WHAT DATA DO WE KEEP ABOUT USERS?

Not much, is the answer! The only personal data we ask for from users is your name, country, telephone, website address and e-mail address. It's the stuff you see when you login to admin on the "Your details" page, click on your username in the top right hand corner of any page in Admin to see it. Of that only the contact e-mail address, your country and website address is required, we don't mind if people don't want to provide the other stuff. All this data can be updated at any time in Admin and it is deleted if you close your account.

If you have a Premium account then we may have your address stored in a Billing account (aka My Account). This will include your name, address and a billing email address. You may view and update any part of this data by logging into your Billing account (aka My Account) the details of which are e-mailed to you when you first create it.

All data is stored at our host, Rackspace, in their data-center in Fort Worth, Texas, USA. All communications between you and your Billing account (aka My Account) or your shopping cart account (aka Admin) is over encrypted SSL/TLS.

COOKIES

From the moment you enter Admin your activities may be logged. Tracking is via cookie and IP address. This information may be used proactively to develop a profile of your behaviour. It is collected purely for the purpose of ensuring your own security. For example, if you try to login too many times with the wrong password then you may be blocked from further attempts. You cannot enter Admin without cookies enabled.

For information about cookies see the Help file that comes with your browser. As a general rule we only ever use session (memory resident) cookies, they "die" when you close down your browser.

USE OF THIS DATA

We don't have a mailing list and we don't make any sort of mass mailings to users. We use the Contact e-mail address only when we need to contact you about an operational matter directly related to your account, for example if you have forgotten your password. If you are a Premium account holder and are paying your fees via a Billing account (aka My Account) then renewal notices and payment reminders are sent to the e-mail address in your Billing account.

Data such as a users country and business type is purely for statistical analysis. We keep it so that we can make sure we're targeting our resources in the right places. We don't have any advertising on this site, we don't sell data to anyone else. It's just for us.

Please note that SMTP (e-mail) is not an encrypted protocol. When we use email the email address and the contents of the message pass across the internet unencrypted. If you wish to send information to us securely then email us first and we will send you the URL to a secure dropbox.

When we receive a request to close an account, all data associated with both yourself and your customers is deleted and cannot be recovered.

WHO HAS ACCESS TO THE DATA ABOUT YOU?

No one except employees of Mal's e-commerce limited.

Some users publish information about their site as part of a post in the User Group Forum. Apart from this "self-disclosure" there are no circumstances under which we would pass on any details about a user to a third-party. Very occasionally we help a customer contact a merchant but we do so only after very carefully considering their request.

LINKS TO OTHER SITES

This web site contains some links to other sites that are not owned or controlled by Mal's e-commerce Limited. Please be aware that we are not responsible for the privacy practices of them. You should read the privacy statements of each and every web site that collects personally identifiable information.

This privacy statement applies only to information collected by Mal's e-commerce Limited.

BUSINESS TRANSITIONS

In the (unlikely) event Mal's e-commerce Limited goes through a business transition, such as a merger, acquisition by another company, or sale of all or a portion of its assets, your personally identifiable information will likely be among the assets transferred. You will be notified by prominent notice on our Web site, for 30 days, of any such change in ownership or control of your personal information.

CHANGES IN THIS PRIVACY STATEMENT

If we decide to change our privacy policy, we will post those changes to this privacy statement, the homepage, and other places we deem appropriate so that you are aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we disclose it.

A WORD ABOUT YOUR CUSTOMER DATA

Customer data belongs to you, the merchant, not to Mal's e-commerce Limited. We just store it for you until you have picked it up. For most users that means we are just a secure chanel for comunicating your order data to you, a bit like email, only much more secure. However if you archive orders in Admin then that data may be stored until you either delete it or you close your account. It is stored very securely at our hosts, Rackspace, Fort Worth Texas, USA. Technically, in Europe, this is called being a "data proccessor".

We do not keep your customer data beyond the routine back-up of the live database which is made for purely operational reasons. Database backups are automatically deleted after a month. This means that if you delete an order, there will be no record of it all anywhere in our systems after a month!

There are no circumstances under which we would pass on your customer data to anyone other than the merchant to whom it belongs.

Please remember the same order data is sent to you by email so it will also be stored at your email service providor. Unlike us though, they may not delete it automatically. Furthermore, email (SMTP) is not a secure encypted protocol.

If you have any specific questions about Privacy then please feel free to contact us.

Mal Stewart
ms@mals-e.com
Mal's e-commerce Limited