Privacy policy

1. Who is responsible

ULU Studio Ltd (trading as PatronNow), company number 17259257, registered office Swan Building, 20 Swan Street, Manchester M4 5JW, is the controller for this website and, in the PatronNow service, for account data, billing, support and diagnostics. ICO registration number 00015215224. Contact: privacy@patronnow.app.

An organisation that uses PatronNow is the controller of the sponsor, enquiry, agreement and person data it puts into the service. We process that data on the organisation's instructions, under the processing terms in section 10 of our terms of service.

2. This website

This website sets no cookies, stores nothing in your browser, runs no analytics and makes no requests to other sites. It is hosted by Cloudflare, which handles standard request data (your IP address, browser and the pages you ask for) to deliver and protect the site. We do not keep our own record of visits. Apart from that, the only personal data this website handles is what you send through the pilot form.

The pilot form. If you use the form to ask about the pilot, we receive your organisation's name, your name, email address, phone number if you give one, and what you write. Cloudflare emails it to our pilot inbox, which is on Google Workspace; the website does not store it. We use it only to reply about the pilot and to arrange it, on the basis of our legitimate interest in answering your enquiry. We keep it while we are discussing the pilot with you and delete it within 12 months if the pilot does not go ahead. Ask us to delete it sooner at privacy@patronnow.app.

3. The PatronNow service

Your account. When you create an account we collect your name, email address, password (stored only as a one-way hash), language and time zone, and the organisation details you enter. If you turn on two-factor authentication, we store the secret needed to check your codes.

What your organisation creates. As you use the service we store what you create: opportunities, sponsors and their contact details, enquiries, proposals, agreements, invoices, payment records, delivery evidence and reports. We keep a history of significant actions, such as who accepted a proposal and when, because that history is the point of the service. For this data your organisation is the controller (section 1).

People who do not have an account. A Sponsor who opens a proposal confirms their email address with a one-time code before accepting or declining, and we record the acceptance: the version accepted, the time, the name and email address used. Someone who sends an enquiry from an organisation's public page gives their name, organisation, email address and message, which go to that organisation's Admins. Where an organisation presents an adult for sponsorship, it records that person's details, images and permission. Each of these is held for the organisation, which is the controller.

Payments. If an organisation sets up online payments, Stripe collects what it needs to verify the organisation and pay it. We receive confirmation of payments, refunds and disputes and the account's status, never card numbers or bank log-in details. Plan payments to us are also made through Stripe.

Support and diagnostics. If you contact us, we keep your message and our reply. When something goes wrong in the service, it records an error report: the page, the time and technical details, with passwords, codes and similar secrets removed. We also record security events, such as sign-ins and failed attempts.

Cookies and browser storage. The service sets one cookie, which keeps you signed in. It is essential, cannot be read by scripts, and ends when you sign out or after 24 hours without activity. The service also stores a few display preferences in your browser, such as how a list is laid out or a notice you have dismissed; they stay on your device and are not sent to us. There are no analytics, advertising or tracking cookies or scripts in the service.

4. Why we process it and on what basis

• To provide the service you asked for: performance of our contract with you.
• To send service emails such as sign-in links, verification codes, invitations, enquiry notices, billing notices and replies to support requests: performance of the contract. We do not send marketing email.
• To support you and fix problems, using your messages and error reports: our legitimate interest in running a reliable service.
• To keep the service secure and prevent abuse, including rate limiting, security events and the action history: our legitimate interest in running a safe service.
• To meet legal obligations, such as keeping records of invoices and payments: legal obligation.

5. Who we share it with

Only with the providers we need to run the service, each under a contract:

• DigitalOcean: hosting and the database, in London;
• Brevo: sending the service's emails;
• Backblaze: storing our encrypted backups, in its EU Central region (Amsterdam);
• Google Workspace: our own mailbox, for messages you send us;
• Cloudflare: hosting this website and sending the pilot form.

Stripe processes payments as an independent controller for its own purposes, under its own privacy policy. We do not sell personal data and do not share it with advertisers.

Sponsors and organisations share information with each other through the service by design: a proposal sent to a Sponsor contains the organisation's details, and an accepted agreement with its invoices and reports is visible to both.

6. International transfers

The PatronNow service and its database run on DigitalOcean in London. Brevo stores email data, and Backblaze our encrypted backups, in the European Union. Stripe and Google may process data in the United States and elsewhere; where any provider transfers personal data outside the UK, its contract with us includes the safeguards UK law requires. Our backups are encrypted on our own server before they are sent to Backblaze, and only we hold the key.

7. How long we keep it

• Your account: for as long as it is open. If you ask us to delete your sign-in account, we do so within one month, apart from the records below that must be kept.
• A closed organisation: disabled at once; an Admin can reopen it within 30 days; then its data is deleted.
• Invoices and payment records: at least six years after the end of the financial year they relate to, as UK tax law requires.
• Accepted agreements, with the minimum identity and acceptance record: seven years after the sponsorship ends or its last payment, whichever is later, then reviewed for deletion.
• Proposals: an unsent draft 90 days after it was last edited; a declined, expired or withdrawn proposal 12 months after it ended. Email verification codes are erased within 24 hours of use or expiry.
• Error reports and security events: 12 months.

Where we keep a record after the reason for its personal details has passed, we reduce those details to what the record still needs. Server logs on our host are rotated automatically and kept only briefly.

Backups. We take an encrypted backup every day. Each is kept for 35 days and then deleted, so data deleted from the service has left our backups within about five weeks. DigitalOcean also keeps its own short-term backups of the database. When an adult presented for sponsorship withdraws their permission or asks for their data to be erased, the decision is recorded separately, by reference number only, so that restoring a backup cannot bring their data back into use.

8. Your rights

You can ask for a copy of your personal data, ask us to correct or delete it, object to or restrict processing, and ask for your data in a portable format. Email privacy@patronnow.app; we respond within one month. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk.

If your data is held by an organisation in its PatronNow workspace, that organisation is the controller, so contact it first. We will help it answer you.

9. Children

PatronNow is not directed at children. Accounts are for adults acting for an organisation, and the service does not offer sponsorship of anyone under 18. Organisations should not enter children's personal details in PatronNow.

10. Changes

We will post changes here, with the date at the top, and email account holders about material changes before they take effect.