Privacy Policy

Last updated: 26 May 2026

1. Introduction

Lay The Terms is built for sensitive documents. Our privacy approach is simple: collect less, explain clearly, process only what is needed, avoid selling personal information, and give users practical control over uploaded content and reports.

This Privacy Policy explains how Lay The Terms collects, uses, stores, and protects personal information. We are designed with the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) in mind and aim for transparent privacy handling consistent with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth).

2. Who we are

Lay The Terms is an AI contract scanner and fine print risk checker. This service is operated from New South Wales, Australia. For privacy-related enquiries, contact privacy@laytheterms.com.

3. What information we collect

We collect only the information reasonably necessary to provide document analysis, account access, billing, support, security, and service improvement.

• Account information: email address, name (via Clerk authentication), and account preferences.
• Uploaded documents: PDFs, Word documents, pasted text, screenshots, and public URLs that you submit for analysis.
• Generated reports: the analysis results, Soul Scale scores, and flagged clauses produced from your uploads.
• Usage data: Quick Review and Deep Report usage, feature use, and error logs to help us improve the service.
• Billing information: payment metadata processed by Stripe (we do not store full card details).
• Support communications: emails or messages you send to our support team.

4. How we use your information

• To generate contract analysis reports and display them to you.
• To manage your account, authentication, and saved reports.
• To process payments and manage subscriptions.
• To provide customer support and respond to enquiries.
• To improve our clause detection, scoring, and report quality.
• To maintain security and detect abuse or unauthorised access.

5. Uploaded documents and generated reports

When you upload a document, screenshot, image, URL, or text, we process that content to generate your analysis report. We do not sell uploaded documents or personal information.

Uploaded documents remain yours. Lay The Terms does not claim ownership of your contracts, screenshots, PDFs, images, URLs, or text. You give us permission to process uploaded content only so we can provide, secure, debug, improve, and support the service.

We encourage users not to upload documents containing highly sensitive personal information unless they are comfortable with that information being processed for analysis.

6. AI and third-party providers

Uploaded content may be processed by trusted infrastructure, storage, OCR, and AI service providers where necessary to deliver the service. These may include:

• Clerk (authentication and identity)
• Stripe (payments and billing)
• Supabase (database and storage)
• Vercel (hosting and analytics)
• OpenRouter / OpenAI (cloud AI analysis for Deep Reports)

We choose providers with strong security practices and aim to minimise data sharing to what is necessary.

7. Storage and retention

Uploaded documents may be retained temporarily to generate, display, debug, and improve reports. We aim to minimise retention and allow users to request deletion of uploaded documents and associated reports.

• Uploaded documents: retained while needed to generate and display reports, then deleted within 7 days unless saved by the user.
• Saved reports: retained while the user account remains active unless deleted by the user.
• Anonymous uploads: deleted within 7 days.
• Error and security logs: retained for up to 90 days.
• Backups: may persist up to 30 days after deletion.
• Billing records: retained as legally required for tax and accounting purposes.
• Aggregated analytics: retained indefinitely only when non-identifiable.

8. Deletion requests

You may delete uploaded documents and reports from your account dashboard where available, or request deletion by contacting privacy@laytheterms.com. We will action deletion requests within a reasonable timeframe, subject to technical and legal constraints.

9. Overseas processing

Some providers we use may store or process data outside Australia, including in the United States and Europe. By using Lay The Terms, you acknowledge that your data may be transferred to and processed in jurisdictions with different privacy laws.

10. Security

We use reasonable technical and organisational safeguards to protect uploaded documents, reports, account data, and service infrastructure. These safeguards include encrypted connections (HTTPS), access controls, provider-level security tools, logging, monitoring, and restricted administrative access.

No online service can guarantee absolute security. Users should avoid uploading documents containing unnecessary sensitive information.

Lay The Terms is designed to minimise document exposure. We do not sell uploaded documents, and Deep Reports are only sent to AI providers when the user requests premium analysis.

11. Cookies and analytics

Lay The Terms uses essential cookies and similar technologies to keep the site secure, maintain login sessions, remember preferences, process payments, and understand basic site performance. We do not use cookies to read uploaded documents.

12. Access and correction

You have the right to access and correct the personal information we hold about you. Contact privacy@laytheterms.com to make a request.

13. Complaints

If you believe we have breached your privacy rights, please contact us at privacy@laytheterms.com. If you are not satisfied with our response, you may lodge a complaint with the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC).

14. Notifiable Data Breaches

If a notifiable data breach occurs (unauthorised access, disclosure, or loss of personal information likely to result in serious harm), we will assess the breach and notify affected individuals and the OAIC where required under the Notifiable Data Breaches scheme.

15. Changes to this policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. Changes will be posted on this page with an updated date.

16. Contact

For privacy, deletion, and data-related enquiries: privacy@laytheterms.com