Privacy Policy

1. Who we are

SharpFix is an online directory that helps people in South Africa find local service providers. For this policy, SharpFix is the "responsible party": the business that decides how and why your personal information is processed.

Business name

[registered business name], trading as SharpFix

Registration number

[CIPC registration number]

Information Officer

[Information Officer's name]

Email

[contact email]

Phone

[contact phone number]

Address

[physical address]

2. What we collect

If you're looking for a service

• Your area or location. You choose an area, or allow your browser to share your location. We round your location to about 1 km before it leaves your device, and use it only to find pros near you. We don't save it to a profile or share it with businesses.
• Which businesses you contact. When you open a business's contact details, we count it for that business. We don't record who you are.
• Ask SharpFix. If you describe a problem (and add a photo), we send it to our AI service so it can answer you. We don't save what you send or link it to you. Please leave out names, addresses and phone numbers.
• Rating reminders. If you ask us to remind you to rate a business, we keep your notification code (from your browser) or your email address, with the business you contacted, until the reminder is sent, and for at most 30 days.
• Daily limits. To stop misuse, we count how many contact details, Ask SharpFix answers and ratings come from each internet connection each day, using a scrambled (hashed) form of the IP address that can't be turned back into it. The counts are deleted after 3 days.
• Reviews. If you leave a review, we keep your star rating, your comment, the first name you give and the date. These are shown publicly on the business's listing.
• Reports. If you report a listing, we keep the reason and anything you write.

If you join the launch list

Before SharpFix opens, you can ask us to email you when it does. We keep your email address, the area you live in and, if you give them, your first name, with the date you agreed to be emailed.

If you list a business

• Account details: your name, email address and password. We store passwords only in scrambled (hashed) form, so we can't read them. If you sign in with Google, we receive your name, email address and profile picture from Google instead of a password, through our hosting provider's sign-in service. We don't get access to anything else in your Google account.
• Listing details: business name, your name, service, area, how far you travel, phone or WhatsApp number, email and website (both optional), prices, experience, qualifications and description.
• Photos: any photos you choose to add to your listing, such as your work, tools, vehicle, premises or logo. Photos are public once they pass our check.
• Identity documents: a copy of your ID and, for work with children, the elderly or pets, a police clearance certificate. A police clearance contains information about criminal records, which POPIA treats as special personal information. We only process it with your consent.
• A live selfie: a photo you take with your camera on SharpFix while making a gesture we ask for, such as a thumbs up. We compare it with the photo on your ID to confirm the listing is really yours. A selfie used this way is biometric information, which POPIA treats as special personal information. We only process it with your consent.
• Payment records: payments are made through PayFast. We receive what you paid for (Featured, or your listing once listing fees start), the amount, date, payment status and a subscription reference. We never see or store your card details.
• Activity: how many clients opened your contact details, your reviews and any reports about your listing.
• Referral: if you created your account through a SharpFix referral agent's link, which agent referred you.

If you send a business a booking request

Your name, WhatsApp number, email if you give it, the day and time you'd like, and what you need done. We pass these to that business only, with your permission, so it can confirm the booking. If you gave an email, we use it to send your booking confirmation and a reminder the day before.

If we listed your business from your website

To help clients find local businesses, we list some businesses using only what they published on their own website: the business name, the service it offers, its area or suburb, and its business phone number, email and website, plus the page we found them on. We describe what the business does in our own words. These listings are marked "Not checked yet". We don't collect anything else about the business or its people, and we never copy listings from other directories.

If a business adds you to an invoice

Businesses on Pro can record what a client owes them: the client's name, cell number or email, the amount, what it's for and the due date. The business decides what to record and is responsible for it; we store it for them and, if they added an email, send up to three payment reminders on their behalf. Contact the business, or us, to have your details corrected or removed.

If you're a SharpFix referral agent

Your name, phone number and email, your login, your referral code, the businesses that signed up with your link, and the commission earned and paid to you.

From everyone

Like all websites, our hosting provider keeps short-lived technical logs of requests to the site, such as the IP address, browser type, the page requested and the time. We use these only to keep the site running and secure.

3. Why we use it

We only use personal information for these purposes:

• To show clients the businesses near them and let them contact those businesses.
• To answer questions asked to Ask SharpFix, and to send rating reminders people ask for.
• To create and run business accounts and listings, and to take payments for Featured (and for listings, once listing fees start).
• To check that businesses are who they say they are, and that people who work with children, the elderly or pets have a police clearance.
• To show honest reviews, and to handle reports, complaints and misuse of the site.
• To send you messages about your account, such as password resets and payment or listing updates.
• To email people on the launch list when SharpFix opens, because they asked us to.
• To list businesses from the details on their own websites so clients can find them, and to email each of those businesses once so it can claim its listing or have it removed.
• To keep the site secure, prevent fraud, and meet our legal obligations, such as tax record keeping.

We rely on the lawful grounds in section 11 of POPIA: your consent (for identity documents and police clearances and selfies), what's needed to provide the service you signed up for, our legal obligations, and our legitimate interest in keeping clients safe and the site free of fraud, and in helping clients find local businesses using details those businesses chose to publish. A business can object to that at any time, and we'll remove its listing.

Apart from the one opening email people on the launch list asked for, and the one email we send a business we listed from its website, we don't send marketing messages. If we ever want to, we'll ask for your consent first, and you can say no.

4. ID, selfie and police clearance checks

When a business uploads documents, an automated system, which uses an artificial intelligence (AI) service from a third-party provider, reads them to check that they look genuine, are in the right name, and (for police clearances) show no criminal record. A listing can't go live until this check passes.

The same system compares the business's live selfie with the photo on their ID, and checks that it's a live photo showing the gesture we asked for. This is an automated comparison, not a certified biometric system, and a person at SharpFix reviews anything it can't decide. We use the selfie only for this check.

If the automated check can't confirm your documents, a person at SharpFix reviews them. You can also ask for a person to review any decision the automated check made about you, and tell us why you think it's wrong, by contacting us at [contact email].

These checks can't confirm documents with Home Affairs or the South African Police Service. Clients see only a tag such as "ID and selfie checked", never the documents, the selfie or anything on them.

Photos a business adds to its listing are also checked by the AI service before clients can see them, to keep out things like contact details, photos of children and offensive content. Photos the check turns down are deleted, and the business sees why. A person at SharpFix looks at any photo the check can't decide on.

5. Who sees your information

• Clients see a business's public listing: business name, first name, service, area, description, prices, experience, qualifications, website, photos that passed our check, check tags and reviews. The phone number and email are shown when a client taps Contact.
• The SharpFix team can see listings, documents, reports and payment records, only to run and check the service, and the launch list, only to tell people when SharpFix opens.
• The referral agent who signed you up, if you used an agent's link, sees your business name, area, the date you signed up, whether your subscription is active, and the commission they earned from your payments. Agents never see your documents, contact details or card details.
• Service providers who work for us, under agreements that require them to keep the information confidential and secure: our hosting, database and file storage provider, the AI service that reads documents, compares selfies, checks photos and answers Ask SharpFix questions, our email and phone notification services, and PayFast for payments.
• Authorities, only when the law requires it, for example a court order, or when it's needed to protect someone's safety.

We don't sell or rent personal information to anyone.

6. Information sent outside South Africa

Some of our service providers, such as our hosting and AI providers, store or process information on servers outside South Africa. Under section 72 of POPIA, we only send personal information across the border where the recipient is bound by laws, rules or an agreement that protect it at least as well as POPIA, or where you've agreed to it.

7. How long we keep it

• Identity documents and selfies are deleted when you replace them, when your listing is removed, and when you delete your account. Ones uploaded but never submitted are deleted after 7 days.
• Photos are deleted when you remove them, when your listing is removed, and when you delete your account. Photos that don't pass our check are deleted straight away. Copies kept by internet caches can take up to a day to disappear.
• Listings stay until you delete them. Once listing fees start, a listing that isn't paid for is hidden from clients, not deleted.
• Listings we made from a business's website stay until the business claims or removes them, or asks us to. When one is removed, we keep only its website address and phone number, so that we never list it again.
• Your account stays until you delete it from the My business page, or ask us to delete it.
• Payment records (amount, date, plan and PayFast reference) are kept for five years, because tax law requires it.
• Referral commission and payout records are kept for five years, for the same reason.
• The launch list is deleted automatically 90 days after SharpFix opens, or sooner if you unsubscribe with the link in the email or ask us to remove you.
• Rating reminders are deleted once they're sent, and at most 30 days after you asked.
• Booking requests and invoices are deleted 12 months after the booking date or after the invoice is paid or cancelled, and straight away when the business's listing is removed.
• Technical logs are kept by our hosting provider for a limited time, then deleted automatically.

8. How we protect it

The site only works over an encrypted connection. Identity documents are kept in private storage that clients and the public can't reach, and so are selfies; our team opens them through links that expire after a few minutes. Passwords are hashed, and only the SharpFix team can use the admin tools.

No system is completely secure. If we believe someone has accessed personal information without permission, we'll tell the Information Regulator and the people affected as soon as reasonably possible, as section 22 of POPIA requires.

9. What we keep on your device

We use your browser's storage for a few things that make the site work, not to track you or show you targeted ads:

• A login cookie, if you have an account.
• The area you last searched, and whether you want us to use your location.
• The businesses you contacted, so you can review them later, and the first name you used on your last review.
• The referral code from an agent's link, for up to 60 days, so the agent is credited when you sign up.
• The problem you described to Ask SharpFix, for up to two hours in that browser tab, so your message to a pro can start with it.

SharpFix doesn't show ads. If that ever changes, we'll update this policy first.

10. Your rights

Under POPIA you have the right to:

• Ask whether we hold personal information about you, and for a copy of it.
• Ask us to correct information that's wrong, or delete information we no longer need or may not keep.
• Object to us using your information, including on the ground of our legitimate interests.
• Withdraw your consent at any time. If you withdraw consent for your identity documents or selfie, we'll delete them, and your listing can no longer show as checked or stay live.
• Ask for a person to review a decision made by our automated document check.
• Complain to the Information Regulator.

Businesses can update their details and delete their account and listing at any time from the My business page. For anything else, email [contact email]. You can also ask by phone, post, SMS or WhatsApp. Correction, deletion and objection requests are free, and we'll tell you what we did within 30 days. We may need to confirm who you are first.

The Information Regulator

If you're unhappy with how we handled your information, please tell us first so we can put it right. You can also complain to the Information Regulator: email POPIAComplaints@inforegulator.org.za, call 010 023 5200, or visit inforegulator.org.za.

11. Children

SharpFix is for adults. You must be 18 or older to list a business or leave a review. Some businesses on SharpFix work with children, but we don't knowingly collect personal information about children. If you think a child has given us their information, contact us and we'll delete it.

12. Changes to this policy

We'll update this policy when the way we handle information changes, and change the date at the top. If a change affects businesses with an account, we'll email them before it takes effect.

13. Contact us

Questions about privacy, or a request about your information: email [contact email] or write to our Information Officer, [Information Officer's name], at [physical address].