Terms of use

This translation is for your information. Only the German version is legally binding. Go to the German version

Last updated: 19 October 2026

These terms govern how you use the Buchlio app and the Buchlio account. The privacy notice for the app and account describes how data is processed.

1. Scope and provider

These terms apply to the Buchlio app (macOS, Windows, iOS, Android), the Buchlio account and the account portal at account.buchlio.de. The provider and your contractual partner for the use is:

PikCode, Mikayil Gacek (Einzelunternehmer)
Mühlstr. 32, 65760 Eschborn, Deutschland
Contact: support@buchlio.de or the contact form.

In these terms, “we” and “us” means the provider.

• Who it is for: Buchlio is aimed at businesses within the meaning of § 14 BGB (Unternehmer), i.e. the self-employed, freelancers and small businesses who use Buchlio for their commercial or independent professional activity. If you use Buchlio as a consumer (§ 13 BGB), these terms apply as well. Your mandatory consumer rights remain unaffected, and rules that expressly apply only to businesses do not apply.
• Buying the subscription: You do not buy the subscription from us but from Paddle or in the respective store (section 4). These terms apply to the use of the app and the account in any case.
• Your own terms: Terms and conditions of yours that differ from these only apply if we expressly agree to them.

2. What Buchlio provides

• App: With Buchlio, you capture receipts, write quotes (Angebot) and invoices (Rechnung), also as e-invoices (E-Rechnung), confirm payments, prepare reports such as the Umsatzsteuer-Voranmeldung (advance VAT return, filed monthly or quarterly in ELSTER) and the Anlage EÜR (form for the cash-basis profit statement, income minus expenses, filed with the tax return), and export an accounting package with a DATEV posting batch. The current range of features is described on the home page and in the help; system requirements and known limitations are on the downloads page.
• Local instead of a provider cloud: The app stores your bookkeeping data – receipts, originals, invoices, payments, contacts and reports – on your device and, if you set it up, in your own cloud storage. You connect your own email mailboxes directly from the app. We do not receive this data and do not store it on our servers.
• Buchlio account: The account service handles sign-in, sessions and device approvals, the subscription status and the delivery of your support requests. It does not accept bookkeeping data.
• Support: You send questions, bug reports and feature requests from the app or via the contact form. We answer as quickly as possible but do not commit to fixed response times.
• Updates and changes: In the website version, you receive updates through the app, in the store versions through the respective store. We develop Buchlio further and change it if there is a valid reason, such as new laws or tax rules, security, new operating system versions or technical progress; this causes you no additional costs. If a change affects your access or usability more than insignificantly, we inform you in good time beforehand. You can then cancel your subscription; your statutory rights remain unaffected.

3. Buchlio account

• Registration: To create and change data, you need a Buchlio account. You register with a code sent to your email address, with Google or with Apple. The account itself is free; registering concludes the contract of use under these terms. In doing so, you expressly accept these terms. Afterwards, you can also sign in with a passkey.
• Correct details: Use an email address that belongs to you and at which you can be reached. Sign-in codes, confirmations and notices about these terms are sent to it.
• Personal access: An account belongs to one person. Do not pass on sign-in and recovery codes or passkeys, and protect your email mailbox and your devices. We recommend two-factor authentication in the account portal. If you suspect misuse, sign out other devices in the account portal and inform us.
• Deletion: You can delete your account at any time in the account portal (in the app under Settings › Account & subscription › “Delete account”). Section 14 describes the consequences.

4. Subscription, trial, payment and cancellation

• Subscription: Writing features require the “Buchlio” subscription with monthly or yearly billing and the same features. The current prices are under Pricing. The total price that the checkout or the store shows you before the purchase is binding. Store offers may differ from the website prices.
• Website subscription: If you buy via the account portal, Paddle (Paddle.com Market Ltd.) is the seller and your contractual partner for the purchase (reseller and merchant of record). Paddle handles the order, payment, invoice, VAT (Umsatzsteuer), cancellation and refunds; Paddle’s buyer terms apply to this. To pay, the account portal forwards you to Paddle’s checkout.
• Store subscription: If you buy in the app via the App Store or Google Play, purchase and billing are handled by Apple or Google respectively. The terms of the respective store also apply; if they conflict with these terms, they take precedence for download, purchase and billing.
• Trial: Monthly and yearly subscriptions start with a 7-day trial with all features. If you do not cancel before it ends, the trial turns into the paid subscription you chose.
• Renewal: The subscription renews automatically for the chosen term (month or year) until you cancel. The seller charges the price at the start of each term.
• Cancellation: You cancel a website subscription in the account portal under “Manage / cancel website subscription” (Paddle’s subscription management), and a store subscription in the subscription settings of Apple or Google respectively. The cancellation takes effect at the end of the current term; until then, the subscription remains usable. If you delete your account, however, a website subscription ends immediately (section 14).
• Payment problems: If the seller grants a grace period after a failed payment, the subscription stays active for that long. After that, Buchlio is read-only (section 6) until the payment is made or a subscription is running again.
• Price changes: New prices for a running subscription apply at the earliest from the next term and only if you were informed in good time beforehand. Where the law or the seller’s terms require it, the seller obtains your consent. If you do not agree, you can cancel with effect from the end of the current term.

5. Withdrawal and refunds

• Website subscription: Paddle handles withdrawal and refunds as the seller. Paddle’s buyer terms and refund policy apply. As a consumer, you have the statutory right of withdrawal; the details, including deadlines and early expiry, are governed by Paddle’s terms. You request a refund via the link in your purchase confirmation or at paddle.net.
• Store subscription: You request refunds for purchases in the App Store or on Google Play from the respective store; its rules apply.
• Partly used terms: A cancellation takes effect at the end of the term. A pro rata refund is only given where the law or the seller’s terms provide for it.
• Account deletion: The immediate cancellation of a website subscription when you delete your account does not come with an automatic refund.

Statutory claims remain unaffected in all cases.

6. Read-only mode and mandatory updates

Without signing in or without an active subscription, Buchlio opens your workspace read-only. The trial and grace periods for payment problems count as an active subscription. The end of a subscription deletes no bookkeeping data and does not reinterpret it.

• Stays available: Viewing data, overviews and reports, opening originals, exporting CSV files and the accounting package with the DATEV posting batch, creating and restoring backups, sharing documents, disconnecting email and cloud connections, changing the appearance, installing updates and reaching support.
• Paused: Creating, changing, deleting, imports, sending emails, cloud sync, mailbox fetching, due date notifications and automatic changes. Local changes not yet synced are kept and synced as soon as a subscription is active again.
• Offline: With an active subscription, a signed offline proof confirms your write access for up to seven days without an internet connection. After that, the app again needs a connection to the account service for writing features. “Sign out” removes the session and the offline proof from your device immediately.
• Mandatory updates: For urgent fixes, the account service can set a minimum version of the app. Older versions are then read-only until you update; data, reports, exports and backups stay available.

7. Rights of use

• Licence: The app, its interface and texts are protected by copyright; the rights belong to us or our licensors. We grant you the non-exclusive, non-transferable and non-sublicensable right to install and use the app on your own devices for your own purposes: the read-only features also without an account and subscription, the writing features for the duration of your active subscription.
• Not allowed:
  • selling or renting the app or your access, or making them available to third parties;
  • circumventing or modifying the access check, the offline proof or other protective measures;
  • modifying, decompiling or reverse engineering the app beyond what the law permits;
  • removing copyright and licence notices.
• Statutory rights: Your rights under §§ 69d and 69e UrhG, for example to make a backup copy, to correct errors and to establish interoperability, remain unaffected.
• Open source: For included open-source components, their licences take precedence.
• Your content: Everything you record in Buchlio remains yours. We acquire neither rights to it nor access to it.

8. Your obligations

• Lawful use: Use Buchlio only within the law. You yourself are responsible for the personal data of your customers, suppliers and other persons that you record in Buchlio.
• Backups: Buchlio works locally. We have no copy of your bookkeeping data and therefore cannot restore it. Create backups regularly (Settings › Data & backup) and also keep important backups in a separate place.
• Check results: Recognised details are suggestions. Check amounts, dates and tax rates before saving, and all reports and exports before you use them – in particular the Umsatzsteuer-Voranmeldung, the Zusammenfassende Meldung (EC sales list of supplies and services to businesses in other EU countries), the Anlage EÜR and the DATEV posting batch.
• Check documents: You check invoices, quotes, dunning letters (Mahnung) and e-invoices that you create with Buchlio for correctness and mandatory details before sending them.
• Agree on default assignments: Suggestions such as the DATEV standard assignment, categories, tax treatments and EÜR lines are default assignments based on general rules. Agree on them with your tax adviser before you rely on them.
• Retention: You fulfil statutory retention obligations for invoices, receipts and other documents yourself. Check them before you delete data, backups or your workspace.
• Your own accounts with third parties: The terms of their providers apply to your email and cloud accounts. You are responsible for the content and recipients of the emails you send via Buchlio; Buchlio only sends after your confirmation.
• Fair use of the account service: No automated mass requests, no attacks, no circumvention of security or abuse protection and no use of other people’s accounts.

If you seriously breach these obligations, we may temporarily block your account or terminate it for good cause (section 14). In doing so, we take your legitimate interests into account. You can still read and export your local workspace even then.

9. No tax or legal advice

• Buchlio is a tool for your bookkeeping. It provides no tax or legal advice and does not replace individual advice.
• Buchlio prepares documents and values but transmits nothing to the Finanzamt (local tax office), to ELSTER or to DATEV. You or your tax adviser are responsible for the content, completeness and deadlines of your tax returns, Voranmeldung filings and other filings.
• The tax reports follow German rules; Buchlio calculates VAT according to the VAT accounting you choose in the accounting profile – based on consideration received (Ist-Versteuerung) or based on consideration agreed (Soll-Versteuerung). Check whether this choice suits your situation.
• The estimated tax reserve is a guide, not a tax assessment.
• Buchlio claims no GoBD certification. You are responsible for keeping your books properly.

10. Availability

• App: The app works locally. Reading, exports and backups work independently of our servers and without an internet connection.
• Account service: We operate the account service with reasonable care but do not commit to any particular availability. Maintenance, faults or security measures can interrupt it temporarily. The offline proof bridges such interruptions for up to seven days. If payment or subscription services are temporarily unreachable, the subscription status last confirmed continues to apply until the end of its term.
• Third-party services: App stores, Paddle, sign-in with Google or Apple, your cloud storage and your email mailboxes are outside our control. Sync and mailbox fetching depend on your internet connection and the respective provider.

11. Liability

• We are liable without limitation for intent and gross negligence, for injury to life, body or health, under the Product Liability Act (Produkthaftungsgesetz), for fraudulently concealed defects and to the extent of a guarantee we have given.
• In the case of slight negligence, we are only liable if we breach an essential contractual obligation – that is, an obligation whose fulfilment makes the proper performance of the contract possible in the first place and on whose observance you may regularly rely. Liability is then limited to the foreseeable damage typical of the contract.
• For the loss of data, we are only liable up to the effort that would have been required to restore it if you had created backups regularly (section 8).
• These rules also apply to the personal liability of our vicarious agents and assistants (Erfüllungs- und Verrichtungsgehilfen).
• Statutory rights in the case of defects remain unaffected.

12. Data protection

How the app and the account process data is described in the privacy notice for the app and account; for the website, the website privacy policy applies.

13. Changes to these terms

We may change these terms if laws, case law, features or technical foundations change. We send you the changed terms by email to the address of your Buchlio account at least six weeks before they take effect. If you do not object before they take effect, the new terms apply; we expressly point this out in the notice. If you object, the previous terms continue to apply to you. We may then terminate the contract of use as of the date the change takes effect, for a running subscription at the earliest at the end of the paid term. We do not change prices or the core of the agreed service this way.

14. Term and termination

• Term: The contract of use for your account runs for an indefinite period; a subscription runs for the chosen term and renews under section 4.
• Termination by you: You end the contract of use at any time by deleting your account in the account portal. You cancel a subscription with the respective seller (section 4).
• Termination by us: We may terminate the contract of use with three months’ notice, for a running subscription at the earliest at the end of the paid term. The right of both parties to terminate for good cause remains unaffected.
• Consequences of deleting your account:
  • All sessions and device approvals end.
  • A website subscription is cancelled immediately, without an automatic refund (section 5).
  • You cancel subscriptions in the App Store or on Google Play yourself in the respective store.
  • Your local workspace and your Cloud Vault are kept. The app then opens your workspace read-only; exports and backups remain possible.
• End of a subscription: Buchlio becomes read-only (section 6); your data stays with you.

15. Final provisions

• German law applies, excluding the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods. If you are a consumer, the mandatory consumer protection provisions of the state in which you have your habitual residence remain unaffected.
• If you are a merchant (Kaufmann), a legal entity under public law or a special fund under public law, the exclusive place of jurisdiction for all disputes arising from this contract is our registered office in Eschborn.
• If a provision is invalid, the rest of the contract remains valid; the statutory provision takes its place.
• The contractual language is German. Translations of these terms are for understanding only; the German version is authoritative.
• We are neither willing nor obliged to take part in dispute resolution proceedings before a consumer arbitration board.