Privacy policy

For delivery handovers we record event time, location and accuracy, assigned courier, contact outcome and resolution history. Location is captured for the arrival action, not continuous tracking. Customers see timing, distance and accuracy; raw coordinates and private evidence are restricted. Assigned couriers receive only the delivery details and contact information needed for their assignment. Raw arrival coordinates are cleared from resolved cases after 90 days by the scheduled cleanup; unresolved cases retain necessary evidence for review. Financial and decision records follow the retention rules below.

1. Who is responsible

The controller is Lana Seelenbinder, trading as HomeChefs, 46 Tratinska Street, Zagreb, Croatia, OIB 81872952556. Data protection enquiries: support@home-chefs.app.

When a cook handles your data for their own purposes — for example keeping a note of a regular customer's preferences — the cook is a controller in their own right for that use.

2. What we collect and why

3. Location and distance

Discovery works on distance, so we need an approximate position. On a first visit we estimate country and language from your IP address; if you set an area or save an address, that choice is stored and used instead and is remembered on your next visit. If you allow precise location in your browser, it is used to centre search and is not stored as a track history. We do not follow you around in the background, and cooks never see your exact position — only the delivery address you give them for an order they are fulfilling.

4. Allergies and health information

If you tell a cook about an allergy or intolerance in the order chat, that is health-related data. We process it only to pass your message to the cook and, if a safety report is made, to investigate. Please share only what is needed for your meal to be safe.

5. Who we share data with

• The cook of your order — your name, order details, chat, and the delivery address if you chose delivery.
• The customer, for a cook — kitchen name, area, hours and public profile.
• Payment provider — payments, payouts, identity verification and fraud checks.
• Email provider — sending account, order and, if you opted in, menu emails.
• Push messaging provider — delivering push notifications to your device.
• Mapping provider — address autocomplete and directions.
• Hosting and database provider — storing and serving the application.
• AI provider — text and images a cook submits to the writing and photo helpers. Customer chat is not sent to AI.
• Authorities, advisers or an acquirer — where the law requires it, to establish or defend legal claims, or in a business transfer.

We do not sell personal data and we do not use it for third-party advertising.

6. What other users can see

Your display name and reviews you write are public. A kitchen name, its badges and its leaderboard position are public. Meals you save are private to you. A cook's kitchen page, photos, area, hours and rating are public. Your exact address, email, phone number and payment details are never public: the cook sees a delivery address only for an order they are fulfilling, and a kitchen's exact address is shown only to a customer with a confirmed order.

If a kitchen decides not to take new orders from you, any private note that kitchen records is never shown to you or to other users: only that kitchen and HomeChefs support can see it.

7. International transfers

We keep data inside the European Economic Area where we can. Some providers process data elsewhere; in that case the transfer relies on an adequacy decision or on the European Commission's standard contractual clauses, with additional safeguards where needed. Ask us and we will tell you which applies to a given provider.

8. How long we keep it

9. Your rights

Under the GDPR you can ask us to:

• confirm what we hold and give you a copy (access);
• correct anything wrong (rectification);
• delete data we no longer need (erasure);
• restrict or object to processing based on legitimate interests;
• give you your data in a portable format;
• withdraw consent at any time, without affecting what was done before.

Much of this you can do yourself in Preferences. Otherwise email support@home-chefs.app; we answer within one month. If you are unhappy with our answer you may complain to your local supervisory authority — in Croatia, the Personal Data Protection Agency (AZOP).

We do not make decisions with legal effect about you by automated means alone.

10. Emails, push and unsubscribing

Order and account emails are part of the service and cannot be switched off while you have an active account. Menu announcements from kitchens you follow, review reminders and other optional messages are opt-in, and each one can be turned off per category and per channel in Preferences. Every marketing email carries an unsubscribe link that works with one click, without signing in, and applies to that category.

Anyone may separately subscribe to a weekly Recipes & Stories email. We store the address and language, send a confirmation link, and only send the roundup after confirmation and when new content is available. Its unsubscribe link stops only these content emails; it does not change order or other email preferences.

11. Businesses we contact

When a new kitchen registers, we may introduce HomeChefs to businesses in that area using contact details the business itself publishes — a business name, a public email address, a website and a location. We do not buy contact lists and we do not scrape personal inboxes.

• A business receives one introduction and, at most, one reminder. Nothing further is sent unless the business opts in.
• Only after opting in does a business receive the weekly menu digest, and every email carries a one-click unsubscribe.
• An unsubscribe, a bounce or a complaint suppresses that address permanently.
• To be removed or to object, email support@home-chefs.app and we will delete the record.

12. Connected apps and assistants

HomeChefs Discovery in ChatGPT shares only published meals, kitchens, recipes and stories. No account is needed. It receives search filters and, for nearby searches, coarse location shared by ChatGPT. Our discovery server does not retain these queries or locations, request full conversations, access private accounts or process payments. OpenAI handles your conversation under its own privacy policy. You can stop using the connection at any time.

If you connect an approved assistant to your account, it can search public kitchens and read your own orders on your behalf, within the permission you granted. It never sees another person's account, chat or address, and it cannot make payments on your behalf. You can disconnect it at any time in your account, which stops further access immediately.

13. Security

Traffic is encrypted in transit, passwords are stored hashed, database access is row-level restricted so users only reach their own records, payment card data never touches our servers, and administrative access is limited and logged. No system is perfectly secure; if a breach affects your rights we notify you and the supervisory authority as the law requires.

14. Children

HomeChefs is not for under-18s. We do not knowingly collect their data; if we learn we have, we delete the account.

15. Changes and contact

We will update this policy as the service changes; the date at the top shows the current version, and we give notice of material changes. Questions: support@home-chefs.app. Cookies are covered separately in the cookie policy.