Your data and privacy
Phrazl holds your account details, your trips, your review history and your purchase records, in a managed Postgres database on Amazon Web Services. This article lists every category it stores and why, where that sits, how long it stays, and how you delete it.
What this article covers
You are signed in with an email address and a password, you have a trip or two set up, and you want to know what that leaves behind. This article answers four questions in the order a traveller actually asks them: what is stored, where it is kept, how long it stays, and how you get rid of it.
It is not a policy summary written for lawyers. It is the same declared list the product works from, including the quieter records that exist to count how travellers move through the app.
What Phrazl stores and why
| Stored | Why | How long |
|---|---|---|
| Your email address, name and a hashed password | To sign you in and keep your trips attached to your account | While your account exists |
| Your trips: destination, departure date and chosen scenarios | To select the phrase set and calibrate the review schedule to your departure | Until you delete the trip or the account |
| Your review history per phrase: result, interval, next review time | To schedule what you practise next and show curriculum coverage | Goes with the trip it belongs to |
| Purchase records: Stripe checkout session and payment intent ids, amount and status per trip pack | To unlock what you bought, apply the returning traveller discount, and re-lock a pack if Stripe refunds the payment | Until you delete the account |
| Support requests you send from the account screen | To fix purchase problems and refund what did not unlock | Until you delete the account |
| Your answer, if you give one, to 'What stopped you?' on the paywall: one chosen reason and an optional short note, at most once per trip | To learn why travellers decide not to buy, so the price, the languages offered and the audio can be fixed where they are the reason | Until you delete the account |
| Funnel milestones: one record per trip when you set it up, finish the free 20, start or finish a listen walk, see the paywall, start a checkout or buy | To understand where travellers stop between signing up and buying, so the product can be improved there | Until you delete the account |
| Usage events: a timestamped record when you set up a trip, review a phrase, finish the free 20 or buy a pack, and an at-most-hourly last-seen time | To count, as totals only, how many travellers use the product and whether they come back, in Phrazl's own database with no third-party analytics service | Deleted after 16 weeks |
| A trip built without an account at /try: destination, date, scenarios and grades on its five sample cards, under a random token in a cookie, with no name or email | To show five phrases shaped to your trip before any account exists | Moved onto your account when you sign up; an unclaimed one is deleted, cookie and all, after 7 days |
| Milestones for a /try trip: that it was set up, that its five cards were finished, and that it was claimed at sign-up; a step name and a random id only | To count how many visitors look before making an account and how many then make one; no name, email, destination or date is held with them | Kept as counts, and they stay once the trip they name is deleted |
Where it is kept, and who else touches it
Everything in that table sits on Amazon Web Services, in a managed Postgres database, on the product's own hosting stage. Server logs roll off within 30 days.
The declared data handling record names these outside services and what each one does:
- Stripe takes card payments for trip packs and collects your billing address to work out UK VAT. Purchases are open to customers in the United Kingdom for now.
- Amazon Web Services hosts the app and its database.
- Amazon SES, part of Amazon Web Services, sends password reset emails to your address when you ask for one.
- Your browser's speech recogniser, Apple's or Google's depending on the browser, turns your voice into text for the speaking check in listen and repeat, and only after you tap the mic. No recording reaches Phrazl and none is stored here.
Sentry is also among the services Phrazl uses.
Two things are worth naming because they are not in place: there is no independent security audit or SOC 2 report, and there is no two-factor authentication. Sign-in is email and password. We would rather you read that here than guess at it.
Delete or download your data
- Download the JSON file first if you want to keep anything
Your account screen downloads a JSON file of everything held about you. Do that before you delete, because deletion does not leave you a copy.
- Delete a single trip and its review history
Open that trip's edit screen and delete the trip there. The destination, departure date, scenarios and the review history attached to that trip go with it. Your account and any other trips stay as they are.
- Delete the whole account
On your account screen, type your email address to confirm. The account, trips, review history, purchase records, support requests and paywall answers are removed in one transaction.
- Know what Stripe keeps
Stripe retains its own payment records as required by law. Deleting your Phrazl account removes Phrazl's purchase records, not Stripe's.
- Leave a guest trip unclaimed if you want it gone
A trip you built at /try sits under a random token in a cookie with no name or email. Sign up and it moves onto your account with its grades. Leave it unclaimed and it is deleted, cookie and all, after 7 days.
If it did not work, or you want to check something first
If the download does not arrive, the confirmation box does not accept your email address, or you removed something you needed back, email support@phrazl.com. Every message there lands in the support desk.
If you came here to work out what a purchase left behind rather than what a trip did, the account screen article covers the packs you own and what you paid. The articles on exporting your data and deleting your account walk those two screens through step by step, and the article on what Phrazl counts explains the funnel milestones in more detail.
There is no separate control for review history on its own: it is deleted with the trip it belongs to, or with the account.
Questions
Does deleting my account remove my purchase records?
Yes. The account, trips, review history, purchase records, support requests and paywall answers go in one transaction when you confirm deletion on the account screen. Stripe retains its own payment records as required by law.
Can I get a copy of my data without deleting anything?
Yes. The account screen downloads a JSON file of everything held about you, and downloading it changes nothing else.
How long is my data kept if I just stop using Phrazl?
It is kept while your account exists and removed when the account is deleted. Usage events are deleted after 16 weeks, and server logs roll off within 30 days.
Is my voice recorded during the speaking check?
No. Your browser's own speech recogniser, Apple's or Google's, turns your voice into text after you tap the mic. No recording reaches Phrazl and none is stored here.
Where is the database?
On Amazon Web Services, in a managed Postgres database, on the product's hosting stage. Amazon Web Services hosts the app and its database, and Amazon SES sends password reset emails when you ask for one.
Can I turn on two-factor authentication?
Not today. Sign-in is email and password. There is also no independent security audit or SOC 2 report.
What happens to the trip I set up at /try before making an account?
It is held under a random token in a cookie, with no name or email. Signing up moves that trip and its grades onto your account. An unclaimed one is deleted, cookie and all, after 7 days, and the milestones that counted it stay as a step name and a random id only.
Why does Phrazl keep a record of the paywall question?
Because it is the only way to learn why travellers walk away. It stores one chosen reason and an optional short note, at most once per trip, and it goes when the account goes.