Privacy Policy

1. What we collect

If you contact us: your name, email address and the content of your message, so that we can reply and keep a record of the enquiry.

If you create an account: your name, email address and a securely hashed password. We never store your password in a readable form. We also record sign-in attempts and the time of your last sign-in so that we can lock an account after repeated failed attempts.

If you save or compare schools: the schools you save, linked to your account, so your shortlist is there next time.

If you claim a school listing: your name, work email address, role and the school you represent, so that we can verify the claim.

Automatically: a small amount of technical information such as the pages you visit and general usage patterns, used to keep the service secure and to understand which parts of it are useful.

School records themselves are not personal data about you. They come from published UK government open data.

2. Why we can use it

We rely on contract where processing is needed to run an account you have asked for, on legitimate interests where we answer your enquiry, secure the site and improve the service, and on consent for any non-essential cookies. You can withdraw consent at any time.

3. Cookies

We ask for your cookie choice the first time you visit and remember it for 30 days, after which we will ask again. Strictly necessary cookies keep you signed in and keep the site secure; they cannot be switched off. Anything beyond that is only set if you accept.

4. Who we share it with

We do not sell your personal data and we do not share it with schools or advertisers. We use a small number of service providers to host the site, store our database and deliver email, and they process data only on our instructions. We may disclose data if the law requires it.

5. How long we keep it

Contact messages are kept for up to 24 months. Account data is kept for as long as your account is open and deleted on request. Password reset links expire after one hour.

6. Your rights

Under UK GDPR you can ask for a copy of your data, ask us to correct or delete it, ask us to restrict or stop certain processing, and object to processing based on legitimate interests. To exercise any of these, email [email protected]. We will respond within one month.

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your data you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk.

7. Security

Data is transmitted over encrypted connections, passwords are hashed, and access to our database is restricted. No system is perfectly secure, but we take reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect your information.

8. Children

SchoolFinder is intended for adults — parents, carers and school staff. We do not knowingly collect personal data from children.

9. Contact us

Privacy questions and data rights requests: [email protected]. For anything else, please use our contact form.