TRUST
The evidence behind an adviser decision.
A principal or licensee should be able to see where the data sits, who can release advice, what a reviewer can trace and which promises are written into the terms.
Open the review packet- Data location
- Sydney region
- Advice authority
- Adviser release
- Regulatory inputs
- Dated and approved
- Decision evidence
- Reviewable history
- Commercial promises
- Published clauses
FOR LICENSEE REVIEW
Start with the decision you need to make.
This page is arranged as a working review packet, with the relevant control or evidence linked behind each question. It is intended to support a real approval conversation, not stand in for one.
Who controls advice and release?
- Adviser-controlled release authorityReview
Aether prepares reviewable work. The adviser remains the decision-maker and release gate.
- AI proposal and confirmation boundariesReview
AI-assisted work stays behind context, proposal review, confirmation and audit controls.
- What the AI features send, and to whomReview
The per-feature data flow, the provider's published retention terms, and the firm-level off switch.
What can oversight inspect?
REGULATORY INPUTS
Regulatory values are governed, not guessed.
Every regulatory value used by Aether's advice stack comes from a dated pack with a recorded approval state, and production refuses to load a pack that is not approved. The pack is the unit of approval; individual values carry source notes where they have been sourced individually.
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Dated packs
Regulatory values live in dated files, not scattered through page copy or calculations.
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Source provenance
Each pack carries source notes so a reviewer can trace where its values came from.
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Reviewer approval
A pack needs explicit approval before production will accept it.
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Production guard
Production startup refuses unapproved regulatory packs, while CI checks for values written directly into application logic.
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Fail closed
Missing values produce a reviewable insufficient-data state instead of fabricated output.
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Fair use
All features are included without per-client, per-document or per-Statement-of-Advice charges. Two functions carry published fair-use limits: bulk document extraction (1,000 document extractions per practice per month) and Vesper AI usage (2,000,000 tokens per adviser seat per month). Aether will notify a customer approaching a limit and will not interrupt work in progress.
These exist to stop a 500-client back-book being pushed through the extraction pipeline in a weekend, not to meter ordinary work. No normal practice comes near them, and nothing is ever billed per use.
REVIEW HISTORY
What happened, what changed and why.
The useful compliance story is not just the final document. It is the record of work that led there.
Audit logging
Record edits, fact-find changes and document generation are logged with adviser ID, timestamp and IP, then made reviewable inside the application.
- Material record changes
- Document versions and publication state
- Adviser identity, time and originating IP
Advice reasoning
Aether records why strategies were recommended, deferred or rejected, so the history includes alternatives considered as well as the recommendation that reaches the document.
- Eligibility and scope
- Rationale, alternatives and cautions
- Reviewed reasoning carried into documents
DATA LOCATION AND ACCESS
Sydney-region records with inspectable controls.
The hosting, storage and session boundaries are named plainly so they can be checked during review.
- Application and database
- The application and PostgreSQL 18 managed database run in the Sydney region. Data is encrypted at rest and daily snapshots follow the managed backup policy.
- Documents and object storage
- Object storage also remains in the Sydney region. The application sits behind Caddy 2 with TLS, HSTS and security headers.
- Identity and sessions
- Passwords are hashed with bcrypt. Cookie-based sessions are signed with itsdangerous through Starlette SessionMiddleware, with no session tokens held by a third-party identity provider.
WHERE DATA GOES
The two documents your IT team will ask for.
Both are maintained in the Aether repository and published from that one file, so the version you read is the version Aether holds. The contract pack points at them by name.
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Subprocessors
Every third party that processes data on Aether's behalf: what reaches it, the region it is processed in, how long the provider keeps it, and a link to its terms.
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AI data handling
What each AI-assisted feature sends to the model provider and when, what the provider says it does with it, what Aether has not done yet, and the controls a firm holds.
IN WRITING
Promises you can read before you buy.
The three promises on the price card appear here as the clauses that go into the order form.
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Term and cancellation
Subscriptions run month to month. Either party may cancel with notice effective the end of the current billing month. There is no minimum term, no automatic renewal period, and no cancellation fee. Part-months are not refunded.
A minimum term protects the vendor from its own product. We would rather earn the next month.
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Price changes
Aether may change list pricing at most once in any twelve-month period, and any increase to an existing customer's per-seat price is capped at the change in the Australian Consumer Price Index (All Groups, weighted average of eight capital cities) over the preceding twelve months. No increase applies within twenty-four months of a customer's start date. Founding-partner rates are fixed for the period stated in the customer's order form.
Above-inflation rises on a system a practice cannot easily leave are the most-cited grievance with incumbent advice software. The cap is measurable, so it can be checked.
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Data export
At any time during the subscription, and for twelve months after cancellation, the customer may request and receive a complete export of their data, including client and household records, fact-find content, advice and projection records, generated documents, and the associated audit trail, in a documented, non-proprietary format. No fee applies. Aether will not withhold, delay, or condition an export on settlement of any account.
This is the answer to the fair question a principal asks of a small supplier: what happens to my records if you fold? They leave with you, in a format another system can read, whether or not we are still here to help. The same export is what a licensee or a successor adviser receives on request.
CONTINUE THE REVIEW
Bring the hard questions.
Email reid@aetherforge.au or request a sandbox walkthrough. Reid can take your principal or licensee through the evidence before any client data moves.