Cookie Policy

1. What this policy covers

This policy covers cookies (small files a website stores on your device) and similar technologies — importantly including browser local storage. UK law — the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR) together with the UK GDPR — applies to any storage of, or access to, information on your device, not only classic cookies. So where we use local storage for a non-essential purpose, we treat it under the same consent rules as a cookie.

2. Our privacy-first approach

• We set only strictly necessary cookies and storage by default.
• Non-essential technologies (such as analytics) are switched off until you opt in. Our cookie banner lets you Accept all, Reject non-essential with one click, or Customise by category.
• You can change or withdraw your choice at any time using the "Cookie settings" link in the footer (see section 7). Withdrawing consent is as easy as giving it.
• We deliberately minimise what we use. In particular, we count page and profile views in a cookieless way — using a daily-rotating, salted hash that stores no IP address and sets no analytics cookie.

3. The categories we use

Our banner groups technologies into three categories:

• Strictly necessary (always on, no consent required) — the site cannot work without these. They keep you signed in, protect against fraud and abuse, and remember your cookie choices.
• Functional (off until you opt in) — remember optional preferences to improve your experience.
• Analytics (off until you opt in) — help us understand aggregate usage to improve the service. We use Google Analytics in this category. It is switched on only if you opt in — if you reject non-essential cookies or ignore the banner, Google Analytics is never loaded and sets no cookies. When enabled, it sets the cookies listed in section 4 and involves a transfer of data to Google (see section 5).

We do not use advertising or cross-site tracking cookies, and we do not sell your data.

4. Cookies and storage we actually use

We also protect forms against cross-site request forgery (CSRF), but this uses a token sent within the page's own requests — not a tracking cookie.

5. Third-party cookies

• Stripe — when card billing is live and you go through checkout for a paid plan, Stripe sets strictly-necessary fraud-prevention cookies. See Stripe's own cookie and privacy notices. No Stripe cookies are set until you use paid-plan checkout.
• Google Analytics — loaded only if you opt in to analytics (see section 3). Google Analytics involves a transfer of data to Google in the United States, protected by an appropriate safeguard as described in our Privacy Policy.
• We use no third-party advertising or cross-site tracking cookies.

6. Our reviews widget on clinicians' websites

Vuemedics offers an embeddable reviews widget that clinicians can place on their own websites. The widget is built to set no non-essential cookies or storage on those sites — it serves read-only review data without tracking — so it does not create new cookie-consent obligations for the clinician's website.

7. How to manage your choices

• On Vuemedics: use the cookie banner, or the "Cookie settings" link in the footer, to accept, reject, or change the non-essential categories at any time.
• In your browser: you can block or delete cookies and clear local storage via your browser settings. Note that blocking strictly-necessary items may stop you signing in.
• Withdrawing consent does not affect anything we lawfully did before you withdrew it.

8. Changes and contact

We may update this policy — for example when we introduce a new technology such as analytics — and will show an updated version and date. For any question about cookies, contact [email protected]. For how we handle personal data more generally, see our Privacy Policy. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk.