Privacy Policy

Welcome to ”Life In UK Help”. Your privacy is of the utmost importance to us. We are committed to being transparent about how we collect, use, and protect your personal information. This Privacy Policy is designed to help you understand what data we gather when you visit our website, why we collect it, and how we safeguard it.
We value the trust you place in us when you use our services. This document outlines our practices regarding data handling in accordance with the UK GDPR and other relevant privacy laws. We encourage you to read this policy carefully to make informed decisions about sharing your information with us.

Who we are?

Our website, www.LifeInUKHelp.com, is an independent online guide dedicated to providing helpful and reliable information about living in the UK. For the purpose of the UK GDPR, the data controller is the owner of www.LifeInUKHelp.com. For all general inquiries, please visit our Contact Us page. For any privacy-related questions, you can contact us directly at:

What data we collect and why?

Comments

When visitors leave comments on the site we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection. An anonymized string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available here. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.

Media

If you upload images to the website, you should avoid uploading images with embedded location data (EXIF GPS) included. Visitors to the website can download and extract any location data from images on the website.

Contact Forms & Newsletters

When you use our contact form or subscribe to our newsletter, we collect the information you provide, such as your name and email address. We use this information solely to respond to your inquiries or to send you the newsletter you requested.

Analytics

Analytics We use both Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity to understand how visitors use our website. Clarity uses behavioral metrics, heatmaps, and session replay to help us improve the site’s design and user experience. Data is collected using first- and third-party cookies and is used for site optimization, security, and advertising. For details on how Microsoft handles data, please see the Microsoft Privacy Statement.

Cookies

A cookie is a small file that is stored on your device. We use cookies for the following purposes:

Functional Cookies: If you leave a comment on our site you may opt-in to saving your name, email address and website in cookies. These are for your convenience so that you do not have to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies will last for one year. When you log in, we will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices. Login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me”, your login will persist for two weeks. If you log out of your account, the login cookies will be removed. If you edit or publish an article, an additional cookie will be saved in your browser that includes no personal data and simply indicates the post ID of the article you just edited; it expires after 1 day.
Analytics Cookies: We use analytics cookies from Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity to gather anonymous data about website usage. Clarity’s cookies are also necessary to enable features like heatmaps and session replay.
Temporary Cookies: If you visit our login page, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.

Embedded content from other websites: Articles on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website. These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content.

Revoking and Managing Your Consent

You have the right to withdraw your consent for non-essential cookies at any time. We aim to make it as easy to withdraw consent as it was to give it.

1. Managing Consent via Your Browser:

Because your cookie preferences are stored on your device, the simplest way to completely revoke your previous consent is by manually deleting all cookies in your web browser settings. When you clear your cookies and revisit our website, the Cookie Consent Banner will reappear, allowing you to provide new preferences or reject all non-essential tracking (such as Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity).

2. Browser-Specific Instructions:

For instructions on how to clear cookies in Chrome, please visit: Support
For instructions on how to clear cookies in Firefox, please visit: Support
For instructions on how to clear cookies in Microsoft Edge, please visit: Support
For instructions on how to clear cookies in Apple Safari, please visit: Support
Donations and Financial Transactions

When you choose to support ”Life In UK Help” via a financial contribution (Tip), we collect necessary transaction data. This process is handled by a third-party service (Stripe) through an external platform (Ko-fi). We do not store your full credit card details on our server. We do collect the following information provided by the payment processors: Donor Name, Email Address, the amount of the contribution, and the date of the transaction. This data is retained for administrative and tax compliance purposes

Who we share your data with?

We do not sell your personal data. We may share it with third-party services that help us operate our website, such as:

Google Analytics: For website traffic analysis.
Microsoft Clarity & Microsoft Advertising: For advanced website analytics, heatmaps, session replay, and targeted advertising (as described in the Analytics section).
Spam detection services: To prevent spam comments.
If you request a password reset, your IP address will be included in the reset email.
Payment Processors (Stripe): For securely processing financial transactions and managing tip receipts.
Donation Platform (Ko-fi): For managing the interface of the donation process.

How long we retain your data?

We retain your data only for as long as necessary.

Comments & User Profiles: We retain comments and their related metadata indefinitely (to allow automatic approval of follow-up comments) and store registered user profile information until the user requests deletion.
Financial Records (Donations/Tips): Records related to financial contributions (Donor Name, Email, Transaction Amount, and Date) are retained for a minimum period of six (6) years from the end of the relevant financial year, as required by UK tax and accounting regulations (HMRC). This data is held strictly for legal, administrative, and audit compliance.

What rights you have over your data?

If you have an account on this site, or have left comments, you can request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided to us. You can also request that we erase any personal data we hold about you. This does not include any data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.

Where your data is sent?

Visitor comments may be checked through an automated spam detection service.

Thank you for visiting ”Life In UK Help”. We hope you find our website a helpful and valuable resource for your journey in the UK.