Privacy & cookies

This page is a draft and is being reviewed. If you have questions, please contact us.

Who we are

AwayGameFC ("we", "us") is run by Garrett James Blair, a sole trader based in New Zealand. We are responsible for the personal information described here under New Zealand's Privacy Act 2020. Our privacy officer is Garrett James Blair. You can reach us through our contact page or at [contact email, once you have your domain].

What we collect

If you're a player

• Your name, email address and password (passwords are stored in scrambled form — we can't see them).
• Your date of birth. We use it to confirm you're 18 or over and to show your age. We never show your date of birth to anyone.
• Your profile photo, if you add one.
• Your football details: position, height, preferred foot, passports, current level, languages, where you're based, where you'd like to play, your bio and your highlight video link.

If you're a coach

• Your name, email address and password.
• Your date of birth, used only to confirm you're 18 or over. It's never shown to anyone.
• Your profile photo, if you add one.
• Your coaching details: roles, licences, experience, age groups coached, past clubs, languages, where you're based and would work, your coaching philosophy, a video link, and whether you say you hold a police or working-with-children check.
• Copies of coaching licence certificates you choose to upload, so we can verify them. These are private: only you and the AwayGameFC team can open them — never clubs or the public.

If you're a club

• Your club's name, country and website, a contact name, and the email address and password used for the account.
• Your verification status and any information we gather to check your club is genuine.

Everyone

• Messages sent between clubs and players or coaches on AwayGameFC, and clubs' shortlists.
• Anything you send us through the contact form: your name, email and message.
• Basic technical information, such as your IP address, browser type and the pages you visit, which our hosting provider records to keep the site running and secure.

How we use it

• To run AwayGameFC: create your account, show player and coach profiles, and let verified clubs shortlist and message them.
• To check clubs are genuine before they can contact anyone.
• To keep people safe: investigate reports, prevent scams and misuse, and enforce our terms and community guidelines.
• To reply when you contact us, and to send emails about your account (for example, confirming your email address).
• To meet our legal obligations.

We do not sell your personal information, and we don't use it for advertising.

Who can see your information

• Public profiles. When a player or coach chooses "Show my profile to clubs", their profile can be seen by anyone on the internet — not only clubs — and may appear in search engines. For players this includes name, age, football details, bio and videos; for coaches, name, coaching details and video (a coach's age is not shown). You can hide your profile at any time from your account.
• Clubs you're talking to. When a club messages a player or coach, they see the club's name and country, and both see the conversation.
• Licence certificates are seen only by you and us. Clubs only see a "Verified" mark next to a licence we've checked.
• Shortlists are private to the club that made them. Pro members can see how many clubs shortlisted them, but never which ones.
• Profile views. When a verified club opens a player's or coach's profile, we record that it was viewed. Pro members can see how many clubs viewed them, but not which ones.
• Us. We can access account details and messages when we need to — for example to verify a club, investigate a safety report, fix a problem, or if the law requires it.

Service providers and storage outside New Zealand

We use trusted providers to run the site. They process information on our behalf, and some are based outside New Zealand:

• Supabase — our database, photo storage, logins and account emails. Your data is stored in Sydney, Australia.
• Vercel — hosts the website (a US company; our site runs from its Sydney location).
• YouTube (Google) — plays highlight videos embedded on profiles.
• When we add them: an email delivery service, and a payment provider (such as Stripe) for paid features.

When information goes overseas, we take reasonable steps to make sure it is protected in a way that is comparable to New Zealand law. We may also share information if required by law or to protect someone's safety.

How long we keep it

• We keep your account information while your account is open.
• When you delete your account, your profile, photos, certificates, messages and shortlists are deleted straight away. If you ask us to do it for you, we'll do it within 30 days. Backup copies may take a short time longer to clear.
• We keep contact-form messages for up to 2 years.
• We may keep limited information for longer if we need it for legal reasons or to deal with a safety issue.

Keeping it safe

The site uses encrypted connections (HTTPS), access to data is restricted, and passwords are never stored in readable form. No system is perfectly secure, so please use a strong password that you don't use anywhere else. If a privacy breach is likely to cause serious harm, we will tell the people affected and the Office of the Privacy Commissioner.

Your choices and rights

• See and correct your information. Most of it you can edit yourself in your account. You can also ask us for a copy of what we hold, or to correct it.
• Hide your profile at any time by unticking "Show my profile to clubs".
• Block a club from messaging you.
• Delete your account at any time from your account page, or ask us to do it.

We'll respond to requests within 20 working days. If you're not happy with how we've handled your information, please tell us first. You can also complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner at privacy.org.nz.

If you're in the UK or European Union

We process your information to provide the service you signed up for, for our legitimate interests in running a safe platform, and where required, with your consent. You also have the right to object to certain processing, to ask us to restrict it, to receive your data in a portable format, and to complain to your local data protection authority.

Age

AwayGameFC is only for people aged 18 and over. If we learn that someone under 18 has created an account, we will delete it.

Cookies

We only use essential cookies: small files that keep you logged in and keep your account secure. We don't use advertising or tracking cookies, and we don't use analytics tools that follow you around the web.

Highlight videos are shown using YouTube's privacy-enhanced mode. When you play a video, YouTube (Google) may set its own cookies and collect information under Google's privacy policy.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy as AwayGameFC grows. We'll change the "last updated" date above, and if the changes are significant, we'll let you know by email or on the site.