Privacy Policy

BlinkaRide ("we", "us") operates the marketplace platform at blinkaride.com. For the purposes of UK data protection law, we are the controller of the personal information described in this policy, except where an operator acts as a separate and independent controller of information you provide for the purposes of fulfilling your journey.

For privacy queries, contact us at support@blinkaride.com.

BlinkaRide is a marketplace that connects passengers with independent taxi and private hire operators. We are an intermediary — the contract for the transportation service is between you and the operator you book with. Each operator is an independent business and acts as a separate controller of the data it processes to assess, confirm and fulfil your journey. The operator's own privacy notice may also apply to information you share with them.

BlinkaRide publishes listings for taxi and private hire operators across the UK. To populate and maintain these listings, we may source business information from publicly available sources, including:

• Google Business Profiles and Google Maps
• Local authority and national licensing registers for taxi and private hire operators
• Companies House (the UK register of companies)
• Other publicly accessible directories and business registers

Information sourced this way may include the business name, trading address, phone number, website, and licensing or registration details. This information is treated as business data rather than personal data where it relates solely to the business itself. Where it includes information about identifiable individuals (for example, a sole trader's name), we treat it as personal data and handle it accordingly.

Operators whose information appears on BlinkaRide may claim their listing, update their details, or request removal by contacting us at support@blinkaride.com.

We may collect and process the following categories of personal information:

Booking and journey data

• Full name, email address, phone number
• Pickup and destination addresses, place identifiers and coordinates
• Requested date, time and journey duration
• Passenger count, luggage requirements
• Vehicle or service preferences
• Notes or special requirements you provide to the operator
• Booking reference, status and timeline
• Price quotes, fare acceptances and journey cost
• Cancellation reasons and history

Accessibility requirements

If you specify an accessibility requirement (for example, a wheelchair-accessible vehicle), this may indicate health-related information. We collect only what is necessary to match you with a suitable operator. We treat this information with additional care.

Reviews and communications

• Reviews and ratings you submit
• Messages and enquiries sent to us
• Support case records

Technical and usage data

• IP address, browser type and version, device type
• Pages visited, referring URLs, session data
• Authentication tokens and security logs
• Cookies and similar technologies (see our Cookie Policy)

Operator account data (agency users only)

• Business name, contact details, licensing information
• Billing and subscription details (payment metadata via Stripe; we do not store card numbers)
• Uploaded logos, service descriptions and pricing

Some information is mandatory to submit a booking request — for example, your name, contact number, pickup location and requested time. If you do not provide it, we may be unable to submit the request to an operator.

UK GDPR requires us to have a lawful basis for each use of your personal information. The table below sets out our main purposes and the basis we rely on.

We do not use your personal data for marketing purposes. We do not send marketing emails and do not share your data with third parties for advertising.

Where we rely on legitimate interests, we have balanced those interests against your rights and concluded that they are not overridden. You may object to processing based on legitimate interests — see section 9.

We share personal information only where necessary to operate the platform. We do not sell your data, share it for advertising purposes, or disclose it to third parties for their own marketing.

• The operator you select — your name, contact details and journey information are shared with the operator so they can assess and fulfil your booking. The operator acts as an independent controller for this purpose and their own privacy notice may apply.
• Email delivery provider (Resend) — your email address is passed to our email provider solely to deliver booking confirmations and transactional notifications. They process it only on our instructions.
• Hosting and infrastructure providers (Vercel, Render, Supabase) — our platform infrastructure processes data as part of operating the service. These providers act as processors under our instructions.
• Address search (Google Maps API) — when you type a pickup or destination address, the search text is sent to Google's Maps API to return address suggestions. This is a server-side call; Google receives the search query but not your name, contact details or booking information.
• Payment provider (Stripe) — used for operator subscription billing only. BlinkaRide does not process passenger payments. Stripe does not receive passenger personal data.
• Professional advisers — lawyers, accountants and insurers where necessary, subject to confidentiality obligations.
• Regulators, law enforcement and courts — where we are legally required to disclose information.
• Potential acquirers or investors — in the context of a corporate transaction, subject to confidentiality obligations.

Where third parties process data on our behalf as processors, we have data processing agreements in place requiring them to process information only on our instructions and with appropriate security measures.

Some of our service providers process personal data outside the United Kingdom. Where this occurs, we take steps to ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place in accordance with UK data protection law, such as the UK International Data Transfer Agreement (IDTA) or reliance on UK adequacy regulations where applicable.

You may request further information about international transfer safeguards by contacting support@blinkaride.com.

We retain personal information only for as long as necessary for the purposes described in this policy.

After the relevant period, data is securely deleted or anonymised. Anonymised data (which cannot identify you) may be retained for analytical purposes without time limit.

Under UK GDPR you have the following rights in relation to your personal information:

• Access — to request a copy of the personal information we hold about you
• Rectification — to ask us to correct inaccurate or incomplete information
• Erasure — to ask us to delete your personal information where we no longer have a lawful reason to retain it. This right is not absolute; we may retain information where required by law, for legal claims or fraud prevention.
• Restriction — to ask us to restrict processing of your information in certain circumstances
• Objection — to object to processing based on legitimate interests, or to direct marketing at any time without giving a reason
• Portability — to receive a copy of information you provided to us in a structured, commonly used format, where processing is based on contract and carried out by automated means
• Automated decision-making — not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing that produces legal or similarly significant effects

We do not currently use solely automated decision-making that produces legal or similarly significant effects on users.

To exercise any of these rights, email support@blinkaride.com. We will respond within one calendar month. We may ask you to verify your identity before acting on a request. There is normally no charge, subject to statutory exceptions for manifestly unfounded or excessive requests.

You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk or by calling 0303 123 1113. We would appreciate the opportunity to address any concern before you contact the ICO.

We use appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your personal information against unauthorised access, loss, destruction or alteration. These include encrypted data transmission, access controls and secure credential storage. No method of transmission over the internet is completely secure; we cannot guarantee absolute security.

We do not make decisions about you that have legal or similarly significant effects based solely on automated processing. Our service-area matching and search logic assists in surfacing relevant operators but does not make binding decisions.

BlinkaRide is not intended for use by children under the age of 16 without the involvement of a parent or guardian. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 16. If you believe we have inadvertently collected such information, please contact us and we will delete it promptly.

We may update this policy from time to time. When we make material changes we will notify you by email (where we hold your address) or by posting a prominent notice on the platform before the changes take effect. The "last updated" date at the top of this page reflects the most recent revision. Previous versions are available on request.

Questions about this policy or how we handle your data? Email support@blinkaride.com.