Privacy notice

Who we are

Matchanic is a website where drivers post a job for their car and garages can quote for it. We don’t do the work and we don’t take payment for it. Garages pay us a commission when a driver accepts their quote.

Matchanic is run by To add: Legal name of the business, of To add: Registered office or business address. We decide how the information described here is used, which makes us its controller under UK data protection law. Our registration number with the Information Commissioner’s Office is To add: ICO registration number.

For anything about your information, email To add: Privacy email address.

What we collect

If you’re a driver

• Your name, email address and password. We never see your password: it goes to our sign-in provider, Supabase, which stores it in a form that can’t be read back.
• Your phone number, and your postcode when you give it.
• Your car’s registration, and the make, model, engine size, fuel type and year saved with your job. We look these up from the registration, or you type them in.
• Each job you post: what the car needs, your notes, and the postcode you give for it, with the map position we work out from it.
• Messages you send to garages, and when they were read.
• Reviews you write: a star rating and any comment.
• Which kinds of email you’ve switched off.

If you’re a garage

• The owner’s name, and the account’s email address and password (handled by Supabase, as above).
• The details you give when you apply: business name, phone number, address and business type.
• The two documents you upload when you apply: proof of trade, such as an insurance certificate or business registration, and a photo or scan of the owner’s driving licence.
• Your profile: photo, bio, opening hours, the days and times you’re available, specialities, the year you were established, qualifications and any certificate images you add.
• Your postcode, the map position we work out from it, and your job radius.
• Your prices for automatic quotes, whether they’re switched on, and the message sent with your automatic quotes.
• Your quotes (price, message and what’s included), your messages and your replies to reviews. Also what you keep for yourself: notes on jobs, message templates, and the jobs you’ve marked Not interested.
• Dates and notes you add to your calendar.
• A record of your account’s credit: each commission we charge (with the job, the car’s registration and which of your garages it was for), each top-up and any adjustment we make, and your balance. Also any refund you ask for, with your reason and what you tell us, and our decision.
• Which kinds of email you’ve switched off.

Everyone who uses Matchanic

• The cookies that keep you signed in. Our cookie notice lists them.
• A record of each email we send you, or decide not to send: what it was about, and when it was sent or why it wasn’t.
• When a garage, or someone at Matchanic using our admin pages, views a driver’s phone number: who viewed it, for which job, when, and how many times.
• When someone at Matchanic changes an account or a job on our admin pages: who did it, when, and what changed. For example, editing a garage’s details, entering a quote for a garage, cancelling a job, changing a garage’s credit balance, deciding a refund request, or changing the email address someone logs in with.
• What you tell us when you email us or reply to one of our emails: your email address, what you write and anything you attach.
• Technical records our providers keep when you use the site, such as your IP address, your browser and when you signed in.

Where it comes from

• Most of it comes from you: when you fill in a form on the site, or email us.
• Car details come from the DVLA Vehicle Enquiry Service and the DVSA MOT history service. We send them the registration you enter.
• Map positions and area names come from postcodes.io, using the postcodes entered on the site.
• For drivers, quotes and messages about your job come from the garages that send them. Sometimes someone at Matchanic enters a quote for a garage, with its message. On the site, both are marked as entered by Matchanic.
• For garages, reviews and messages come from drivers. Someone at Matchanic may also add or correct your details.

What we use it for

• To run your account and sign you in. Suggested basis: contract.
• To show your job to garages, show you their quotes, and pass messages between you. Suggested basis: contract.
• To look up your car from its registration. Suggested basis: contract.
• To place postcodes on a map, so a garage’s Dashboard and new-job emails can cover jobs within its job radius, and a quote can show how far away the garage is. Suggested basis: contract.
• To email you about your jobs, quotes, messages and account. Suggested basis: contract.
• To charge garages commission, keep each garage account’s credit balance, and deal with top-ups and refund requests. Suggested basis: contract.
• To check garage applications, including the proof of trade and the driving licence. Suggested basis: legitimate interests (knowing who runs the garages on Matchanic).
• To show garage profiles and reviews to anyone who visits. Suggested basis: legitimate interests (helping drivers choose a garage).
• To keep the service safe, by logging who views a driver’s phone number and what people at Matchanic change on our admin pages. Suggested basis: legitimate interests.
• To answer your emails and requests. Suggested basis: legitimate interests.
• To keep the records the law requires. Suggested basis: legal obligation.

We don’t sell your information, and we don’t use it for advertising.

Who can see it

Garages

If you’re a driver, any account registered as a garage on Matchanic can see your job while it’s open, whether we’ve approved its application, are still checking it or have turned it down. They see your name, your car and its registration, what it needs, your notes and the postcode you gave. A garage that has quoted on your job, or that we’ve assigned it to, can still see these details after the job closes. We never ask for your home address, and garages don’t see your email address.

Only garages that have quoted on your job can see your phone number, and we keep a record when one does. Once you accept a quote, the other garages can no longer look up your number on Matchanic.

Anyone who visits

If you’re a driver, a review you write appears on the garage’s public profile with your star rating, your comment, the date and any reply from the garage. It doesn’t show your name.

If you’re a garage, your public profile can be seen by anyone, signed in or not, from the moment you apply, whether or not we approve your application. It shows your business name, photo, address, opening hours, phone number, bio, specialities, business type, year established, qualifications with any certificate images, and your reviews and replies. Your address is shown as you typed it, including any postcode in it. Your prices and documents are not on it.

Two more details are public but aren’t shown on your profile page: the owner’s name (the page shows it only if there’s no business name) and your job radius. Anyone who knows how can read them from our database, without signing in.

Anyone signed in to Matchanic can read the rest of a garage’s account details in the same way, including its postcode and map position, whether its application has been approved, and the reason if we’ve disabled it.

To add: Whether anyone signed in to Matchanic can read a driver’s name or other details on a driver’s account, and so tell who wrote a review. Check before launch, and remove this box once signed-in users can read only their own account and garages’ accounts.

Drivers

If you’re a garage, drivers see your quote on their job, with your profile details, your rating and how many reviews you have, how far away you are when both postcodes are known, and how many jobs you’ve won on Matchanic this month.

People at Matchanic

People at Matchanic can see accounts, jobs, quotes, messages, garage documents, and each garage account’s credit balance, commission charges, top-ups and refund requests, to run the service, check applications and deal with problems. When one of them views a driver’s phone number on our admin pages, we keep a record. To add: Who at Matchanic can also open the database directly, for example to close an account, and whether that is recorded

When the law requires it

We may share information with the police, a court or a regulator when the law requires us to.

Companies that help us

These companies handle information for us, to run parts of the site:

• Supabase: our database, sign-in and file storage, including garage documents, photos and certificates. It receives your IP address and browser details whenever you use the site, and it sends our sign-in emails, such as password reset links To add: check whether Supabase sends these itself or through Resend.
• Vercel: hosts the website and runs our server code. It receives your IP address with every visit.
• Resend: sends our other emails, such as new quotes, messages and new jobs. It receives your email address and what each email says.
• The DVLA Vehicle Enquiry Service and the DVSA MOT history service: our server sends them the registration you enter, to look up the car.
• postcodes.io: finds where a postcode is on the map and the name of its area. Browsers send it the postcodes entered on the site, and a garage’s browser also sends the postcodes of the jobs it’s viewing. It receives the IP address of the browser that asks.
• To add: The company that hosts our email inbox: receives the emails you send us, including replies to ours.
• OpenStreetMap: the job maps that garages use load their map images from OpenStreetMap’s servers, which receive the viewer’s IP address.
• A payment provider, To add: which one, once chosen: garages can’t top up their credit by card on the site yet. When they can, the card payment will be handled by a payment provider, which will receive the card details. We won’t store card numbers: we’ll keep the amount, whether the payment went through, and the provider’s reference for it.

Where it’s stored

How long we keep it

• Accounts and profiles: To add: how long after an account is closed
• Jobs, quotes, messages and reviews: To add: how long
• A garage’s application documents: To add: how long after the decision
• Records of commission charges, top-ups and refunds: To add: how long, which tax and accounting rules may set a minimum for
• Records of phone number views: To add: how long
• Records of emails sent: To add: how long
• Records of changes made by people at Matchanic: To add: how long
• Emails you send us: To add: how long
• Technical records kept by our providers: To add: how long

Your rights

Under UK data protection law, you can ask us to:

• give you a copy of the information we hold about you
• correct information that’s wrong
• delete your information
• limit how we use it, or stop using it
• give you your information in a form you can pass to someone else

Some of these don’t apply in every case, for example when the law requires us to keep a record. We’ll tell you if that’s so.

You can change some details yourself: drivers on My details, garages on My profile. For anything else about your information, email To add: Privacy email address. To close your account, email To add: Support email address.

If you’re unhappy with how we’ve handled your information, please tell us first. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office at ico.org.uk.

Emails from us

We email you when something happens on your account, such as a new quote on your job, a new message, or a new job for your garage. We don’t send marketing emails.

You can switch each kind of email off on your Notifications page, or with the link at the bottom of each email. Emails about your account itself, such as the decision on a garage application, can’t be switched off.

Cookies

We only store what’s needed to sign you in and to remember a few things as you use the site, such as a reply you’ve started but not sent. Our cookie notice lists each one.

Changes to this notice

If we change this notice, we’ll update it here and change the date at the top.

Questions and requests

Email To add: Privacy email address, or see other ways to reach us.