Submission Terms

These Submission Terms ("Terms") apply to every story or other content you submit to Protecting American Consumers Together ("PACT," "we," "us," or "our") through the intake form on this site. By checking the consent box and submitting the form, you agree to these Terms.

1. What you agree to at submission

The consent box on the intake form reads, in full:

I'm sharing my story with PACT and giving PACT permission to use it — including with my name and identifying details — in PACT's research, public reports, press materials, and outreach to journalists, lawmakers, regulators, and coalition partners. I understand I can ask PACT to stop using my story at any time by emailing info@protectingamericanconsumers.org.

That sentence is the operative grant. The rest of these Terms describes how it works in practice.

2. The license you grant PACT

When you submit a story, you grant PACT a worldwide, royalty-free, sublicensable, perpetual, and irrevocable (except as described in Section 6) license to:

• read, store, analyze, copy, and otherwise process your submission internally;
• quote, paraphrase, summarize, excerpt, translate, and publish your submission — including with your first name, last initial, city, state, age, and other identifying details you chose to provide — in PACT's research, public reports, white papers, public service announcements, press releases, social media, websites, presentations, testimony, and other public-facing materials;
• combine your submission with other submissions to produce de-identified, aggregated statistics and themes;
• share your submission with journalists, lawmakers, their staff, regulators, researchers, and PACT coalition partners who are working on the same consumer-protection issues, with the same usage rights described above; and
• authorize the recipients above to do the same.

You are not granting PACT ownership of your story. You keep your underlying rights and may share your story however you like elsewhere.

3. Use of your contact information

We will use your email and (if provided) phone number to follow up on your submission, ask clarifying questions, confirm details before quoting you, or invite you to participate in further PACT work. We will not sell your contact information. See our Privacy Policy for more.

4. Your warranties

By submitting, you confirm that:

• You are at least 18 years old.
• The story you are submitting is your own experience, or you have the right to share it.
• The information you provide is true and accurate to the best of your knowledge.
• You are not bound by a non-disclosure agreement, settlement agreement, gag clause, or court order that would prevent you from sharing the story with PACT.
• You are not naming third parties (such as attorneys, firms, doctors, or lenders) in a knowingly false or defamatory way.

5. What PACT will and will not do

PACT will:

• Read every submission.
• Make reasonable efforts to protect your contact information from public exposure.
• Use professional judgment when deciding which details to publish — for example, omitting a city if leaving it in would identify you in a small community.

PACT will not:

• Sell your story or your contact information.
• Provide you with legal advice or act as your attorney. Submitting a story to PACT does not create an attorney-client relationship.

6. Withdrawing your story

You can ask PACT to stop using your story at any time by emailing info@protectingamericanconsumers.org with the subject line "Withdraw my submission" and the email address you used to submit.

When we receive your request, we will:

• Stop sharing your story with new third parties going forward;
• Remove your story from PACT-controlled public materials we can reasonably edit (websites, social posts, press kits) within 30 days; and
• Notify journalistic and coalition recipients that you have withdrawn permission to use your name with the story going forward.

Withdrawal does not require PACT to claw back materials already printed, broadcast, filed in legislative records, archived by third parties, or already published by news organizations operating under their own editorial judgment. PACT may also retain a copy of your submission in internal archives for compliance and audit purposes.

7. No compensation

PACT does not pay submitters. You are not entitled to any payment, royalty, or share of grant funding because PACT uses your story.

8. No legal advice; not a referral service

PACT is an advocacy coalition, not a law firm. Nothing on this site is legal advice. Submitting a story does not mean PACT will refer you to an attorney or take action on your individual claim.

9. Disclaimers and limitation of liability

The site and the intake form are provided "as is" without warranties of any kind. To the maximum extent permitted by law, PACT and its coalition partners are not liable for any indirect, incidental, special, or consequential damages arising out of your use of the site or your submission.

10. Changes

PACT may update these Terms. The version number above changes when we do. Older submissions remain governed by the version of these Terms that was in effect when they were submitted; new submissions are governed by the current version.

11. Contact

Questions, withdrawal requests, or corrections: info@protectingamericanconsumers.org.