Privacy Policy

Who we are

This website is run by Zach Boyd, trading as ZB Automations, a sole-trader business based in County Kildare, Ireland. For this policy ZB Automations is the “controller” of your personal data: it decides why and how your data is used.

Business details. ZB Automations is the trading name of Zach Boyd, a sole trader based in County Kildare, Ireland. Email: zach@zbautomations.ie. WhatsApp and phone: +353 83 201 3732.

This policy covers zbautomations.ie. The portfolio site at portfolio.zbautomations.ie has its own privacy policy.

What we collect, why, and how long we keep it

• Visiting the site (always on, no cookies, no personal data). We count visits with Umami, a privacy-focused analytics tool that ZB Automations runs itself on its own server (analytics.zbautomations.ie, Oracle Cloud, Amsterdam, in the EU). No third-party analytics company receives your visit. Umami uses no cookies, does not store your IP address and does not track you across other websites or visits. What is counted: an anonymous page view, page speed measurements, the outcome of the quote assistant (that a request was sent, with the services and timing chosen, never your details) and your privacy choice. Legal basis: our legitimate interest in knowing whether the site works and keeping it fast (Article 6(1)(f) GDPR). Kept in aggregate for up to 24 months.
• Hosting and security. Cloudflare hosts and protects the site, so it processes your IP address, browser details and request times to deliver pages and block attacks. Legal basis: our legitimate interest in running a secure site. We do not use this for profiling or advertising. Cloudflare keeps these logs under its own retention rules.
• Error reports. If something breaks, the error message, where in the code it happened, the page and your browser type are sent to ZB’s own error-tracking service. They carry no cookies, identifiers or query strings. Legal basis: our legitimate interest in fixing faults. Kept only as long as needed to fix the problem.
• Optional: “Help improve the site” (only if you allow it). How the page is used during your visit: sections reached, scroll depth, how long you are active on the page, buttons and links used, which steps of the quote assistant you reach and how long a field’s content is (never what you type), errors, screen size, language, and the website you arrived from. Kept for 24 months with no name, email or IP address attached.
• Optional: “Recognise me when I return” (only if you allow it). A random visitor id kept in your browser, and a device signature made from details such as screen size, graphics card, fonts and time zone, so a returning visitor can be told from a new one and automated visits can be spotted. Kept for 12 months from your last visit. It is used only for ZB Automations’ own statistics and never shared or used for advertising.
• Optional: “Record my visit” (only if you allow it). A replay of how you move around the page (scrolling, pointer movement and clicks) and click heatmaps, viewed only by Zach. Everything you type is hidden in the recording, and password and payment fields are never captured. Replays are kept for 30 days and heatmap data for 90 days.
• Optional: “Save my draft”. This switch applies only to forms that offer to save a draft. The quote assistant on this site does not save anything you type: if you leave without sending, nothing you typed is kept. It remembers only the choices you tick, in your browser tab, until you send the request or close the tab.
• The legal basis for all of the optional items is your consent (Article 6(1)(a)), and for anything stored on your device, regulation 5 of the ePrivacy Regulations (S.I. 336/2011). You can withdraw consent at any time without affecting anything done before; switching a purpose off stops it straight away. If your browser sends a Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track signal, every optional switch starts off. More detail on each item is in the Cookie Policy, and the full list of measured events is in ZB’s source repository (docs/analytics-events.md); email us if you would like a copy.
• Your privacy choice. The banner offers two equal choices, “Accept essential” (only what the site needs to run) and “Accept all”, and nothing optional is switched on until you choose. Your choice is stored in your browser for 180 days so you are not asked again. We also keep an anonymous record of the choice (a random id, the choices made, the policy version and the time) so we can show consent was handled properly. Legal basis: our legal obligation and legitimate interest in demonstrating compliance (Article 7(1) GDPR). Kept with the analytics data, up to 24 months.
• Quote requests and enquiries. If you use the quote assistant at the bottom of the home page and on the quote page, we collect your first name, your email address (required) and, only if you choose to add them, a WhatsApp number, your business name and any notes, together with the services and problems you select, when you need the work and a rough monthly loss figure if you use the calculator. Your details are used only to reply to your quote and to prepare it. Legal basis: steps taken at your request before entering into a contract (Article 6(1)(b)). If it does not lead to a project we delete it within 12 months of our last contact.
• Messages by WhatsApp, phone and email. If you contact Zach this way, or give a WhatsApp number so he can message you there, we use what you send only to reply and to discuss the work you asked about. Legal basis: steps at your request before a contract, or our legitimate interest in answering enquiries. Kept on the same terms as quote requests.
• Spam protection. Before a quote request is accepted, Cloudflare Turnstile runs a short bot check and we apply an hourly limit per visitor. The limit uses a one-way scrambled (hashed) version of your IP address, not the address itself, and deletes it automatically within two hours. Legal basis: our legitimate interest in preventing abuse.
• If you become a client. We keep the contract, invoices and related records for the length of the working relationship and then for as long as Irish tax and accounting law requires, which is usually six years. Legal basis: performing the contract and our legal obligations.

Who receives your data

• Cloudflare (hosting, security, the Turnstile bot check) and Zoho Mail (sending and storing our email) act as our processors.
• ZB Automations’ own servers on Oracle Cloud in Amsterdam run the analytics and a private business dashboard where a copy of each quote request is saved so it can be followed up. Only ZB can access them.
• WhatsApp (provided to people in the EEA by WhatsApp Ireland Limited, part of Meta) handles your messages only if you message Zach there or give a WhatsApp number. It applies its own privacy policy.

We do not sell your data, share it for advertising, or use it to profile you.

Transfers outside the European Economic Area

Some of these providers are based in, or may process data in, countries outside the EEA, such as the United States. Where that happens they rely on safeguards the GDPR allows, such as the EU–US Data Privacy Framework or the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses. See each provider’s own privacy notice for details.

The quote assistant and automated decisions

The quote assistant is an automated form that follows a fixed script, and it tells you so in its first message. It does not use an artificial-intelligence model, and nothing it does makes a decision about you. Zach reads every request himself.

Providing your information

To get a quote you must give your first name and an email address, so we can reply. Everything else is optional. Without them we cannot answer your request. You never have to use the assistant: you can message Zach directly instead.

Your rights

You can ask us for access to the personal data we hold about you, to correct it, to delete it, to restrict how we use it, to receive it in a portable format, and to object to processing based on legitimate interests. Where we rely on your consent you can withdraw it at any time, as easily as you gave it, using Privacy choices in the footer of any page; withdrawing does not affect what happened before. To make a request, email zach@zbautomations.ie. We reply within one month, free of charge, and may need to confirm who you are first.

You also have the right to complain to the Irish Data Protection Commission (dataprotection.ie) if you think your data has been mishandled.

Children

This site is for businesses and is not aimed at children. We do not knowingly collect data from anyone under 16.

Cookies and similar technologies

Our Cookie Policy lists everything stored on your device, what each item does and how long it lasts.

Changes to this policy

If we change this policy the “last updated” date changes. If a change needs your consent again, we will ask you again.