.

Loss of the right of withdrawal. You lose the right of withdrawal once we have fully performed the Service, that is when the Document or the search report has been delivered to you, provided you made the request and gave the acknowledgment described above.

This section does not apply to Business clients.

12. Complaints

If you think we have not performed the Service as agreed, tell us by e-mail at info@poloniahub.com or by post to the address in section 1. Please state your order number, what went wrong and what you expect us to do. We reply to a Consumer’s complaint within 14 days of receiving it, by e-mail or on another durable medium; if we do not reply within that time, the complaint is deemed accepted. We reply to Business clients within 30 days.

If a Document is damaged in transit or does not match what you ordered, tell us within 14 days of receiving it and we will obtain a replacement at our cost or, where that is not possible, refund the affected part of the price.

13. Our liability

We are liable for performing the Service with the care expected of a professional document service. We are not liable for:

• a decision of a Polish authority, including a refusal to issue a Document, a finding that no record exists, or a finding that you are not entitled to it;
• the time an authority takes;
• whether an authority in your country accepts the Document, or what legal effect it has there;
• errors in a Document that reflect the content of the original record;
• consequences of inaccurate or incomplete information you gave us;
• events beyond our reasonable control, such as postal strikes, the closure of an office, or the loss of records.

Nothing in these terms limits our liability for intentional misconduct, for death or personal injury, or for anything that cannot be limited under the law that applies to you. In relation to Business clients, our total liability for an Order is limited to the Service fee paid for that Order, and we are not liable for loss of profit or indirect loss.

14. Personal data

How we handle your data and the data of the people named in your application is described in our Privacy Policy, which forms part of the information we give you before the contract is concluded. Our use of cookies is described in the Cookie Policy.

15. Out-of-court dispute resolution

If we cannot resolve a complaint together, a Consumer may use out-of-court dispute resolution. In Poland the competent body for disputes of this kind is the Provincial Inspectorate of the Trade Inspection in Szczecin (Wojewódzki Inspektorat Inspekcji Handlowej w Szczecinie), ul. Wały Chrobrego 4, 70-502 Szczecin, and Consumers may also seek free help from a municipal or district consumer ombudsman (rzecznik konsumentów) or a consumer organisation. Information in English is available from the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection at uokik.gov.pl. Consumers living in another EU country can contact their local European Consumer Centre. Using out-of-court resolution is voluntary for both sides and does not affect your right to go to court.

16. Governing law and courts

These terms and the contract are governed by Polish law. If you are a Consumer, you also keep the protection of the mandatory consumer laws of the country where you live, and you may bring a claim in the courts of that country as well as in Poland. Disputes with Business clients are decided by the court with jurisdiction over our registered office.

17. Changes to these terms

We may change these terms for the future, for example when our services, prices, providers or the law change. The version in force when you place an Order applies to that Order. The date at the top of this page shows when the current version took effect.

18. Model withdrawal form

Complete and return this form only if you wish to withdraw from the contract.