YOWLTerms of Use
These terms govern your use of this platform (“the Platform”), accessible at yowl.co.za, operated by CDSoft (Pty) Ltd (Registration No. 2023/618547/07), 16 Sering Street, Red Swallow Room, Stellenbosch, Western Cape, 7600. You can reach us via our contact page.
1. What this Platform is
The Platform is an online software tool for recruiters and hiring organisations. It gives an organisation a place to manage its recruitment — job listings, candidate records, and hiring pipeline — along with a branded public web presence for its open roles.
We are not a recruitment agency. We do not recruit candidates, shortlist for employers, submit applications on anyone’s behalf, or act as an intermediary in any hiring decision. We build and maintain the software — the recruiting is done by you, our customer, using your own judgement and acting in your own name.
Where the Platform provides your organisation with application email addresses (e.g. j22@yowl.co.za), those are mailboxes we host for your organisation. Applications sent to them are made to you, not to us — we route and store the mail as your operator. How we handle applicants in that flow is set out in our Applicant Terms & Privacy Notice.
This positioning is deliberate and legally significant. Under the Employment Services Act 4 of 2014, a private employment agency is an entity that recruits and places candidates. We do neither — in the same way that an accounting software vendor is not an accounting firm. We provide software; you act on your own behalf at all times.
Using this Platform does not create an employment relationship between you and CDSoft (Pty) Ltd, or between any candidate and any organisation, unless a separate employment contract is concluded directly between those parties.
2. Who may use the Platform
You must be 18 or older to create an account.
Accounts belong to individuals acting for an organisation — a recruitment business, an employer hiring for itself, or an individual recruiter. By registering an organisation you warrant that you are authorised to act for it and to accept these terms in its name.
By creating an account you confirm you have read and accepted these terms.
3. Your organisation, listings, and candidate data
Ownership and licence
You own your content. When you register an organisation or post a job listing, you grant the Platform a non-exclusive licence to display and index that content for as long as your account is active. We do not sell your content to third parties.
Your organisation name and address
Registering an organisation reserves a Platform web address (e.g. your-name.yowl.co.za). You warrant that the organisation name and address you choose do not infringe anyone else’s rights — including trademarks and company names. We may reclaim an address that infringes rights, impersonates another business, or violates these terms.
Your responsibility for accuracy
You are responsible for what you publish. Organisation details and job listings must be truthful and not misleading. We do not verify the information you submit — we rely on you to keep it accurate and up to date. If we discover content that is false or deceptive, we may remove it and may suspend the account.
Don’t impersonate anyone, and don’t use the Platform to harass, spam, or discriminate.
Job listings
Job listings must represent genuine open roles. We may remove listings that appear fraudulent, misleading, or in breach of the Employment Equity Act 1998. We cannot independently verify every listing — if a role is no longer available or the listing contains inaccuracies, that is your responsibility to correct or withdraw.
The Platform may offer distribution of your listings to affiliated job boards — currently gigz.co.za and permz.co.za, also operated by CDSoft (Pty) Ltd. Where you choose to distribute a listing, the listing appears on those boards in your organisation’s name and remains your responsibility, and by enabling distribution you accept the destination board’s Terms of Use (gigz, permz) on your organisation’s behalf.
Candidate data you bring onto the Platform
The Platform lets you store and manage candidate information — applications, CVs, contact details, notes. That information is personal information under the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (POPIA). For candidate data you collect and manage, your organisation is the responsible party and CDSoft (Pty) Ltd acts as an operator processing it on your instructions.
You warrant that you have a lawful basis for the candidate data you bring onto or collect through the Platform, that candidates have been appropriately informed, and that you honour their rights under POPIA — including access, correction, and deletion. If a candidate asks us directly to remove their data from your organisation’s records, we will refer the request to you and may act on it ourselves where the law requires.
You may use candidate personal information only for the recruitment purpose for which it was provided — assessing and communicating with the candidate about the role they applied for, or roles you are actively recruiting for. You must not repurpose it (for example, unrelated marketing) without a lawful basis, and any communications you send to candidates must comply with POPIA, including its direct-marketing rules (section 69).
AI-assisted candidate assessment
The Platform may offer AI-assisted tools that summarise and rank applications against a role to help you review candidates. These tools are decision-support only. They do not, and are not intended to, make hiring decisions: you retain sole control over every decision to progress, shortlist, or decline a candidate, and the Platform does not automatically reject or filter out candidates on your behalf. You must not treat a tool’s output as the sole basis for declining a candidate without your own review.
When you use these tools you remain responsible for your compliance with the Employment Equity Act 1998, POPIA, and all applicable law — including informing candidates that automated assessment is used and honouring their right to a human review. Applicants who apply through a Platform application address are shown our Applicant Terms & Privacy Notice before their application is processed; for candidates you bring onto the Platform by other means, providing an equivalent notice is your responsibility.
The assessment tools are provided “as is”. We make no representation or warranty as to the accuracy, reliability, fairness, or freedom from bias of any summary, score, or ranking, or its fitness for any hiring decision. Outputs are generated by AI and may be wrong.
Responsibility for what you post
If you post a listing or register an organisation on behalf of a company, you warrant that you are authorised to act for that company.
Your organisation is solely responsible for the content of each listing and for its compliance with applicable law — including the Employment Equity Act 1998, the Employment Services Act 2014, and advertising and consumer protection legislation. The Platform displays listings; it does not author, endorse, or verify them.
You indemnify CDSoft (Pty) Ltd against any claim, loss, or damage arising from content you post on the Platform or distribute to affiliated job boards, or from your handling of candidate data — including sharing or distributing candidate data to third parties without a lawful basis, claims of discrimination (including any arising from your use of the Platform’s AI-assisted assessment tools), misleading advertising, POPIA breaches within your organisation’s responsibility, or infringement of third-party rights. This applies to every member of your organisation’s account. In plain terms: if what you publish or how you treat candidates causes a legal problem, that problem is yours, not ours — wherever the listing appears.
4. Employment contract documents
The Platform offers tools that generate standard employment documents — currently a fixed-term employment contract — by inserting the details your organisation enters into a fixed standard template. The Platform may also offer tools for sending a generated contract to the person concerned for electronic signature.
Templates, not legal advice
These are standard document templates, not legal advice. CDSoft (Pty) Ltd is not a law firm and does not provide legal services; using these tools does not create an attorney–client or any other professional relationship. Generated documents are provided “as is”: we make no representation or warranty that a generated document is legally sufficient, up to date, or suitable for any particular hire or set of circumstances. If you are unsure whether the template fits your situation, take legal advice before using it.
The contract is yours
A generated contract is a contract between your organisation and the person you are hiring. CDSoft (Pty) Ltd is not a party to it and does not review, verify, or approve it. You are responsible for the accuracy of every detail you enter and for checking the generated document before you issue or sign it.
The template’s built-in statements
The template records, among its statutory particulars, that no bargaining council agreement or sectoral determination covers your business and that the employee receives no cash payments or payments in kind beyond the stated pay. By generating a contract you confirm that these statements are true for your organisation. If a bargaining council agreement or sectoral determination does cover your business, the template is not suitable and you must not use it.
Employment law compliance is yours
Your organisation remains solely responsible for compliance with employment law in respect of any contract you generate — including the Basic Conditions of Employment Act, the Labour Relations Act (including its fixed-term employee provisions), and the National Minimum Wage Act. The Platform does not check the pay you enter against the national minimum wage, which is adjusted from time to time (typically on 1 March each year) — that check is yours.
Electronic signing
Where the Platform is used to send a generated contract for electronic signature, the Platform acts as a conduit: it delivers the document to the signee, records the signature event (including time, email address, and network address, as evidence of who signed), and stores the signed document for your organisation. The signature applied is an ordinary electronic signature under the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act 25 of 2002, which is valid for employment contracts.
Responsibility and indemnity
You indemnify CDSoft (Pty) Ltd against any claim, loss, or damage arising from a document generated with these tools or from its use — including any claim, dispute, award, or judgment involving a person to whom you issued such a document, whether before the CCMA, a bargaining council, the Labour Court, or any other forum. In plain terms: the contracts you generate and sign are your contracts — disputes under them are yours, not ours.
5. No outcomes guaranteed
We do not guarantee that a job listing will attract applicants, that candidates sourced through the Platform will be suitable, or that any hire will result. Decisions about who to approach and who to hire rest entirely with you — the Platform has no part in those decisions.
6. Free and paid features
Core features may be free or paid — the relevant pricing page on the Platform is the authoritative source at the time of purchase.
If a paid feature is purchased, the Consumer Protection Act 68 of 2008 gives you a 5-business-day cooling-off right for electronic transactions. Refund requests within this window will be honoured.
7. What we may do with your account
We may suspend or close an account that violates these terms, posts fraudulent content, mishandles candidate data, or is used to harass others. Where practical we’ll give notice and a chance to respond before taking action.
8. Limitation of liability
To the extent permitted by law, CDSoft (Pty) Ltd’s liability for any claim arising from use of the Platform is limited to the amount you paid us in the 3 months preceding the claim. We are not liable for indirect losses, lost opportunities, or outcomes of any hiring decision made using the Platform.
9. Governing law
These terms are governed by South African law. Disputes will be resolved in the courts of South Africa. If a provision of these terms conflicts with the Consumer Protection Act or any other applicable SA legislation, the legislation prevails.
10. Changes
We may update these terms. If a change materially affects your rights, we will notify active users by email at least 14 days before the change takes effect. Continued use after that date constitutes acceptance.
Questions? Contact us