Privacy
Last updated 28 September 2026
VanBooks helps UK tradespeople keep their books. This page explains what we collect, why, who helps us process it, and your rights. Questions: hello@vanbooks.uk.
What we collect
- Your account: your email address, and the business details you add in Settings (business name, trade, address, phone, email for customers, bank account name, sort code and account number for your invoices).
- Your books: invoices and your customers' names, addresses and contact details that you enter, costs, mileage and journeys.
- Receipts: photos you take or upload, and the text read from them.
- Voice and typed notes: the text of notes you dictate or type on the Log screen. We don't store audio. Speech is turned into text by your phone or browser's own speech service (for example Google on Android) before it reaches us.
- Billing: your subscription status. Card details go straight to Stripe; we never see or store them.
- Technical: a sign-in cookie, a cookie remembering light or dark mode, and short-lived server logs used to fix problems. No advertising or tracking cookies.
Why we use it
- To provide VanBooks: storing your books, making invoices, working out tax estimates and reading your notes and receipts. (Our contract with you.)
- To take payment for your subscription. (Our contract with you.)
- To keep the service secure and working. (Our legitimate interests.)
- To keep financial records the law requires. (Legal obligation.)
We don't sell your data or use it for advertising.
Who processes it for us
- Vercel: hosts the website and app. Our server code runs in London.
- Neon: our database, in London.
- Vercel Blob: stores receipt photos, in London. We encrypt every photo ourselves (AES-256) before it's stored.
- Anthropic: its Claude AI reads the notes you dictate or type, and your receipt photos, to fill in the details for you to check. Anthropic doesn't use this data to train its models.
- Resend: sends sign-in emails.
- Stripe: takes subscription payments and keeps payment records.
- Cloudflare: runs our domain name.
Some of these companies are based in the US, so some data may be processed there. Where that happens, it's protected by the UK's approved safeguards, such as the UK Extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework or standard contractual clauses.
Sharing
Invoices you send, and receipt links you share, can be seen by anyone who has the link. Shared receipt links stop working after 30 days, or straight away if you withdraw them.
How long we keep it
We keep your data while you have an account. If you delete your account, we delete your books, receipts and business details straight away. Stripe keeps records of past payments for as long as the law requires. Receipt photos you took but never saved with a cost are deleted after two days.
Your rights
- See and take your data: download your records from Tax at any time, or ask us for a copy.
- Correct it: edit anything in the app, or ask us.
- Delete it: delete your account in the app or website at any time.
- Object or restrict: email us.
- Complain: you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk.
Children
VanBooks is for people running a business and isn't meant for anyone under 18.
Changes
If we change how we use your data, we'll update this page and tell you by email before it takes effect.