Email & Data Policy
Version 1.1 · Last reviewed 2026-05-31 · Owner: Are You Faster CIC
Applies to areyoufaster.com, community.areyoufaster.com, and the partner-outreach and CRM systems that send and manage our marketing communications. The Are You Faster mobile apps collect different data (including device location, for GPS activities) and are governed by their own privacy policies: the iOS app privacy policy and the Android app privacy policy.
This document is the single source of truth for how Are You Faster CIC handles personal data and direct-marketing communications. The implementations in appsscript/Code.gs, firestore.rules, partners.html, and the Hub all derive their behaviour from this document. If a conflict arises between an implementation and this document, this document wins.
1. Identity
| Controller | Are You Faster CIC |
|---|---|
| Legal form | UK Community Interest Company |
| Company number | 16536715 |
| Registered office | Unit 82a, James Carter Road, Mildenhall, IP28 7DE, United Kingdom |
| Privacy contact | partners@areyoufaster.com |
| Founder / data lead | Daniel |
2. Lawful basis
Personal data collected through the partner-interest form is processed under the consent lawful basis (UK GDPR Art. 6(1)(a)).
Consent is recorded at the moment of form submission as a permanent record on the Firestore document, including:
consent: true- the boolean tickconsent_text: "…"- the exact wording the data subject saw and ticked, stored verbatim, never derived latersubmittedAt: <server timestamp>- the moment consent was given
consent_text is included so that, if the form copy ever changes, we still have proof of what each individual subject specifically consented to.
Personal data used for partnership outreach to organisations - our cold-outreach emails and the leads/CRM records that manage them - is processed under the legitimate interests basis (UK GDPR Art. 6(1)(f)). Our legitimate interest is identifying organisations that may benefit from a free partnership with a non-profit; it is balanced against the limited use of publicly listed organisational contact details for a relevant, business-context approach. Recipients can object at any time (see §6 and §7) and we honour it immediately.
3. Data we collect
Article 5(1)(c) - data minimisation
The partner-interest form collects, and only collects, these fields:
| Field | Purpose | Required? |
|---|---|---|
name | Personalisation in follow-up | Required |
email | The communication channel | Required |
organisation | Context for the partnership conversation | Optional |
organisationType | Routing the right follow-up | Required |
interests[] | Which partner offering to follow up on | Optional |
message | Free-text - what they want to tell us | Optional |
referrer | The ?from=… URL parameter, if Daniel sent an invite | Auto-captured |
sourceUrl | The page URL at the moment of submission | Auto-captured |
consent | Explicit consent flag | Required |
consent_text | The exact wording they consented to | Auto-captured |
Through the website and partner-interest form we do not collect: phone numbers, postal addresses, IP addresses, browser fingerprints, or location data. (The mobile apps do use device location for GPS activities - see their own privacy policies, linked at the top of this page.)
Outreach & CRM data
For partnership outreach we also hold, per organisation: organisation name, a publicly listed contact email, town/region, activity or sport type, and short publicly available business context used to tailor the approach. As we correspond, a relationship record (the “leads” CRM) tracks engagement - emails sent, link clicks, replies, and a derived hot/warm/cold status - so we can avoid contacting an organisation after it has asked us to stop and see who we have already reached. This data is drawn from publicly available organisational listings, not from the individuals themselves.
4. Recipients
Submitted data is accessible to:
- The Are You Faster CIC founder (Daniel) and any person they explicitly delegate to
- Google's infrastructure as a sub-processor (Firebase Firestore, Apps Script, Gmail, Sheets) under their respective Data Processing Addenda
Partnership-outreach and CRM records carry the same access (the founder and the Google sub-processors above) and the same protections set out in this policy.
We do not:
- Share with advertising networks
- Sell data to third parties
- Pass data to other CIC partners or affiliated organisations
- Add submitters to any list other than the AYF partner-update list
5. Retention
Article 5(1)(e) - storage limitation
| Document type | Retention period |
|---|---|
partner_interest documents in state pending | Indefinite until processed |
partner_interest documents in state emailed / error / suppressed / invalid | 24 months from submittedAt, then auto-deleted |
partner_unsubscribed records | Permanent - required to honour right-to-object on an ongoing basis |
| Submissions Sheet rows | Same 24 months |
partner_invites records | 24 months from sentAt |
Outreach + CRM records (invite_queue, leads, lead_audit, reply_queue, outbound_queue, analytics) | Retained while the partnership is active or under consideration; deleted on request, on objection, or when no longer needed |
Auto-deletion is performed by the daily purgeOldSubmissions() Apps Script trigger.
6. Subject rights
Articles 15-22
We acknowledge and uphold every right under UK GDPR. Each is operationalised:
| Right | How exercised | Where implemented |
|---|---|---|
| Right of access (Art. 15) | Email partners@areyoufaster.com; response within one calendar month | exportSubjectData() |
| Right to rectification (Art. 16) | Email partners@ with the correction | Manual edit of Firestore document |
| Right to erasure (Art. 17) | Email partners@ requesting deletion | eraseSubjectData() |
| Right to restriction (Art. 18) | Email partners@ requesting we stop processing | Manual addition to suppression list |
| Right to data portability (Art. 20) | Same as right of access - we return JSON | exportSubjectData() |
| Right to object (Art. 21) - to direct marketing and to our legitimate-interest outreach | Click any unsubscribe link, or reply “stop”, to any email | Auto-handled - see §7 |
| Right to withdraw consent (Art. 7(3)) | Same as right to object | Auto-handled - see §7 |
Response timeline for all rights: one calendar month from receipt of a verifiable request (Art. 12(3)).
7. Unsubscribe - two paths, one outcome
The data subject can opt out at any time. Two paths exist because email clients (Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail) prefer a built-in one-click flow for deliverability, while users who follow the in-email link expect a confirmation step.
Path A - Two-step (the in-email "Unsubscribe" link)
- User clicks the "Unsubscribe (we'll ask once to confirm)" link in the email footer.
- The Apps Script web-app endpoint validates an HMAC-signed token bound to the recipient's email address.
- A branded confirmation page is shown: "Are you sure you want to stop receiving partner updates from Are You Faster?" with a single button.
- Clicking the button adds the email to
partner_unsubscribed(idempotent), sends a courtesy "you've been removed" email, and renders a confirmation page.
Path B - One-click (RFC 8058 List-Unsubscribe header)
- Every outbound email carries
List-UnsubscribeandList-Unsubscribe-Post: List-Unsubscribe=One-Clickheaders. - Email clients render an "Unsubscribe" link next to the sender name. Clicking it sends a POST to our endpoint.
- The endpoint validates the same HMAC token, adds the email to
partner_unsubscribed, and returns HTTP 200. - No UI is shown - the email client renders its own confirmation.
Both paths
- Are idempotent
- Write to the same
partner_unsubscribedcollection - Take effect immediately - the next scheduled trigger will skip any address on this list
- Are permanent - re-subscribing requires completing the partner-interest form again, with fresh consent
HMAC token security
- Tokens are derived as
HMAC-SHA-256(secret, lowercase(email)) - The secret is a 32-byte random value stored in Apps Script Properties (encrypted at rest by Google)
- Tokens cannot be forged without the secret
- A leaked token only authorises opt-out for that specific email - no other action is possible
- Tokens never expire, but stale tokens still only authorise opt-out
8. Security measures
Article 32
| Layer | Control |
|---|---|
| Transport | HTTPS-only; HSTS preload |
| Browser | CSP locked; X-Frame DENY; nosniff; Referrer-Policy strict-origin |
| Form | Honeypot field; client throttle; reCAPTCHA v3 via Firebase App Check |
| Database | Firestore rules: anonymous create-only on partner_interest, strict field whitelist, server-timestamp enforcement, all reads/updates/deletes denied |
| Bot defence | App Check enforced on Firestore production |
| Server | Apps Script as user OAuth (no long-lived service-account key) |
| Logging | PII redacted from execution logs and from error messages |
| Concurrency | LockService prevents parallel script runs |
| Rate-limit | Per-email: max one welcome per address per 24 h |
| Per-run cap | 20 documents per trigger run, bounding blast radius |
9. Breach response
Articles 33-34
| Within | Action |
|---|---|
| Immediately on detection | Disable App Check enforcement - freezes new writes. Stop the 5-minute trigger. |
| Within 1 hour | Assess scope: which records, which fields, how many subjects affected. |
| Within 24 hours | Document the breach in writing (cause, scope, mitigation). |
| Within 72 hours | Notify ICO via ico.org.uk if the breach is likely to result in a risk to subjects. |
| Without undue delay | Notify affected subjects directly if the breach is likely to result in a high risk (Art. 34). |
10. Records of processing
Article 30
This document, together with the source code in the project repository, constitutes the record of processing required under Art. 30 for partner-interest data processing.
11. Cross-project consistency
This policy applies identically to:
- areyoufaster.com marketing site (Firebase project
ayf-cic2) - community.areyoufaster.com Hub (Firebase project
ayf-cic) - Any future project handling AYF marketing or partner data
Specifically:
- The
partner_unsubscribedsuppression list is honoured across every outbound communication path. If an address is suppressed for marketing emails, it cannot be re-added by submission to a different surface (the Hub must check this collection before sending). - Subject-rights requests received on any surface are routed to partners@areyoufaster.com and processed as described in §6.
- The 24-month retention applies to every store of partner-interest data.
- The same
consent_textwording is used wherever consent is captured for the partner-update mailing list.
12. Canonical consent text
This is the exact wording shown next to the consent checkbox on the partner-interest form, and the exact value stored in the consent_text field of every submission:
I'd like to receive occasional Are You Faster partner updates. We won't share your details, won't add you to anything else, and you can unsubscribe from any email.
Changes to this wording require:
- Updating
partners.htmlform copy - Updating the
CONSENT_TEXTconstant inappsscript/Code.gs - Bumping the version of this document
- Documenting the change in the changelog below
13. Cookies
The marketing site at areyoufaster.com sets no first-party cookies and uses no analytics, advertising, or tracking pixels.
The single exception is the partner-interest form at /partners: when you focus a form field, Google reCAPTCHA v3 loads and may set cookies on Google's google.com domain (a third-party context) as part of its anti-bot scoring. This load is deferred until you engage the form, so visitors who never submit experience a cookie-free session. By focusing or submitting the form you accept this anti-bot scoring as a necessary security measure under the legitimate-interest exemption (PECR Reg 6(4)).
No third-party cookies are used for analytics or marketing on this site.
Changelog
| Version | Date | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 1.0 | 2026-05-08 | Initial publication. Canonical consent text v1. 24-month retention. Both unsubscribe paths active. |
| 1.0.1 | 2026-05-11 | Published as a public page at /policy. Added §13 (cookies). Documented reCAPTCHA defer-on-focus behaviour. |
| 1.1 | 2026-05-31 | Added legitimate-interest basis for partnership outreach to organisations and the leads/CRM; clarified the mobile apps are covered by their own privacy policies; documented outreach/CRM data, retention, and the right to object. |