Privacy notice

This notice explains what personal information Pistos Bookkeeping collects through this website, why, who else handles it, how long it is kept, and what rights you have. It is written to meet the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and Irish law, including the ePrivacy Regulations on cookies.

Who we are

Pistos Bookkeeping provides bookkeeping and accounts preparation services to businesses and sole traders throughout Ireland. Pistos Bookkeeping is responsible for (the “controller” of) the personal information described here. You can contact us about it at info@pistosbookkeeping.com.

What we collect

• Enquiry form: your name, business name (optional), email address, phone number (optional), the service you are interested in, and the message you write. When you send it, your enquiry is emailed to our mailbox. The website itself does not keep a copy.
• Spam check: to stop the form being misused, the website keeps a scrambled code made from your IP address, together with the times you used the form. The code cannot be turned back into your IP address, and the address itself is not stored.
• Server logs: like most websites, this website’s server records each request in log files, including your IP address, the page requested, the time and your browser type.
• Analytics (only if you accept): how the site is used, collected by Google Analytics: the pages viewed, how you arrived at the site, the type of device and browser, and your approximate location (country or city). Google Analytics gives your browser a random identifier, stored in a cookie, so that repeat visits can be counted. Google Analytics does not store your IP address. See Cookies below.
• Spam protection (only if you allow it): the enquiry form uses Google reCAPTCHA to tell people from automated spam. It collects information about your device and browser and how you use the page, including your IP address, and sends it to Google, which returns a score. We receive only that score, which is added to your enquiry email. The form is shown only after you allow reCAPTCHA.

You do not have to give us any information. We need your name, email address and a short message to answer an enquiry; everything else on the form is optional. You can also email us directly instead of using the form.

Why we use it and the legal basis

• To answer your enquiry: taking steps at your request before we agree to work together (GDPR Article 6(1)(b)).
• Spam check and server logs: our legitimate interest in keeping the website and the enquiry form secure and working (Article 6(1)(f)).
• Analytics and spam protection: your consent (Article 6(1)(a)), which you give or refuse in the cookie window that appears on your first visit, or for reCAPTCHA alone with the button by the form. You can withdraw it at any time.

We do not sell your information, and we do not use it for advertising or profiling. No decisions about you are made by automated means.

Who handles it for us

These companies process personal information on our behalf, only on our instructions and under data processing terms:

• Zoho provides our email. Your enquiry is sent to our Zoho mailbox over an encrypted connection and is stored there, in Zoho’s data centres in the United States. Zoho protects this transfer with the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses.
• Amazon Web Services (AWS) provides the server this website runs on, in its data centre in Ireland. The server logs and spam-check codes are kept on it.
• Google Ireland Limited provides Google Analytics, only if you accept analytics. Google may transfer this data to the United States, relying on the EU–US Data Privacy Framework and the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses.

Google reCAPTCHA is provided by Google Ireland Limited, only if you allow it. Google uses the information reCAPTCHA collects under its own Privacy Policy and Terms of Service, to run reCAPTCHA and for general security purposes, so for that information Google decides how it is used and how long it is kept. It may be transferred to the United States under the same safeguards.

How long we keep it

• Enquiries you do not go ahead with: deleted from our mailbox within 12 months of our last contact.
• Enquiries that become a client relationship: kept with your client file, for as long as Irish tax and company law requires records to be kept (generally six years).
• Spam-check codes: used for one hour, then deleted the next time the form is used once 24 hours have passed.
• Server logs: kept for 14 days for security and to fix faults, then deleted.
• Analytics: Google Analytics keeps visit data linked to the cookie identifier for 2 months, after which only totals remain.

Cookies

This site sets no cookies by default. Google cookies are set only after you click Accept all in the cookie window, or, for reCAPTCHA alone, Allow reCAPTCHA by the enquiry form. If you click Reject, no Google cookies are set, the analytics cookies already set are removed, and the enquiry form is hidden again; you can still email us. reCAPTCHA’s storage on this site is removed too. Its cookie and the storage inside its frame belong to google.com, so this site cannot remove them; you can delete them in your browser settings. You can change your choice at any time with the Cookie settings link in the footer.

Your rights

You have the right to:

• ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you;
• ask us to correct it, or to delete it;
• ask us to restrict how we use it, or object to our using it for our legitimate interests;
• receive the information you gave us in a common electronic format, or have it sent to someone else;
• withdraw consent at any time, without affecting anything done before you withdrew it;
• complain to the Data Protection Commission, the Irish supervisory authority, at dataprotection.ie.

To use any of these rights, email info@pistosbookkeeping.com. We will reply within one month.

Changes to this notice

We may update this notice. The date at the top shows when it last changed.