Privacy Policy

1. Who we are

This website is operated by Vets Compared Ltd, a company registered in Northern Ireland (Company No: NI741225) with its registered office at 12a British Road, Aldergrove, Crumlin, Northern Ireland, BT29 4DH.

2. How we use cookies and analytics

We use Google Analytics 4 (GA4) via Google Tag Manager to understand how visitors interact with our website. This helps us improve content and user experience.

What data do we collect?

When you accept cookies, GA4 may collect:

• Pages you visit and how long you stay
• How you arrived at our site (e.g., search engine, direct link)
• Your approximate location (country/region level only)
• Device type and browser information
• Interactions with buttons and links (e.g., "Call Now" clicks)

Your consent

When you first visit our site, you'll see a cookie consent banner with two options:

• Accept: Allows us to use analytics cookies to improve your experience
• Reject: Blocks analytics cookies; no tracking data is collected

Your choice is stored in your browser and respected on all our related websites (see cross-domain consent below).

Cross-domain consent

We operate multiple related veterinary directory sites (e.g., vetsinengland.com, bedfordshirevets.com, corkvets.com). To avoid showing you the consent banner repeatedly, when you accept or reject cookies on one site, we carry your preference to other related sites using a URL parameter (cm_consent). This parameter is automatically removed after your preference is applied.

Google's role

Google processes analytics data on our behalf as a data processor. Google may use this data to improve their own services. For more information, see:

• Google Privacy Policy
• How Google uses data from sites that use their services

Managing your consent

To change your mind:

• Clear your browser's local storage or cookies
• Reload any page on our site
• The consent banner will appear again for you to make a new choice

3. Quote requests

You can ask veterinary clinics for a quote on our websites and in the VetsCompared app inside ChatGPT. Sending a request introduces you to the clinics you select. It does not book an appointment, and it does not accept treatment or a charge.

Clinic listings on this site are publicly available information from official registers and business directories. A quote request is separate from those listings.

What a quote request stores

When a quote request is sent, we store:

• Your first name, email address, and phone number
• The postcode, Eircode, or ZIP you enter, or another location the website form accepts
• The service or procedure you ask about
• The type of animal, when you give one. The ChatGPT form requires an animal before it will send
• An age, if you give one. Age is optional
• The clinics you select
• A submission identifier
• A receipt naming each clinic the request was saved for, whether a notification was queued, and whether email delivery was confirmed

The website quote form can also store a last name, the pet's name, a breed, a weight band when the form asks for one, a location derived from the place you gave, and files you attach. The ChatGPT form does not ask for a last name, a pet name, a breed, a weight, or files, and it does not create a saved profile for your email address. The website form does create that profile so you can return to the request. Sending a quote does not switch on marketing email.

Why we use it

We use these details to send the request to the clinics you confirmed, to keep a record of that send, and to pass replies between you and those clinics. We send only after you confirm the clinics and the details and agree to share them. On the website that agreement is the consent box. In ChatGPT it is the consent field on the quote form.

Who receives it

The clinics you select receive an email notification from info@email.vetscompared.com. That message includes your first name, the service, the animal, and the age if you gave one. It includes your phone number when that clinic is on a paid plan that shows numbers immediately, or after that clinic unlocks the request. Otherwise the message says the number is locked. It does not include your email address. We keep the email address so replies can go through VetsCompared. A clinic can see the email address on the request after the request is marked as booked.

A clinic replies to the VetsCompared reply address on the notification, or in its VetsCompared dashboard. We pass that reply on. A clinic that can see your phone number may call you. An approved account holder for the clinic may be copied on the notification. Some clinic groups are also copied on a legal address configured for that group.

On the website, we email you a confirmation of the clinics you selected. That confirmation includes the postcode, Eircode, or ZIP on the request. About three days later we may email you to ask how the clinics responded. The record for that follow-up expires 30 days after the date it is due to be sent. That expiry does not delete the quote. The ChatGPT request does not send either of those emails.

A website quote can also be posted to our staff Slack channel, including your name, email, phone, and postcode. Files attached on the website are stored in Cloudflare R2. If the visit came from a Google ad click, we may send that click identifier to Google Ads. If the clinic uses our practice system, the website request can be forwarded there, with the same limits on when the phone number and email address are included. A ChatGPT quote request is not posted to Slack, is not sent to Google Ads, and is not forwarded to a practice system.

ChatGPT operational logs

When ChatGPT calls the directory tools, OpenAI sends an anonymised subject identifier and an anonymised session identifier. We write those identifiers, the tool name, the outcome, how long the call took, and a town or area label to the application log. That log line does not include your name, email, phone, or postcode. A postcode used only to find clinics is not written into the place label.

We also store a rate-limit row. Its key is the caller IP address together with that subject identifier. The count resets about one minute after the row is written. We do not run a job that deletes the row.

How long quote records are kept

The quote, the messages, the submission receipt, and the notification queue are stored in our database. They do not have an automatic deletion date. A reminder time stored on a message does not delete the request. Resend, which delivers the emails, states that its own production backups are kept for 7 days. That is Resend's backup period. It is not a date on which we delete the quote.

To ask for a copy, a correction, or deletion, email info@vetscompared.com or use the contact page at https://www.vetscompared.com/contact. This policy does not set a response deadline. Deleting our copy does not recall a message a clinic has already received, and it does not require that clinic to delete its own copy.

Processors and transfers

• Neon Postgres, on Amazon Web Services in eu-central-1 (Frankfurt), stores the quote records, messages, submission receipts, notification queue, and rate-limit rows.
• Vercel hosts the website and the ChatGPT directory endpoint, and keeps the application logs, including the ChatGPT subject and session identifiers described above.
• Resend, Inc. delivers the quote emails. See Resend's security note at https://resend.com/docs/security.
• Google processes website analytics when you accept cookies, as described above. Google Ads receives a click identifier only for a website quote that arrived from a Google ad click.
• Slack receives the website staff alert described above.
• Cloudflare R2 stores files attached to a website quote.
• Sentry receives error reports from the service. Our filter redacts fields named as an email, phone, or name. The quote code does not add your contact details to those reports.
• The clinics you select receive the notification described above and then use it for their own purposes.

4. Server logs

Our hosting provider may log an IP address, browser type, and referring page for security and operation. The ChatGPT application log and rate-limit row described above are separate. They include the anonymised subject identifier OpenAI sends and, for the rate-limit row, the IP address.

5. Vetrics Medicines API

The UK Veterinary Medicines / Vetrics Medicines API at https://api.medicines.vetrics.co is a Great Britain catalogue lookup. It is not a quote request. The name, email, phone, animal, and clinic details in section 3 are not collected by those medicines tools. What that API records is described at https://api.medicines.vetrics.co/privacy.txt.

6. Links to other websites

Our website includes links to veterinary clinic websites and other third parties. We are not responsible for their content or privacy practices. Please review their privacy policies before providing personal data.

7. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy to reflect technical or legal changes. Revisions will be posted here with an updated effective date.

8. Your rights

Under UK and EU data protection law, you have the right to:

• Access personal data we hold about you
• Request correction or deletion of your data
• Object to processing or request data portability
• Withdraw cookie consent by clearing your browser cookies. Clearing cookies does not unsend a quote request that has already been delivered

To exercise these rights, contact us using the details below.

9. Contact

If you have questions about this policy or wish to exercise your rights: