- Your projects, photos and files are stored in Australia (DigitalOcean, Sydney).
- We use your location only when you ask the app to — to find a chainage or track you along a road. Some locations used in the app may be recorded in our usage statistics, to help us understand how Chainage is used and keep improving it.
- We don't sell personal information, and we never see your full card number.
- Inactive free accounts are deleted after 2 years, and inactive accounts that have paid are deleted after 3 years — always with reminder emails first. Details below.
01Who we are
Chainage is provided by TekSwipe Traffic of Queensland, Australia ("we", "us", "our"). This policy applies to personal information we handle through the Chainage web app, installable app, share links, this website and our support channels (the "Service"). It should be read with our Terms of Service.
You can use the Chainage map without an account and without telling us who you are. You'll need an account — with your name and email address — to save projects, join a company or buy a plan.
02Information we collect
| Category | What it includes |
|---|---|
| Account details | Your name, email address and password. Passwords are stored only as a one-way hash (bcrypt) — we can't read them. We also keep sign-in and account activity timestamps. |
| Company details | Company name, members, invitations, roles, permissions, seats and folder structure, if you create or join a company. |
| Billing information | Payments are handled by Stripe. We keep your Stripe customer and subscription IDs, your plan, seat and storage-pack counts, billing status and invoice history. We may see limited card details such as the card brand and last four digits, but we never receive or store full card numbers. |
| Your content | Projects, phases, layers, saved points, dropped pins, chainage ranges and their locations, notes, links, photos, files, tags, project details (such as client and job number), share-link settings and the activity log. Photos can contain EXIF metadata, such as the location and time a photo was taken and the device used. |
| Location data | Your device's GPS location, only when you choose to use locate or live tracking. The location is sent to our servers to calculate the nearest chainage. We don't track your location in the background. |
| Usage and device data | IP address (and an approximate location derived from it), browser and device type (user agent), screen size, language, time zone, referring page, pages viewed, and how the app is used, such as searches, pins and location features. Some of these events may include a location — for example the map point involved and how accurate it was — which helps us understand where Chainage is useful and make it better. We use a random identifier stored in your browser to group these events, and we record error reports. |
| Communications | Emails and messages you send us, and records of our replies. |
Most information comes directly from you or your device. Some comes from others — for example, when a company owner invites you by email, or when Stripe tells us a payment succeeded or failed.
04How we use information
- To provide the Service — calculate chainages, show map and traffic data, save and sync your projects, host your photos and files, run company workspaces and deliver share links.
- To manage accounts and billing — authenticate you, apply plan limits, process subscriptions, seats and storage packs, and issue receipts.
- To communicate with you — service and security notices, billing emails, retention reminders before deletion, and responses to support requests. We'll only send marketing emails if you've agreed or where the law allows, and every marketing email has an unsubscribe link.
- To keep the Service secure — detect and prevent abuse, fraud, scraping and unauthorised access, enforce rate limits and our Terms, and investigate incidents.
- To understand and improve the Service — analyse usage in aggregate, fix bugs and plan new features.
- To meet legal obligations — including tax, accounting and record-keeping requirements, and lawful requests from authorities.
05Consent and legal basis
We collect personal information only where it's reasonably necessary for the Service and our functions. We use it for the purpose we collected it for, for related purposes you would reasonably expect, with your consent, or where required or authorised by law.
Location access is controlled by your device: the app only receives your GPS position after you grant permission and choose to use a location feature, and you can withdraw permission at any time in your browser or device settings. By creating an account and using the Service, you consent to the handling described in this policy. If you don't provide certain information (such as an email address), we may not be able to provide parts of the Service.
07Overseas disclosure
Your account data, projects, photos and files are hosted in Australia. However, some of our service providers may store or process personal information overseas (APP 8):
- Stripe — United States and other countries where Stripe operates;
- Google (Analytics, Maps and Street View) — United States and other countries where Google operates;
- OpenStreetMap/Overpass, OpenFreeMap and our email delivery provider — servers that may be located outside Australia, including in Europe and the United States.
We take reasonable steps to ensure these providers handle personal information consistently with the APPs, including by choosing reputable providers with published privacy and security commitments and limiting what we send them to what's needed.
08Security
- All connections to the Service are encrypted in transit with HTTPS.
- Passwords are hashed with bcrypt and never stored in plain text.
- Photos and files are kept in private storage. Every request is checked against your project access, share-link scope and settings before anything is served.
- Share links can be password-protected, set to expire and revoked at any time.
- Access to production systems is limited to the people who need it (least privilege), and we use rate limiting and monitoring to detect abuse.
No method of transmission or storage is 100% secure, so we can't guarantee absolute security. If a data breach is likely to result in serious harm, we will notify affected people and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) as required by the Notifiable Data Breaches scheme.
09Data retention & storage policy
We keep personal information only for as long as we need it. All account data, projects, photos and files are stored in DigitalOcean's Sydney, Australia region. Here's how long we keep things:
| Data | How long we keep it |
|---|---|
| Active accounts | For as long as the account is active. |
| Free (Starter) accounts | If inactive for 2 years, the account and its data (projects, photos and files) are deleted, after reminder emails. |
| Accounts that have held a paid plan | Accounts that have previously held a paid plan, or belong to a company that has paid, are deleted if inactive for 3 years, after reminder emails. |
| Active paid subscriptions | Never deleted for inactivity while the subscription is active. |
| Company data | Kept while the company has an active subscription or any active member. Company data follows the company owner's plan history — so the 3-year period applies if the company or its owner has ever paid. |
| Cancelled subscriptions | Data is kept, and anything beyond the free limits becomes read-only, until the retention period above passes or you delete it. |
| Backups | Deleted data is removed from our backups within 90 days. |
| Billing records | Kept as required by Australian tax law — typically 5 years — even if your account is deleted. |
| Analytics and security logs | IP addresses and device data are kept only as long as needed for analytics, troubleshooting and security, then deleted or anonymised. |
What counts as inactivity
An account is inactive when there has been no sign-in and no other account activity (such as creating or editing projects, or subscription changes) during the period.
Reminders before deletion
Before deleting an inactive account, we send reminder emails to the account's email address — at least 60 days, 30 days and 7 days before deletion. Signing in at any time resets the clock. Please keep your email address up to date so the reminders reach you.
Deleting your data sooner
You can delete projects, photos and files yourself at any time, and you can ask us to delete your whole account by emailing support@tekswipe.com.au (or in the app where that option is available). We may need to verify your identity first. Deleting a personal account doesn't delete company projects, which belong to the company. You can export project data (GeoJSON or CSV) before deleting.
10Your rights and choices
- Access. You can ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you.
- Correction. You can update most account details in the app, or ask us to correct information that's inaccurate, out of date or incomplete.
- Deletion. You can ask us to delete your account and personal information, subject to legal record-keeping obligations.
- Marketing. You can unsubscribe from marketing emails at any time. Service, security and retention emails will still be sent.
- Location and cookies. You control location permission and cookies through your browser and device settings.
To make a request, email support@tekswipe.com.au. We'll respond within 30 days. We don't charge for making a request, though we may charge a reasonable fee for complex access requests, and we'll explain if we can't meet a request and why.
Complaints
If you have a privacy complaint, please contact us first so we can try to fix it. If you're not satisfied with our response, you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) at www.oaic.gov.au ↗ or on 1300 363 992.
11Children
The Service is a professional tool and is not directed at people under 18. Accounts are for adults only. If we learn that we have collected personal information from a child without appropriate consent, we will delete it.
12Changes to this policy
We may update this policy as the Service or the law changes. We'll update the "last updated" date and, for significant changes — such as a shorter retention period or a new category of disclosure — let you know by email or in the app before they take effect.
13Contact us
For privacy questions, requests or complaints, contact TekSwipe Traffic:
- Email: support@tekswipe.com.au
- Location: Queensland, Australia
- Website: tekswipetraffic.com.au ↗