Privacy Policy

1. Who we are

[[LEGAL_NAME]] ("we", "us") runs B4R, short for Buying 4 Retail, at buying4retail.com. B4R is appraisal software for used-car dealerships. It tells a buyer what is likely to go wrong with a vehicle and what that tends to cost, so the dealership can price a trade-in correctly.

This policy covers the website and app at buying4retail.com. It applies to people who visit the site and to the appraisers, managers and other dealership staff who use B4R with an account. If your dealership has an agreement with us, our Terms of Service and any order form also govern how we handle what the dealership puts into B4R.

2. What we collect when you make an account

You can look up vehicles without an account. You need one to save anything. When you make one, we collect:

• Your email address and password. Supabase, which runs our sign-in, stores the password as a one-way hash, not the password itself. We ask you to confirm your email address before the account works.
• Your name, as you type it at sign-up or later on your profile.
• Your store and your role (appraiser or manager). These are set when you create a store, join one with a code your manager gave you, or when a manager changes your role.
• Two-factor authentication, if you turn it on. Supabase stores the secret that links your authenticator app to your account. The QR code you scan is drawn in your browser from data Supabase sends; no outside QR service is involved.
• Sign-in records. Supabase keeps your signed-in session and records sign-in events, including the IP address and browser they came from.
• Invitations. When a colleague is invited to a store by email address, we keep that email address with the invitation, along with the store and the role.

If you sign in with Google or Microsoft

If you choose "Continue with Google" or "Continue with Microsoft", that company asks for your permission and then sends us basic profile information: your email address, your name, the ID that company uses for your account, whether your email address is verified and, where it provides one, a link to your profile picture. From Google we ask only for the openid, email and profile permissions. From Microsoft we ask only for openid, email, profile and User.Read (your basic profile). We don't ask either company for your mail, calendar, contacts or files, and B4R cannot see them.

Supabase stores that profile information with your account. B4R itself uses only your email address and your name. Section 12 covers this in more detail.

3. What your dealership enters about vehicles

Most of what B4R holds is work: vehicles your store looked at and what it decided. That data belongs to your dealership (see the Terms, section 6).

• Saved appraisals: the VIN, year, make, model, mileage, condition, the recon items you ticked, the outcome and the maximum-buy figure. Later, if you record them, what the car actually cost to buy, what recon actually cost, what it sold for, and a note.
• Savings records: the amount and reason attached to an appraisal you logged.
• Saved cars: the VIN, year, make, model, trim, mileage when saved, and who saved it.
• Walkaround photos of a saved car, taken on your phone or uploaded. They are kept in a private storage area, not at a public web address, and the app shows them through links that stop working after one hour. Anyone who has one of those links can open the photo until it expires. Photos can catch license plates, people, paperwork, the inside of a car or a customer's driveway, so take them with that in mind.
  • The app normally shrinks a photo on your phone before uploading it, which also strips the hidden data stored in the file, such as where the photo was taken. A photo that is already small enough, or that your browser cannot process (some HEIC files on a computer, for example), is uploaded as it is and keeps whatever the file contains, which can include its location.
• Community notes you write about a vehicle. A store note is visible only to your store. A public note can be read by anyone with a B4R account, and accounts are open to anyone who signs up, so that is not limited to dealership staff. The app shows a public note as coming from "another dealership", not with your name. But every account that reads a public note also receives your account identifier and your store identifier with it: random ID codes, not your name or your email address. Anyone who can link those codes to you can tell the note is yours.
• Change requests: corrections you suggest to our catalogue, with your reason. We review them, and may reply with a review note. Other members of your store can read your change requests, including your reason and our review note.
• Diagnose questions: the symptoms you type into Diagnose. We save each question with the vehicle, the matches it got, your store and the time, but not your name or account. Questions from every store are pooled into a list of common questions for each vehicle. Anyone with a B4R account can read the saved questions, including the store identifier stored with each one, and accounts are open to anyone who signs up. In a small store that can point back to you, so keep personal details out of Diagnose.
• Market ZIP code: the ZIP code you type on the Market tab, used for local market searches.

Things you enter that we don't keep

• Auction run sheets. When you upload a run list (PDF, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, CSV or text), your browser reads the file. Only the VINs found in it leave your device, to be decoded. We don't receive or store the file.
• Camera scans. When you scan the VIN barcode, the camera image is read on your device and only the VIN is used. A photo of the VIN plate is shown on your screen and is not uploaded.
• The customer condition report. It is put together in your browser from the vehicle's details, our catalogue and the store name you type. It contains no VIN, no valuation or offer, and no customer details; it does list typical repair-cost ranges. We don't store it; you copy it and send it yourself.

What we don't collect about your customers

B4R does not ask for the names, phone numbers, email addresses or home addresses of the dealership's customers, and there is no field for them anywhere in B4R. Information about a consumer can reach us only incidentally: a VIN and mileage, what is visible in a photo, or something a user types into a free-text note. Please don't put customer contact details into notes, change requests or Diagnose.

4. What we collect automatically

• Hosting logs. Vercel, which hosts buying4retail.com, records each request: the IP address, the browser and the address requested, including anything in that address. For a VIN lookup that includes the VIN; for a market search it includes the ZIP code.
• Database and sign-in logs. Supabase records requests to our database and sign-in service, with the IP address, the browser, the account making the request and the request itself, which can include a VIN.
• Page analytics. The B4R app page uses Vercel Web Analytics to count visits. For each page view it records the page address, the page you came from, an approximate location (country, region, city), your device type, operating system and browser. It uses no cookies. Vercel says it identifies a visit by a hash of the incoming request that it discards after 24 hours. We don't send it your name, email address or account. Before anything is sent to Vercel Web Analytics, B4R removes two things from the page address: everything after the # sign, which is where a sign-in link carries its sign-in details, and the ?join= and ?code= parameters, which can carry a store's join code. If an address can't be read well enough to remove them, nothing is sent. This Privacy Policy and the Terms of Service page don't load analytics.

5. Who receives data, and why

We use these services to run B4R. Each receives only what its part of the job needs.

People inside B4R who can see your data

• Your store. Members of your store see the store's saved appraisals and outcomes, saved cars, photos, store notes, past appraisals of the same VIN at your store, and the change requests anyone at the store has sent, including the free-text reason given and our review note. Managers also see the store's roster: each member's name, role, when the account was created, and activity (appraisals logged, last active, and recon dollars caught).
• Anyone with a B4R account. Accounts are open to anyone who signs up, so this is not limited to dealership staff. Any account can read public community notes, with the account and store identifiers stored with them, and saved Diagnose questions, with the store identifier stored with each one, as section 3 describes.
• Us. B4R's operator account can read every store's data, including appraisals, outcomes, notes, change requests, saved cars, photos, rosters, join codes and invitations, so that we can run, support and fix B4R.

Other disclosures

• If the law requires it, for example a valid subpoena or court order, or when we need to protect people's safety or defend our legal rights.
• If the business is sold or merged. The data would go with B4R to the new owner, and this policy would keep applying to it until account holders are told otherwise.
• Links you click. Some buttons open a Google or YouTube search built from the make, model, generation or engine, or a dealer's own listing page. Those sites' policies apply there. We don't add your data to those links.

6. What we don't do

• We don't sell personal information, and we don't share it for advertising based on your activity across other sites or apps.
• We don't show ads or pass data to data brokers, and we don't put advertising trackers or tracking pixels on B4R's pages.
• We don't use your data or your customers' data to train AI models, and Anthropic's terms don't allow it to train on what we send.
• We don't disclose personal information to anyone for their own direct marketing.

7. Cookies and browser storage

B4R sets no cookies. It keeps a few small items in your browser's local storage, which stays on your device:

• sb-ksanteomnghgjuhqybql-auth-token: your signed-in session, so you stay signed in. Signing out removes it.
• b4r.marketZip: the ZIP code you last used on the Market tab.
• b4r.apprSections: which Appraisal sections you opened or closed on a computer.
• b4r.brief.dismissed: the date you last dismissed the market brief strip.
• b4r.devStore: used only on our operator account, to remember which store it is viewing.

Vercel Web Analytics uses no cookies. Clearing this site's data in your browser removes all of the above. If you sign in with Google or Microsoft, their pages set their own cookies on their own sites.

8. How long we keep data

We have not set automatic time limits on most data. Here is what actually happens today:

• Your account and your store's work are kept while the account and store exist, until you or your store deletes them or asks us to.
• You can delete these yourself in the app: a saved appraisal (its savings record goes with it), a community note, a saved car (its photos go with it), a single photo, and two-factor authentication. Leaving a store, or being removed from one, does not delete what you saved there; it stays with the store.
• Deleting your account has no button yet. Email us (section 9). When we delete an account, its profile, saved appraisals, savings records, community notes and change requests are deleted with it. Saved cars and photos belong to the store, so they stay with the store unless the store asks us to delete them; they no longer point to you. Saved Diagnose questions are not tied to your account and stay in the pooled list.
• Cached lookups. We keep copies of answers from NHTSA and MarketCheck, including listing history for a VIN and market results for a ZIP code, so the same lookup does not cost another call. We stop using a copy after one day for market data and up to 30 days for government data. Expired copies are not deleted automatically yet; they stay in our database until we clear them.
• Photo links stop working after one hour. Join codes made in the app expire after 30 days.
• Logs held by Vercel and Supabase are deleted on those providers' own schedules for our plan.
• Anthropic deletes what we send within 30 days, with the exceptions in section 5.
• Backups. Deleted data can remain in our providers' backups and logs until those are replaced on the providers' schedules.

9. Seeing, correcting, exporting and deleting your data

• See and correct it yourself. Your name can be changed on your profile, under Account. Your saved appraisals, saved cars, photos and notes are all visible in the app.
• Ask us. Email [[CONTACT_EMAIL]] from the address on your account to ask for a copy of your data, a correction (including a change to your account's email address, which the app can't do yet), or deletion of your account. We will confirm the request is yours and answer within 45 days. There is no export button, so we send a copy in a common file format.
• Store records. Some requests are the dealership's to decide, such as deleting records that belong to the store. If yours is one of those, we'll tell you and work it out with the store.
• If you are a dealership's customer and think your vehicle's VIN, or a photo of you or your car, is in B4R, contact the dealership that appraised it. You can also email us.
• Google and Microsoft access can be removed from your account with them at any time (section 12).

We won't treat you differently for making any of these requests.

10. Security

• Connections to B4R and to our providers are encrypted (HTTPS).
• Every table in our database has row-level security switched on. It limits each account to its own records and its store's records, apart from the shared items and the operator access described in section 5.
• Photos are kept in a private storage area and shown through links that expire after one hour.
• Passwords are stored as one-way hashes, and two-factor authentication with an authenticator app is available to every account.
• The keys for MarketCheck, Anthropic and our database's administrative access are held on our server and never sent to your browser.

No system is perfectly secure. If a breach affects your personal information, we will notify affected account holders and dealerships without unreasonable delay and as the law requires.

11. Children

B4R is a business tool for dealership staff. It is not meant for anyone under 18, and we don't knowingly collect personal information from children. If you think a child has made an account, email us and we will delete it.

12. Google and Microsoft sign-in data

Google user data

• What we access. With the openid, email and profile permissions: your name, email address, Google account ID, whether your email address is verified, and a link to your profile picture. Nothing else. B4R has no access to your Gmail, Drive, Calendar or Contacts.
• How we use it. To create your B4R account and sign you in, to show your name and email address on your profile, and to show your name to your store's managers. We don't use it for advertising, we don't sell it, and we don't use it to train AI models.
• Who we share it with. It is stored by Supabase, our sign-in provider. We don't transfer it to anyone else, except where the law requires it or with a sale of the business as section 5 describes.
• How we protect it. As section 10 describes.
• How long we keep it, and deleting it. For as long as your B4R account exists. It is deleted with the account; email us to delete it. You can also remove B4R's access at any time from your Google Account (myaccount.google.com/connections). Removing it withdraws the permission you gave B4R; if you choose "Continue with Google" again later, Google asks you for that permission again. Removing it does not sign you out of B4R where you are already signed in, and it does not delete your B4R account or the profile information already stored with it. To end a session, sign out in B4R; to delete the account, email us.

B4R's use and transfer of information received from Google APIs adheres to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.

Microsoft

Microsoft sign-in works the same way. We receive the basic profile information in section 2, use it only to create your account and sign you in, and keep it with your account until the account is deleted. You can remove B4R's access in your Microsoft account settings, or, for a work account, ask your IT administrator. As with Google, removing access does not sign you out of B4R or delete your account.

13. California privacy disclosures

These disclosures are made under the California Online Privacy Protection Act and the other California laws named below.

• Categories of personal information we collect: identifiers (name, email address, IP address, account IDs from Google or Microsoft); account credentials; work information (store and role); vehicle information that can relate to a person (VINs, mileage, and photographs); the free text you type; and device and usage information (browser, device type, approximate location, pages visited).
• Categories of third parties we share it with: hosting and database providers, an email delivery provider, vehicle-data and market-data providers, an AI provider, sign-in providers you choose, and content delivery networks, all named in section 5.
• Reviewing and changing your information: section 9.
• How we tell you about changes to this policy: section 15.
• Effective date: shown at the top of this page.

California Do Not Track disclosures

B4R does not track you across other websites over time, and we have not put advertising or cross-site tracking tools on it. Because there is no cross-site tracking to turn off, B4R does not change what it does when your browser sends a Do Not Track signal or a Global Privacy Control signal. No third party collects personal information about your online activity over time and across different websites through B4R. The content delivery services in section 5 receive your IP address and browser details when your browser fetches files from them, and their own policies cover what they do with that.

California Consumer Privacy Act

The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) applies to businesses above certain thresholds: more than $26,625,000 in annual revenue, buying, selling or sharing the personal information of 100,000 or more California consumers or households, or earning half of annual revenue from selling or sharing personal information. We don't meet any of them, so the CCPA does not apply to us directly. Some dealerships that use B4R are covered by it. For those dealerships we act as a service provider: we process the personal information they put into B4R only to provide B4R to them as this policy and our Terms describe, and we don't sell or share it as the CCPA defines those words. Whatever the law requires of us, you can make the requests in section 9.

Direct marketing (California Civil Code section 1798.83)

We don't disclose personal information to third parties for their direct marketing purposes.

14. Where data is processed

B4R is run from and for the United States. Our database is hosted in the United States. Our other providers may process data in the United States and in other countries where they operate; Vercel's network, for example, serves the site from locations around the world.

15. Changes to this policy

When this policy changes, we update the effective date at the top. For a material change, such as collecting a new kind of data, sending data to a new service or using it in a new way, we will email account holders at the address on their account at least 30 days before the change takes effect. Earlier versions are available on request.

16. Contact us