Privacy Policy

Last updated 16 August 2026

Plain-language draft, not final legal copy. This accurately reflects what Petcious's app and backend actually collect and do with it today — but it hasn't been reviewed by an attorney. Given real banking details and identity documents are collected during vendor verification, get this reviewed against South Africa's POPIA (Protection of Personal Information Act) before treating it as sufficient on its own.

1. What we collect

Category	Examples	From
Account info	Name, email, phone number	Everyone, at sign-up
Pet info	Name, breed, age, weight, vaccination records, allergies, medical conditions, photos	Owners
Location	Device GPS (to show nearby providers), suburb/address	Owners, Vendors
Business & verification info	Business name, registration number, VAT number, banking details (account number, branch code — encrypted at rest), background-check consent, certifications, insurance proof, facility photos	Vendors
Booking & payment	Booking history, amounts charged, Paystack transaction references	Everyone
Messages & reviews	Content of messages between Owners and Vendors, review text and photos	Everyone
Device info	Push notification token	Everyone, if notifications are enabled

2. Why we collect it

To run the marketplace — matching Owners with nearby Vendors, processing bookings, showing pet details a Vendor needs to provide care safely.
To take payment — banking and payment details are used solely to process bookings and vendor payouts through our processor, Paystack.
To verify Vendors — background-check consent, certifications, and business documents are reviewed by Petcious's admin team before a Vendor's listing goes live.
To communicate — booking confirmations, reminders, and account-security codes (email and push notification).
To keep the platform safe — moderating reviews, investigating reports, and enforcing our Terms of Service.

3. Who can see what

A Vendor sees an Owner's pet details and booking info only for pets actually booked with them — never another Owner's data. Reviews, business listings, and vendor specials are public. Banking details are encrypted and visible to no one except Petcious's own verification process and, on deliberate request, an admin reviewing that specific vendor's submission — never bundled into any list view. We don't sell your personal information to anyone.

4. Where it's stored

Data is stored on Google Firebase (Firestore, Cloud Storage), access-controlled so that, by default, a user can only read their own data — everything else requires going through a server-side function that checks who's asking. Banking details are additionally encrypted at the field level before they're ever written to the database.

5. Your choices

You can review and correct your account and pet information in the app at any time.
You can turn off push notifications in your device settings.
You can delete your account from Settings — this disables your login and marks your records as removed; certain records (e.g. completed booking history relevant to a Vendor's own accounts, or anything we're required to keep for tax/compliance reasons) may be retained as required by law.

6. Children

Petcious is for adults booking pet-care services. It isn't directed at children, and we don't knowingly collect information from anyone under 18.

7. Changes

We'll update this page as the platform changes, and update the date at the top when we do.

8. Contact

Questions, or a request about your data: info@petcious.app