Pharmia Terms of Service

Last updated: 2026-05-19

About this revision. This is a substantive revision of our previous Terms of Service. Among other changes, it revises the limitation of liability and indemnification provisions, adds standard protective clauses, names the operating entity correctly, and clarifies the medical disclaimer. Continued use of Pharmia after a material revision requires renewed acceptance of these Terms.

1. Who we are and acceptance of these Terms

Pharmia is an AI-assisted patient-intake service used by community pharmacies in Quebec. It is operated by Bento Studio Inc. ("Bento Studio", "Pharmia", "we", "us", "our").

These Terms of Service ("Terms") govern your use of Pharmia. By taking the affirmative acceptance step presented to you — an explicit "I accept" action that must be completed before you use Pharmia — you agree to these Terms. These Terms are made available for you to review at the point of that acceptance step, so that you have the opportunity to read them before you accept. Using Pharmia is not permitted without taking that step. If you do not agree, do not use Pharmia.

These Terms may be revised. Where a revision is material, your continued use of Pharmia requires you to accept the revised Terms through the same affirmative step. The version in force is the one published on the date shown above.

2. Definitions

In these Terms:

Professional User means a pharmacist or a pharmacy that uses Pharmia to conduct patient intake and obtain a clinical pre-analysis. A Professional User uses Pharmia in the course of its professional practice.
Patient means an individual who interacts with Pharmia, through a participating pharmacy, to provide intake information about their own health (or, where applicable, as the representative of a person unable to consent).
Controller means the party that decides why and how personal information is processed — for the patient's information, the pharmacy.
Processor means the party that processes personal information on the controller's documented instructions — Bento Studio, operating Pharmia.

Where a clause applies only to one of those classes, it says so.

3. The services and the controller/processor relationship

Pharmia provides software that conducts an AI-assisted patient intake and produces a clinical pre-analysis for the pharmacist to review. The pharmacy is the controller of the patient's personal information and Pharmia is the processor, as defined in Section 2 and described in the Privacy Policy.

The pharmacy remains responsible for its own professional and legal obligations toward the patient. The pharmacist's professional secrecy is non-delegable — it arises under the Civil Code of Québec, the Pharmacy Act, and the pharmacist's Code of ethics, and nothing in these Terms or in the processor relationship transfers, diminishes, or discharges it.

4. Medical disclaimer and professional responsibility

Important — please read carefully.

Pharmia is software that produces a pre-analysis for a pharmacist to review. It is not a substitute for the professional judgment of a pharmacist or other health professional. Its output is not a clinical conclusion for you to rely on or act on by yourself; you should rely on the professional judgment of your pharmacist, not on the pre-analysis on its own.

Pharmia is not for emergencies. If you already know or believe you are experiencing a medical emergency, call 911 or your local emergency services immediately, or go to emergency services — do not wait for or rely on an intake. The intake is designed to surface indicators of urgency for the pharmacist to review; it is not a means of obtaining emergency help.

The pharmacist is the sole clinical decision-maker. Pharmia conducts an intake and produces a pre-analysis. A pharmacist reviews that pre-analysis and exercises clinical judgment. The pre-analysis does not, by itself, produce a clinical decision.

This disclaimer describes how the service is designed to be used. It is not a waiver of Pharmia's responsibility for its own conduct. It does not displace or limit a Patient's own recourse against Pharmia for harm caused by Pharmia's own fault, including a defective AI output. The statement that the pharmacist is the sole clinical decision-maker describes the intended workflow; it does not transfer Pharmia's responsibility for its own fault to the pharmacist, and it is not a statement that Pharmia's AI output is accurate, reliable, or complete.

Pharmia does not guarantee that it will detect or escalate every urgent or red-flag symptom, and you should not delay seeking care while waiting for the pre-analysis. If your condition is urgent or worsening, seek care without waiting. This sentence does not limit Pharmia's responsibility for a negligent or defective failure of the intake to surface a red flag it reasonably should have surfaced; it is not a shield for such a failure.

5. Eligibility and accounts

To use the services you must be able to enter into a binding agreement. A Professional User must be a pharmacist or pharmacy entitled to practise, and warrants that it holds the professional standing it represents. A Patient uses the services through a participating pharmacy.

6. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

use the services in violation of any applicable law or professional rule;
use the services to submit information you have no right to submit, or to impersonate another person;
attempt to gain unauthorized access to the services, other accounts, or related systems;
interfere with, disrupt, or place an unreasonable load on the services;
copy, modify, reverse-engineer, or create derivative works of the services except as the law permits; or
use the services to develop a competing product.

7. Intellectual property

The services, the software, and the content (other than personal information processed on behalf of a pharmacy) are owned by Bento Studio or its licensors and are protected by intellectual-property law. Subject to these Terms, Bento Studio grants you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable licence to use the services for their intended purpose. No other rights are granted.

8. Fees

Fees, where they apply, apply to Professional Users and are set out in a separate order or subscription arrangement between the Professional User and Bento Studio. No fee is charged to a Patient for using the services. Billing terms, including amounts, billing cycle, and payment method, are governed by that separate arrangement.

9. Privacy

The handling of personal information through the services is described in the Pharmia Privacy Policy, which forms part of your relationship with Pharmia; please review it.

10. Disclaimers and warranties

To the extent permitted by law, the services are provided "as is" and "as available", and Bento Studio does not give warranties that are not expressly set out in these Terms.

This Section does not, and is not intended to, disclaim or limit anything that Quebec law does not permit to be disclaimed or limited. In particular, it does not disclaim liability for bodily or moral injury, liability for gross or intentional fault, or liability under the rules governing safety defects (articles 1468 and 1469 of the Civil Code of Québec). Section 11 governs the limitation of liability and prevails over this Section to the extent of any inconsistency; consistent with this Section, Section 11 itself carves out — and does not cap — liability for bodily or moral injury, for gross or intentional fault, and under the rules governing safety defects.

Two audiences. Like Section 11, this Section applies the two-audience distinction. As against a Patient, the "as is" and "as available" provision does not operate beyond what Quebec law permits, including the rules protecting a consumer against an abusive or external clause in an adhesion contract; the disclaimer is not invoked to deny a Patient a warranty or recourse that Quebec law confers on the Patient. As against a Professional User, the provision does not operate beyond what Quebec law permits either: a Professional User who subscribes to the services on Bento Studio's standard terms is itself an adhering party to a contract of adhesion (article 1379 of the Civil Code of Québec), and the disclaimer does not operate to exclude or limit a warranty or service-quality obligation to the extent Quebec law does not permit that as against an adhering party, even where both parties are businesses. The fact that a Professional User uses the services in the course of its professional practice does not, on its own, make the service-quality obligation freely excludable.

11. Limitation of liability

Bodily and moral injury — never excluded or limited. Nothing in these Terms limits or excludes the liability of Bento Studio for bodily injury or moral injury. This carve-out is unconditional and applies to every user, whether a Professional User or a Patient.

Gross or intentional fault — never excluded or limited. Nothing in these Terms limits or excludes the liability of Bento Studio for gross fault or intentional fault.

Safety defects — never excluded or limited. Nothing in this Section limits or excludes the liability of Bento Studio under the rules governing safety defects (articles 1468 and 1469 of the Civil Code of Québec). This carve-out applies to every user, whether a Professional User or a Patient, and the cap below does not apply to a claim governed by those rules — including a Professional User's economic loss arising from a safety defect. This is consistent with Section 10, which identifies the rules governing safety defects as non-disclaimable.

No limitation applies to a Patient. No monetary cap and no limitation of liability in these Terms applies to a claim by a Patient. A Patient's recourse against Bento Studio for harm caused by Bento Studio's own fault — including harm caused by a defective AI output — is not capped or limited by these Terms. The statement in Section 4 that the pharmacist is the sole clinical decision-maker describes the workflow and does not shield Bento Studio from liability for its own fault.

Cap applicable only to Professional Users. Subject to the two carve-outs above, and only as against a Professional User, the total liability of Bento Studio is limited as follows:

The limitation applies only to (a) indirect, consequential, special, and punitive damages, and (b) direct economic loss caused by ordinary fault. These are treated as distinct categories: the limitation reaches a Professional User's direct economic loss caused by ordinary fault (for example, economic loss from a service outage) as a deliberate allocation of that ordinary-fault economic risk.
The limitation does not apply to bodily or moral injury, to gross or intentional fault, to liability under the rules governing safety defects (articles 1468 and 1469 of the Civil Code of Québec), or to any claim by a Patient.
Where the limitation applies, the total aggregate liability of Bento Studio to a Professional User is limited to the greater of (a) the fees paid by that Professional User to Bento Studio in the twelve months before the event giving rise to the claim, or (b) $6,000 CAD (six thousand Canadian dollars), which is the agreed floor. Because the limit is the greater of those two amounts, it can never resolve to zero.

No exclusion of indirect damages in these Terms operates as a means of limiting liability for bodily or moral injury; the carve-outs above sit above any such exclusion and prevail over it.

12. Indemnification

Indemnification by Professional Users. A Professional User agrees to indemnify and hold harmless Bento Studio from third-party claims, losses, and reasonable costs to the extent they arise from the Professional User's (a) misuse of the services, (b) breach of these Terms, or (c) violation of its own professional or legal obligations, including its obligations as controller toward the patient.

Patients are not subject to a general indemnity. A Patient is not required to indemnify Bento Studio for claims arising from the Patient's use of the services generally. The only obligation that may run from a Patient is narrowly limited to a claim arising from the Patient's own fraudulent or unlawful misuse of the services. There is no blanket patient indemnity.

Each party remains responsible for its own fault, and nothing in this Section requires a party to indemnify Bento Studio for harm caused by Bento Studio's own fault.

13. Term and termination

These Terms apply for as long as you use the services. A Professional User may terminate in accordance with its separate subscription arrangement; Bento Studio may suspend or terminate access for a breach of these Terms or where required by law. A Patient may stop using the services at any time.

Data on termination. On termination of the service relationship, patient health information held by Pharmia is, at no charge and on the controller pharmacy's instruction, returned to that pharmacy or destroyed, with confirmation of the return or destruction. If Bento Studio is acquired or its operations are discontinued, patient health information remains subject to the same protections and any successor is bound by them.

Provisions that by their nature should survive termination — including Sections 3, 4, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 16 — survive.

14. Governing law and dispute resolution

These Terms are governed by the law in force in the Province of Quebec and the applicable laws of Canada.

The courts of Quebec have jurisdiction over any dispute arising from these Terms. This forum designation binds Professional Users. For a Patient, the designation of the Quebec courts is non-exclusive and yields to any mandatory rule of consumer-protection or other protective law that entitles the Patient to bring or defend proceedings in another forum; nothing in these Terms requires a Patient who is a Quebec consumer to waive the jurisdiction their protective law confers.

Nothing in these Terms waives any right to participate in a class action or other collective proceeding, or requires a dispute to be resolved only on an individual basis.

15. General provisions

Severability. If any provision of these Terms is held invalid or unenforceable, that provision is severed or limited to the minimum extent necessary, and the remaining provisions stay in full force.
Entire agreement. These Terms, together with the Privacy Policy and any separate subscription arrangement applicable to a Professional User, constitute the entire agreement between you and Bento Studio regarding the services and supersede prior agreements on that subject.
Force majeure. Bento Studio is not liable for a failure or delay in performance caused by an event beyond its reasonable control. The party affected by such an event gives the other party prompt notice of it, makes reasonable efforts to mitigate its effects, and resumes performance as soon as reasonably possible once the event has ended. If the event persists beyond a reasonable period, either party may terminate the affected service relationship on notice to the other. This provision does not limit any liability that Quebec law does not permit to be limited.
Assignment. You may not assign these Terms without Bento Studio's consent. Bento Studio may assign these Terms in connection with a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets, and gives the other party notice of any such assignment; any such assignment does not reduce the protection of personal information, which remains governed by the Privacy Policy.
No waiver. A failure or delay by either party in exercising a right is not a waiver of that right.
Survival. The provisions identified in Section 13 survive termination.
Notices. Notices to Bento Studio may be sent to the contact in Section 16. Notices to you may be given through the services or to the contact information associated with your account.

16. Contact

Bento Studio Inc. Registered address: 117 rue de la Canardière, Terrebonne (Québec) J6W 6K3, Canada Quebec enterprise number (NEQ): 1180894173 Email: privacy@pharmia.com

17. Languages

These Terms are published in French and in English. The two versions are equally authoritative, each a faithful rendering of the other, and neither is subordinate to the other. Both versions are published on the Pharmia website; you may obtain the version in the other language directly on the website or by contacting Bento Studio at the address above.