Policies

Scope of Service Policy

What Brighter Latitude does, what is included, what is not included, and how our founder-led Costa Rica journey service works from first route idea to confirmed land arrangements.

Website version 2.0, last updated 19 July 2026

At a glance

Our service: We design and coordinate personalised Costa Rica land journeys using selected accommodation, activity, guide, and transport partners.
Flight boundary: We provide airport and timing guidance, but customers book and manage all flights directly.
Partner delivery: Partners deliver their own services and are responsible for their operations. Brighter Latitude remains responsible for the coordination services it agrees to provide.
Customer fee: A separate 10% Journey Management Fee applies to the managed land-services subtotal and is shown before payment.

Our Role

A journey designer and land-booking coordinator

Brighter Latitude helps travellers move from curiosity to a practical Costa Rica journey. We understand the brief, shape the route, prepare a proposal, coordinate selected partners, manage the agreed land-booking process, and organise confirmations and final guidance.

Plain-language promise

You tell us what you are searching for. We shape the journey, coordinate the agreed accommodation, activities, guides, and transfers, and give you a clear trip packet. You book and manage your flights directly.

Founder-led MVP

The website includes an AI-assisted discovery experience. During the MVP, submitted information is emailed to the founder for manual review. The founder asks follow-up questions, contacts partners, prepares proposals, and manages bookings. The discovery tool does not make a binding booking, supplier commitment, payment decision, or refund decision by itself.

Our service boundary

Your accepted formal proposal is the source of truth. It identifies what Brighter Latitude will coordinate, what is excluded, the 10% Journey Management Fee, supplier prices, payment timing, confirmation status, support level, and any partner-specific cancellation terms.

Brighter Latitude	Local partners	The traveller
Designs, consolidates, coordinates, communicates, tracks, and provides reasonable assistance.	Deliver accommodation, activities, guiding, transfers, vehicles, and other booked services.	Provides accurate information, books flights, reviews terms, pays on time, and meets personal travel requirements.

How The Service Works

From curiosity to a confirmed land journey

Stage	What happens	What is not yet final
1. AI-assisted discovery	You share interests, timing, travellers, pace, comfort level, budget, and important preferences.	No hotel, activity, transfer, partner, or price is confirmed.
2. Founder review	The founder receives the submission by email, reviews it, and may ask follow-up questions.	The discovery summary is not a quote or booking instruction.
3. Free first route idea	We provide a high-level route direction built around what you want to discover.	Sample stays, activities, and budgets are indicative and subject to change.
4. Formal proposal	You receive a clearer route, proposed land services, exclusions, supplier information, pricing, the 10% Journey Management Fee, payment schedule, and known cancellation terms.	Availability remains subject to partner confirmation and required payments.
5. Acceptance and payment	You approve the proposal and pay according to the stated schedule.	A request or payment does not confirm a component until the partner accepts it.
6. Booking management	We contact partners, request or secure reservations, manage agreed payments, and track confirmations.	Substitutions, revised pricing, or additional approval may be needed if availability changes.
7. Final travel packet	You receive the confirmed route, timings, pickup details, partner contacts, booking references where available, and practical guidance.	The packet does not replace insurance, emergency services, or official entry advice.
8. Travel support	We provide reasonable assistance related to the components we coordinated.	Support is not 24/7 emergency or concierge service unless explicitly stated.

Confirmation language

Route ideas and proposals use words such as indicative, to request, held, or confirmed. A service is confirmed only when the partner accepts the booking and Brighter Latitude issues confirmation details.

What Can Be Included

Land services listed in your accepted proposal

The website describes the service generally. Only the components listed in the accepted proposal are included for a particular journey.

Service area	What Brighter Latitude can do
Journey design	Shape the route around your interests, party, dates, pace, comfort level, budget, and priorities.
Accommodation	Recommend, request, reserve, confirm, and coordinate hotels, lodges, resorts, or other stays included in the proposal.
Transfers and local transport	Arrange agreed airport pickups, private transfers, shared shuttles, route transfers, drivers, or other local transport.
Activities and guides	Coordinate agreed tours, nature experiences, hot springs, wildlife activities, family activities, guides, coffee, food, culture, and similar components.
Meal and route logic	Consider realistic meal timing and journey flow. Restaurant reservations or included meals apply only where the proposal says so.
Partner communication	Request quotes and availability, communicate relevant preferences, track responses, and clarify partner terms.
Payments and confirmations	Collect agreed customer payments, pay or settle with partners where applicable, and organise confirmation records. Card numbers remain with the payment processor.
Final travel packet	Provide an organised itinerary, timings, pickup details, partner contacts, inclusions, exclusions, and booking references where available.
Pre-trip and reasonable journey support	Answer questions and help communicate with partners about the components we coordinated, within the support level stated in the proposal.

Proposal controls scope

Anything not listed as included is outside the service scope unless Brighter Latitude later confirms the addition in writing, including any revised price and cancellation terms.

Flights

Guidance from us, booking and airline management by you

Flight booking is not part of the MVP. Brighter Latitude helps the land journey fit sensible arrival and departure choices, but the traveller purchases and manages every flight directly with the airline or booking platform.

What we can help with

Suggest whether San Jose, Liberia, or another airport best fits the proposed route.
Recommend practical arrival and departure windows for transfers and first or final hotel nights.
Flag route consequences, connection risk, or overnight needs created by proposed flight timing.
Use confirmed flight numbers and times to coordinate an included airport transfer.
Try to adjust land arrangements when an airline changes your schedule, subject to partner availability and cost.

What remains your responsibility

Search, select, book, pay for, and confirm flights.
Enter correct legal names and meet passport, visa, entry, transit, health, and onward-travel requirements.
Manage seats, baggage, meals, upgrades, airline accounts, check-in, schedule changes, cancellations, credits, and refunds.
Monitor airline communications and arrive in time for departure.
Purchase appropriate travel insurance if desired.

Airline disruption

Brighter Latitude is not responsible for airfare, ticketing, airline performance, missed connections, baggage, or airline refund decisions. We will make reasonable efforts to help re-coordinate the land components we booked, but partner fees, availability, and price differences may apply.

Flight information and privacy

We may request an airport, flight number, and scheduled arrival or departure time where needed for a transfer. We do not need passport or payment card information for flight ticketing because we do not book the flight.

Exclusions And Partner Delivery

Clear boundaries make the promise more credible

Area	Not included unless the proposal clearly says otherwise
Flights	Searching, purchasing, ticketing, managing, changing, or refunding flights. Flight guidance remains available.
Independent bookings	Any hotel, activity, transfer, guide, restaurant, rental vehicle, or other service you book or pay for outside Brighter Latitude.
Passports, visas, and entry	Checking, obtaining, renewing, or guaranteeing travel documents, immigration eligibility, entry permissions, or official requirements.
Travel insurance	Providing or replacing insurance advice or coverage. Appropriate insurance is strongly recommended.
Professional advice	Medical, legal, tax, immigration, financial, or other regulated advice.
Emergency services	Police, ambulance, rescue, hospital, embassy, or other emergency response. Use the appropriate local channel first.
24/7 concierge	Continuous real-time support unless explicitly included and priced in the accepted proposal.
Guarantees outside our control	Weather, wildlife sightings, road conditions, government action, partner staffing, exact journey times, or perfect service delivery.
Personal expenses	Tips, minibar, laundry, spa services, meals not listed, baggage fees, upgrades, incidentals, and personal purchases.

Partners deliver the travel services

Hotels, lodges, activity operators, guides, drivers, and other partners deliver their own services under their operating conditions, safety procedures, staff, equipment, licences, insurance, local rules, and house terms.

Responsibility split

Partners are responsible for the safe and proper delivery of their own services. Brighter Latitude is responsible for the journey-design, booking-coordination, payment-administration, communication, and support services it agrees to provide. Nothing in this policy limits rights or responsibilities that cannot lawfully be limited.

Pricing And Recommendations

A separate 10% fee and transparent partner economics

Journey Management Fee

When you proceed with a managed journey, Brighter Latitude charges a 10% Journey Management Fee on the customer-facing subtotal of the land services we coordinate and book. Flights, travel insurance, personal spending, tips, and components you book independently are excluded. The proposal shows the fee as a separate line before payment.

What the fee covers

Detailed route finalisation and practical itinerary logic.
Partner sourcing, quote and availability coordination.
Booking administration, payment scheduling, and confirmation tracking.
Reasonable revisions within the agreed scope.
Final travel packet and reasonable pre-trip support.

Partner compensation

Some partners may also pay a commission or provide a confidential net rate. This compensation supports the business but does not determine which option we recommend.
Recommendations are based on fit, availability, route logic, service terms, budget, and your stated priorities.

Independent recommendations

We may earn different amounts from different partners. We do not recommend a hotel, activity, guide, or transfer because it pays more. The formal proposal should make the customer price and Journey Management Fee clear, even where confidential partner net rates are not itemised.

Read with the Pricing & Payments Policy

The separate Pricing & Payments Policy explains the fee basis, payment schedule, currency, partner compensation, and what happens when prices or scope change.

Management fee and cancellation

The Journey Management Fee pays for work completed by Brighter Latitude and is generally non-refundable once detailed booking work begins. Partner charges follow the partner-specific recovery rules explained in the Cancellation & Refund Policy.

Changes, Confirmation, And Support

Travel changes, the status of each component matters

Moment	What can usually happen
Before the formal proposal	The route direction can usually be adjusted at a high level without supplier commitments.
Before payment and booking	The proposal can often be revised, but new availability, prices, and cancellation terms may apply.
After partner requests begin	Changes may require new quotes, partner fees, extra coordination, or replacement components.
After confirmation	Partner change or cancellation terms, availability, and price differences control what is possible.
During travel	Changes are handled case by case. Local conditions, partner rules, timing, and available alternatives control the outcome.

Support before and during the trip

Support area	Included scope
Before travel	Questions about the confirmed route, timings, partners, inclusions, payments, final packet, and practical journey flow.
During travel	Reasonable help with itinerary questions or partner communication related to components booked through Brighter Latitude.
Urgent situations	Contact local emergency services, the hotel front desk, the relevant partner emergency number, or the appropriate authority first when safety or time is critical.
Not 24/7 by default	Brighter Latitude is not a round-the-clock concierge or emergency-response provider unless the accepted proposal explicitly says otherwise.

Founder capacity

During the MVP, support is founder-led. Response targets may be stated in the proposal or final packet. Customers should not rely on Brighter Latitude as the only channel for urgent partner, safety, medical, or emergency matters.

Traveller Responsibilities And Linked Policies

Good coordination depends on accurate information and timely decisions

Traveller responsibility	Examples
Accurate information	Names, dates, ages where relevant, room needs, confirmed flight timing, luggage, contact details, budget, and important restrictions.
Timely review and payment	Review proposals, approve or request changes, and pay by deadlines needed to hold availability.
Flights and travel documents	Book and monitor flights, maintain passports, visas, entry documents, health documentation, and legal eligibility to travel.
Health, mobility, dietary, and accessibility needs	Share high-level needs early so we can ask partners whether a component is suitable. Do not assume accessibility unless confirmed in writing.
Insurance	Consider appropriate travel insurance for cancellation, interruption, medical needs, baggage, delays, and supplier events.
Conduct and local rules	Follow partner instructions, safety briefings, local laws, park rules, and respectful behaviour toward communities and environments.

Accessibility, families, and special needs

We can consider mobility, accessibility, dietary, family, age, comfort, and pacing needs. Suitability depends on partner confirmation. We do not guarantee that a room, vehicle, activity, route, or guide is suitable unless that has been specifically confirmed in writing.

Policies that work together

Document	What it controls
Scope of Service Policy	What Brighter Latitude does, what is excluded, and who is responsible for what.
Pricing & Payments Policy	The 10% Journey Management Fee, supplier charges, compensation, deposits, balances, currency, and payment process.
Cancellation & Refund Policy	How the Journey Management Fee and partner charges are treated when a trip or component changes or is cancelled.
Data Policy & Privacy Promise	How traveller, booking, analytics, and marketing information is collected, used, shared, protected, and retained.
Accepted formal proposal	The journey-specific inclusions, exclusions, prices, partner terms, payment schedule, support level, and confirmation status.

Problems, Short Version, And Contact

Reasonable support, not absolute control

If something goes wrong

Travel involves real-world movement, weather, roads, infrastructure, wildlife, partners, and people. If a confirmed component cannot be delivered as planned, Brighter Latitude will make reasonable efforts to communicate, help coordinate, and seek a practical alternative where possible.

Refunds, credits, substitutions, and schedule changes depend on the affected component, partner terms, recoverable amounts, and the Cancellation & Refund Policy.

Partner delivery

Brighter Latitude does not control weather, wildlife, road conditions, government action, partner staffing, hotel operations, vehicle operations, or emergency services. The relevant partner remains responsible for delivering its service. We remain responsible for the coordination work we agreed to perform.

Website short version

What we do. We design and coordinate personalised Costa Rica land journeys around your curiosity, travel style, timing, comfort level, and budget.
What we handle. When listed in your accepted proposal, we can coordinate accommodation, activities, guides, transfers, partner payments, confirmations, and final trip guidance.
Flights. We provide airport and timing guidance, but you book and manage every flight directly.
How we charge. A separate 10% Journey Management Fee applies to the managed land-services subtotal. Some partners may also compensate us, but compensation does not determine our recommendations.
Your proposal controls. It is the source of truth for inclusions, exclusions, pricing, confirmation status, partner terms, cancellation rules, and support level.

Updates and contact

We may update this policy as the service, supplier network, pricing, technology, or booking model evolves. The version published when you accept your formal proposal applies unless the proposal states a more specific rule.

Contact

For scope questions, email salazar.jose@brighterlatitude.com or use the contact route at brighterlatitude.com.

This policy does not exclude any customer right or business responsibility that cannot lawfully be excluded. The service structure and terms should be reviewed by qualified counsel for the jurisdictions in which Brighter Latitude sells or organises travel.

Questions about this policy? Write to reservations@brighterlatitude.com.

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