Privacy policy

Competently Ltd (“we”, “us”, “our”), a company registered in England and Wales (company number 17330828), operates competently.ai and is the controller of the personal data described below. This page explains what we collect, why, the legal basis we rely on, who we share it with, how long we keep it, and your rights. Questions go to hello@competently.ai.

Data we collect

• Account data - your name and email address, collected at sign-up through our authentication provider, Clerk.
• Study data - the questions you are served, your results (marks, percentages and whether you passed), topics studied, and your progress over time.
• Written answers - when you submit a written answer it is sent to our AI provider to be marked. We do not store the text of your answer; we keep only the result.
• Subscription and purchase data - your plan, any single-exam purchases (the exam, the amount paid and when access ends), the start and end dates of any free trial, any invite code you redeemed and when your complimentary access ends, or that you tried after all its places had gone, the identifiers Stripe gives your customer record and subscription, and a record that you confirmed at checkout that your access should start straight away. We never see or store your card details: payments are handled entirely by Stripe.
• Usage records - a log of each AI request made on your behalf (the type of task, the model used and the number of tokens), which we use to monitor cost and reliability. These records hold your account ID but no answer content.
• Emails you send us, and any feedback you choose to give.

How we use it, and our legal basis

• To provide the service - running your account, serving and marking questions, and tracking your progress. Legal basis: contract (it is necessary to provide what you signed up for).
• To take payment and manage your subscription or trial. Legal basis: contract.
• To contact you about your account and the service - for example welcome messages, changes that affect you, and asking how you are finding Competently. Legal basis: legitimate interests (keeping you informed and improving the service). You can ask us to stop at any time.
• To improve the service, and to keep it secure and within budget, including reviewing usage records and feedback. Legal basis: legitimate interests.
• To keep our question banks big enough - we monitor how much of each topic's question bank a learner has used. When a learner has seen most of a topic, our team receives an internal email with their email address and the topic, so we can add more questions. We record that the alert was sent so it is sent only once, and delete that record with your account. Legal basis: legitimate interests.
• To keep financial records required by UK tax law. Legal basis: legal obligation.
• To tell our team about invite codes - when a code’s last place is taken, or someone tries a code whose places have gone, our team is sent a short internal notification that includes the person’s email address. If you try a code after its places have gone, we keep your email so we can contact you if a place opens up. Legal basis: legitimate interests.

We do not send marketing emails unless you have agreed to receive them, and every such email will let you opt out. AI marking is study feedback only: it does not make any decision about you with legal or similarly significant effect.

Who we share it with

We use the following providers, each acting on our behalf and only for the purposes above. We do not sell your data.

• Supabase - our database, hosted in the EU (Frankfurt, Germany).
• Vercel - hosts the website and application, running in its EU (Frankfurt) region.
• Clerk - sign-in and account management.
• Stripe - payments and subscription billing.
• Resend - sends emails on our behalf, including internal notifications to our team.
• Tally - runs the feedback forms linked from our emails. It receives what you choose to enter in a form.
• Our team messaging tool - may receive the same internal notifications.
• Anthropic - the AI that generates questions and marks written answers. Your answers are sent to Anthropic to be marked. Anthropic does not use data sent through its API to train its models, and keeps it only for a limited period under its commercial terms.

International transfers

Clerk, Stripe, Anthropic, Vercel and Resend are based in the United States, so some of your data may be processed there. Where it is, the transfer is protected by the UK’s approved safeguards, such as the UK International Data Transfer Addendum to the EU standard contractual clauses, or the UK-US data bridge where the provider is certified under it.

How long we keep it

• Account and study data - for as long as your account is open. When your account is deleted, your account record, results, progress and invite-code records are deleted with it.
• Written answers - not stored by us.
• Billing and payment records - kept for six years to meet UK tax requirements. This includes records of payment events that Stripe sends us, which can contain your name and email address.
• Usage records - kept while needed to monitor cost and reliability. After your account is deleted they remain linked only to an account ID that no longer matches any account, and they contain no answer content.
• Internal team notifications - copies remain in our team’s email and messaging tools until we delete them, which you can ask us to do.
• Questions you caused to be generated - the questions themselves stay in our question bank, as they contain nothing about you. They may carry the account ID that requested them.

Cookies

We use only strictly necessary cookies. Clerk sets a session cookie so you stay signed in as you move between pages. We do not use advertising, analytics or third-party tracking cookies.

Your rights

Under UK data protection law you have the right to access the personal data we hold about you, to have it corrected, to have it deleted, to restrict or object to how we use it, and to receive it in a portable form. To use any of these rights, including to delete your account, email hello@competently.ai. We will respond within one month. Deleting your account also cancels any active subscription.

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your data, please tell us first so we can put it right. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK data protection regulator, at ico.org.uk or on 0303 123 1113.

Changes to this policy

If we make a significant change to how we use your data, we will update this page and, where appropriate, tell you by email.

Contact

Competently Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 17330828.
Email hello@competently.ai.