OTbuddy Terms of Use

Effective: October 2, 2026

1. Agreement and eligibility

OTbuddy is operated by Marshall McKinley Works LLC. These Terms cover the OTbuddy website and iPhone app. By creating an account, accessing OTbuddy, or purchasing a subscription or one-time product, you agree to these Terms and acknowledge the Privacy Notice. You must provide accurate account information, keep your credentials secure, and use the Service only for lawful educational purposes. OTbuddy is available only to adults age 18 or older. By creating an account, you confirm that you are at least 18 years old. If you are under 18, do not create or use an OTbuddy account.

2. Educational use; no professional advice

OTbuddy provides study questions, simulations, explanations, study tools, analytics, and AI-assisted educational content. Content is for general education only and is not medical, legal, academic-advising, testing, licensure, or clinical advice. OTbuddy is not a substitute for course instruction, faculty guidance, supervision, official professional standards, current laws or regulations, or authoritative examination materials.

3. PHI prohibition and privacy safety

OTbuddy is designed as a PHI-prohibited educational service, not a clinical record system. Do not enter, upload, paste, or send protected health information (PHI), identifiable patient/client information, medical-record identifiers, clinical documentation containing identifiers, or other information that could identify a real patient or client. Use fictional or fully de-identified cases. Automated privacy screening is an additional safeguard and cannot guarantee detection of every identifier. OTbuddy does not claim HIPAA compliance merely because these safeguards are present.

4. AI disclosure

Some features use artificial intelligence. AI output can be incomplete, inaccurate, outdated, misleading, or inappropriate for a particular situation. You are responsible for reviewing and verifying output before relying on it. Do not use OTbuddy AI as the sole basis for clinical, educational, legal, safety, or professional decisions. Do not submit protected health information (PHI), personally identifiable patient/client information, confidential records, or information you are not authorized to disclose.

4A. AI Researcher and access to publications

AI Researcher helps locate research and organize citations. It does not include journal subscriptions or guarantee full-text access. Publishers may require payment, a subscription, or institutional access. Available AI summaries and appraisals use eligible abstracts, not the full article; review the original publication before relying on an interpretation. Article and abstract rights remain with their owners. A publicly accessible article or abstract is not automatically licensed for copying or redistribution.

5. Exam-preparation and non-affiliation notice

OTbuddy’s NBCOT® Exam Prep is not affiliated with or endorsed by The National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy, NBCOT®. NBCOT® is a registered trademark owned by The National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy, Inc. OTbuddy is also not affiliated with or endorsed by the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA). OTbuddy practice questions are original educational study materials and are not official NBCOT examination questions. References to OTR, COTA, NBCOT, AOTA, OTPF, or other third-party names are for identification, education, or descriptive reference only. Third-party names, marks, publications, and materials remain the property of their respective owners.

6. No guarantee of results

Use of OTbuddy does not guarantee improved grades, examination performance, a passing score, certification, licensure, competence, employment, clinical performance, or any other result. Readiness indicators, percentages, analytics, recommendations, and simulated examination results are educational feedback only and are not validated predictions of performance on an official examination.

7. Subscriptions, one-time purchases, cancellation, and refunds

Recurring subscriptions. Study Plus and Study Pro subscriptions renew automatically at the price and interval shown before purchase unless renewal is canceled. Review the purchase confirmation and your billing provider’s renewal information. Access ordinarily continues through the paid expiration date after cancellation, subject to refunds, revoked purchases, account deletion, these Terms, and applicable law.

Website purchases — Stripe. Website purchases are processed by Stripe. Manage or cancel website subscription renewal through the Stripe Customer Portal in your OTbuddy plan settings. Website purchases are final and non-refundable, with no credits or prorated refunds for unused time, except where applicable law or binding payment-provider requirements require otherwise. Contact OTbuddy support for billing errors or a request based on a legal entitlement.

iPhone in-app purchases — Apple. In-app purchases are billed through your Apple Account. Manage or cancel Apple subscriptions in iPhone Settings → your name → Subscriptions → OTbuddy. Request Apple purchase refunds at reportaproblem.apple.com; eligibility and decisions follow Apple’s policies and applicable law. OTbuddy’s website refund policy does not override Apple’s refund process or your statutory rights.

Use the original billing provider. Where you purchased determines where billing is managed, even when you use OTbuddy on a different device. Signing in on another platform, restoring purchases, or purchasing another plan does not itself cancel an existing subscription. Apple and Stripe subscriptions are separate billing arrangements; check existing subscriptions before purchasing another. Eligible access is associated with your OTbuddy account. Use the same OTbuddy account across devices. Restore eligible Apple purchases from Account → Apple plans, purchases & restore using the Apple Account used to purchase. Restoring does not replenish used exam credits or restart an expired pass.

One-time purchase refund policy. Exam credits and 7-Day Study Pro Passes are final and non-refundable, including unused credits or pass time, except where required by applicable law or Apple’s or Stripe’s applicable rules or binding decisions. Apple purchase refund requests follow Apple’s process described above. This policy does not limit non-waivable consumer rights.

One-time exam credits. A purchased Full Practice Exam credit provides one credential-specific exam attempt. One credit is used when the corresponding exam starts on the website or iPhone app. Resume the same in-progress attempt without an additional credit, subject to its timer. Submitted exam reports remain available while your account and the Service remain available. Exam-credit purchases do not renew automatically.

7-Day Study Pro Pass. This is a time-limited, non-renewing purchase, not lifetime access or a recurring subscription. It provides seven consecutive days of Study Pro access; an Apple pass runs from the purchase date recorded by Apple, and a website pass adds seven days from activation or from the end of an existing active website pass. Check the access-expiration date shown in your account. Unused time does not pause or extend the pass. Buying a pass does not cancel an existing subscription.

Changes and consumer rights. Future pricing or plan features may change with appropriate notice. A change does not authorize an undisclosed charge. Nothing in these Terms limits non-waivable consumer rights or remedies under applicable law.

8. Payments

Payment processing is provided by Stripe for website purchases and Apple for in-app purchases. OTbuddy does not intentionally store complete payment-card numbers or card security codes. Each provider’s payment services are subject to its applicable terms and privacy practices. The iPhone app is also licensed under Apple’s Standard End User License Agreement.

9. User content and study materials

You retain rights you have in notes, study guides, prompts, and other material you submit. You represent that you have permission to submit that material. You grant OTbuddy the limited rights necessary to process, store, and transform submitted material to provide requested features. Do not upload copyrighted examination questions, proprietary test-preparation banks, confidential course materials, PHI, or other content you do not have the right to use.

10. OTbuddy intellectual property

Except for user content and identified third-party material, OTbuddy's software, original questions, graphics, branding, interface, and original content are protected by applicable intellectual-property laws. Your subscription provides a personal, limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable right to use the Service. You may not scrape, systematically copy, resell, redistribute, reverse engineer, or use OTbuddy content to build a competing question bank or service except as permitted by law.

10A. Copyright and prohibited content use

Except where OTbuddy expressly permits otherwise in writing, you may not copy, reproduce, scrape, systematically extract, redistribute, publish, sell, sublicense, create derivative commercial question banks from, or use OTbuddy proprietary content to train or develop another study product, question bank, or AI system. Third-party materials remain subject to their respective owners’ rights.

10B. Responsible use and account enforcement

You must use OTbuddy and OTbuddy AI lawfully, ethically, and consistently with these Terms and applicable academic and professional standards. Material violations—including unauthorized content sharing or extraction, attempts to compromise the Service, abusive or prohibited AI use, fraud, or circumvention of access controls—may result in restriction, suspension, or termination of access. Where permitted by applicable law and these Terms, access restricted, suspended, or terminated for a material violation may be non-refundable. OTbuddy may preserve appropriate records of enforcement actions and provide any non-waivable rights or remedies required by applicable law.

11. Acceptable use

You may not misuse the Service; interfere with security or operation; attempt unauthorized access; share paid credentials outside your account; use automated means to extract substantial content; submit malware; impersonate others; infringe intellectual-property or privacy rights; or use OTbuddy to facilitate unlawful, deceptive, harmful, or clinically unsafe activity.

12. Availability and changes

Features may change, be corrected, be interrupted, or be discontinued. OTbuddy may suspend access when reasonably necessary for security, abuse prevention, legal compliance, maintenance, or material breach of these Terms.

13. Disclaimers

To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, the Service and its content are provided on an “as is” and “as available” basis without warranties of accuracy, completeness, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, uninterrupted availability, or error-free operation. Nothing in these Terms excludes warranties or rights that cannot legally be excluded.

14. Limitation of liability

To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, OTbuddy and its operators will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for loss of data, opportunity, revenue, examination fees, academic standing, certification, licensure, or professional opportunity arising from use of or inability to use the Service. These limitations do not apply where prohibited by law.

15. Account termination

You may stop using OTbuddy at any time. To delete your account, use Account → Permanently delete account in the iPhone app or Profile & settings → Security on the website. Deletion permanently removes your OTbuddy account and app-owned study data and ends access through that account. Deleting the app or account does not cancel subscription renewal with Apple or Stripe. Cancel renewal with the original provider separately; cancellation is not a prerequisite to requesting account deletion. Deletion does not itself issue a refund or transfer purchases to a new account. Apple refund requests follow Apple’s process; website requests follow Section 7, with all non-waivable legal rights preserved. Information retention is described in the Privacy Notice.

16. Changes to these Terms

OTbuddy may update these Terms as the Service evolves. Material changes will be presented through the Service or another reasonable notice mechanism before they become effective when required by law. Continued use after an effective update constitutes acceptance where permitted by law.

17. Entire agreement; applicable law

These Terms and the Privacy Notice form the agreement governing your use of OTbuddy, subject to rights that cannot be waived under applicable law. If a provision is unenforceable, the remaining provisions remain in effect to the extent permitted by law.

18. Contact

For questions about these Terms, purchases, or your account, contact Marshall McKinley Works LLC through OTbuddy Support. If you cannot sign in, use the inquiry form on the OTbuddy home page. Do not include passwords, payment-card details, or patient information.