Terms of Service

These Terms are an agreement between you and ShobShob Technologies Inc., operating as PickTheCook (“PickTheCook”, “we”, “us”), a corporation incorporated under the Canada Business Corporations Act (corporation no. 1804384-1) with its registered office at 150 Evergreen Mount SW, Calgary, AB T2Y 0L8.

PickTheCook is a marketplace that connects customers with independent bakers and cooks who prepare food in their home kitchens or in licensed commercial or shared kitchens. PickTheCook facilitates discovery, ordering, and payment; it is not the preparer of any food.

Service area

PickTheCook is currently offered only in the Calgary area of Alberta, Canada. Kitchens on PickTheCook must be located in the City of Calgary; we do not onboard kitchens anywhere else. Customers can order for pickup from a kitchen, or for delivery where the kitchen offers it, within the Calgary area. We do not fulfil orders outside Alberta, and the service is not directed to residents of Quebec. We plan to expand as we complete each area's legal requirements.

PickTheCook acts only as a venue and intermediary. Each order is a contract of sale directly between you and the independent seller, who is the merchant of record. PickTheCook is not a party to that contract and is not the seller’s agent. PickTheCook does not produce, prepare, store, inspect, or test any food, and does not warrant any seller’s products, licensing, or food-safety practices.

Independent sellers & compliance

Each seller is solely responsible for identifying, obtaining, maintaining, and complying with every licence, permit, approval, registration, training, insurance, labelling, food-safety, and other legal requirement applicable to their business, premises, food, activities, pickup, and delivery. PickTheCook may review a seller's application or profile against its marketplace standards, but it relies on each seller's contractual representations and self-attestations about licences, permits, and other legal requirements and is not responsible for authenticating sellers' credentials or documents. Any review PickTheCook performs is limited to what PickTheCook states it checked and is not confirmation that a credential is authentic, current, or sufficient. Stripe identity and payout verification is separate and does not verify regulatory compliance.

A seller may voluntarily provide a licence, permit, or other credential for review. A PickTheCook review is not a government approval, inspection, safety certification, endorsement, or guarantee that the credential remains valid or covers every item or activity. PickTheCook may request proof at any time, including through random, periodic, risk-based, complaint-triggered, or regulator-requested reviews, and may hide listings or suspend a seller who does not cooperate or provides invalid, expired, contradictory, altered, or falsified proof. These controls do not make PickTheCook the producer or seller of the food and do not transfer the seller's responsibility to PickTheCook.

Food from independent kitchens & allergens

Items are prepared in sellers' home kitchens or in commercial or shared kitchens, as each seller tells us, and inspection and permit requirements vary by seller, food, premises, and activity. Cross-contamination is possible. PickTheCook makes no “allergy-free”, “nut-free”, or similar guarantees. Customers with severe or life-threatening allergies should exercise extreme caution and contact the seller directly before ordering. You must acknowledge the allergen notice at checkout. Responsibility for safe food handling rests with the seller; responsibility for allergy decisions rests with the customer.

Listings may carry dietary labels such as vegetarian, vegan, halal, kosher or spicy. Sellers choose these labels themselves from the options PickTheCook offers. PickTheCook shows them to you as reported by that seller and lets you filter by them; a filter shows kitchens with at least one item the seller labelled that way. PickTheCook does not check them and does not confirm that an item meets any halal, kosher, or other dietary or religious standard; a label is not a certification. No kitchen on PickTheCook can rule out cross-contamination. If a dietary or religious requirement matters to you, ask the seller before you order.

Pricing, fees & payments

Prices are set by the independent seller. At checkout you pay the seller’s listed prices, any seller-set delivery fee, applicable taxes, and an optional tip. Tax may differ by item and may be zero-rated or taxable under applicable law. The independent seller is the supplier of the food; PickTheCook provides the marketplace and charges the seller a marketplace commission — it is not added to your price. Tips go entirely to the seller; PickTheCook takes no share of tips. PickTheCook may collect or remit taxes where required or permitted by law. When you place a scheduled order it is sent to the seller to accept first; you are asked to pay only after the seller accepts, and the order is confirmed once your payment succeeds. When you pay, your card is first authorized — a temporary hold — and your bank checks the billing postal code you enter against the one it has on file. If it matches, the payment is taken at once and your order is confirmed. If it does not match, or your bank cannot check it, the hold is released and nothing is charged; you can correct the postal code or use another card while your time to pay lasts; after three holds that fail the check, the order can no longer be paid. A released hold may still appear in your banking app for a short time until your bank removes it. You then have a limited time to pay — normally 60 minutes, and less when your pickup or delivery time is near, because the payment window always closes at least 15 minutes before your pickup or delivery window starts. The time remaining is shown on your order page; once it runs out you can no longer start a payment, and an unpaid order is cancelled automatically, with nothing charged. An Available now order works differently: you authorize your card at checkout, which places a temporary hold, and the same postal-code check applies (a hold that fails it is released at once, before the order reaches the seller; the seller's own Stripe account still records the released hold), and the seller has a short time to accept. Your card is only charged if the seller accepts; if they decline or do not respond in time, the order is cancelled and the hold is released. Either way, you are never charged for an order the seller did not accept, and if your card is ever charged for an order that was not confirmed, PickTheCook asks the seller to refund you in full. The seller is the merchant of record and receives your payment through their own Stripe account; PickTheCook does not hold your funds. The Privacy Policy describes what the seller can see about your payment.

Notes you add to an order. Anything you write in the order notes reaches the seller as soon as you send the request (for an Available now order, as soon as your card hold passes the postal-code check), which is before you pay. Keep your street address, postal code, unit or suite number, and door, gate, or buzzer codes out of the notes; we check the notes automatically and may ask you to take those details out before the request is sent. For a delivery order, put a unit or suite number in the unit field at checkout instead — the seller can see the delivery address only after the order is confirmed and paid.

Your account & security

You are responsible for keeping your sign-in credentials confidential and for activity under your account. For your security, we limit repeated sign-in attempts and may temporarily lock an account after repeated failed attempts. We may suspend accounts or listings where reasonably necessary to protect customers, sellers, or the platform — for example on suspected fraud, abuse, or a food-safety concern.

Cancellations & refunds

You may cancel free of charge before the seller marks the order “Preparing”. If you had not yet paid, nothing is charged. If you had already paid, the seller — who is the merchant of record — issues your refund through Stripe; PickTheCook notifies them and does not move the seller's funds, so a refund shows as complete once Stripe has processed it. After “Preparing”, cancellations are handled case by case through a support request; there are no automatic refunds for change of mind once preparation has started.

Custom orders (made by accepting a seller's quote to a custom request) work differently: you pay the full quoted price after you accept the quote, and the order is confirmed once your payment succeeds. The same limited payment window applies, running from the moment you accept the quote. You may cancel a custom order up to 72 hours before the pickup time for a full refund (issued by the seller through Stripe). Within 72 hours of pickup the seller has committed ingredients and time, so the payment is not automatically refundable; if something goes wrong, open a support request and we will review it with both parties. Quotes are valid for 48 hours; nothing in this section limits rights you have under Alberta consumer-protection law that cannot be waived by agreement.

Liability

PickTheCook is a marketplace facilitator, not a food producer. Each seller is responsible for the safety, preparation, labelling, and quality of the food they sell. To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, PickTheCook is not liable for allergic reactions, foodborne illness, or other harm arising from items prepared by independent sellers, and PickTheCook's total liability for any claim connected to an order is limited to the amount you paid PickTheCook for that order. Nothing in these terms excludes or limits PickTheCook's liability for its own negligence, wilful misconduct, privacy obligations, or any other duty to the extent applicable law does not permit that liability to be excluded or limited, and nothing limits or excludes rights you have under Alberta consumer-protection law that cannot be waived by agreement.

Changes to these terms

We may update these terms from time to time. Changes are posted on this page with an updated "Last updated" date, and material changes will be highlighted in the app or by email. Continuing to use PickTheCook after a change takes effect means you accept the updated terms.

Governing law

These terms are governed by the laws of the Province of Alberta and the federal laws of Canada applicable in Alberta. Questions about these terms can be sent to info@pickthecook.com (or support@pickthecook.com for privacy or incident matters).