Cookie Policy

1. What Are Cookies?

Cookies are small text files placed on your device when you visit a website. They are widely used to make websites work, to improve your experience, and to provide information to site owners. Cookies cannot access other files on your device or carry viruses.

This policy also covers similar technologies, such as local storage, session storage, and pixels, which perform comparable functions. References to "cookies" in this policy include these technologies.

This policy explains how Car Audit uses cookies on our website, the legal basis for doing so, and the choices available to you. Our use of cookies is governed by the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (PECR) and, where cookies involve personal data, the UK GDPR.

2. How We Use Cookies

We aim to keep our use of cookies to a minimum. Where we do use them, they fall into the following categories:

• Strictly necessary cookies: essential for the website to function. These include cookies set by our e-commerce platform (Shopify) to operate the shopping basket and checkout, keep your session secure, prevent fraud, balance site traffic, and remember your cookie preferences. They are exempt from the consent requirement and cannot be switched off in our systems, because the site would not work without them.
• Functional cookies: help the website remember choices you make, so that features work more smoothly on a return visit. If used, these are set only with your consent.
• Analytics cookies: if enabled, these help us understand how visitors use the site, which pages are visited, and how people move around it, so we can improve it. They collect information in an aggregated form and are set only with your consent.
• Third-party cookies: some features rely on services provided by others, such as our embedded booking and scheduling calendar, which may set their own cookies when you use those features. These are governed by the relevant provider's own privacy and cookie policies.

We do not use advertising or cross-site tracking cookies. If that ever changes, this policy will be updated first and such cookies will only be set with your consent.

3. Session and Persistent Cookies

Cookies on our site may be either session cookies, which are deleted automatically when you close your browser, or persistent cookies, which remain on your device for a set period or until you delete them. Persistent cookies are used, for example, to remember your cookie preferences so you are not asked on every visit, and by our platform to keep a basket available if you return to complete a booking.

4. Third-Party Services and Content

Where our website includes tools or content provided by others, such as our booking and scheduling system, our payment provider's checkout, embedded Google Maps on our coverage page or web fonts, those providers may set cookies or receive technical information, such as your IP address, when the relevant content loads. We do not control these cookies, and we recommend reviewing the relevant provider's own cookie and privacy policies for details of what they collect and why.

Our website also contains links and buttons that take you to third-party services, such as WhatsApp for contacting us and Google for reading our reviews. No cookies are set by those services through our site itself; their cookies apply once you arrive on their platforms, under their own policies.

5. Consent

Strictly necessary cookies are set automatically, as the law permits. If we enable functional or analytics cookies, they are set only after you have given consent through the cookie controls presented on our site. If no cookie controls are shown, this theme should be treated as using only strictly necessary cookies and the third-party services you actively choose to open, such as WhatsApp or the booking provider. You can delete cookies through your browser as described below.

6. Managing Your Cookie Preferences

You can control and manage cookies in several ways:

• Where we present a cookie banner or preferences tool, you can accept or decline non-essential cookies directly, and return to it later to change your choice
• Most web browsers let you view, manage, and delete cookies through their settings, and block cookies from being set in future
• You can delete cookies already stored on your device at any time

Please note that blocking or deleting strictly necessary cookies may stop parts of the website working, including the basket and checkout, and some features may not function as intended.

7. Browser Controls

Guidance on managing cookies is available in the help section of all major browsers, including Chrome, Safari, Firefox, and Microsoft Edge. The "Help" or "Settings" menu in your browser explains how to view and adjust your cookie settings. Independent guidance is also available from the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk.

8. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Cookie Policy from time to time to reflect changes to our website, our providers, or the law. Any changes will be posted on this page, and the date at the top reflects the most recent revision. Where a change involves setting new non-essential cookies, we will seek fresh consent before doing so.

9. Related Policies

This Cookie Policy should be read alongside our Privacy Policy, which explains how we handle personal data more generally, including the technical data referred to in this policy, and our Terms and Conditions.

10. Contact Us

If you have any questions about our use of cookies, please get in touch via our Contact page.