Frequently Asked Questions
This page answers the questions providers and customers ask most often. Every answer is grounded in the behaviour documented elsewhere in this handbook; where a question touches a deeper topic, the answer links to the chapter that covers it in full. If a question here disagrees with a product chapter, the product chapter wins — it is the source of truth.
The questions are grouped by audience: for everyone, for customers, for providers, and a section on Happenings. A final troubleshooting section covers the most common "why didn't this work" situations.
For everyone
What is Fyndow?
Fyndow is a professional community and marketplace where local service providers are found, booked, and paid. It brings three things together in one place: a marketplace for discovering and hiring local providers, a business toolkit providers use to run their work (scheduling, quotes, invoices, payments), and communities — forums where trades, geographies, and topics are discussed, and where membership in a gated community can become a verifiable trust signal. On top of all three sits Happenings, time-boxed posts that announce what's going on right now. See Roles & The Permission Model for how the platform serves customers, providers, organizations, and admins.
What roles can my account have?
There are four roles: customer, provider, organization, and admin. A new sign-up is a customer by default. A customer can be promoted to a provider through the "become a provider" flow without creating a new account — the platform flips the role and walks you through a short onboarding (business name and city). An organization account runs gated communities and community programs but does not get the business toolkit. Admin accounts are provisioned by the platform, not through public sign-up. The full breakdown of what each role can do is in Roles & The Permission Model.
Do I need a separate account to buy and to sell?
No. The same account can both hire providers and (once upgraded) run a business. Your role determines which tools you see, but you keep one identity, one login, and one set of conversations.
Is there a mobile app and a web app?
Yes — there is a web app and a mobile app, plus an admin dashboard for platform staff. All of them are clients of the same Fyndow backend, which is why the customer-facing apps stay in feature parity: they are built on one shared contract rather than three separate codebases. How to read that contract is described in the API Reference.
What currency are payments in?
Payments are processed in Canadian dollars (CAD) — every charge is created in CAD. See How Providers Get Paid.
For customers
How do I pay for a booking or order?
You pay securely inside Fyndow. When you pay an invoice, booking, or order, the money is handled by Fyndow's secure checkout and settles to the provider, minus Fyndow's transparent platform fee. You do not need any kind of merchant or payout account to pay — only providers need one, so they can get paid. The full mechanics are in How Providers Get Paid.
Is my money held before the provider gets it?
Yes. Fyndow holds funds in a protection window — sometimes called escrow — between the moment you pay and the moment the provider is paid out. While the money is held, a refund or dispute can be resolved cleanly instead of chasing funds that have already moved on. This is the heart of Fyndow's buyer-and-seller protection: your payment is real and committed for the provider, and recoverable for you if something goes wrong. See How Providers Get Paid.
What is the refund policy if I cancel?
Refunds work in three layers: the provider's chosen policy template, a non-negotiable platform floor, and admin-mediated disputes for anything unclear. Providers do not write free-text policies — they pick from a fixed set of templates, which is shown to you before you book or check out.
- Service cancellations are timing-based. The templates are Flexible, Moderate (the default), and Strict, each defining how much you get back depending on how far ahead of the appointment you cancel.
- Product returns are condition-based. The templates are Standard (the default), Final sale, and Custom / made-to-order.
The exact rule for each template — for example, Flexible gives a full refund if you cancel at least 24 hours ahead and a partial refund after that — is in Refund & Cancellation Framework.
What if the provider doesn't show up or misrepresents the work?
That is covered by the platform floor, which overrides any provider policy. If the provider no-shows, never delivers, commits fraud, or the work or product is not as described, you are entitled to a full refund regardless of their cancellation or return template. The floor is enforced through Fyndow's disputes process with admin review — not by the provider's policy. See Refund & Cancellation Framework and Disputes & Chargebacks.
How do I leave a review?
Reviews are tied to verified transactions and are mutual — both sides can rate each other after a completed booking or order. This keeps reviews honest: only people who actually transacted can review, and providers can respond. See Trust & Reputation for how transaction history gates reviews.
What is a gated community and why would I join one?
Most forums are open — anyone can read and post. A gated community is a membership-verified space run by an organization. Joining matters because membership in a gated community can act as a trust signal that surfaces in marketplace discovery — for example, filtering search to providers who belong to a community you trust. See Communities & Forums.
For providers
How do I start getting paid?
You connect a payout account through a short, guided onboarding inside Fyndow. Once your identity and bank details are verified, you become able to accept payments and receive payouts. You reach your own payout dashboard from inside Fyndow whenever you need it. See How Providers Get Paid.
What is Fyndow's platform fee?
Fyndow charges a transparent platform fee on transactions. It is shown clearly and applied consistently — there are no surprise deductions, and it is the same kind of charge for everyone in the same situation. Providers always see exactly what they will receive, and customers always see what they are paying, before anything is confirmed. The fee is what funds secure checkout, the protection window, refund and dispute handling, payout to your own account, and the records that keep everything accountable. See How Providers Get Paid.
When do I actually receive the money in my bank?
Your customer's payment is held in the protection window first, and then paid out to your bank account. How long funds stay held depends on the type of transaction and your cancellation policy — the principle is constant: money is released when delivery is settled, not before. That holding window is exactly what lets refunds and disputes be resolved fairly. See How Providers Get Paid.
Can I run more than one business?
Yes. A single provider account can own and manage multiple businesses, with a business selector and data scoped so each business stays separate. This is a structural rule of the platform, not an add-on. See Roles & The Permission Model.
How do I choose my refund policy?
You pick one service-cancellation template and one product-return template from the fixed sets described above. New businesses default to Moderate for service cancellation and Standard for product returns. The template you choose is shown to customers at booking and checkout and on your public profile. You cannot write free-text policy language. See Refund & Cancellation Framework.
What happens to the platform fee when I issue a refund?
How Fyndow's fee is treated on a refund depends on whose fault the situation is. The detailed treatment is documented in Refund & Cancellation Framework.
Is there an AI assistant, and can it touch money?
Yes — the AI assistant is a primary provider interface that can act across the business toolkit. Financial and other write actions are confirmation-gated: the assistant returns a preview that requires your explicit confirmation before any change is saved. It cannot silently move money or change your data on your behalf. See The AI Assistant.
Can I integrate Fyndow with my own software?
Fyndow already connects to the tools providers lean on — calendar sync, accounting export, and messaging channels among them. A fuller public developer interface is forward-looking work rather than something shipped today. What's available now, and what's planned, is described in Integrations; the API Reference explains how Fyndow's own apps are built on one shared contract.
Happenings
What is a Happening?
A Happening is a time-boxed post — the thing a business or a person wants people to know about right now. A weekend market, a one-day sale, a workshop, a grand opening, a seasonal promotion: each is a Happening with a start, an end, and an audience. Happenings surface while they're relevant and quietly retire when their window closes, so the feed reflects what's actually going on. See Happenings for the full picture.
Who can post a Happening?
Posting is open to everyone, not just businesses — but it depends on the type of post:
- Events (a real-world gathering) can be posted by anyone signed in, as themselves. You don't need to run a business to tell your neighbourhood about a cleanup day, a pop-up, or a fundraiser; the post simply carries your name and avatar.
- Promotions and ads advertise a commercial offering, so they require a business you own and carry that business's name and logo.
The right to be heard isn't reserved for paying businesses — what Fyndow charges for is reach, not the act of posting. See Happenings.
Is posting a Happening free?
It depends on the audience, not on who you are:
- A Happening posted to a community is free. It's visible only to that community's approved members, it goes live immediately, and it's self-moderated like the rest of community content.
- A Happening posted to the public feed is paid per post, at one flat price that's the same for everyone, and it's reviewed before it goes live.
What you're paying for with a public post is distribution, which costs the same regardless of who's posting or what they're promoting. The economics are in Paying for Reach.
What's the difference between a community post and a public post?
| Community reach | Public reach | |
|---|---|---|
| Audience | Approved community members | Everyone, geo-aware |
| Cost | Free | One flat price per post |
| Goes live | Immediately | After Fyndow's review |
| Moderation | Self-moderated by the community | Reviewed before publishing |
Community reach is the everyday channel for telling the people who already belong to your space what's coming up. Public reach puts a post in front of everyone on Fyndow, with nearby people seeing what's relevant to them. See Happenings.
Why was my public Happening reviewed before going live?
Every public Happening passes a quality gate before it's published. The review keeps the public feed free of spam, scams, and content that doesn't belong, so the feed stays worth opening. It's a quality check, not an editorial one — most posts sail through. If a post is declined, you're told why and can edit and resubmit it for another look, and fixing a problem doesn't mean paying again. Community posts skip this entirely because they're seen only by members and are self-moderated. See Paying for Reach.
What happens to a Happening when its dates pass?
It auto-expires and drops out of the feeds when its run-window closes — nothing lingers past its relevance. Promotions and ads that don't carry an end date simply stay live until you remove them or their window closes. You can see everything you've posted across every state — drafts, in-review, live, and ended — from your own Happenings view. See Happenings.
Troubleshooting
I paid but the invoice still shows unpaid.
Payment confirmation can lag a moment after you pay while Fyndow records the successful charge, marks the invoice or order paid, and notifies the provider. Refreshing usually clears a brief timing gap. If it stays unpaid, the charge may not have gone through — check that your payment actually completed, and contact the provider or support if it persists. See How Providers Get Paid.
I finished onboarding but still can't take payments.
You can accept payments only once your payout account is fully verified. If onboarding looks done but you still can't charge, your details may still be under review — finish any remaining verification steps from your payout dashboard inside Fyndow. See How Providers Get Paid.
My availability shows "closed all days" after editing it.
Availability is set per day, and a day with no hours is treated as closed. If a day looks closed unexpectedly, re-set that day's hours and save. The scheduling behaviour is covered in The Business Toolkit.
A community won't let me post.
Open forums let any signed-in user post. Gated communities are membership-verified — you must be an accepted member to post there, and only members see what's posted. A thread can also be locked (no new comments), or a reply can be rejected for going too deep into a thread. See Communities & Forums.
My public Happening still isn't visible.
A public Happening goes live only after it's paid for and approved in review. If it's still a draft, it hasn't been paid yet; if it's in review, it's waiting on the quality gate; if it was declined, you'll have a reason and can edit and resubmit without paying again. Community Happenings, by contrast, are live the moment you post them. See Happenings.
This FAQ covers the most common questions grounded in the current product chapters. As public-facing onboarding, billing, and support flows are finalized, expect new questions here on account management, notification preferences, and data export.