RespondPilot (“we”, “us”) is a service that helps businesses reply to Google reviews, publish Google Business Profile posts and create review QR codes. This policy explains what personal information we collect, why, where it is processed and how you can access or correct it. It is written to meet the New Zealand Privacy Act 2020 and Google's API Services User Data Policy.
Who is responsible for your information
- Our customers' data. When a business uses RespondPilot, that business decides what the service does with its reviews, replies and posts. The business is the agency responsible for that information, and we hold and process it as its agent (Privacy Act 2020, section 11).
- Account and website data. For the accounts people use to sign in, access requests sent through our website, and our own records, we are the responsible agency.
What we collect
- Account details: name, work email address, role, the business you belong to and the locations you are assigned to. A password is stored only as a secure hash.
- Access requests: what you enter in the request-access form (name, work email, optional phone number, business name, number of locations, industry, country, website and message).
- Google Business Profile data, only after an admin connects Google and grants access: your business accounts and locations (names, addresses, Google identifiers), reviews on those locations (reviewer display name and profile photo link as published by Google, star rating, review text and date), replies, and the posts you publish through us.
- Business content you give us: brand voice settings, reply rules, business brief, offers and events, photos and logos you upload, and the text of replies and posts you write or approve.
- QR code scans: the time of each scan and whether it looks like an automated bot. We do not store the scanner's IP address or device details.
- Security and activity records: sign-in sessions (including IP address and browser type, used to keep your account secure) and an audit log of actions taken in each business account.
Why we use it
- To provide the service: show reviews, draft and publish replies, schedule and publish posts, create QR codes and show dashboard figures.
- To run accounts: set up businesses, manage users and permissions, send service emails (invitations, password resets, alerts you can switch off).
- To keep the service secure and reliable, investigate problems and provide support.
- To respond to access requests and meet our legal obligations.
We do not sell personal information, use it for advertising, or share it with data brokers.
Google user data and Limited Use
RespondPilot's use and transfer to any other app of information received from Google APIs will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.
- We request the Google Business Profile permission (
business.manage) only to list your locations, read reviews, publish and manage replies, and publish and manage posts on the locations you choose. - Google user data is used only to provide and improve the user-facing features of RespondPilot that you can see in the app.
- We do not sell Google user data, and we do not use or transfer it for advertising, including retargeting or personalised ads.
- We do not use Google user data to train or improve general AI or machine-learning models, ours or anyone else's.
- People at RespondPilot do not read Google user data unless you ask us to (for example, for support), it is needed for security or to investigate abuse, it is required by law, or it has been aggregated and anonymised for internal operations.
- Google access tokens are encrypted at rest. You can revoke access at any time by disconnecting Google in the app or in your Google account's security settings. We revoke our tokens when you disconnect or cancel.
AI processing
To draft replies and posts we send the review text, star rating, reviewer first name, location name, and your brand voice and business brief to Google's Gemini models, reached through fal.ai and OpenRouter. They process this only on our behalf to return a draft. We only allow routing to model providers that don't store prompts or use them to train models. [Confirm fal.ai's, OpenRouter's and Google's current retention terms before launch.] Drafts are checked by our own rules, and your settings decide which ones need a person's approval before anything is published.
Where your information is processed (overseas)
These service providers process personal information for us, only on our instructions and only to run RespondPilot:
- Hosting and database: [hosting provider], [region, e.g. Sydney, Australia].
- AI drafting: fal.ai (Features & Labels, Inc.) and OpenRouter, United States, using Google Gemini models.
- Email delivery: [email provider, e.g. Plunk], [region].
- Fonts: our pages load fonts from Google Fonts, which receives your browser's IP address when fonts are fetched.
Because these providers act as our agents and do not use the information for their own purposes, we remain responsible for it under the Privacy Act 2020. We choose providers that protect information in ways comparable to New Zealand law. New Zealand law does not require the information to be stored in New Zealand.
How long we keep it
- While a business account is active, we keep its data so the service works (for example, review history for the dashboard).
- When a business cancels, we revoke its Google tokens straight away and purge all Google-derived data and business content within 30 days of cancellation.
- Records we must keep by law, such as invoices, are kept for the period the law requires (generally 7 years for tax records).
- Logs of errors from Google's services are deleted after 30 days. Backups are overwritten on a rolling basis within [N] days.
- Access requests that do not become customers are deleted after [N] months.
How we protect it
Information is encrypted in transit, Google tokens are encrypted at rest, and access inside a business is limited by role and by location. Every change is recorded in an audit log. If a privacy breach is likely to cause serious harm, we will notify the Office of the Privacy Commissioner and affected people as soon as practicable.
Accessing and correcting your information
You can ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you, and ask us to correct it (Privacy Act 2020, information privacy principles 6 and 7). Email our privacy officer at [privacy@your-domain]. We will respond within 20 working days and will not charge you for making a request. If your request is about information a business customer controls, we will help that business respond.
Reviews themselves are published by Google. To change or remove a review you wrote, use Google Maps or Google Search; we cannot edit customer reviews.
Cookies
We use only the cookies needed to sign you in and keep your session secure. We do not use advertising or cross-site tracking cookies.
Questions and complaints
Contact our privacy officer at [privacy@your-domain]. If you are not satisfied with our response, you can complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner at privacy.org.nz.
Changes to this policy
We will post any changes on this page and update the date above. If a change is significant, we will tell account admins by email before it applies.