Your privacy on PinPals

PinPals (pinpals.ie and the PinPals apps for iPhone, iPad, Android, Apple Watch and Wear OS) is run from Dublin, Ireland. We are the “controller” of the personal data described here, under the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Irish Data Protection Acts.

Contact us about anything in this policy at info@pinpals.ie.

Your account. Your name, email address, password (stored only as a secure hash) and date of birth. If you join with Apple or Google, we receive your name and email address from them (Apple may give us a private relay address instead) — never your Apple or Google password.

Your golf profile. Anything you choose to add: photo, home club, county and country, handicap index, bio, Golf Ireland membership number, the games and formats you like, and your mobile number. You decide whether your handicap and age range are shown.

What you do on PinPals. Tee times you post or join; groups, societies and trips; events and itineraries; rounds, scores, scorecards, statistics and who certified them; posts, photos, videos, comments, reactions and course reviews; messages; marketplace listings, offers and feedback; and the reports you make.

Location. With your permission, your phone’s location — to show tee times and courses near you, and, during a round, your distance to the green, the hole you’re on and where your shots were played. Shot positions are saved with that round’s scorecard. During a live round with the lock screen card on, location is used in the background until the round ends. We don’t track your location at any other time.

Voice. “Say scores” uses your phone’s speech recognition. We receive only the scores it hears, never a recording.

Verification. If you ask for a Verified badge, a photo of your membership card with your Golf Ireland number and club. The photo is checked automatically (see “Who we share it with”) and kept only if a person needs to look at it, then deleted once they decide.

Junior members. For members aged 13–15, a parent or guardian’s email address and their approval; if a card check is switched on, Stripe checks the parent’s card for €0 and it isn’t kept.

Your device and use. Your device type, app version and notification token (to send you alerts), your IP address (to protect accounts and limit abuse), which sections of PinPals are used (to run and improve the service), and an age range your app store may provide.

• To run PinPals for you — your account, profile, tee times, groups, live scoring, scorecards, messages, the marketplace and notifications (performance of our contract with you).
• To keep members safe — age-appropriate access for under-18s, parent approval for 13–15 year olds, reliability scores, Verified badges, scam and abuse protection, and dealing with reports (our legitimate interests and legal obligations).
• To show your location-based features — only with your permission, which you can withdraw in your phone’s settings at any time (consent).
• To improve PinPals — understanding which features are used (legitimate interests).
• Adverts — some adverts are chosen by your county or club. Members under 18 never see targeted adverts, or adverts for alcohol or betting (legitimate interests).
• To meet the law — for example, keeping records of transactions (legal obligation).

Other signed-in members can see your profile (name, photo, club, and your handicap if you show it), your posts and the things you take part in. Members under 18 are shown with more limits: their profile is seen only by their parent, approved contacts and people they play with, and under 16 their surname shows as an initial.

Your mobile number is shared only with the organisers of groups you choose, group by group. Things you share with a link — a scorecard, a live round you let someone follow, a tee time, results or a clubhouse TV leaderboard — can be seen by anyone with that link.

We never sell your personal data.

We use these companies to run PinPals. Each only processes data on our instructions:

• Supabase — our database, sign-in and file storage, hosted in Ireland (EU).
• Vercel — hosts the website.
• Resend — sends our emails.
• Apple and Google — sign-in (if you choose it), app store purchases and age signals, and push notifications.
• Expo — delivers app updates and push notifications.
• Google Maps Platform — satellite imagery for hole maps (it receives the map area being viewed).
• Apple WeatherKit and Open-Meteo — weather for courses and rounds (they receive a course’s location, not yours).
• Anthropic — reads membership card photos for Verified badges.
• Stripe — payments and the optional parent card check.

Some of these are based outside the EU. Where your data leaves the EU, it is protected by the EU’s adequacy decisions (including the EU–US Data Privacy Framework) or Standard Contractual Clauses.

We may also share data if the law requires it, or to protect members from fraud or harm.

Most marketplace sales and society payments are settled directly between members — in cash, by bank transfer or Revolut. PinPals shows the payment details an organiser or seller chooses to share, but doesn’t handle that money or see those transactions.

• Your data is kept while you have an account.
• When you delete your account, it is locked straight away and erased 30 days later (the gap lets a mistake be undone if you ask).
• If you have bought or sold through PinPals, the records of those transactions are kept for six years, as Irish tax law requires; the rest of the account is anonymised.
• Verification photos are deleted as soon as a decision is made.

You can ask to see, correct, download or delete your data, to restrict or object to how we use it, and to withdraw any consent you’ve given. Much of this you can do yourself:

• Edit your profile — on your profile page or in the app.
• Download your data — in the app: Profile → Privacy & security → Download my data.
• Delete your account — in the app (Profile) or on the website (Delete account). If you joined with Apple, deleting also ends PinPals’ access to your Apple ID.

For anything else, email info@pinpals.ie. We’ll reply within one month. If you’re unhappy with how we’ve handled your data, you can complain to the Irish Data Protection Commission (dataprotection.ie).

PinPals is for golfers aged 13 and over. Members aged 13–15 need a parent or guardian to approve their account, and members under 18 can’t use tee times, Social, chat or marketplace selling, and see no targeted or age-restricted adverts. If you think someone under 13 has an account, use “May be under 18” on their profile’s report menu or email us, and we’ll act on it.

The website uses only the cookies it needs to work: keeping you signed in, remembering a few settings, and protecting sign-in. The app stores your sign-in securely on your device (in the iPhone Keychain). We don’t use advertising cookies or third-party tracking.

Data is encrypted in transit and at rest. Access to each table is limited by security rules in the database itself, staff access is limited and protected with a second sign-in step, and passwords are never stored in a readable form.

If we change this policy, we’ll update the date at the top. If a change affects you significantly, we’ll tell you in the app or by email first.