Terms of Service

1. About this service

Decode My Digger ("we", "us", "our") is operated by PM Project Change Pty Ltd (ABN 83 692 182 479), an Australian private company registered in New South Wales.

We provide a service that takes digitised images of Australian military service records and produces decoded reports in Word and Excel format. Where you purchase the image retrieval option, a member of our team also manually retrieves the publicly available digitised record you nominate from the National Archives of Australia's RecordSearch. By using our website and services, you agree to these Terms of Service.

2. Eligibility

You must be at least 18 years of age to use this service. By creating an account, you confirm that you meet this requirement.

3. Service description

You upload scanned images of Australian military service records. Our system processes those images using artificial intelligence to transcribe, decode, contextualise, and produce a structured report. The output is a Word document and an Excel spreadsheet delivered electronically.

Image retrieval option. Instead of uploading images, you may purchase image retrieval and nominate your record by supplying its RecordSearch link, together with the service person's name and service number. A member of our team then retrieves the digitised pages of that record individually and manually from RecordSearch - there is no automated connection to National Archives systems - and the decode proceeds as normal. Retrieval covers one nominated record per order and applies only to records that are already digitised and publicly viewable in RecordSearch's online viewer. For available digitised records, we aim to deliver your decoded report within 2 business days of your order.

We do not guarantee 100% accuracy in transcription or interpretation. Military records vary in legibility, completeness, and condition. Our reports represent a best-effort interpretation and should be verified against the original records for critical research purposes.

4. What to expect from your decode

Service records documented everything. Including postings, promotions, medical entries, disciplinary actions, criminal proceedings, and sexually transmitted infections. Your decode presents every entry exactly as it was recorded. Nothing is omitted or softened.

These records were written by hand, by clerks, under operational conditions. They contain errors, gaps, and sometimes contradictions. Your decode is the beginning of your family's research, not the end. Unit war diaries, campaign records, war crimes records, and other archives can all deepen the story from here.

Your decoded report presents these entries factually and in plain language, exactly as they appear in the original record. It is delivered as an editable Word document and Excel spreadsheet so your family has full control over what you keep, what you add to, and what you choose to share.

5. Payment and pricing

Prices are displayed in Australian Dollars (AUD) and include GST where applicable. Payment is processed by Stripe. You must pay before your records are decoded. We do not store your payment card details - these are handled entirely by Stripe.

We reserve the right to change pricing at any time. Price changes do not affect orders already placed and paid for.

6. Refund policy

If our system is unable to produce a meaningful decode of your uploaded records (for example, due to image quality or record type limitations), we will issue a full refund. Refund requests must be made within 14 days of purchase.

Image retrieval orders. Retrieval requires a record that is already digitised and publicly viewable in RecordSearch's online viewer - you confirm this when you supply the record link at the time of ordering. If a record you have nominated cannot be retrieved (for example, it is not digitised, or access to it is restricted), we will refund your order in full and direct you to the National Archives' copy-ordering service, where you can request digitisation directly from the Archives. The Archives sets its own fees and timeframes for digitisation, which are outside our control.

A record is considered successfully decoded when 80% or more of the content has been meaningfully extracted and interpreted. Where specific entries cannot be read with confidence, they are noted as illegible in your report rather than guessed. We do not offer refunds for minor illegible entries within an otherwise complete decode. If you believe there is a factual error in your report, contact us and we will review it. Refund requests must be made within 14 days of purchase.

7. Your content

You retain ownership of the images you upload. By uploading images, you grant us a limited licence to process them for the sole purpose of producing your decode report. We do not use your uploaded images for training, marketing, or any other purpose without your explicit consent.

8. Data retention and downloads

Your decoded reports (Word document and Excel spreadsheet) are available for download from your account for 90 days from the date of processing. After 90 days, all uploaded images and decoded reports are permanently deleted from our systems.

We strongly recommend downloading your reports as soon as they are ready. We are unable to recover or regenerate deleted reports after the 90-day period. If you require a new decode after deletion, a new upload and payment will be required.

9. Intellectual property

The decoded reports we produce are your property once delivered. The Decode My Digger brand, website design, processing methodology, and software remain our intellectual property.

10. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

• Upload content that is not a legitimate military service record
• Use the service for any unlawful purpose
• Attempt to reverse-engineer, scrape, or interfere with our systems
• Resell or commercially redistribute decoded reports without our written permission

11. Limitation of liability

To the maximum extent permitted by Australian law, our total liability to you for any claim arising from your use of the service is limited to the amount you paid for the specific decode in question. We are not liable for any indirect, consequential, or incidental damages.

Nothing in these terms excludes or limits any rights you have under the Australian Consumer Law that cannot be excluded or limited by agreement.

12. Governing law

These terms are governed by the laws of New South Wales, Australia. Any disputes will be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of New South Wales.

13. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms from time to time. The effective date at the top of this page indicates the most recent revision. Continued use of the service after changes constitutes acceptance of the revised terms.

14. Contact

For questions about these terms, contact us at matilda@decodemydigger.com.au