Effective 15 August 2026 · Last updated 15 August 2026
These terms cover your use of TRUE COST — the web app at banksiasprings.github.io/truecost, the Android app, and the browser extension. They're written to be read, not to be impressive.
TRUE COST is provided by Steven McNichol, a sole trader in Queensland, Australia ("we", "us"). By using the app you agree to these terms and to our Privacy Policy. If you don't agree with them, please don't use the app.
Use TRUE COST as much as you like, for your own purposes — personal or business — free of charge. We grant you a personal, non-exclusive, revocable licence to do that. In return, please don't:
The app's source code is published separately on GitHub under its own licence, and nothing here limits any rights that licence gives you.
This is the important one. Every figure TRUE COST produces is an estimate, generated by a model, for comparison purposes. It is not financial advice, not tax advice, and not a valuation. We are not licensed financial advisers and nothing in the app takes your personal circumstances into account.
Costs of ownership depend on things no model can see: how you drive, what the car has been through, what fuel costs next year, what an insurer quotes you, what a buyer will actually pay. Our resale figures in particular are fitted from asking prices in public listings — they're a good guide to the shape of depreciation and a much rougher guide to the dollar level, and we know they overstate depreciation over long holding periods. Where the app doesn't have enough data to be confident, it says so; please take that seriously rather than reading past it.
Registration, stamp duty, fuel and charging rates are refreshed periodically from public sources and can be out of date or wrong. The business-use and GST features produce rough working figures only — they are not a substitute for an accountant, and you should not lodge anything with the ATO on the strength of them.
Check anything that matters before you spend money on it. Decisions you make using this app are yours.
TRUE COST is provided "as is". We don't warrant that it will be accurate, complete, uninterrupted, or free of errors, and we may change or discontinue it at any time. You're responsible for keeping your own backups — the app has an Export Backup button for exactly that reason, and data held only in a browser can be lost when you clear site data, switch devices or reinstall.
Nothing in these terms excludes any rights or guarantees you have under the Australian Consumer Law that cannot lawfully be excluded. Where we're permitted to limit our liability rather than exclude it, our liability is limited to re-supplying the app to you. Since TRUE COST is supplied free of charge, we're not liable for any loss, cost or damage arising from your use of it, to the fullest extent the law allows.
You agree to cover us for any claim or loss that arises because you used the app in a way these terms don't allow, or in breach of the law or someone else's rights. This doesn't apply to anything caused by us.
The app links out to other sites — vehicle listings on Carsales and similar, the Green Vehicle Guide, government rate pages — and can read a listing you're already looking at so you don't have to retype it. We don't control those sites, we don't endorse them, and we're not responsible for their content, their accuracy or their privacy practices. The listing itself remains the source of truth for whatever it says; if our reading of a listing and the listing disagree, believe the listing.
The app also depends on services run by others (hosting, form handling, cloud sync). If one of those is down or changes, parts of the app may stop working.
We may update these terms as the app changes. The effective date at the top tells you which version you're reading, and continuing to use the app after a change means you accept the updated terms.
These terms are governed by the laws of Queensland, Australia. Any dispute goes before the courts of Queensland, and you and we submit to their jurisdiction.
Steven McNichol · Queensland, Australia
smcnichol@outlook.com