Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains what personal data Quiet Rose handles, why, who receives it, how long it is kept and what you can do about it. It is written for everyone whose data may pass through the shop: people who buy, people who are offered a gift, people who contribute to the book, people who write to us and people who simply visit. A gift order involves two people, and only one of them chose to deal with us at the start, so this policy pays particular attention to the recipient.

1. The short version

These points summarise the policy. The sections that follow give the detail, and the detail applies if the two ever seem to differ.

• We use personal data to carry out orders, tell the people involved what they need to know, handle refunds and meet legal duties.
• We do not sell personal data, and we do not send marketing without consent.
• Card details go to Stripe and never reach us.
• The buyer is never shown the recipient’s address or phone number.
• Recipient data, the note and the buyer’s email are erased 30 days after the order closes. Accounting records are kept as long as the law requires.
• We use no advertising or tracking cookies and no analytics tools.
• Depending on where you live, you may have legal rights over your data. You can use them by writing to support@quietroseproject.com.

2. Words used in this policy

“Personal data” means information about an identifiable living person. The “buyer” is the person who places and pays for an order. The “recipient” is the person whose first name and email address the buyer enters. The “Site” is quietroseproject.com in any language. An order “closes” when it has been delivered or refunded.

3. The personal data we handle

What we hold depends on your relationship with the shop. Most people fall under only one of the headings below.

3.1 If you buy a gift

We handle the following information, all of which you give us when you order or which arises from the order.

• Your email address, used for your receipt and your order updates.
• The sender name you choose, of up to 60 characters, as the recipient will see it.
• A suggested delivery day, if you give one.
• Your note of up to 400 characters.
• The order itself: order number, products, sizes, quantities, prices, any tip, dates and the stage the order has reached.
• The language you were using, and a reference from Stripe that links the order to the payment. This reference is not your card number.
• Anything else you tell us when you write to us about the order.

3.2 If you are the recipient of a gift

We receive your first name and email address from the buyer, along with the language chosen for your email. We did not obtain them from any other source. We use them to send you the invitation and one reminder.

If you accept the gift, you then give us the delivery details below. If you decline or do not answer, we never receive them.

• The name for the delivery.
• A phone number for the courier.
• The city, street and, if there is one, the apartment or office.
• The day and time window you choose.
• Any instructions for the courier, of up to 300 characters.

3.3 Other records about a gift

We keep a record of whether the gift was accepted, declined, delivered or refunded. Where a courier provides one, we may also keep a link to a proof of delivery, such as a photograph. It is not shown to the buyer, and it is erased with the other details after 30 days. If you choose to block future gifts, we keep only a keyed hash of your email address, as described below.

3.4 If you contribute to the book

We handle your email address, the amount, the date and a reference number, together with Stripe’s payment reference. The email address is used to send you a confirmation and to handle a refund if one is due.

3.5 If you write to us

Contact-form messages are sent to us by email. They contain the name, email address and message you enter. If you write to support@quietroseproject.com directly, we receive whatever your message contains. Please do not send card numbers or other sensitive details.

3.6 If you visit the Site

You do not need an account to browse or to buy. Like any website, the Site cannot be delivered to your device without technical data such as your IP address, which is handled by our hosting provider, Cloudflare. Google Fonts sees your IP address when a page loads. Your cart stays in your own browser, as the Cookies and Browser Storage Notice explains.

3.7 What we do not collect

We do not receive your card number. We do not offer user accounts, so we hold no passwords for customers. We do not use advertising identifiers, tracking cookies or analytics tools. We do not ask for sensitive information such as health data or political views. The note and the courier instructions are free text, so please do not put sensitive information in them.

4. Where personal data comes from

Most of what we hold comes directly from the person it concerns: buyers enter their own details at checkout, recipients enter their own delivery details, and people who write to us choose what to say.

There are three exceptions. A recipient’s first name and email address come from the buyer. Couriers and florists may tell us what happened with a delivery, including whether it was completed. Stripe tells us whether a payment or refund succeeded and gives us a reference for it, but it does not give us your card number. We do not buy personal data, and we do not combine it with data from data brokers or advertising networks.

5. If you do not give us information

You are never obliged to deal with the shop. A buyer who does not give an email address cannot place an order, because we would have no way of sending a confirmation or telling the buyer about a refund. A recipient who does not give delivery details simply does not receive the gift, and the buyer is refunded. A recipient has no obligation of any kind to give us anything. Courier instructions are optional, and so is the apartment or office line.

6. How we use personal data

We use personal data only for the purposes below. We do not use it to build advertising profiles.

• To take an order and its payment, and to confirm them to the buyer.
• To invite the recipient, send one reminder and show the Private Page.
• To prepare and deliver an accepted gift, and to make any change the recipient asks for.
• To tell the buyer the stage the order has reached, and to tell the buyer if the gift has been delivered or could not be delivered.
• To issue refunds, deal with damaged or wrong items and arrange returns.
• To answer messages, complaints and requests about personal data.
• To honour a recipient’s request to block future gifts.
• To prevent and investigate fraud and misuse of the gifting service, in line with the Acceptable Use and Gifting Policy.
• To keep accounting records and meet other legal duties, and to establish or defend legal claims, including a dispute over a card payment.

7. Legal grounds for using personal data

Some laws, including the GDPR and the UK GDPR, require a legal ground for each use of personal data. Where such a law applies, we rely on the grounds set out here.

We rely on the performance of a contract when we use a buyer’s data to carry out an order or a contribution, and when we use a recipient’s data at the recipient’s own request to arrange a delivery.

We rely on our legitimate interests when we use the first name and email address entered by a buyer to offer the gift to the recipient, when we keep the hash that makes a block work, when we prevent misuse and fraud, and when we deal with messages and legal claims. We have considered those interests against the privacy of the people concerned, which is why the invitation is limited to what the recipient needs to decide, and why each recipient can decline and block future gifts. You may object to any such use, as explained under “Your rights”.

We rely on legal obligations when the law requires us to keep accounting records or to disclose information. If we ever ask for your consent to something, such as marketing, you may withdraw that consent at any time without affecting anything done before.

8. Who can see what within a gift order

Because an order connects two people, it matters what each of them can see.

8.1 What the buyer can see

The buyer sees the recipient’s first name, which the buyer entered, and the stage the order has reached: invited, accepted or delivered. The buyer receives an email when the recipient accepts, and another once the gift has been delivered. Neither email gives the date or time of delivery.

The buyer is never shown the recipient’s address, phone number or courier instructions, and is not shown the day the recipient chooses. If the gift does not go ahead, the buyer is told only that it could not be delivered, and is not told which reason applied or whether the recipient’s address has been blocked.

8.2 What the recipient can see

The invitation says that a gift is waiting and gives the sender name entered by the buyer and a private link. It does not say what the gift is, and it does not give the price or the note. The Private Page shows the sender name and the form for the delivery details. It does not show what the gift is, the price, any tip or the buyer’s email address. The note arrives with the gift.

8.3 Private links

The Private Page and the Order Page are reached through private links, without a password. Anyone who has a link can open that page, so please do not forward it or post it anywhere.

9. The emails we send

Every email below is part of carrying out an order or a contribution. You will not receive anything else from the shop unless you ask for it or consent to it.

9.1 Emails to buyers

A buyer receives a confirmation with a link to the Order Page, a message when the recipient accepts, a message once the gift has been delivered, and a message if the gift could not be delivered or the order has been refunded. A buyer who writes to us also receives our reply.

9.2 Emails to recipients

A recipient receives the invitation, one reminder after 48 hours if there has been no answer, and a confirmation after giving or changing delivery details. Those who decline receive no further messages about that gift. No new invitation is sent to an address that has been blocked.

9.3 Emails to contributors

A person who contributes to the book receives a confirmation, and a message if a refund is made.

10. A recipient’s data from start to finish

Because recipients did not choose to give us their details at the start, this section follows those details through an order, step by step.

• The buyer enters a first name and email address. These are encrypted when they are stored.
• We use the email address to send the invitation from gifts@quietroseproject.com and, if needed, one reminder.
• If the recipient declines, no delivery details ever reach us, and the order is refunded and closed. If the recipient does not answer, no delivery details reach us, and the order stays open until it is answered.
• If the recipient accepts, the delivery details are encrypted when they are stored, and they stay hidden from the buyer.
• When the order goes to the florist, the people who prepare and deliver it receive what the delivery requires.
• Once delivery has taken place or the order has been refunded, the order closes.
• Thirty days later, the recipient’s data and the note are erased from the order record.

11. Keeping data accurate

We rely on the people who give us information to give it correctly. We do not check whether a first name, sender name or email address entered by a buyer is accurate. Until the order has gone to the florist, a recipient can correct delivery details on the Private Page, and after that by writing to support@quietroseproject.com. A buyer can write to the same address to correct the buyer’s own email address while the order is open. If you think that something we hold about you is wrong, please tell us.

12. Who receives personal data

We share personal data only with the following recipients and only as far as each one needs it. We do not sell personal data to anyone.

12.1 Stripe

Stripe processes payments and refunds. It receives your card details directly from you on its payment page, together with the buyer’s email address, the products, the amounts and the order number. We do not pass the recipient’s details to Stripe. Stripe also publishes its own privacy notice, which explains the uses for which it takes responsibility itself, such as fraud prevention and meeting its financial obligations.

12.2 Cloudflare

Cloudflare provides the hosting, the database and the sending of email. Order records are stored with it, and the emails we send pass through it. As the host of the Site, it also handles technical data about requests, including IP addresses, and it may make aggregate traffic and security figures available to the site owner.

12.3 Florists and couriers

The people who prepare and deliver a gift receive only what the delivery requires: the items, the note that goes with the gift, and the recipient’s delivery details. They do not receive card details or the buyer’s email address.

12.4 Google Fonts

The fonts on the Site are loaded from Google Fonts, which sees your IP address when a page loads. We do not send it any information about your order.

12.5 Email and banking providers

Emails reach you through your own email provider, and payments and refunds pass through your bank or card issuer. Those organisations act under their own terms and privacy notices.

12.6 Authorities and advisers

We may disclose personal data if the law requires it, or where it is needed to establish, exercise or defend legal claims, to protect someone’s safety, or in response to a valid request from a competent authority. We may also share what is necessary with a professional adviser, such as an accountant or lawyer.

12.7 A new owner

If the shop is ever transferred to someone else, the personal data needed to carry on open orders and keep required records may pass to the new owner, who would have to use it in line with this policy unless you are told otherwise.

13. Data controller

Maxime Rivière, trading as Quiet Rose, decides how and why personal data is used in the shop, and is what some laws call the data controller. In this policy, “we”, “us” and “our” mean that person, together with anyone acting on that person’s behalf in running the shop.

The seller is a private individual and not a company. There is no separate privacy department. All questions and requests about personal data go to support@quietroseproject.com, and we reply within 2 business days.

14. Transfers to other countries

Transfers abroad may occur because the providers named above operate internationally. Your data may therefore be handled in a country other than your own, where the law may not offer the same protection as the law where you live.

A buyer may also be in a different country from the recipient, and delivery details necessarily go to the florists and couriers in the city where the delivery takes place. If you want to know more about how a transfer affects your data, write to support@quietroseproject.com.

15. How long we keep personal data

We keep personal data for the periods below. An order closes when it has been delivered or refunded.

• Recipient data, including the first name, email address and delivery details: erased 30 days after the order closes. A gift with no answer stays open, so its details are kept until it closes. We review such gifts after 30 days, and you can ask us to close one at any time.
• The note: erased 30 days after the order closes.
• The buyer’s email address in the order record: erased 30 days after the order closes.
• Orders where payment was never completed: the record is deleted after about two days.
• Book contributions: the email address is erased about 30 days after the contribution has been handled.
• Accounting records: kept as long as the law requires.
• Block on future gifts: only a keyed hash of the email address is kept. It has no automatic expiry, because the block would otherwise stop working.
• Messages sent to us by email or through the contact form: these stay in our mailbox and are outside the automatic 30-day erasure. No fixed period applies, and you can ask us to delete them at any time. We will do so unless we need them to deal with an open matter or a legal claim.

15.1 What remains after the 30 days

Once the recipient data, the note, the sender name, any proof of delivery and the buyer’s email are erased, the order record stays without them. It contains the order number, the products, the amounts, the dates, the stages the order went through and Stripe’s reference. We keep this record for accounting purposes and to deal with any later dispute over a payment.

15.2 Copies we do not control

Emails already delivered stay in the mailboxes of the people who received them. Stripe keeps its payment records according to its own rules and legal duties. Cloudflare and other providers may keep technical logs for a limited time under their own policies. Operational notices about an order that are sent to our own mailbox may also remain there. They contain the order number, the amount and, for deliveries, the day and time window requested, without the recipient’s name or address.

16. How data is protected

Private fields are stored encrypted using AES-256-GCM. That covers the recipient’s first name, email address and delivery details, and the note. Some other data is not stored in that encrypted form, including the buyer’s email address, the sender name and the contents of the order. Access to the order records is restricted.

Card details never reach us. Private links are signed, so that they cannot simply be guessed from an order number. The Site does not load advertising or analytics scripts.

No system or email service can be perfectly secure, and we do not claim otherwise. If a security incident affects your personal data, we will do what the law that applies requires, which may include telling you and the competent authority.

17. Your rights

Depending on where you live, laws such as the GDPR, the UK GDPR, Ukraine’s personal data law or the Philippine Data Privacy Act may give you rights over your personal data. Which rights you have, and how far they go, depends on the law that applies to you. They may include the following.

• To be told how your data is used, and to receive a copy of it.
• To have inaccurate data corrected.
• To have data erased in certain circumstances.
• To restrict how your data is used in certain circumstances.
• To object to a use based on legitimate interests.
• To receive data you gave us in a portable form in certain circumstances.
• To withdraw consent, where we rely on it.
• To complain to a data protection authority.

17.1 How to use your rights

Write to support@quietroseproject.com from the email address connected with your request and tell us what you would like, including an order number if you have one. You do not have to use any particular form of words. We reply within 2 business days. A full answer may take longer, and we will provide it within the time the law that applies to you allows. There is normally no charge.

We may need to confirm your identity before acting, so that we do not give your data to someone else. We will ask for no more than is reasonable for that purpose.

17.2 When we may not be able to do everything you ask

Some requests have limits. We may have to keep accounting records even if you ask us to erase them. If we erase delivery details before an order is finished, we may no longer be able to deliver it, in which case the buyer is refunded. We will not give a buyer the recipient’s data, or a recipient the buyer’s email address, because that would affect the rights of another person. After the 30-day erasure we may hold nothing further that can be linked to you. If we cannot do what you ask, we will explain why.

17.3 Rights and choices specific to recipients

If you are a recipient, you can decline a gift without giving a reason. When you decline, you can also block future gifts sent to that email address. Until the order has gone to the florist, you can change your delivery details on your Private Page. The Notice to Gift Recipients explains all of this in more detail.

17.4 Complaints to an authority

You may be able to complain to the data protection authority of the country where you live or work, or of the place where you believe a problem occurred. We would welcome the chance to help first, but you do not have to come to us before going to an authority.

18. Marketing

We do not send marketing without consent. Buying a gift, receiving one or contributing to the book does not count as consent. The emails described in this policy, such as confirmations, invitations, the one reminder, delivery notices and refund notices, are part of the service and are not marketing. If we ever offer a mailing list, joining it will be a separate choice, and you will be able to leave it at any time.

19. Automated steps

Some steps in an order happen automatically: the reminder after 48 hours and the emails sent at each stage. These are simple rules, applied in the same way to everyone. We do not profile people, and we do not make automated decisions about anyone on the basis of their personality, behaviour or finances.

20. Cookies and browser storage

We use no advertising or tracking cookies and no analytics tools. Your cart lives in your browser’s local storage. The Cookies and Browser Storage Notice gives the detail.

21. Children

Buyers must be 18 or over, and the Site is not directed at children. We do not knowingly ask children for personal data. A buyer’s entry of an email address does not tell us the age of the person it belongs to, and we have no way of checking it. If you believe that a child has given us personal data, or that a gift invitation has reached a child, a parent or guardian may write to support@quietroseproject.com and we will deal with the matter promptly.

22. If you give us information about someone else

A buyer gives us the first name and email address of another person. Please do this only for someone you know, in good faith, and in line with the Acceptable Use and Gifting Policy. Please do not put information about other people in your note or your messages unless it is necessary.

23. Other services

When you pay, you leave the Site for a page run by Stripe, and Stripe’s own terms and privacy notice apply to that page. We are not responsible for how other organisations handle personal data under their own responsibility. Where a provider acts on our behalf, this policy describes how we use it.

24. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy if the shop or the law changes. The date of the latest version appears on this page. If a change substantially affects how we use personal data we already hold, we will take reasonable steps to let the people concerned know, for instance by email where we still have an address for them. We will not treat your silence as consent to marketing or to any new use that requires consent.

25. How to contact us

Please write to Quiet Rose, at support@quietroseproject.com, or use the contact page. We reply within 2 business days. If your request concerns an order, please include the order number if you have it.