The short version
- We only collect what we need to run your check, your account and the site.
- We never sell your personal information. We don't use advertising or tracking cookies, and the way we count visitors uses no cookies at all.
- The registration you check is used to fetch licensed UK vehicle records. The report is about the vehicle, not you.
- Card payments are handled by Stripe. We never see or store your full card number.
- Some parts of the service are written by AI (from Anthropic). The AI works from vehicle records, or from what you type into the chat, and it is never used to make decisions about you.
- You can ask to see, correct or delete your data at any time by emailing privacy@deanscarcheck.com.
1. Who we are
Dean's Car Check is a service operated by Ricki Robin Ltd (trading as Dean's Car Check and Dean's Classic Cars), a company registered in England and Wales, company number 17186577, registered office 66 Paul Street, London EC2A 4NA. For the personal information described in this policy, Ricki Robin Ltd is the data controller. If you have any privacy question or request, email us at privacy@deanscarcheck.com.
Where a vehicle-data supplier (such as Total Car Check or Experian), or Google if you sign in with Google, uses information for its own purposes, it is a separate controller and its own privacy notice applies to that use.
2. The information we collect
- Account details: your email address and the sign-in details you create. Accounts and sign-in are handled for us by Supabase. You need a free account to run a check.
- Google sign-in: if you choose Continue with Google, Google confirms who you are and shares your email address and basic profile details (your name and a link to your profile picture) with us. We never see your Google password.
- Vehicle registrations you check: the registration mark you enter, and the reports we produce, which we keep in your account with their reference numbers so you can view them again.
- Orders and payments: what you bought, when, and what you paid, and any credit packs you hold (balances, expiry dates and what you have used). Your card payment is processed by Stripe on its own payment page. We receive confirmation that a payment was made and a reference for it; we never receive or store your full card number.
- Reminder preferences: if you opt in to MOT reminders, we store the vehicle and the email address the reminder should go to.
- What you type into Speak to Dean, our AI chat assistant. It is an AI, not a person. Your messages are sent to our AI provider, Anthropic, to write a reply. We don't keep chat transcripts on our servers; your own browser keeps the conversation for up to 7 days so you can pick it up again (New chat clears it). Please don't type personal, payment or log book details into the chat.
- Feedback you send us: the type you choose (complaint, improvement, idea or thank you), your message and, only if you add it or you are signed in, your email address so we can reply. It goes privately to our team and is never sent to the AI.
- Technical information: basic data your browser sends when you use the site (such as your device type, browser and general location from your IP address), used to keep the service secure and working.
- Error reports: if something on the site breaks, our error-monitoring service, Sentry, receives a technical report of the fault so we can fix it. We have set it not to collect cookies or your account details, and we remove registrations, report links and similar details from web addresses before a report is sent. It does not record your screen.
- Visitor statistics: Vercel Web Analytics counts visits without cookies. It records the page visited (with report links removed, and nothing kept from the web address except campaign tags), the site that referred you, your browser, operating system and device type, and your general location (such as country and city). It is not tied to your IP address and cannot follow you across other websites.
3. Why we use it, and our lawful bases
- To provide the report you asked for, run your account and let you sign in (including with Google, if you choose it). Lawful basis: performance of our contract with you.
- To write the automatically generated parts of a report, such as the summary and, on Guided Gold, the reading of your vehicle's results. Lawful basis: performance of our contract. We send the AI the vehicle's records, not your name, email address or payment details.
- To take payment, keep transaction records and email you about your order, including confirming the choices you made at checkout. Lawful bases: performance of our contract, and our legal obligations (for example, consumer, tax and accounting law).
- To send reminders you asked for: your consent, which you can withdraw at any time using the unsubscribe link or by contacting us.
- To answer your questions in the chat assistant and read your feedback: our legitimate interests in helping customers and improving the service.
- To keep the service secure, prevent misuse, find and fix faults, and count visits: our legitimate interests in running a safe, reliable service and understanding how it is used, balanced against your rights.
- No automated decisions about you. We do not make decisions about you by automated means that have legal or similarly significant effects. The AI and the record risk score describe a vehicle's records, not you.
4. Who we share it with
We use a small number of trusted providers to run the service. They only process your information on our instructions, except where they are a separate controller (see section 1).
Vehicle data
- Total Car Check (and Experian, for the outstanding-finance element): supply the provenance, risk and finance data behind paid reports.
- Vehicle Data Global: supplies the DVLA vehicle record (make, model, specification, tax and MOT status).
- DVLA Vehicle Enquiry Service: we send the registration to show you the vehicle before you pay, and to re-check MOT dates before we send a reminder.
- DVSA: the official MOT history service.
- One Auto API: taxi and private-hire licence history.
Running the service
- Supabase: hosts your account, stored reports and feedback, in the EU (Ireland).
- Google: sign-in, only if you choose Continue with Google.
- Stripe: processes card payments.
- Anthropic: the AI provider behind the automatically generated parts of reports and the Speak to Dean chat assistant. It does not use this data to train its models.
- Upstash (QStash): runs the background job that builds your report after you pay. It receives the order's registration, the tier you bought and an account reference.
- Resend: delivers the emails we send (order emails, reminders and account emails) and forwards feedback to our team.
- Sentry: error monitoring (see section 2).
- Vercel: hosts and serves the website and provides our cookie-free visitor statistics.
The vehicle-data providers set their own terms and, for the finance data, Experian's guarantee applies. Those terms are linked from our Terms & Conditions. We do not sell your personal information to anyone, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.
5. Where your information is processed
Our database is in the EU (Ireland). Our website's servers, and several of our providers (including Vercel, Stripe, Anthropic, Upstash, Resend, Sentry and Google), are based in, or may process data in, the United States. Where your information goes outside the UK, we rely on the safeguards UK data protection law requires, such as UK adequacy regulations (including the UK-US data bridge, for providers certified under it) or the UK International Data Transfer Agreement or Addendum, so your information keeps an equivalent level of protection.
6. How long we keep it
- Your account and saved reports: for as long as your account is open, so you can return to your reports. You can delete a saved report yourself from My checks at any time. To close your account, email privacy@deanscarcheck.com and we will delete your account and reports within one month (subject to the records below).
- Order and payment records: up to 6 years, to meet UK tax and accounting law.
- Reminder settings: until you turn the reminder off, it has been sent, or you close your account.
- Feedback: up to 2 years, then deleted.
- Chat messages: we don't keep them. Your browser keeps the conversation for up to 7 days. Anthropic keeps messages only for a limited period under its commercial terms, and does not train its models on them.
- Error reports: up to 90 days in Sentry, then deleted automatically.
- Visitor statistics: the anonymous code used to count a visit is discarded within 24 hours; the page-view statistics are kept as totals.
- Delivery and job records held by Resend, Upstash and Vercel: for the short periods those providers set.
- Everything else: no longer than we need it for the purpose we collected it.
7. Your rights
Under UK data protection law you have the right to:
- ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you;
- ask us to correct information that is wrong or incomplete;
- ask us to delete your information;
- ask us to restrict or object to how we use it;
- ask for your information in a portable format; and
- withdraw any consent you have given, at any time.
To exercise any of these, email privacy@deanscarcheck.com. We will reply within one month. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk (though we'd appreciate the chance to put things right first).
8. Cookies and storage
We use a small essential cookie to keep you signed in, and your browser's temporary session storage to carry a check through the checkout flow. These are needed for the site to work. If you use Speak to Dean, your browser also keeps that conversation in its own local storage for up to 7 days. If you answer the two questions about your purchase on a Guided Gold finance section, your browser remembers your answers so the explanation stays tailored to you. All of this stays on your device.
Our visitor statistics use no cookies and store nothing on your device. Google's sign-in pages and Stripe's payment page use their own cookies on their own sites. We do not use advertising or third-party tracking cookies.
9. Children
Dean's Car Check is intended for people aged 17 or over. It is not aimed at children, and we do not knowingly collect information from them.
10. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy from time to time. When we do, we'll change the date at the top of this page, and for significant changes we'll let you know.
11. Contact us
For any privacy question or request, email privacy@deanscarcheck.com, or write to Ricki Robin Ltd, 66 Paul Street, London EC2A 4NA.
