Terms of Use

These terms are between Diwan HR, a service operated by Najdat Talmsani Audeh ("Diwan", "we", "us"), and the company using Diwan (the "Company"). The service agreement signed with the Company supplements these terms; where they differ, the service agreement prevails. The Privacy Policy forms part of these terms.

1. The service

Diwan is a human resources, payroll and attendance system for companies in Syria: employee records and organisation structure, attendance and punching, leave, requests and approvals, payroll, payslips and statements, notifications, recruitment, reports, and the "Hala" assistant. It runs in the browser and in the Android and iPhone apps, and is offered in two ways:

• Diwan Cloud: hosted by us, at an address dedicated to the Company.
• On-premises edition: on the Company's own server, under licence and with our support.

Plan features, the number of employees and devices, and the level of support are set out in the service agreement. We develop the service continuously, so over time we may add, change or remove features.

2. Account and users

• We set up the Company's account and appoint the system administrator and the first payroll officer named in the service agreement. From then on, the Company adds its own users and assigns roles and permissions itself.
• The Company is responsible for who it grants access to and with which permissions, for closing the accounts of people who leave, and for its users' protection of their passwords and sign-in codes.
• Each user is responsible for their own account and must not share their access with anyone.
• If the Company notices unauthorised access, it can end sessions from the interface and should notify us at [email protected].

3. The Company's responsibility for data and settings

3.1 Accuracy of data

The Company is responsible for the accuracy of everything it enters or imports: employee data, contracts, salaries and pay components, the wage registered with social insurance, account numbers, attendance and corrections, the exchange rates it enters, and every setting it selects. Diwan calculates on the basis of what is entered.

3.2 Payroll, tax and social insurance: Diwan is a tool

• Diwan is a calculation and organisation tool, not a legal, accounting or tax adviser. Legal responsibility for salaries, social insurance, tax and settlements towards employees and authorities rests with the Company.
• Social insurance rates and tax brackets in Diwan are locked to the legal values through rule packs that we update, and the Company cannot modify them. For settings that affect employee entitlements (such as the minimum wage, overtime and leave), the system refuses to save anything less favourable than the law and allows terms more favourable to the employee.
• These safeguards are aids, not a guarantee of compliance. We work to keep the rule packs correct and current, but the Company must verify results with its accountant before approving a payroll run, paying, or filing with authorities. A payroll run is closed only through the Company's own approvals.
• Tax base: by default Diwan uses the actual wage, as the decree provides. If the Company chooses in its settings to calculate tax on the wage registered with social insurance, the system displays a clear warning, and this choice is entirely at the Company's own responsibility; any resulting difference, penalty or claim is borne by the Company.
• Who bears an employee's tax (the employee or the Company) is a setting in each employee's pay profile, and the Company is responsible for that choice.

3.3 Settings and approvals

Approval workflows, permissions, payroll visibility levels, data deletion periods, sign-in methods and all other settings are chosen by the Company, which is responsible for their effects.

3.4 Employees and candidates

The Company is responsible (as controller) for its employees' and candidates' data, and we process it on the Company's behalf (Privacy Policy, Section 2). The Company is responsible for informing its employees of the processing, obtaining any consent required by law, and responding to their requests.

4. Acceptable use

The following are prohibited: using Diwan for anything unlawful; attempting to access another company's data or parts of the system without authorisation; deliberate probing, intrusion or overloading of the system; decompiling the application to copy or resell it; or uploading files containing malware. If this occurs, we may suspend the account or user immediately to protect the service and other customers.

5. Hala (artificial intelligence)

• Hala runs on an AI service key on the Company's own account; the cost and the provider's terms are the Company's. The Company can turn Hala off or remove the key at any time.
• Hala does not calculate: numbers in its answers come from Diwan's engine. It changes nothing without the user's explicit confirmation. Even so, its answers are assistance only, and decisions remain with people.

6. Availability, support and backups

6.1 Diwan Cloud

• We work to keep Diwan available at all times, but we do not commit to a specific availability percentage and do not guarantee uninterrupted operation.
• Planned maintenance: we notify the Company at least 48 hours in advance and try to schedule it outside working hours. Urgent security fixes may be applied without advance notice where delay would put data at risk.
• Backups: every night we take a backup that is encrypted on the server before it leaves it, and store it on separate storage in another country (the server is in Finland and the backups in Germany). Every month, a restore of the latest backup is tested automatically, and we are alerted if the test fails.
• Attendance and punching continue to work on phones without a connection, and punches are delivered when the connection returns.
• The WhatsApp channel runs through an intermediary platform, not the official WhatsApp Business service, and may be interrupted. Notifications continue to be delivered inside Diwan and by email.

6.2 Support response times

Support tickets are raised inside Diwan, and their targets are counted in working hours: Sunday to Thursday, 9:00 to 17:00 Damascus time, excluding Syrian public holidays.

The "Cloud, managed" plan receives the targets of the next higher priority. These are targets we work to, not a guarantee carrying compensation.

6.3 On-premises edition

• The server, its backups, its security and the network are the Company's responsibility. The system takes encrypted backups to a second disk at the Company's premises and alerts the Company if a backup is overdue, but keeping copies off the server and testing restoration is the Company's responsibility.
• Encryption keys are held only by the Company, on the recovery sheet. Diwan keeps no copy of them or of the Company's backups, so we cannot recover the data if they are lost.
• Expiry of the licence or support, or exceeding the employee count, does not lock anything in the system. Only updates and new rule packs stop until renewal.

7. Payment and invoices

• Prices, plan and contract term, as well as invoicing dates and payment due dates, are set out in the service agreement.
• We issue periodic invoices; the employee count invoiced is the greater of the number agreed in the contract and the number of active employees at the start of the period, as set out in the service agreement.
• Payment is by Sham Cash or cash, or any other method we agree. The Company can view its invoices and receipts inside Diwan.
• The Hala API key and the related provider usage are charged to the Company directly by the provider, not included in our invoice.

8. Late payment and suspension

• If an invoice is overdue, the system shows a notice to the system administrator and finance, and we contact the Company.
• If the delay continues, we may suspend the account after prior written notice, in accordance with the periods set out in the service agreement. Suspension is carried out manually by the Diwan team, not automatically.
• During suspension: administrative accounts are locked, but employee accounts keep working (employees can view their payslips and data and punch), and verification links for issued letters keep working. Data is not affected.
• Once the amounts due are paid, the account is restored as it was.

9. Termination and data export

• Either party may terminate the contract by giving 30 days' written notice.
• In the event of a material breach of these terms or of the service agreement, the other party may give written notice, and if the breach is not remedied within 15 days of that notice, may terminate the contract immediately. This does not limit immediate suspension under Section 4 to protect the service.
• After termination: the Company's account is suspended and its data remains stored. On request, we provide a copy of its data (Excel for employees and closed payroll runs); before termination, the Company can also export its reports to Excel and PDF from the system itself.
• Full deletion takes place only upon the Company's written request, 30 days after the request, and is irreversible. Deleted data remains in the encrypted backups until it rotates out (about one year at most).
• On-premises edition: the data is already at the Company's premises and remains there.

10. Ownership

• The Company's data belongs to the Company. We use it only to provide the service to the Company.
• Diwan (the software, apps, design and brand) belongs to us. The Company has a non-exclusive right of use for the contract term, and may not copy, sell or redistribute it.
• Letters and payslips produced by the system carry the Company's letterhead and logo. By default they include a small footer line "Issued via Diwan · diwanhr.com", which the Company can turn off in its settings.

11. Limitation of liability

• To the extent permitted by law, Diwan is provided "as is", and we undertake to work with reasonable professional care.
• We are not liable for: the consequences of incorrect data or settings entered by the Company; the Company's decisions regarding payroll, tax, social insurance and its employees (Section 3); outages of internet, electricity or third-party services (the AI provider, the WhatsApp platform, push notification services); the on-premises server, its network, backups and keys; or loss of profit or indirect damage.
• Our total liability for all claims shall not exceed the amounts paid by the Company to Diwan in the 12 months preceding the event giving rise to the claim.
• These limits do not apply where the law does not permit them.

12. Confidentiality

Each party keeps confidential the other party's information learned through the service, and uses it only to perform the contract. The Diwan team does not access the Company's data except under a grant from the Company (Privacy Policy, Section 7.2).

13. Changes to these terms

If we make a material change to these terms, we will notify the Company 30 days before it takes effect. If the Company does not agree, it may terminate the contract before the change takes effect.

14. Governing law and disputes

These terms are governed by the laws in force in the Syrian Arab Republic. The parties will try to resolve any dispute through amicable negotiation within 30 days of written notice from either party. If it is not resolved, it will be referred to the competent courts of Damascus.

15. Contact

[email protected]

Diwan HR, a service operated by Najdat Talmsani Audeh · Damascus, Syria