Privacy Policy

1. Introduction

AuPairly ("we," "our," or "us") is committed to protecting your privacy. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you use our platform at aupairly.net.

This policy complies with the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) of South Africa and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

2. Information We Collect

2.1 Information You Provide

• Account Information: Email address, password, name
• Profile Information: Location, age, experience, qualifications, bio
• Photos: Profile photos and reference documents
• Family Information: Children's ages, requirements, budget range
• Payment Information: Processed securely through Yoco (we do not store card details)

2.2 Automatically Collected Information

• IP address and browser type
• Device information
• Usage data and analytics
• Cookies for authentication and preferences
• Error reports: When a page or our server runs into an error, we record a technical report: the error message, the page address with IDs, search terms and codes removed, your account ID, and your browser or software version. Email addresses, ID numbers, phone numbers and access tokens are removed before the report is sent
• Visitor analytics: We use Searchlark Journeys to understand how visitors use this website, so we can improve it. It records the pages you visit, how far you scroll and which links and buttons you click. It also makes masked recordings of visits that replay how the page was used: all text is hidden, nothing you type is recorded, au pair profile cards are blocked out, and nothing is recorded in signed-in areas. It uses no cookies and stores nothing on your device, does not record what you type into forms, and does not store your IP address. Visits can’t be linked to you after one day. We keep this data for up to 90 days. Searchlark (MJ Enterprises (Pty) Ltd) processes it on our behalf. Once a week, masked summaries of some visits are sent to Searchlark’s AI provider in the United States to explain where visitors leave the site. If your browser sends a Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track signal, nothing is recorded

3. How We Use Your Information

• To create and manage your account
• To match families with au pairs
• To facilitate communication between users
• To process payments and subscriptions
• To send important updates and notifications
• To improve our platform and user experience
• To prevent fraud and ensure platform safety
• To comply with legal obligations

4. Information Sharing

We do not sell your personal information. We may share your information:

• With other users: Your profile information is visible to families (au pairs) or au pairs (families) based on your account type
• Role Codes (families): When an au pair registers interest using your Role Code, they can see a short reminder of the role — the town (or province) and a general age band for your children, such as “toddler & pre-schooler”. We never show them your name, your suburb or street, your contact details, your children’s exact ages or gender, or anything you wrote in your description or household notes
• Service providers: Supabase (hosting), Yoco (payments), email services, Sentry (error reports, stored in the European Union), Searchlark (visitor analytics)
• Legal requirements: When required by law or to protect our rights

5. Your Rights (POPIA & GDPR)

You have the right to:

• Access: Request a copy of your personal data
• Correction: Update or correct your information
• Deletion: Delete your account and data (see section 7 for the few records we have to keep)
• Objection: Object to processing of your data
• Data Portability: Receive your data in a portable format
• Withdraw Consent: Withdraw consent at any time

To exercise these rights, contact us at

6. Data Security

We implement appropriate technical and organizational measures to protect your personal information, including:

• Encryption of data in transit and at rest
• Secure authentication (passwords are hashed)
• Access controls and role-based permissions
• Regular security updates and monitoring

7. How Long We Keep Your Information

We keep your information while your account is open. When you delete your account, we delete your information, apart from the few records below that the law or child safety requires us to keep.

7.1 When you delete your account

Your account, profile, photos, documents and messages are deleted as soon as you confirm. If anything can’t be deleted straight away, we finish the job within 30 days. Copies in our database backups are overwritten automatically within 30 days.

7.2 What we keep, and why

• Payment records (7 years): If you paid us, we keep your name, email address, what you paid for, the amount, the date and the invoice number. South African tax and company law requires us to keep these records. Only the people who handle our accounts can see them, and we delete them after 7 years. Yoco keeps its own records of card payments under its own privacy policy.
• Testimonials: We remove your name and photo. If the words alone could still identify you, we take the testimonial down.
• Feedback: We keep what you told us so we can improve AuPairly, but we delete your email address and anything else that links it to you.
• Safety records (3 years): If we removed an account because of a concern about the safety of children or other users, we keep a small record: the reason, the date, and a coded version of the email address and ID number. The code lets us spot the same person signing up again, but can’t be turned back into the original details. We delete this record after 3 years.

7.3 If we close your account

If we close your account, for example because it broke our Terms, we delete your information in the same way as 7.1 and 7.2.

7.4 Unfinished accounts

If you started an account but never finished your profile, and you haven’t logged in for 12 months, we’ll email you. If you don’t log in within 30 days of that email, we delete the account.

8. Children's Privacy

Our platform is not intended for users under 18. We do not knowingly collect information from children. If you believe we have collected information from a minor, please contact us immediately.

9. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of significant changes by email or through a notice on our platform. Continued use after changes constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.

10. Contact Us

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or your personal data:

• Email:
• Address: [To be added]