Privacy Policy

Guides That Work ("we," "us," or "our") is operated by Tony Tam. This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect when you use our website at guidesthatwork.com, how we use it, and your rights regarding that information. We believe in being straightforward, so this is written in plain English rather than dense legalese.

Information We Collect

When you create an account or make a purchase, we collect:

• Account information — your email address and display name, provided when you sign up via email/password or Google OAuth.
• Payment information — when you purchase a guide or subscribe, your payment is processed entirely by Stripe. We never see, store, or have access to your full credit card number. We receive only a transaction confirmation and basic billing details (last four digits, billing country) from Stripe.
• Usage data — which guides you have purchased or downloaded, forum posts you create, and general interaction with the site.

Cookies and Analytics

We use Firebase Analytics (provided by Google) to understand how visitors use our site. This may set cookies on your device to track anonymous usage patterns such as page views, session duration, and referral sources. These cookies do not contain your personal information.

Firebase Authentication also uses cookies and local storage to keep you signed in across sessions. These are essential for the site to function and cannot be disabled without losing login functionality.

How We Use Your Information

We use the information we collect to:

• Create and manage your account
• Process purchases and deliver PDF guides
• Manage your subscription (if applicable)
• Send email notifications about purchases, guide updates, subscription changes, and discount codes via Amazon SES
• Provide customer support
• Improve our guides and website based on aggregate usage patterns

We do not sell, rent, or share your personal information with third parties for their marketing purposes.

Third-Party Services

We rely on the following trusted third-party services to operate Guides That Work:

• Stripe — payment processing. Stripe handles all credit card data securely under their own Privacy Policy.
• Amazon SES (AWS) — transactional email delivery for purchase confirmations, subscription updates, and guide update notifications.
• Firebase / Google Cloud — hosting, authentication, database (Firestore), file storage, and analytics. Google's privacy practices are described in their Privacy Policy.

Each of these services has their own privacy policies and data handling practices. We encourage you to review them.

Data Retention

We retain your account information and purchase history for as long as your account is active or as needed to provide you with access to your purchased guides and subscription benefits. If you request account deletion, we will remove your personal data within 30 days, though we may retain anonymized transaction records as required for accounting and legal purposes.

Your Rights

You have the right to:

• Access your data — request a copy of the personal information we hold about you.
• Correct your data — update your email or display name through your account settings.
• Delete your account — request full deletion of your account and associated personal data by emailing us.
• Export your data — request your purchase history and account information in a portable format.

Security

We take reasonable measures to protect your information. All data is transmitted over HTTPS. Passwords are hashed by Firebase Authentication and never stored in plain text. Payment data is handled entirely by Stripe, which is PCI DSS Level 1 certified. PDF download links are time-limited signed URLs that expire after 5 minutes.

Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. If we make significant changes, we will notify you by email or by posting a notice on the site. The "Last updated" date at the top of this page reflects the most recent revision.

Contact Us

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or want to exercise any of your data rights, please contact us at tony@guidesthatwork.com.