Privacy Notice

1. Who we are

AupairMe is an online platform that helps au pairs and families find and connect with each other in South Africa.

This Privacy Notice explains what personal information we collect, why we collect it, how we use it, and the choices you have regarding your information.

We process personal information in accordance with the Protection of Personal Information Act, 4 of 2013 (“POPIA”).

2. Information we collect

The information we collect depends on how you use AupairMe.

For au pairs, this may include:

• Name and age
• Email address and telephone number
• General location
• Profile photo and other profile photos
• Experience and qualifications
• Languages
• Availability
• Work preferences
• Profile biography and other information you choose to provide

For families, this may include:

• Name and contact information
• General location
• Family and au-pair requirements
• Preferences, availability and other information needed to help find suitable au pairs

We may also collect basic technical information necessary to operate and secure the website, such as login/session information and basic device or request information.

3. Why we use your information

We use your personal information to:

• Create and manage your AupairMe account
• Create your au-pair or family profile
• Help match au pairs and families
• Allow users to search for suitable matches
• Enable relevant users to view profile information
• Provide access to AupairMe's services and features
• Communicate with you about your account
• Provide support
• Process payments where applicable
• Keep a record of your acceptance of our Terms and Conditions and this Privacy Notice
• Keep AupairMe secure and prevent misuse
• Meet our legal and regulatory obligations

Where you purchase a paid service, we may process information necessary to process and administer that payment.

We will not use your personal information for purposes that are unrelated to the AupairMe service without an appropriate reason or consent.

4. Who can see your information

AupairMe connects au pairs and families, so information you provide as part of your profile may be displayed to other appropriate users of the platform.

Some profile information may be visible to families using AupairMe. Access to certain information, including contact details, may depend on the family's level of access or paid service.

Your precise residential address or precise location will not be displayed to other users. Where location is used for searching or matching, AupairMe will use a broader or general location rather than displaying your precise location.

Families should also avoid placing unnecessary private or sensitive information in profile fields that may be visible to au pairs.

Profile and contact information is made available to other users only to support genuine matching and communication through the AupairMe service. Users are not permitted to scrape, harvest, republish, sell, build databases from, or otherwise use another user's information for unrelated personal, commercial or business purposes. These restrictions are explained in our Terms and Conditions.

5. Sharing your information

We do not sell your personal information.

We may use trusted service providers to help operate AupairMe, for example hosting, database, authentication, email, payment or other infrastructure providers.

These providers may process information only as necessary to provide their services to AupairMe.

We may also disclose information where required by law or where reasonably necessary to protect AupairMe, our users or others.

6. POPIA and your rights

Under POPIA, and subject to applicable law, you may ask us to:

• Tell you what personal information we hold about you
• Correct inaccurate or outdated information
• Delete personal information where appropriate
• Object to certain processing where applicable
• Raise a concern about how your personal information is processed
• Lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator (South Africa)

To make a privacy or POPIA-related request, contact us at hello@aupairme.co.za.

Some information may need to be retained where required by law or for legitimate administrative, security or dispute-resolution purposes.

7. Security

We use reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect personal information against loss, misuse, unauthorised access or disclosure.

Access to personal information is restricted according to the functionality of the platform.

We may also take reasonable steps to detect, investigate and respond to suspected scraping, unauthorised collection, misuse or disclosure of information where this is necessary to protect AupairMe or our users.

No online service can guarantee absolute security, but protecting our users' information is important to us.

8. Keeping your information

We keep personal information for as long as reasonably necessary to operate your account and provide the AupairMe service.

If your account is deleted, we will delete or anonymise personal information that we no longer need, subject to information we may be required or reasonably entitled to retain for legal, security, accounting or dispute-resolution purposes.

9. Cookies and technical information

AupairMe may use cookies and similar technologies that are necessary for login, security, preferences and the normal operation of the website.

If analytics or other non-essential tracking technologies are introduced, they should be handled in accordance with applicable privacy requirements.

We do not sell browsing information to advertisers.

10. Keeping your information accurate

Please keep your profile information accurate and up to date.

You can update information available through your AupairMe account. If there is information you cannot change yourself, you can contact us for assistance.

11. Changes to this notice

We may update this Privacy Notice as AupairMe develops or if legal requirements change.

When we make changes, we will update the “Last updated” date on this page.

12. Contact us

If you have a question about privacy, want to update or delete information, or want to exercise your rights under POPIA, please contact us at hello@aupairme.co.za, or using the details on the Contact Us page.

Please also see our Terms and Conditions.