Privacy policy

Last updated 19 October 2026

Who we are

Hi-Vis is a trading name of Highfold Group Ltd (company number 17521208, registered in England and Wales). Registered office: Office 21848, 182-184 High Street North, East Ham, London, E6 2JA. The "controller" of the personal data described here ("we", "us") is Highfold Group Ltd.

Questions about your data? Email hello@hivissites.co.uk. We read every message and we'll get back to you as soon as we can.

What we collect

• Details you give us - your name, business name, phone numbers, email address, town, postcode and the towns you cover; the answers you give Vic about your business (services, about you, opening hours, prices and registrations) and the photos and logo you upload (we take location data out of photos); your messages to Vic in the editor, and the versions of your site as you change it; quote requests that visitors send through a site we host (we hold these for the site's owner as their processor: see below); visit counts for sites we host, made from our hosting server's logs without keeping IP addresses.
• Payment details - handled entirely by Stripe. We never see or store your full card number.
• Messages - what you send us by email or through our contact forms.
• Basic usage data - we count page views without cookies. To count unique visitors we use a one-way, daily-changing hash of your IP address and browser; we can't use it to identify you and it resets every day. For each visit we keep the pages viewed, the kind of device, the country (worked out from your IP address, which isn't stored) and whether the visit ended in a purchase, chat or message, for 90 days, without cookies.
• Security logs - like most websites, our web server and mail server keep logs of each request: your IP address, the date and time, the page or service requested and your browser details (and, for emails, the sender and recipient addresses). We use them only to keep our services secure and working.
• Live chat - the messages you type into our chat assistant and any details you choose to send through it (see Live chat below).

Why we use it, and our lawful basis

Who we share it with

We never sell your data. We share it only with the suppliers below, who help us run Hi-Vis. Suppliers that act for us may use it only on our instructions, under contracts that require them to protect it. Where a supplier also uses data for its own purposes (as the table says), its own privacy policy covers that use.

Some of these suppliers may process data outside the UK (for example in the USA). Where they do, the transfer is protected by UK adequacy regulations (including the UK–US data bridge), or the ICO's International Data Transfer Agreement or the UK Addendum to the EU standard contractual clauses.

How long we keep it

• Homepages you never pick: deleted with their photos 90 days after they're built, with 7 days' notice by email unless you've stopped our reminders (see Reminders about your homepages below). When you buy one, the other two are deleted straight away.
• A walkthrough left unfinished before an account was made: deleted after 3 days.
• Quote requests sent through sites we host: deleted 2 years after they arrive, or straight away when the site's owner deletes their account.
• Earlier versions of your site: 90 days (the newest and the published version are always kept).
• Our record of Vic's work on your site (which model, how much it cost, never your words): 400 days, and the part that counts against Vic's tank for as long as the site exists.
• Your account, site, photos and logo: while your account is open, including after hosting ends, so you can download your files or host the site again. Deleting your account deletes them straight away. An account that has never paid for a site is deleted after 12 months without a sign-in, and we email you 14 days before. Payment records: 6 years (UK tax rules).
• Photos and logos you upload: kept with your site while your account is open, and deleted with homepages you never pick or when you delete your account.
• Enquiries that don't lead anywhere: 2 years.
• Emails to and from our hello@hivissites.co.uk mailbox: deleted from our mail server 2 years after they arrive.
• Our log of the emails we send you (address, subject and whether it was delivered): 1 year.
• Security logs on our servers: 14 days.
• Cookieless page-view and visitor counts: about 13 months (400 days).
• Backups: anything we delete can stay in our backups (nightly copies, plus weekly and monthly encrypted off-site copies) for up to about 3 months, then it's gone.
• Live chat conversations: 180 days after the last message; details you send through the chat, with the recent part of the conversation, are kept like other enquiries.

Live chat

Our website has a chat assistant. It is an automated AI assistant, not a person: it answers questions using Hi-Vis's own web pages and information we've written for it, and it can make mistakes. If it can't help, it can take your details so our team can reply to you by email.

• What we keep - the messages you type, the assistant's replies, the page you started the chat on, when it happened, and a one-way hash of your IP address that changes every day (only to stop one connection using up the assistant - we don't use it to identify you). Please don't type card details or sensitive personal information into the chat; card numbers are removed automatically, from the chat and from details you send.
• AI processing - to write its replies, your messages and the relevant parts of our website are sent to Abacus.AI, Inc. in the United States, which acts as our processor under a contract that requires it to protect your data. The transfer is protected by UK adequacy regulations (including the UK–US data bridge), or the ICO's International Data Transfer Agreement or the UK Addendum to the EU standard contractual clauses.
• Details you send us - if you choose to leave your details (for example your name, email address and phone number) they reach the Hi-Vis team in the same way as a message through our contact form, together with the recent part of your conversation (so the team has the context), we email you to confirm we've got them, and we reply by email. Nobody from the team joins the chat itself.
• Why (lawful basis) - legitimate interests (answering questions about Hi-Vis websites, prices and hosting), and steps you ask us to take before entering into a contract when you ask us to get back to you.
• How long - chat conversations are deleted 180 days after the last message. If you send your details, they and the recent part of the conversation that goes with them are kept like other enquiries (2 years).
• On your device - once you start a chat, your browser keeps the conversation (in local storage, not a cookie) so it stays open as you move between pages. It's cleared the next time you visit after 24 hours without using it, or straight away when you choose "Start a new chat" or clear this site's data. Once you've sent your details, your browser no longer keeps them.

Building your site with Vic

Vic, our site assistant, writes and edits your website with AI models that we reach through Abacus.AI, Inc. in the USA (listed above): Anthropic's models (USA) do the writing, and on Premium a Google model (USA) makes the background image when you have no photos. To do that we send Abacus.AI the business details you type into the walkthrough and the editor, your messages to Vic, small copies of your photos (so Vic can describe them for people who can't see them, choose where they go and check they're suitable) and your site's text. We never send your password or card details. Abacus.AI processes this for us, on our instructions, and passes it to the AI company whose model does the work, to give us Vic's reply. We do this to provide the service you've asked for (contract), and before that, for the free homepages you asked us to build (steps you ask us to take before a contract).

When you press Publish, your site's text is checked automatically, by the same AI provider, for content that breaks our rules (terms section 9). Clear breaches are blocked and we email you why; if you reply, a person at Hi-Vis looks at it again. If the result isn't clear, a person at Hi-Vis looks at it before it goes live (our legitimate interest in keeping unlawful and harmful sites off our hosting).

Reminders about your homepages

If you see your homepages but don't pick one, we may send up to two reminders, about 2 and 7 days later. You can say no to them in the walkthrough, and every reminder has a one-click link to stop them. We send these because you've asked us about our service: our legitimate interests, under the rules in the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations for people who've been in touch with us about buying.

When you buy one of your homepages, the other two are deleted straight away. Homepages you never pick are deleted, with their photos, 90 days after they're built. Unless you've stopped our reminders, we email you 7 days before. A walkthrough left unfinished before an account was made is deleted after 3 days. An account that has never paid for a site is deleted if nobody signs in to it for 12 months, and we email you 14 days before. Otherwise your account stays until you delete it.

Where hosted sites live

Sites we host are published as plain web pages to a second, separate server, also run by our hosting company (listed above). It holds the published pages and their images, and the web server's logs. We count daily visits to each hosted site from those logs, without keeping anyone's IP address, so we can show its owner a monthly visitor report. It holds no accounts, passwords or quote requests. When you delete your account, your published pages are deleted from the hosting server too.

Quote requests on sites we host (we're the site owner's processor)

Every site we host belongs to a tradesperson. When someone sends a quote request through one, that business decides what happens to it: it's the controller and Hi-Vis is its processor (section 10 of our terms). We store the request on our main server, show it in the business's Hi-Vis account and email it to the business, with the person who asked as the reply-to address. We don't email the person who sent it. We use these details for nothing else.

They're held on the servers of our hosting company as listed above, and deleted automatically 2 years after they arrive, or straight away when the business deletes its Hi-Vis account. Each hosted site has its own privacy page. If you've sent a quote request through one, please contact that business about your data; if you write to us instead, we'll pass your request on.

Your rights

You can ask us for a copy of your data, to correct it, to delete it, to restrict or object to how we use it, or to receive it in a portable format. You can withdraw consent at any time. If you have an account you can delete it yourself from your account page. Email hello@hivissites.co.uk for anything else - we'll respond within one month.

If you're unhappy with how we've handled your data, you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk or on 0303 123 1113. We'd appreciate the chance to put things right first.

Changes

If we make important changes we'll update the date above and, where appropriate, tell you by email.