These twelve clauses are the full agreement between you and CalcWise. They run in order; cross-references
between them refer to the numbered sections below.
01
Acceptance of these terms
By accessing or using calcwise.org (the “Site”), you agree to be bound by these Terms of
Service (these “Terms”), whether or not you create any account — and since CalcWise has
none, your use of the Site is the only acceptance mechanism there is. These Terms apply to every visitor,
without exception. If you do not agree to these Terms, you must not access or use the Site. You represent
that you are of legal age to form a binding contract in your jurisdiction, or that you are accessing the
Site only with the involvement and consent of a parent or legal guardian. CalcWise may update these Terms
from time to time as described in Section 10; your continued use of the Site after an update takes effect
constitutes your acceptance of the revised Terms.
02
The calculators are estimates, not professional advice
The calculators, tools, guides, and other content on the Site are provided for general informational and
educational purposes only. They produce planning estimates based on the inputs you provide and the
formulas, rates, and thresholds published by the IRS and other federal agencies at the time each
calculator was last reviewed. They are not tax advice, legal advice, accounting advice, or financial
advice. They are not a substitute for the individualized services of a qualified CPA, enrolled agent, tax
attorney, or financial planner, and a calculator's output is not, and must never be treated as, a filed
tax return, a professional opinion, or written advice on which you are entitled to rely for
penalty-protection or any other purpose.
Aaron Jegla, the founder of CalcWise, is not a Certified Public Accountant, an enrolled agent, an
attorney, or a Certified Financial Planner, and holds none of those licenses or designations. He is both
the author and the reviewer of every calculator on the Site — a self-review process that is
disclosed in full on the About page and is expressly weaker than
an independent review by a licensed professional, though stronger than no review at all. That disclosure
is incorporated into these Terms by reference. You are solely responsible for independently verifying any
figure, rate, threshold, or result against current IRS guidance, the applicable Internal Revenue Code
section, or the advice of a qualified professional before you rely on it for any decision where real
money, a real filing, or a real legal consequence is at stake.
03
No professional relationship
Your use of the Site does not create a CPA-client relationship, an attorney-client relationship, an
advisory relationship, a fiduciary relationship, or any other professional relationship between you and
CalcWise or Aaron Jegla. No duty of care is owed to you beyond what is expressly stated in these Terms,
and nothing on the Site — including any calculator output, article, FAQ answer, or editorial
content — should be construed as personalized advice tailored to your specific facts and
circumstances. If you send an email to aaron@calcwise.org, that message does not create a professional or advisory relationship of any kind,
and CalcWise is under no obligation to respond to it or to provide you with individualized guidance in
reply.
04
Accuracy of figures; no warranty
Tax rates, contribution limits, phase-outs, and other inflation-adjusted or legislated figures change
over time, sometimes mid-year, and sometimes with retroactive effect. CalcWise reviews and dates every
figure used in its calculators, and the sourcing and verification process behind that review is described
on the Methodology page, which is incorporated into these
Terms by reference. Notwithstanding that review process, CalcWise does not warrant, represent, or
guarantee that any figure, rate, formula, or result on the Site is current, complete, or applicable to
your situation as of the date you access it. You are solely responsible for confirming that any figure or
rule you rely on is still in effect and applies to your specific facts. This clause should be read
together with the disclaimer of warranties in Section 08, which governs the legal effect of any
inaccuracy.
05
Acceptable use
You agree not to:
-
(a) scrape, crawl, spider, or otherwise harvest content from the Site by automated means;
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(b) submit automated, bulk, or programmatic queries to any calculator;
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(c) reverse engineer, decompile, disassemble, or otherwise attempt to extract the source code of
any calculator engine, which is CalcWise's original work;
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(d) republish, redistribute, mirror, or present the Site's calculators or content as your own, or
use the Site to build, train, or populate a competing product or service;
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(e) use the Site in any way that damages, disables, overburdens, or impairs it, or that interferes
with any other person's use and enjoyment of it; or
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(f) use the Site for any unlawful purpose or in violation of any applicable law or regulation.
For the avoidance of doubt, ordinary personal or business use of the calculators is expressly permitted
and encouraged, including generating a share link for your own inputs, printing a result for your own
records, and sharing a printed or linked result with your accountant, bookkeeper, or business partner.
06
Intellectual property
The Site's original content — including its prose, articles, calculator source code, visual design,
the selection and arrangement of its calculators, and the CalcWise name and logo — is the property
of CalcWise and is protected by applicable copyright, trademark, and other intellectual-property laws.
Nothing in these Terms grants you any right to use the CalcWise name, logo, or branding without prior
written permission. For clarity, the underlying tax rules, statutory provisions, IRS forms, published
rates, and formulas that a calculator implements are facts drawn from public law and IRS guidance; they
are not owned by CalcWise, by Aaron Jegla, or by anyone, and nothing in this Section restricts your
ability to use or rely on the tax law itself. You may not reproduce, republish, redistribute, or create
derivative works from CalcWise's original content described above without CalcWise's prior written
permission, except that you may print or share an individual calculator's result — including via
the Site's built-in share-link feature, which encodes only your own inputs into the page URL at your
request — for your own personal or business use.
07
Links to third-party websites
The Site contains links to third-party websites, including IRS.gov and the websites of other federal
agencies, that CalcWise does not own, operate, or control. These links are provided for your convenience
and to support the sourcing described on the Methodology page.
CalcWise is not responsible for the content, accuracy, availability, or privacy practices of any
third-party website, and including a link does not imply CalcWise's endorsement of that site. You should
read the terms of use and privacy policy of any third-party website before using it or relying on its
content.
08
Disclaimer of warranties; limitation of liability
The Site and every calculator on it are provided on an “AS IS” and “AS AVAILABLE”
basis, with all faults, and without warranties of any kind, whether express, implied, statutory, or
otherwise. To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, CalcWise and Aaron Jegla expressly disclaim
all warranties, express or implied, including without limitation the implied warranties of
merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, and non-infringement, and any warranties
arising out of course of dealing, course of performance, or usage of trade. Without limiting the
foregoing, CalcWise makes no warranty that the Site will meet your requirements, that it will be
uninterrupted, timely, secure, or error-free, that any errors will be corrected, or as to the accuracy,
reliability, timeliness, or currency of any calculator, formula, figure, or result. Some jurisdictions do
not allow the exclusion of certain implied warranties, so some of the exclusions in this Section may not
apply to you.
To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, in no event shall CalcWise, Aaron Jegla, or their
respective successors and assigns be liable for any special, incidental, indirect, punitive, or
consequential damages whatsoever — including without limitation damages for lost profits, lost
data, business interruption, loss of business opportunity, or any decision made or filing submitted in
reliance on the Site — arising out of or in any way connected with your use of, or inability to
use, the Site or any calculator, whether based on warranty, contract, tort (including negligence),
statute, or any other legal theory, and even if CalcWise has been advised of the possibility of such
damages. Because the Site is provided free of charge, you agree that CalcWise's total aggregate liability
to you for any claim arising out of or relating to these Terms or your use of the Site, however arising,
shall not exceed one hundred U.S. dollars (USD 100). This limitation applies even if any remedy set
forth in these Terms is found to have failed of its essential purpose. Some states or jurisdictions do
not allow the limitation or exclusion of liability for incidental or consequential damages, so the above
limitation or exclusion may not apply to you, and you may have additional rights that vary by
jurisdiction.
09
Governing law and disputes
These Terms, and any dispute arising out of or relating to them or your use of the Site, are governed by
and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of Michigan, without regard to its conflict-of-laws
principles. Your use of the Site may also be subject to other local, state, national, or international
laws depending on where you access it from. If a dispute arises between you and CalcWise, the parties
agree to first attempt to resolve it informally by contacting CalcWise at
aaron@calcwise.org and describing the issue in
reasonable detail, before either party initiates a formal legal proceeding. Nothing in this Section
prevents either party from seeking injunctive or other equitable relief in a court of competent
jurisdiction located in Michigan at any time.
10
Changes to these terms
CalcWise may modify, update, or replace these Terms at any time, at its sole discretion, to reflect
changes in the Site, the law, or how CalcWise operates. When these Terms change, the “Last
reviewed” date at the bottom of this page is updated to reflect the revision. It is your
responsibility to review these Terms periodically. Your continued access to or use of the Site after any
revised Terms take effect constitutes your acceptance of the revised Terms. If you do not agree to a
revised version of these Terms, your only recourse is to stop using the Site.
11
Severability and waiver
If any provision of these Terms is held by a court or other tribunal of competent jurisdiction to be
invalid, illegal, or unenforceable for any reason, that provision shall be changed and interpreted to
accomplish the objectives of the original provision to the greatest extent possible under applicable law,
and the remaining provisions of these Terms shall continue in full force and effect. CalcWise's failure
to exercise or enforce any right or provision of these Terms shall not operate as a waiver of that right
or provision, and no waiver of any provision shall be effective unless made in writing. CalcWise's waiver
of any breach of these Terms by you shall not constitute a waiver of any subsequent breach.
12
Contact
If you have questions about these Terms, email
aaron@calcwise.org. CalcWise is a one-person
operation, and every message is read personally, though a reply isn't guaranteed on any particular
timeline. For the full contact page, including how to report a wrong number or request a calculator,
see the Contact page; for questions about how CalcWise handles
data, see the Privacy Policy; for questions about how
calculators are built, sourced, and reviewed, see the
Methodology page; for background on who builds and
reviews CalcWise, see the About page.