South Pacific School of Missions

SPSM — TERMS OF SERVICE

Effective date: 16/10/26

Overview

These Terms of Service govern access to https://spsm.online and courses, online teaching, assessments, live sessions and related services provided by the South Pacific Australia School of Missions (SPSM). SPSM is operated by Perth Church of Christ Limited (ABN 69 166 789 260), in collaboration with participating churches.

By registering or purchasing a course, you agree to these Terms and acknowledge the SPSM Privacy Policy. Any optional permission to share your details with outside church leaders or publish identifiable media will be sought separately and is not granted solely by accepting these Terms.

1. Students and accounts

SPSM is generally open to anyone who wishes to enrol, including eligible young people. You must provide accurate registration information, keep your account secure and not share your login with another person.

If you are under 16, you must have the permission and active involvement of a parent or legal guardian to use the Thinkific platform. A parent or guardian must accept applicable terms on behalf of a young person where required by law. If you are under 18, SPSM may request parent or guardian authorisation for enrolment or payment. Contact SPSM before proceeding if you are not sure whether you have the required permission.

2. What the course provides

SPSM offers recorded lesson videos, quizzes, assignments, completion certificates for students who satisfy relevant requirements, and live online classes via Zoom when scheduled. Course content and assessments may be updated in a reasonable manner to keep the programme useful and accurate.

Completing SPSM does not guarantee employment, a ministry appointment, accreditation, or a particular professional or personal outcome.

3. Price and payment plans

The currently advertised standard choices are an upfront course payment of $450, or 24 monthly instalments of $20, totaling $480 across the plan. The currency, any applicable taxes and the final amount payable will be shown at Thinkific checkout. The instalment total is $30 more than the upfront price.

Payments are processed through Thinkific Payments. By selecting a payment plan, you authorise the scheduled charges shown at checkout. The instalment plan is a way of paying for the course, not a monthly subscription that automatically ends if you stop watching lessons. If you wish to withdraw or stop future charges, contact us to request a review; a payment plan is not cancelled unless SPSM confirms the cancellation or applicable law gives you that right.

If you miss payments, we may contact you, seek to resolve the problem and, after reasonable notice where practicable, restrict access in accordance with the platform and applicable law. Any discount or fee waiver must be approved by SPSM.

4. Withdrawals, cancellations and refunds

We do not ordinarily provide an automatic refund merely because a student changes their mind or voluntarily withdraws from a course. However, SPSM aims to be fair and is willing to consider refund requests, partial refunds or cancellation of remaining instalments case by case. Email [email protected] with your circumstances and payment details.

Any approved refund or instalment cancellation will be confirmed to you. Refunds are ordinarily processed through the original payment provider where practicable. Cancellation of an instalment plan may affect ongoing course access; SPSM will explain this when agreeing the arrangement.

Nothing in this section excludes or limits any mandatory rights or remedies under applicable Australian, New Zealand or other consumer law, including remedies where a service fails to meet applicable guarantees or is not supplied as agreed.

5. Ongoing access, platform changes and outages

SPSM currently intends that students whose course fees have been paid, or who remain up to date under an agreed payment plan, may continue to revisit available course videos and other materials for the foreseeable future, including after completion, without a fixed expiry date. This is continuing access, not a promise of lifetime access or perpetual availability of Thinkific.

SPSM may change hosting providers, revise materials, retire outdated lessons or discontinue a programme in the future. We will take reasonable steps to give affected students notice of substantial changes and, where practicable, offer equivalent access or a reasonable alternative. We will honour rights and remedies that cannot be excluded by law.

Online services may be temporarily unavailable because of maintenance, outages or events beyond our reasonable control.

6. Course materials and permitted use

Unless otherwise indicated, lessons, slides, recordings, course text and teaching resources remain the intellectual property of SPSM or their respective authors/licensors. When enrolled, you receive a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable permission to access material for your own study and ministry development.

You may download resources explicitly made available for download and use them for your individual learning. You may not resell, publish, publicly stream, distribute course recordings, share account access or systematically copy course content without permission. If you want to distribute materials to a church group or reuse recordings in another programme, please ask SPSM for permission. Rights granted by law remain unaffected.

7. Assignments, respectful participation and confidentiality

You keep ownership of original work you submit. You give SPSM the limited permission necessary to receive, store, review, assess and retain that material for course administration and completion records.

Be respectful in your interactions and do not harass others, violate confidentiality, upload harmful material or share another person’s identifiable pastoral or private information without appropriate authority. When discussing ministry situations, anonymise individuals and avoid details that could identify them. The course platform is not a confidential pastoral counselling service.

SPSM may moderate or remove inappropriate material or suspend access for serious misuse, subject to applicable law and reasonable process.

8. Zoom sessions and recordings

SPSM may record live Zoom classes for educational use and replays available to authorised students. Participants will be informed when a class is recorded. Recordings normally focus on the presenter but could capture students’ voices, names, video feeds or contributions.

You should not record, copy or distribute SPSM sessions independently without permission. You may keep your camera off and microphone muted and can contact SPSM about alternatives for contributing without appearing in a recording.

SPSM may publicly publish an identifiable recording or image of a student only where it has obtained the appropriate separate media permission or another valid legal basis. Accepting these Terms by itself is not permission for public media use. These arrangements are further described in our Privacy Policy.

9. Privacy and church-leader contact

SPSM collects and processes student information as described in its Privacy Policy. Administrative records are ordinarily accessible to authorised SPSM directors. Where SPSM proposes sharing identifiable student lists with outside church leaders for ministry development or follow-up, it will obtain any separately required consent and apply the limitations explained in the Privacy Policy.

Church leaders who receive information must not treat student lists as unrestricted mailing lists or public directories. Students can ask to review or withdraw optional consent for future disclosures by emailing SPSM.

10. External service providers

SPSM uses Thinkific, Thinkific Payments and Zoom. Access to those systems may be subject to additional provider conditions and technical requirements. SPSM is not responsible for content or services offered by unrelated websites linked from the course site, except where applicable law provides otherwise.

11. Changes, enforcement and ending access

We may reasonably update course content and these Terms from time to time. Material changes affecting existing students will be communicated where practicable and new consent will be sought if legally required.

We may suspend or terminate access in response to material breaches, security risks, non-payment or misuse, but we will use reasonable processes where practicable and preserve mandatory legal rights. You may request account closure; however, leaving the website does not in itself cancel an agreed instalment payment plan.

12. Legal rights and contact

To the extent the law allows, SPSM does not guarantee uninterrupted availability or any particular ministry outcome and is not responsible for losses outside its reasonable control. Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits rights, statutory guarantees, remedies or liabilities that cannot lawfully be excluded or limited.

These Terms are governed by the laws of Western Australia, Australia, subject to mandatory consumer, privacy and other protections that apply to particular students.

Contact: [email protected]. Operator: Perth Church of Christ Limited (ABN 69 166 789 260). Website: https://spsm.online.