Privacy
The Railway History Archive is run by PL Photography Limited, trading as Piemags, company number 10803986, Bridgend, Wales. We are responsible for the personal details this site keeps. Questions about them go to [email protected].
If you make an account
We keep your email address, your name if you give one, and your password in a scrambled form that cannot be turned back into the password. When you sign up, and each time you sign in, we record the date and the town and country your connection appears to come from. That location is Cloudflare's reading of the connection and is only approximate. Your basket and orders are kept with the account. Accounts are for people aged 18 and over.
If you buy a book
Card payments are taken by Stripe, and your card number never reaches us. Stripe passes us your name, email and the billing address you enter, and we keep them with the order. For each download we record the date, the size of the file and the country it went to.
Order records are kept for six years, because HMRC requires a company to keep its records that long.
Emails
We email you a receipt when you buy a book, and a link if you ask to reset your password. Those emails are sent for us by Resend.
If you write to us
A message sent with the contact form is kept with your name, your email address, the subject you chose, any book you named, the country your connection appears to come from and, if you are signed in, your account. We use it to reply to you. A copy is emailed to us through Resend.
Protecting accounts
To limit how many sign-in attempts, new accounts and password resets one connection can make, we keep a scrambled form of your connection's internet address, which cannot be read back.
Cookies
The site sets one cookie, which keeps you signed in for up to 30 days. It is only set when you sign in, and signing out removes it. Before you sign in, your basket is kept in your own browser, and clearing your browser removes it. There are no advertising or tracking cookies. The site's typefaces come from Google Fonts, so your browser fetches them from Google.
The reasons we keep it
Account, order and billing details are kept so we can supply what you have bought and look after your account. Order records are also kept because tax law requires it. Sign-in records and the scrambled internet addresses are kept to protect accounts and stop misuse, which is in our legitimate interest as the business running the site.
The companies that handle it for us
Cloudflare hosts the site and its database and passes on email sent to our address, Stripe takes payments and Resend sends our emails. Some of them handle details outside the United Kingdom, including in the United States, under their own data protection terms. We do not sell or rent anybody's details.
Seeing, changing or deleting your details
You can ask for a copy of what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete it, apart from order records we have to keep for six years. You can also ask us to stop or limit using your details, object to how we use them, or have them sent to you in a form another service can read. Email [email protected]. There is no charge, and we answer within one month.
If your details are ever exposed in a way that puts you at risk, we will tell you, and the Information Commissioner's Office where the law requires it. If you are unhappy with how we have handled your details you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk.