Privacy: the short version for young sailors

This page is for you

SailCoach holds information about your sailing. Some of it you type in. Some of it your coach types in. Some of it comes from race results published on the internet.

This page tells you what we hold, who can see it, and what you can do about it. It is written for you, not for a lawyer.

There is a longer version for adults: the Privacy Policy. Both are true. This one is shorter.

If something here does not make sense, ask a parent or your coach, or email us at [email protected]. A real person reads that.

What we know about you

We hold it for one reason: so your coach can coach you properly and so you can see how your sailing is going over time.

If we do not know your date of birth, we treat you as under 18. That is on purpose. It is safer that way round.

Who can see your stuff

Before the table: while you are under 18, your mum, dad or guardian can see everything you can see on here. All of it.

"Us" means the small team who build and run SailCoach. We can reach the database, because somebody has to be able to fix it. We do not read your notes or your messages for fun, and if we ever have to look at something because of a safety concern, that is written down in our Safeguarding Policy.

Notes your coach writes about you

There are two kinds.

Shared notes are notes about the session. Everyone on that session can read them — including the other sailors.

Private notes are written to one sailor. "Private" means private from the other sailors on the session. It does not mean private from you. If a private note is about you, you can read it. So can the coach who wrote it, and your parent while you are under 18. Nobody else sees it in the app — not the other coaches on the session, not the people who run your club, and not us.

So: your coach cannot write a private note about you that you are not allowed to read.

There is one exception, and you should know about it. A coach also writes session feedback about you — how it went, what to work on. There is a tick box on that form that says "only me". It starts unticked, so normally you can read it. If a coach ticks it, that piece of feedback does not show up for you in the app.

It is still about you, so you can still ask for it. Ask your coach, or email [email protected] and ask for the feedback about you that you have not been shown. You do not need a parent to ask.

Coaches can also draw on video of you and pin a comment to a moment in the clip. That counts as a note about you and the same rules apply.

If a note about you is wrong, or unfair, or says something that never happened, tell your coach first. If that does not fix it, email [email protected]. You have a right to have wrong information corrected, and you do not need a parent to ask for you.

What your parent can do — and what they can never do

While you are under 18, you can have up to two guardians linked to your account. Usually that is a parent.

They can:

• see everything you can see — your profile, coach notes about you, your sessions, your race analysis and your Helm Grade
• read the history of your messages
• reply to a coach's note
• accept a connection invitation on your behalf
• book you onto things and fill in details for you

They can never:

• send a message pretending to be you. Not once, not ever, not by accident. The app refuses it outright, for every guardian, in every situation.
• write your reflection for you — once the account is yours. If a parent set the account up and still runs it, they can write a reflection and the app records it as yours. From the moment you set your own password, reflections are yours alone and the app refuses it.

One honest thing about that first one. If a parent set your account up for you, they picked the email address your password link went to. So we cannot promise you that nobody else has ever been able to sign in as you. If you think someone can get into your account, email [email protected] and we will help you take it back.

Your parent is not inside your conversations. They are not a hidden participant. They read the history on a separate page of their own.

Two things about that. They can read your messages whenever they want, and you do not get told when they do. And there is no sign on your messages screen telling you this — there should be, and we are adding one. Until then, this page is how you find out.

When you turn 18, all of it stops. Automatically, on your birthday. Nobody has to ask, and nobody can switch it back on.

Two true things we should say out loud about that.

• If we have no date of birth for you at all, we keep treating you as under 18 — so it does not switch off by itself. If that is you, email [email protected].
• Right now you can change your own date of birth on your profile, and that would end your parent's access straight away. We do not think that should be your decision to make on your own, and we are changing it. Soon a change will need a parent or us, and your parent will be told.

Who can message you

Normally it is coaches and sailors you are connected to.

But right now, anybody else at your club can start a conversation with you, even if you are not connected. Nobody has to approve it, and nobody tells your parent. We built that so clubs could send announcements to everyone, and it is wider than it should be. We are fixing it. It is the first change on our safeguarding list.

Until we do: you never have to reply to anybody, and nothing in the list below becomes okay because the person is at your club.

If something on here makes you uncomfortable

Sometimes something will not feel right. A message. A photo. Something written in a note. Something that happened at the club and ended up on here.

You are allowed to say so, and you will not be in trouble for saying so. You do not have to be certain. You do not need proof. "This felt weird" is enough of a reason.

Here is what you can do. Any of it. In any order. All of it at once if you want.

1. Tell an adult you trust. A parent, a coach, a teacher, someone at the club. Any adult. This is always a good move and it is usually the fastest one.
2. Email us: [email protected]. That inbox is read every working day and we will reply within one working day. If we think you might not be safe, we will pass it to people whose job is protecting children — and we will tell you that we have done it. We will not pretend otherwise behind your back. How that works is written down in our Safeguarding Policy.
3. Childline: 0800 1111. Free, any time of day or night, and it does not show up on a phone bill. Also at childline.org.uk. They are nothing to do with us, which is exactly the point — sometimes you want to talk to someone outside it all.
4. If someone is in danger right now, call 999.

There is a Report button on every message, and it never tells the person who sent it. But here is the honest bit about what it does today. It marks the message in our database. It does not send an alert to anyone, and there is no screen in the app that shows those reports, so nobody may see it for a long time. Use Report if you want to — and then do number 1 or number 2 as well, because those reach a person. We are fixing this.

Some things are never okay, from anyone, whoever they are and however well you know them:

• asking you to keep a secret from your parents or your coach
• asking for your phone number, or asking you to carry on the chat somewhere else
• asking to meet you on your own
• anything about your body
• pictures of you that you did not agree to
• being unkind in a way that does not stop when you ask

If any of those happen, tell someone. That is the whole rule.

Photos and videos of you

Photos and video are kept in a locked store. The links we make are short-lived, and a link that belongs to somebody else does not work if you try to use it. Only people on that session or event can open them.

Honest bit: we do not yet ask your permission, or your parent's, before a coach uploads a photo or a clip of you. We think we should, and it is on our list to build.

Until it exists: if there is a photo or a video of you on here that you do not want on here, say so. Tell your coach, or email [email protected]. You do not have to give a reason. There is more detail in How we use photos and video.

Race results we found before you signed up

Clubs and race organisers publish results. We collect them, so that the racing part of the app works. That means your name, your sail number, your club and your finishing positions may already have been in SailCoach before you ever made an account. We also collect GPS tracks from the tracking systems used at big regattas.

None of it is on the open internet on our side — you have to be signed in to see any of it.

But "signed in" is a low bar, and you should know that. Anyone with a SailCoach account can type in a sail number and see the names and the races attached to it, including yours. They do not have to know you, coach you, or be at your club. They cannot see your notes, your messages or anything your coach wrote. They can see that you sailed, where, and how you did.

We are changing it, so that only you, your parent and a coach you are connected to can do that. Until then, this is how it works, and you should know.

If you want to know what we hold about you, or you want your name taken out of it, email [email protected] and tell us your name and sail number.

What the app notices while you use it

We should be straight with you about this, because most apps are not.

We ask you first. The first time you arrive, a box appears with "Reject all" and "Accept all" as the same size button. Say no and nothing gets stored, and the app works exactly the same. Some browsers send a "do not track me" signal for you; if yours does, we do not even ask, and the answer is no.

If you say yes:

• your browser is given a random ID, so we can count visits without knowing who you are. When you sign in, we join that ID to your account.
• we record which pages you open, how long you stay, what you click, what device and browser you are on, and your IP address.
• when something breaks, we sometimes record a short replay of what was on the screen so we can work out why. The words are blacked out and pictures are blocked before the replay leaves your device, so nobody sees a coach note or a medical note in one. It shows shapes and clicks, not words.

You can change your mind whenever you like, on the Cookies and storage page. When you say no, we delete the ID from your browser. Signing out deletes it too.

We do not sell any of it. There are no adverts on SailCoach and no advertising trackers in it.

Things you can say no to

• Medical notes, phone number, weight, how you like to learn. All optional. Leave them blank and nothing breaks. One sensible exception: if there is something a coach genuinely needs to know before you go afloat — asthma, an allergy, an injury — tell somebody, even if you would rather not type it in here.
• What a coach can see. When you connect to a coach you pick what they get: recent sessions, goals, training records, events, learning preferences. Pick none of them and they can still coach you. You can change your mind later.
• Being connected at all. You can disconnect from a coach.
• Photos. See above.
• Answering a message. You never have to reply to anybody.

If you are under 13, we also hide head-to-head comparisons against other sailors from you. That is deliberate.

Getting a copy of your stuff, or deleting it

We are being straight here too: there is no button yet. We are building one.

For now, email [email protected] and say what you want — a copy of everything we hold about you, a correction, or your account deleted. We will reply within five working days and finish within one month. That is the legal deadline and we hold ourselves to it.

One more honest bit. Deleting an account is done by hand, because the app cannot yet sweep up everything in one go. Your notes, messages, sessions and photos have to be hunted down one store at a time. We will tell you exactly what we removed. Building the routine that does it properly is the biggest job on our list.

If you are under 18 you can ask us yourself. You do not need a parent to do it for you.

Words we use

Guardian — a parent or carer linked to your account while you are under 18. You can have up to two.

Connection — a link between you and a coach, so you can work together on here. You choose what it lets them see.

Helm Grade — the app looks at your race results and works out roughly where you come in your fleet. It shows a range, not one exact number, because it is never certain — and the fewer races you have done, the wider the range. It never puts a word like "national" on you. It is not a score for you as a person. Nobody is allowed to pick you or drop you from a squad just because of it. If someone says they did, tell us. More about it in our AI and automated decisions page.

Personal data — anything that is about you or could be traced back to you. Your name, obviously. But also your GPS track, your photo and that random browser ID.

Minor — the legal word for someone under 18. We use it in the adult policies. It is not an insult.

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Written for sailors aged about eleven and up. If you are older and want the full version, it is at Privacy Policy, and how we measure ourselves against the rules for children's services is at Children's Code Conformance Statement.