Privacy Policy

Last Updated: 13 June 2025

1. Introduction Welcome to Ask a Barista (askabarista.co.uk), the online home for the UK’s home barista community. We are committed to protecting and respecting your privacy. This policy explains what personal data we collect from you, how we use it, the legal basis for processing, and your rights regarding your data.

Our website is operated from Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom.

2. Data Controller For the purpose of the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR), the data controller is Ask a Barista. You can contact us at privacy@askabarista.co.uk.

3. What Personal Data We Collect

We may collect and process the following data about you:

  • Information You Give Us:
    • Community & Account Information: When you join our community or create an account, we may collect your name, username, and email address.
    • User-Generated Content: We collect the content you submit to the site, including community posts, comments, reviews, questions, and any images you upload (e.g., photos of your coffee setup).
    • Newsletter Subscription: If you subscribe to our newsletter, we collect your email address.
    • Direct Communications: If you contact us directly via email or a contact form, we will collect your name, email address, and the contents of your message.
  • Information We Collect Automatically:
    • Technical & Usage Data: We automatically collect information about your visit, including your IP address, browser type and version, device type, operating system, pages you viewed, and the time and date of your visit. This is primarily collected through cookies and similar technologies.

4. How We Use Your Data

We use your data for the following purposes:

  • To operate and maintain our website and community forums.
  • To manage your account and enable you to participate in community discussions.
  • To send you our newsletter and other marketing communications where we have your consent.
  • To analyse website traffic and improve our content and user experience.
  • To respond to your questions and inquiries.
  • To moderate community discussions and enforce our Terms of Service.
  • To comply with legal and regulatory obligations.

5. Legal Basis for Processing Your Data

Under UK GDPR, we must have a legal basis for using your personal data. Our legal bases are:

  • Consent: We rely on your consent to send you marketing newsletters and to use non-essential cookies. You can withdraw your consent at any time.
  • Legitimate Interests: We process your data for our legitimate interests, such as improving our website, ensuring security, and moderating our community, provided that these interests are not overridden by your rights and interests.

6. Data Sharing and Third Parties

We do not sell your personal data. We may share your data with trusted third-party service providers who help us operate our website, such as:

  • Analytics Providers: (e.g., Google Analytics) to help us understand website usage.
  • Hosting Providers: To host our website and its data.
  • Email Service Providers: To manage our newsletter subscriptions.

We will also disclose your information where required to do so by law.

7. Cookies

Our website uses cookies to distinguish you from other users. A cookie is a small file of letters and numbers that we store on your browser or the hard drive of your computer.

  • Essential Cookies: These are necessary for the website to function.
  • Analytics Cookies: These allow us to recognise and count the number of visitors and see how they move around our website.
  • Affiliate Cookies: If you click on an affiliate link to a product, a cookie may be set to track that you came from our site, which may result in us earning a commission.

You can block cookies by activating the setting on your browser that allows you to refuse all or some cookies.

8. Your Data Protection Rights

Under UK GDPR, you have the following rights:

  • The right to be informed: about how we use your personal data.
  • The right of access: to the personal data we hold about you.
  • The right to rectification: to have any inaccurate personal data corrected.
  • The right to erasure: to have your personal data deleted.
  • The right to restrict processing: of your personal data.
  • The right to data portability: to receive your data in a usable format.
  • The right to object: to the processing of your data for certain purposes.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at privacy@askabarista.co.uk. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK’s supervisory authority for data protection issues.

9. Data Security & Retention

We take reasonable steps to protect your personal data from loss, misuse, and unauthorised access. We will retain your data for as long as is necessary for the purposes set out in this policy, or for as long as your community account is active.

10. Changes to This Privacy Policy

We may update this policy from time to time. Any changes will be posted on this page with an updated “Last Updated” date.