Privacy Policy

Helpful-Site.com is a free online tools website. We provide calculators, converters, and other utilities to members of the public at no charge. A premium subscription is available for users who wish to use the site without advertisements.

If you have questions about this policy or your personal data, please contact us at: info@helpful-site.com

We collect two types of information: information you provide directly, and information collected automatically.

Information you provide:

• Account information — if you create an account (via Clerk), we collect your email address and, optionally, your name. This is used to manage your account and subscription.
• Payment information — if you subscribe to Premium, your payment is processed by Stripe. We do not store your card details. Stripe's privacy policy applies to payment data: stripe.com/gb/privacy.
• Issue reports — if you use the "Report issue" button, your report is sent via email and we receive whatever you write in it.

Information collected automatically:

• Log data — our servers automatically record your IP address, browser type, referring URL, pages visited, and timestamps. This data is used to diagnose technical issues and is not linked to individual identities.
• Cookies and similar technologies — we use cookies for authentication, advertising (Google AdSense), and Plausible analytics. See our Cookie Policy for full details.

We use the information we collect to:

• Provide, maintain, and improve the tools and services on this website
• Process and manage your Premium subscription via Stripe
• Authenticate your account via Clerk
• Display relevant advertisements to free-tier users via Google AdSense
• Respond to support requests and issue reports
• Detect and prevent fraud and abuse
• Comply with legal obligations

We do not sell your personal data to third parties. We do not use your data for automated decision-making or profiling that produces legal or similarly significant effects.

Under UK GDPR, we rely on the following legal bases to process personal data:

• Contract — processing your account and subscription details is necessary to provide the Premium service you have signed up for.
• Legitimate interests — we have a legitimate interest in keeping our service secure and in understanding how it is used, provided this does not override your rights.
• Consent — we rely on your consent for non-essential cookies (such as advertising cookies placed by Google AdSense). You may withdraw consent at any time via the cookie banner or the Cookie Policy page.
• Legal obligation — we may process data as required by applicable law.

We use the following third-party services that may process your data:

Each third party has their own privacy policy. We encourage you to read them. We have data processing agreements in place with these providers where required by law.

Free-tier users see advertisements served by Google AdSense. Google uses cookies and similar technologies to show you personalised ads based on your browsing history across websites. Google's use of advertising cookies enables it and its partners to serve ads based on your visit to this site and other sites on the internet.

You can opt out of personalised advertising by visiting Google Ad Settings or by declining advertising cookies in our consent banner.

Premium subscribers do not see advertisements on this website.

We retain your data for as long as necessary to provide our services:

• Account data — retained while your account is active and deleted within 30 days of account deletion.
• Payment records — retained for 7 years as required by UK financial regulations.
• Server logs — retained for up to 90 days for security and diagnostic purposes.
• Cookie data — varies by cookie; see our Cookie Policy.

If you are in the UK or European Economic Area, you have the following rights:

• Right of access — to request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.
• Right to rectification — to correct inaccurate data.
• Right to erasure — to request deletion of your data ("right to be forgotten"), subject to legal retention requirements.
• Right to restriction — to restrict how we process your data in certain circumstances.
• Right to data portability — to receive your data in a structured, commonly used format.
• Right to object — to object to processing based on legitimate interests, including direct marketing.
• Right to withdraw consent — to withdraw consent at any time where processing is based on consent.

To exercise any of these rights, contact us at info@helpful-site.com. We will respond within 30 days. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).

We take appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your personal data against accidental loss, unauthorised access, or disclosure. These include HTTPS encryption, access controls, and working only with reputable third-party processors.

No method of transmission over the internet is 100% secure. If you have reason to believe that your interaction with us is no longer secure, please contact us immediately.

This website is not directed at children under 13 years of age. We do not knowingly collect personal data from children under 13. If you believe we have inadvertently collected such information, please contact us and we will delete it promptly.

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we do, we will update the "last updated" date at the top of this page. Continued use of the website after changes are posted constitutes acceptance of the revised policy. For significant changes, we will provide a more prominent notice.