Terms & Conditions

These terms govern your purchase and use of anything sold through theciteshop.com. Please read section 9 in particular: it explains that the citation style is removed from your computer when your subscription ends, and what is left untouched when that happens.

The short version

• You are buying an annual subscription to a citation style, not a one-off file. It renews automatically until you cancel.
• Your licence is tied to your Zotero account, and works on as many of your own devices as you like.
• While the subscription is active you get every update and correction to the style.
• When the subscription ends, the style file is removed from your devices. Your Zotero library, your references and your finished documents are never touched.
• You can cancel at any time and keep using the style until the period you have paid for runs out.

1. Who we are

theciteshop.com is operated by Cosmo Quantum LLC, a limited liability company formed under the laws of Wyoming, United States, trading as The Cite Shop ("we", "us", "our").

Registered address: 1021 E Lincolnway, Suite 9528, Cheyenne, WY 82001, United States
Email: [email protected]

2. What these terms cover

These terms form a contract between you and us when you place an order. They apply alongside our Return and Refund Policy and our Privacy Policy, both of which form part of this contract.

You buy as a consumer if you are buying mainly for purposes outside a trade, business or profession. Students and academic researchers buying for their own study or research are consumers for this purpose. Some sections below give consumers additional rights, and where they do, we say so.

If any part of these terms conflicts with consumer protection law that applies to you, that law wins and the rest of these terms continue to apply.

3. What you are buying

We sell subscriptions to citation styles for the Zotero reference manager. A citation style is a CSL file that tells Zotero how to format citations and bibliographies.

A subscription gives you, for as long as it stays active:

• the citation style file named in your order,
• every update and correction we make to that style,
• installation and updates through our Client Sync plugin, and
• support in relation to that style, as described in section 12.

The edition of the published guidance a style follows is stated on its product page and inside the file itself. We do not sell the guidance itself, printed material, or any reference manager software.

4. Placing an order

Your order is an offer to buy. The contract is formed when we send you an order confirmation by email. If we cannot supply what you ordered, we will tell you and refund any payment in full.

Because the style is delivered immediately, you will be asked at checkout to confirm two things: that you want us to begin supply straight away, and that you understand you will lose the 14-day right to cancel that would otherwise apply to the initial subscription. An order cannot be completed without confirming both. Section 8 explains what this does and does not affect.

To use what you have bought you will need a Zotero account. If you do not have one, or cannot activate one, tell us before ordering.

5. Price, VAT and payment

Prices are shown on the product page and include VAT where it applies. The price you pay is the price displayed at checkout.

We take payment by card through Stripe, or through PayPal. We do not receive or store your full card details — see the Privacy Policy for how payment information is handled.

If a price is obviously wrong and you could reasonably have realised it was wrong, we do not have to supply at that price. We will contact you before doing anything.

6. Your subscription and how it renews

Subscriptions run for 12 months from the date of purchase and renew automatically for further 12-month periods until cancelled. Each renewal is charged to the payment method on your account.

We will email you at least 30 days before each renewal, so you have the chance to cancel first, and again on the day we take the payment.

We may change the renewal price. If we do, we will tell you at least 30 days before the renewal it applies to. You can cancel before that date if you do not want to continue at the new price. We will never change the price of a period you have already paid for.

If a renewal payment fails, we will retry and let you know. If it cannot be collected, the subscription ends and section 9 applies.

7. Cancelling

You can cancel at any time, without giving a reason, from your account page, through the link in any of our emails, or by emailing us. It takes a couple of steps and you never need to phone or write to us.

Cancelling stops the next renewal charge. It does not end your current period early and does not refund what you have already paid — you keep using the style until the period you have paid for runs out, and section 9 applies from that point.

8. Refunds and your cancellation rights

Refunds are governed by our Return and Refund Policy. In summary:

• Renewals — if a subscription renews and you did not want it, tell us within 14 days of the charge and we will refund it in full, no reason needed.
• Initial subscription — because you asked us to supply immediately and acknowledged the loss of the 14-day cancellation right at checkout, a first purchase is not refundable simply because you have changed your mind.
• If something is wrong with the product — the waiver above does not affect this. Section 13 applies, and so do your statutory rights.

9. What happens when a subscription ends

This section describes how our software behaves. By installing the Client Sync plugin you consent to it.

Your licence to use the style ends when your subscription ends, whether because you cancelled, because a renewal was not paid, or because we ended it under section 15. When that happens, the Client Sync plugin removes the style file from your devices. Removal happens the next time the plugin runs a check — when Zotero starts, once a day while it is running, or when you open the plugin's settings.

The plugin also removes the style if it cannot reach us to confirm your subscription for three consecutive days. This is a deliberate offline allowance: a short loss of connectivity will not affect you, but the plugin will not keep a style installed indefinitely without being able to confirm it is still licenced. The plugin warns you in its settings pane during this period and tells you how many days remain.

What is removed: only style files that our plugin installed, and files elsewhere in your Zotero styles folder whose contents are identical to a style we supplied to you. A style with the same name or identifier but different contents is left alone.

What is never touched: your Zotero library, your saved references, your attachments, your notes, your Zotero account, and any document you have already written. Documents you have already written keep the formatting they have. What you lose is the ability to add or update citations in that style, because the style is no longer installed.

Removal also happens if you log out of the plugin or uninstall it, for the same reason.

If you resubscribe, you can reinstall the style through the plugin as before.

10. Your licence

While your subscription is active, we grant you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, non-sublicensable licence to install and use the citation style for your own academic, research or professional work.

Your licence is linked to a single Zotero user ID, established the first time it is validated. You may install and use the style on as many devices as you like, provided they are your own and signed in to that Zotero account.

You may not:

• share, sell, lend, publish or otherwise distribute the style file, including by uploading it to a public style repository, a shared drive, a course page or a code host;
• share your licence key or account credentials, or use one licence across unrelated Zotero accounts;
• use the style to create a derivative style for distribution;
• remove or alter the identifying information inside the file; or
• attempt to bypass, disable or interfere with licence validation.

We keep all intellectual property rights in the styles. You are buying access, not ownership.

If you have linked your licence to the wrong Zotero account by mistake, contact us and we will unlink it so you can relink it correctly.

11. The Client Sync plugin

Styles are delivered and updated through The Cite Shop Client Sync, our free Zotero plugin. The plugin is separate from the styles: it is open source, licenced under the GNU Affero General Public License version 3 or later, and nothing in these terms restricts the rights that licence gives you in respect of the plugin's own source code. Section 10 governs the citation styles themselves, which are not open source.

The plugin needs an internet connection to validate your licence and to fetch styles and updates. It contacts us when you install a style, when it checks for updates, and when it runs the subscription checks described in section 9. What it sends and how long we keep it is set out in the Privacy Policy.

12. Support

Support covers our citation styles: installing them, updating them, licence and account questions, and anything about the style's output that does not match the published guidance it follows.

Support does not cover Zotero itself, your reference manager setup, your word processor, or how to reference correctly in your own work. Zotero is independent software and has its own documentation and forums.

Email [email protected]. We aim to reply within 2 working days.

13. If something is wrong

You are entitled to a product that works, matches its description, and is of satisfactory quality. If a style is faulty, does not do what its product page says, or does not work with a version of Zotero its product page lists as supported, tell us and we will put it right — by correcting it, replacing it, or refunding you if we cannot fix it within a reasonable time.

Our correction promise goes further than this: if you find a source type that does not match the published guidance the style follows, tell us and we will correct it, for as long as your subscription is active.

These are your legal rights. In the UK they come from the Consumer Rights Act 2015; in the EEA from Directive (EU) 2019/770; similar protections may apply where you live. Nothing in these terms limits them, and if any part of these terms appears to conflict with them, your legal rights win.

14. Requirements, compatibility and availability

Each product page states the Zotero versions the style is built and tested for. We support those versions. Older or newer versions may work but we cannot guarantee it, and we will say on the product page when supported versions change.

Zotero is developed and operated independently of us by the Corporation for Digital Scholarship. We do not control it. If a change to Zotero, to CSL, or to your word processor affects how a style behaves, we will make reasonable efforts to restore correct behaviour, but we cannot promise a particular outcome or timescale.

We try to keep the site and licensing service available at all times, but we do not guarantee uninterrupted availability. We may suspend either for maintenance, and will give notice where we reasonably can.

Citation styles are a formatting tool. Responsibility for the accuracy and completeness of the references in your own work remains yours, and we do not warrant that output will satisfy any particular institution, marker or publisher.

15. Suspending or ending your licence

We may suspend or end your licence if you materially breach these terms — in particular by distributing a style file or sharing a licence key across unrelated accounts — or if a payment is reversed or charged back.

Where the breach can be put right, we will contact you first and give you a reasonable opportunity to do so. If we end a licence for breach, section 9 applies and no refund is due for the remainder of the period. If we end it for any other reason, we will refund the unused part.

16. Our liability

Nothing in these terms excludes or limits our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, or for anything else that cannot lawfully be excluded — including your statutory rights as a consumer under section 13.

Subject to that: we are responsible for loss or damage you suffer that is a foreseeable result of our breaking this contract or failing to use reasonable care and skill, and our total liability to you is limited to the amount you have paid us in the 12 months before the claim.

We are not liable for loss or damage that was not foreseeable, for loss caused by events outside our reasonable control, or — if you are buying for business purposes — for loss of profit, business, contracts or anticipated savings.

17. Your account

Keep your account details and licence key confidential. Tell us promptly if you think someone else has access to them. You are responsible for activity under your account, except where it results from our failure.

You can ask us to close your account at any time. Closing it ends any active subscription, and section 9 applies.

18. Privacy

Our Privacy Policy explains what we collect, why, and what rights you have. It forms part of this contract.

19. Independence and trademarks

The Cite Shop is an independent business. Our styles are independently produced to follow published referencing guidance as closely as CSL and Zotero allow. They are not official, and are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to the publishers or authors of any referencing guide.

Cite Them Right is a trademark of its respective owner. Zotero is a trademark of the Corporation for Digital Scholarship. Both are referred to here only to describe compatibility.

20. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms when the shop, our products or the law changes. The version published on this page applies to orders placed after it is published, and the date of the most recent change appears at the top.

If we make a change that materially affects an active subscription, we will tell you at least 30 days beforehand, and you may cancel before it takes effect.

21. General

If any provision of these terms is found to be unenforceable, the rest continue in force. If we do not insist that you do something you are required to do, or delay in doing so, that does not prevent us enforcing it later.

You may not transfer your rights under this contract without our written consent. We may transfer ours to another business, and will tell you if we do; your rights will not be affected.

This contract is between you and us. No one else has any right to enforce it.

22. Law and disputes

These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Wyoming, United States, and the courts of Wyoming have jurisdiction.

If you are a consumer, this does not deprive you of the protection of the mandatory consumer law of the country where you live, and you may bring proceedings in your own country's courts. For consumers in the United Kingdom and the European Economic Area, that includes the statutory rights referred to in section 13.

23. Complaints

If something has gone wrong, email [email protected] and tell us what happened. We aim to reply within 2 working days and to resolve complaints quickly and fairly.

If we cannot resolve a complaint between us, consumers in the UK and EEA can seek help from the consumer advice body or alternative dispute resolution scheme in their own country. Your statutory rights are unaffected either way.

24. Contact

Cosmo Quantum LLC
1021 E Lincolnway, Suite 9528
Cheyenne, WY 82001
United States
[email protected]