Privacy

What we do not do

This list comes first because it is the shortest way to describe how the site works.

• There are no third-party analytics, advertising, or tracking scripts anywhere on Plainfare. No Google Analytics, no tag manager, no advertising pixel, no session recording. The only analytics are our own, into our own database.
• We do not sell your personal information.
• When you ask our search a question, the question is processed by a model running on our own server and is not sent to any third-party AI service. What we keep is a one-way hash of the question alongside the answer, not the question you typed.
• We never ask you for a password, because we do not use them. Signing in sends a one-time link to your email address.
• No other company collects information about what you do here over time and across other websites, and nothing on this site follows you elsewhere. We do not track you across the web ourselves either, so there is nothing for a Do Not Track signal to switch off.

When you browse the site

We record events describing what happened: which page was viewed, which action occurred, an anonymous session identifier we generate, the campaign parameters in the link you arrived from if there were any, and which provider listing was involved where that applies. These records go into our own database and are not sent anywhere else.

One consequence worth saying out loud. Our directory includes grief counseling, so one of these records can show that a session viewed grief content. It stays in our database, it is not linked to your name, and it goes to no one.

Provider and city pages offer a map, and it does not load until you press to open it. If you do, the map images come from the OpenStreetMap Foundation, and requesting them tells that organisation your IP address, that you were on Plainfare, and which part of the map you asked to see. It does not tell them which page you were reading. If you never open a map, nothing is ever requested from them.

We do not attach your name, your email address, or anything you type into a form to these records, and the system that receives them will not accept those fields.

When you ask a provider to contact you

The request form asks for your name, your email address, optionally your phone number, which service you need, your rough timeline, and an optional message. It records that you agreed to be contacted, and when.

The message box is free text and it is yours. People sometimes put health details about the person who died, money problems, or family conflict into it. Nothing on our side limits or filters what goes in there, so put in what helps the provider help you and no more than that.

Where it goes: to the provider you chose. If that provider has claimed their listing with us and given us an email address, we notify them directly. If they have not claimed it yet, the request comes to a Plainfare inbox and we pass it on. Either way the provider you named is the recipient, and those are the only two paths.

One thing worth knowing rather than discovering later. If a provider claims their listing after you send a request, they can then see requests sent to them before the claim, including yours. Your request was addressed to them either way, so it does not reach anyone you did not intend, but the timing is not what most people would assume.

We also record that a request happened, with no contact details attached to that record, so we can measure whether the directory works.

When you create an account and use the checklist

Signing in sends a one-time link to your email address. Your email is held by Supabase, our database and authentication provider. We never see or store a password.

The checklist asks about your situation so it can show you the tasks that actually apply: the name of the person who died, the date of death, the state, whether there is a will, whether there was real property, a rough size of the estate, and your role. You can also add your own notes to any task, and those notes are free text like the message box above.

This is information about someone who has died and about your family’s circumstances, and it is the most sensitive thing we hold. It is stored under your account. It is not part of the public directory, it is not shown to other users, and it is not sent to providers.

If you turn on checklist reminders we record that choice so we can email you about upcoming deadlines. You can turn it off in the same place.

When you claim a provider listing

Claiming is for businesses, not families. We check the email domain of the account against the email domain on the listing, and where they do not match we ask you to write to us so a person can verify it. We record who claimed what and when, including the email address of the person who made the claim.

Who processes data for us

That is the whole list of companies that handle data for us. We do not use a customer relationship system, a data warehouse, an advertising network, or a data broker.

• Supabase: our database and sign-in, hosted in the United States. Everything described on this page lives in one Supabase project.
• Resend: delivery of the emails we send, such as a request notification to a provider or a checklist reminder.
• Stripe: payments, for providers who buy a listing. Families never pay us, so this never involves you.

Content we load from another organisation

The map is not ours. If you press to load it, the images come from the OpenStreetMap Foundation, a separate organisation that runs a public map service. They are not working for us and we do not send them anything about you. Requesting an image from them tells them your IP address, in the same way that visiting any website tells that website your IP address, and it tells them which part of the map you asked for. This is the only content Plainfare loads from anywhere other than us.

How long we keep things

These are the periods we hold ourselves to.

• A request you send to a provider: 24 months from when you send it, then deleted.
• The record that you agreed to be contacted, which is the timestamp, the wording you agreed to, and a reference to the request: kept separately for 4 years. Keeping it apart means deleting your request never destroys the proof that you consented, which protects both of us.
• Browsing and analytics events: 12 months. Aggregate counts calculated from them are kept longer and contain no individual records.
• Internal records of provider activity, such as claims and listing changes: 24 months.
• Your account and checklist: kept while your account exists. A checklist goes when you delete it or when you delete your account, whichever comes first.

The honest state of that schedule

The automated job that enforces those periods is being built and is not running yet. Until it runs, the periods above are a commitment we keep by hand rather than something the system does on its own. We would rather tell you that than imply an automation we do not have.

Deleting something removes it from the live service. Our database provider may keep routine backups that still contain it for a limited period, and those exist only to bring the service back after a failure.

Asking us to delete or correct something

Write to contact@plainfare.com and tell us what you want removed or fixed. If you are asking about a request you sent through the site, telling us the email address you used and roughly when is enough for us to find it. We will confirm when it is done.

You can delete a checklist on its own, from the checklist itself. That removes the answers you gave about the person who died and your situation. We delete the record rather than hiding it, and we do not log what was removed.

You can also delete your whole account, which removes everything above and the account with it. You should not have to close your account to remove one checklist, which is why the first option exists.

Children

Plainfare is not directed to children under 13 and we do not knowingly collect information from them. If you believe a child has sent us information, write to contact@plainfare.com and we will delete it.

Changes to this page

If we change what we collect, where it goes, or how long we keep it, we change this page before the change goes live, not after. The effective date at the top tells you when this version took effect.