How your data is looked after
The short version: your list works without an account and stays on your phone. If you sign in, your lists are kept in your account so they work on your other devices and can be shared. Where you are is never collected. Nothing is sold, and there are no adverts or tracking.
On your phone
Your list, what you’ve bought, which shop you usually buy things at, and the order you tick things in each shop are kept in this browser on your phone, as are your visits to shops (which items you ticked together, so a receipt can be checked against them and offered once, after you shop). “I’m here” is something you tap; the app never reads your location. You can clear all of it under Your lists, Your data.
In your account, if you sign in
- Your email address (to send sign-in codes) and the name you choose.
- Your lists and their items, notes, shops and ticks, and who added or is getting each item.
- What you bought and when (from your ticks), for “Running low?” suggestions. Kept for a year.
- Receipts you choose to keep: the shop, the day, the total and what was bought with its price. Card, loyalty and till lines and any numbers that could identify you are removed first. The photo itself is never kept. Kept until you delete them.
- The prices you’ve paid, worked out from those receipts, shown beside your items. Prices over a year old are no longer shown.
Reading a receipt from a photo
If you take a photo of a receipt, it is sent once to an AI service that reads the shop, the day and the lines, and the result comes back for you to check. ShopTrail doesn’t keep the photo. You can always type a receipt in instead.
Who sees what in a shared list
People in a shared list see its items, notes and ticks, who added them, and who said “I’ll get this”, by the name each person chose. They never see your email, your own list, your purchase history, your receipts or the prices you’ve paid, or anything you mark “Only me”. The database itself enforces this, not just the app. If you leave, your “Only me” items go with you.
Sharing the order you tick things (optional)
To help everyone’s lists match the shop, you can choose to share the order you tick things at supermarket chains. You’re asked once, and can switch it on or off under Your lists. Only the chain (for example Lidl), the kinds of item in the order you ticked them (fruit and veg, bread, dairy…) and the day are sent. Nothing links it to you: not your name, account, list, items, the branch, the time or where you are. Because it can’t be traced back to you, it can’t be picked out to delete; it’s dropped after a year.
Shop layouts
When you put a supermarket on a trip (for example Asda South Ruislip), its name is added to a list ShopTrail’s staff use to map each shop’s aisles, with a count of how many trips it’s been on. Nothing on that list says who added it. If you’re signed in and set a supermarket’s aisle order, that order is sent for staff to check, kept against your account (one per shop) so a new one replaces your old one, and staff see it without your name or email. It’s deleted once staff have dealt with it, or with your account. A checked layout holds only the order of the groups, and is used for everyone at that shop.
Helping match products (optional)
Receipts word things in their own way (“TESCO WHOLEMLK 2L”). If you choose to help, when you keep a receipt from a supermarket chain, each line’s wording and the product it turned out to be (for example whole milk, 2 litres, own brand) go into a shared list that helps everyone’s receipts be understood. You’re asked once, and can switch it on or off under Your lists. Only the chain, the wording and the product are kept: not your name, account, list, the branch, the day or what you paid. Because nothing links it to you, it can’t be picked out to delete. Receipts from other shops are never shared.
Sharing prices (optional)
To let everyone compare shops, you can choose to share the prices on your supermarket receipts. You’re asked once, and can switch it on or off under Your lists. For each thing bought, only the product, the chain, the week (not the day) and the price are kept, each on its own: not your name, account, list, the branch, the day or the rest of the receipt. Because nothing links them to you, they can’t be picked out to delete; they’re dropped after a year. Receipts from other shops are never shared.
Offers
Offers you report, and whether you say an offer is still on or gone, are shown to everyone without your name. Your account is kept against them so you can take an offer back and to stop misuse: ShopTrail’s staff can see who reported an offer, and can remove offers and stop an account from reporting more. Offers marked “From the leaflet” were entered by staff. If you delete your account, your answers go, and offers you reported stay without any link to you. Offers are deleted a month after they end.
Trips, reminders and shops near you
A trip’s list is kept like any other list. “Shops near here” uses your location only when you tap it and your phone allows it: it is rounded to about 100 metres, used once to ask OpenStreetMap (through our server) for food shops nearby, and never kept, logged or shown to anyone, including people in a trip group. If you turn on reminders near your shops, ShopTrail checks where you are only while it’s open, on your phone, against your shops’ places (also kept only on your phone); nothing about where you are is sent anywhere, and no one else is told you’re near a shop. Nothing in ShopTrail follows where you go.
CoManTra (optional)
If you connect CoManTra (a money app) under Your lists, you allow it on CoManTra’s own page, and CoManTra gives ShopTrail a key that is kept on our server, never on your phone. With it, ShopTrail can see the names of the CoManTra books you can add to, and send the receipts you choose (or all of them, if you say so): the shop, the day, the lines, the total and a link back to the receipt here. It can’t see anything else in CoManTra. If you change or delete such an entry in CoManTra, ShopTrail leaves it as it is. Deleting a receipt here takes its entry out of CoManTra too, unless you changed it there. Disconnect at any time here or in CoManTra; entries already there stay there.
Emails are only sign-in codes, sent through an email delivery service. No newsletters or marketing.
Cookies and tracking
None. The app keeps your list in your browser’s storage so it works offline; that’s all.
Your rights
You can download everything kept about you, or delete your account and everything that is only yours, at any time under Your lists, Your data. Shared lists carry on for the others, without your private items. For anything else, email [email protected]. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ico.org.uk).
Shop names
Shop names, colours and logos belong to the shops. They are shown only to say which shop a list is for; ShopTrail has no link with any of them.