POPIA & data deletion

App Spender processes personal information in line with the Protection of Personal Information Act, 2013.

• Purpose limitation: statements are processed for one purpose only: detecting recurring app and subscription payments. Where you ask us to contact you, that information is used to contact you about the thing you asked for, and nothing else. The email you give to unlock your full report is stored with the apps from our app list in that report and the currency its figures are in, to count demand for cheaper options; anything shared with app makers is counts only, never who.
• Minimality: we extract the minimum fields needed. App name, date, amount, recurrence. Nothing else leaves the file.
• Consent, and where we do not rely on it: uploading a statement is your consent to scan it, and you confirm it explicitly before the scan runs. Unlocking your full report is different. We ask for an email to get it, so consent would not be freely given, and we rely instead on our legitimate interest under s11(1)(f), with the notice beside the field saying who stores it, what is kept, why, for how long, and that you can object. Marketing is a separate consent you give by ticking a box: never pre-ticked, and never required to use anything, including to unlock your results. We store the exact wording you were shown when you ticked it, and you can withdraw it at any time without giving a reason.
• Transborder flow (s72): six operators process personal information on our instruction, and all of them hold it outside South Africa. Two run the product under agreements providing comparable protection: Vercel, which runs the application, and Neon, which hosts the database. One is Musket Goose, which builds App Spender and keeps it running, and whose monitoring receives this app's error reports: what broke, where, and in which version, never any part of a statement. Three measure its use, and only where you have agreed to them: PostHog, Google Analytics and Meta. Your statement is read only on Vercel, for the seconds the scan takes, and is not stored; no part of it is sent to an AI model, to the three measurement services, or in an error report. If you unlock your report, your email and the apps from our app list in it are stored with Neon. See the privacy policy for exactly what each one receives.
• Retention: raw statements are deleted immediately after the scan. Results live in your browser; if you unlock your full report, your email and the apps from our app list in it are kept for 24 months, then deleted. A replacement request is kept for 24 months from your last contact with us, then deleted automatically, by a job that runs every night, not by someone remembering to. A marketing consent is kept until you withdraw it, and the record of the withdrawal is kept afterwards. That record is how we prove we stopped, and how we make sure you are not added again.
• Children (s34): App Spender is for adults. We cannot obtain a parent or guardian's consent, so anyone under 18 should not use it, and a statement belonging to a child should not be uploaded.
• Security compromises (s22): if personal information we hold is ever exposed, we notify the Information Regulator and the people affected as soon as we reasonably can.
• Objection (s11(3)): where we rely on legitimate interest (the email and apps kept when you unlock your report) you may object at any time at privacy@appspender.com, with no reason needed, and we delete what we hold.
• Your rights: you may ask what we hold about you, have it corrected, have it deleted, object to its use, or withdraw a consent. Use "Delete all my data" in the app for anything held in your browser, the unsubscribe page to withdraw a marketing consent, and privacy@appspender.com for anything else we store. We respond within 30 days and do not charge for it.

Responsible party and information officer

App Spender is operated by Robyn Wolff, who is the responsible party and the Information Officer for POPIA purposes. Data requests go to privacy@appspender.com, and complaints about how we handled your information go to support@appspender.com.

If you are not satisfied with our response, you may lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator of South Africa: complaints.IR@justice.gov.za, or via inforegulator.org.za.