Free trial policy
Last updated: 21 May 2026.
This policy sets out the terms of the free trial period offered by ProMastro (Mr Dennys Pillitteri, sole proprietorship, CBE 0877.004.615) to any professional subscribing to a plan on promastro.be. It supplements the General Terms of Sale (“GTS”) and applies to all plans offered. In the event of any conflict between this policy and the GTS, the GTS prevail.
1. Principle: try without commitment
To allow professionals to evaluate the service with peace of mind before any real payment, and in line with the spirit of Belgian consumer law aimed at protecting contractual freedom (articles VI.45 et seq. of the Code of Economic Law, applicable by analogy to B2B relationships), every new subscription benefits from a free trial period. During this period, the Pro has access to all the features of the chosen plan: published professional listing, direct contact from Visitors, detailed statistics, quality badges, PEPPOL electronic invoicing, AI moderation, etc.
2. Duration of the trial period
| Plan subscribed | Free trial duration | Equivalent in days |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly | 30 days | 30 |
| Annual | 4 months | ≈ 120 days |
The trial period starts on the date of effective activation of the professional account (validation of the pre-authorisation payment, see §3) and ends at 00:00 (Belgian time, CET/CEST) on the day following the last trial day. No real payment is due before expiry. The duration is fixed: no individual commercial extension is granted, except in the case of documented force majeure.
3. Bank mandate mechanism
3.1 Why is a payment card requested?
To activate the recurring direct-debit service at the end of the trial, our payment service provider Mollie B.V. (Netherlands, authorised payment service provider under number 39199-DNB by De Nederlandsche Bank, in accordance with directive (EU) 2015/2366 on payment services) requires the prior setup of a SEPA bank mandate or a card authorisation. This mandate is technically validated by a symbolic pre-authorisation of 0.01 € (one cent) on your card or bank account.
3.2 What happens to the 0.01 € pre-authorisation
The 0.01 € amount is processed in one of the two following ways, according to the rules of the banking network:
Option A — Immediate refund: the amount is credited back to your card within 1 to 7 business days (variable depending on your bank).
Option B — Credit against the first real payment: the amount is deducted from your first invoice after the trial, which therefore amounts to subscription amount − 0.01 €.
In both cases, you effectively pay nothing during the trial. The pre-authorisation is strictly financially neutral.
3.3 Security of bank processing
No complete banking data is stored by ProMastro: only Mollie and your bank handle your payment details, in accordance with PCI-DSS level 1 standards. ProMastro stores only a Mollie token (an opaque identifier) allowing subsequent charges to be triggered without direct access to card data.
4. Trial period anti-abuse
4.1 Uniqueness rule
The free trial period is granted once per professional. Uniqueness is verified using three combined criteria:
VAT number: verified in real time via the European Commission’s VIES service and stored as a SHA-256 hash in the internal register apb_vat_registry.
Email address: stored as a SHA-256 hash in the same register.
Technical fingerprint: HMAC-SHA256 hash of the sign-up IP address, kept for 5 years (legitimate interest — fraud prevention).
4.2 Penalties for circumvention
Any attempt at circumvention (creating several accounts for the same professional, using disposable email addresses linked to the same VAT number, false identities, use of a VPN or proxy to mask the technical origin combined with other indicators) results, by a reasoned and traced decision, in:
1. The immediate suspension of all linked accounts;
2. The cancellation of all ongoing trial periods;
3. Where applicable, a report to the competent authorities where there are elements suggesting a criminal offence (forgery and use of forgery, fraud within the meaning of art. 496 of the Belgian Criminal Code).
No refund is due in the event of a penalty for circumvention.
5. Termination during the trial
5.1 Simple two-click procedure
You can terminate your subscription at any time during the trial period, from your dashboard:
1. Log in to your dashboard;
2. “My subscription” tab → “Cancel my subscription” button;
3. Confirm your choice in the validation window.
Termination is immediate, free of charge, without justification to provide, and without any future payment being charged.
5.2 Consequences of termination during the trial
No payment is charged: the 0.01 € pre-authorisation is either refunded or cancelled depending on the chosen payment method.
Your professional listing remains accessible until the original trial end date: you keep the full benefit of the subscribed period.
After the end of the trial, the listing is unpublished from the Site, removed from internal search results and marked noindex for external search engines.
90-day archiving: the data remains technically archived for 90 days (see privacy policy, §5) to allow you a possible reactivation, then is permanently deleted.
6. End of the trial period (switch to paid)
6.1 If you have not terminated
Upon expiry of the trial period, and in the absence of termination on your part, the following operations are triggered automatically:
1. First real payment automatically charged to the payment method registered with Mollie;
2. Issuance of a compliant invoice: transmission in PEPPOL format for Pros holding a valid Belgian VAT number (B2B e-invoicing obligation applicable since 1 January 2026 in accordance with the Royal Decree of 4 February 2023), or made available in PDF format in the dashboard;
3. Automatic renewal at each subsequent due date (monthly or annual) unless terminated beforehand.
6.2 Automatic reminders before the due date
To give you time to decide, ProMastro sends two reminder emails before the end of the trial:
Email D-7: reminder 7 days before the end of the trial, with a summary of the amount that will be charged and a direct link to the termination procedure.
Email D-1: final reminder 24 hours before the charge.
These reminders are sent to the account’s email address. Check that the account’s main email is correct and look in the “Junk” / “Spam” folders of your mailbox.
7. No refund after the trial
7.1 “Satisfied or terminated” principle
The free trial period itself constitutes the evaluation period for the service. It is designed to allow you to test all the features without any financial commitment. Consequently:
No refund is due for paid periods, even partially used (a month not fully consumed, a year cut short by termination, etc.);
You can terminate at any time; the subscription then ends at the next due date, free of charge and without indemnity, with no early-termination penalty;
The minimum commitment never exceeds the duration of the chosen plan (1 month or 1 year).
7.2 Relationship with the right of withdrawal
This arrangement complies with article VI.53, 1° of the Belgian Code of Economic Law, which excludes the 14-day right of withdrawal in contracts concluded between professionals (B2B). The free trial period largely substitutes for it, offering an evaluation window far greater than the 14 days of the B2C regime (up to 4 months on the annual plan).
8. Special cases
8.1 Gifted subscription (“cadeau”)
If you benefit from a subscription offered by ProMastro on a commercial or promotional basis — invitation code, “Cadeau Max” plan, press partnership, referral programme, etc. — then:
No payment is required and no payment card is requested at activation;
The end of the gifted subscription does not trigger any automatic charge, nor any automatic conversion to a paid subscription;
To continue beyond it, you must manually activate a paid subscription from your dashboard, which opens a new free trial period in accordance with the uniqueness rules of §4 (unless you have already exhausted your trial entitlement for the same VAT number).
8.2 Failed payment at the end of the trial
If the first real payment fails (expired card, bank limit reached, opposition, closed account), Mollie automatically makes three attempts spread over 14 days according to the following schedule:
| Attempt | Timing | Additional action |
|---|---|---|
| Initial | Day 0 (end of trial) | Failure email + secure link to update payment method |
| Retry 1 | Day 3 | Reminder email |
| Retry 2 | Day 7 | Reminder email + SMS if number provided |
| Suspension | Day 14 | Listing suspended, 90-day archiving |
The suspended listing is kept in technical archiving for 90 days before permanent deletion, to give you time to regularise. During this period, you can reactivate the subscription at any time by updating your payment method from the dashboard.
8.3 Changing plan during the trial
You can switch from one plan to another during the trial period (for example Base → Medium, or Monthly → Annual). The remaining trial duration is kept pro rata, within the defined caps (30 days for monthly, 120 days for annual). If the switch entails a higher cap, the difference is offered pro rata to the elapsed time.
8.4 Force majeure during the trial
In the event of force majeure technically attributable to ProMastro (prolonged unavailability of the Site, failure of a critical subcontractor exceeding 72 cumulative hours over the trial period), a discretionary trial extension may be granted, on reasoned request to support@promastro.be, strictly limited to the prejudice suffered.
9. Personal data linked to the trial
The data linked to the trial period (VAT hash, email hash, trial_used flag, IP fingerprint HMAC-SHA256, start date, planned end date) is processed in the context of fraud prevention, legal basis legitimate interest (art. 6.1.f GDPR), with a documented balancing test. It is kept for 5 years after the end of the last trial exercised, in accordance with accounting and anti-fraud obligations. The full privacy policy can be consulted on the privacy page.
10. Amendment of this policy
ProMastro may amend this trial policy to reflect changes to the service, legal requirements or user feedback. Any substantial change (change to the trial duration, change to the anti-abuse rules, addition of a new plan) is notified to active Pros at least 30 days before entry into force, and does not apply retroactively to ongoing trials.
11. Contact
General email: contact@promastro.be
Technical support & billing: support@promastro.be
See also: GTS · pricing grid · FAQ · privacy policy.
