What we will and will not do

Article 1 Why we exist

Rungwell exists to turn the careful human work that machine learning needs into good first jobs, and good first jobs into the next rung: a skill, a promotion, a reference, a better job, with us or elsewhere.

Everything in this charter serves that purpose. Where a client’s interest and a labeller’s welfare conflict, the labeller’s welfare comes first.

Article 2 Employment

Every person who labels, reviews or evaluates data for Rungwell is our employee, with a written contract, health cover, paid leave and statutory contributions.

We do not use crowd platforms, subcontractors or agency labour for client work, and we do not ask employees to work for clients outside their contracted hours.

Article 3 Pay

We pay above the minimum wage that applies to the work in every country where we employ people, and we publish median earnings every year as a multiple of that wage, with our method.

Pay is made up of a base for every scheduled shift and earnings for the work done. Rates vary by task and are shown to labellers before they accept a task.

Article 4 Provenance

Before any project begins, the client must state in writing how the data it sends us was collected, from whom, and on what basis it is held. We will not begin work without that statement, and we will stop work if we have reason to believe it is untrue.

A labeller should never have to wonder whether the people in front of them agreed to be there. This article draws on research published by Frothly, the non-profit that runs the Turing Registry, in report FR-R-2026-06 (September 2026), a study of how the provenance and authenticity of images can be checked. Its conclusion is that the question to ask of an image is where it came from, not how it looks.

Article 5 Purpose

We ask every client what the system it is building is for, and we decline work where the answer is weapons targeting, the identification of individuals without their knowledge, or no answer at all.

Where a project could be put to more than one use, the client must tell us the uses it intends, and must tell us if they change.

Article 6 Sensitive content

Every project is graded before work begins at one of three content tiers. S1 is occasional distressing material; S2 is regular distressing material; S3 is sustained exposure or data under strict confidentiality, and is done only in restricted rooms.

Each tier carries wellbeing time inside the shift, access to counsellors, and quarterly check-ins. Wellbeing time is never deducted from a labeller’s working hours.

Article 7 The right to step away

Any labeller may decline a task carrying a content warning, or ask to leave any project, for any reason, without losing pay for the shift and without being asked to explain.

Article 8 Voice

Every training cohort elects representatives. Labellers at both centres elect one director to our board. Cohort representatives may refer any project to the board’s ethics committee, which must consider the referral at its next meeting and reply in writing.

Rungwell respects the right of everyone who works for us to organize.

Article 9 Labellers’ privacy

We do not publish photographs of the people who work at Rungwell, and we publish their names and stories only with their agreement.

Tools that measure a labeller’s work or attention, including Focus Assurance, are described in plain language in our worker privacy notice, run only during tasks, and are never used to watch a labeller live.

Article 10 Keeping this charter

The board’s ethics committee reviews this charter at least every two years, with the cohort representatives. Breaches may be reported in confidence to ethics@rungwell.org, which is read by the chair of the ethics committee and the General Counsel.