Privacy Policy
This policy explains how Playlee handles personal data in Playlee Clubs, Playlee Tournaments, the tournament directory, Playlee Accounts, our websites and our apps, and who is responsible for it. It is written for the UK GDPR, the EU GDPR and related national rules.
Who we are
Playlee is operated by Playlee Limited, a private limited company registered in England and Wales with company number 17197208. Our registered office is 433 Rotherham Road, Barnsley, United Kingdom, S71 1UX. Contact us about privacy at support@playlee.com.
Who is responsible for your data
Who is responsible (the "controller") depends on the product and on why the data is used:
- Clubs: a club using Playlee Clubs is the controller of the information it collects and manages about its members, players, parents and guardians, coaches and volunteers, such as registrations, medical and consent information, documents, payments, availability, messages and, in Playlee Accounts, its books. Playlee processes that information on the club's behalf.
- Tournament organisers: an organiser using Playlee Tournaments is the controller of the information about teams, players, guardians, referees and ticket buyers collected for their event. Playlee processes that information on the organiser's behalf.
- Playlee: we are the controller for Playlee accounts and sign-in, security and fraud prevention, support, our own billing (paid tournament plans and Playlee Accounts subscriptions), analytics and error monitoring, our own marketing, the tournament directory, and our records of grassroots clubs and their officials.
- Shared family details: when a family belongs to more than one club on Playlee, some of a child's details, including identity and medical information, are held once and shown to each club the family has joined, so that parents do not have to enter them again. Each club is responsible for its own use of those details. Playlee is responsible for keeping the shared record and for showing it only to the clubs the family has joined.
If you have a question about data a club or organiser holds about you, contact them first. You can also contact us and we will pass your request to the right club or organiser and help them respond.
What we collect
What we hold depends on how Playlee is used:
- Accounts: name, email address, phone number, sign-in details, your marketing preferences and the roles you hold in clubs or tournaments.
- Playlee Clubs: player and member details entered by parents or the club, such as name, date of birth, gender, school year, address and FA number; parent and guardian contact details; medical, allergy and accessibility information; consents such as photo and medical consent; player photos and identity documents for league registration; volunteer and coach qualifications and checks; fixtures, availability, attendance and match information; payment plans, invoices and payment status; and messages sent in the app.
- Playlee Tournaments: organiser details; team entries and contact details; player names and dates of birth where an organiser collects them; guardian details; referee details, qualifications and identity checks, and, for under-18 referees, a parent's or guardian's contact details and consent; fixtures and results; and ticket buyers' names and email addresses.
- Tournament directory: tournament details and the organiser contact details published with a listing, and the information you give when you submit or claim a listing.
- Grassroots club records: the names and club roles of club officials, the contact details published for that role, and where and when we found them (see "Grassroots club records" below).
- Payments: Stripe collects and processes card and bank details. Playlee does not store full card numbers; we keep references, amounts and payment status.
- Devices and usage: device and push-notification identifiers, IP address, browser and app information, error reports and how the service is used. If you allow it, the apps use your approximate location to show tournaments near you; it is rounded and not stored.
- Support: messages you send us, including conversations with our support assistant, which is an automated AI assistant rather than a person.
We collect this information from you, from your club or tournament organiser, from a parent or guardian (for children's details), from Stripe (payment status) and, for directory listings and grassroots club records, from public sources such as league, county FA, governing body and club websites.
You need to give us your name and an email address or mobile number to create an account. Clubs and organisers decide which details they need for a registration or entry; if you do not give them, they may not be able to accept it.
How we use data and our legal bases
Where Playlee is the controller, we use personal data on these legal bases:
- Contract: to provide your account and the features you or your club or organiser use, process payments and send service messages.
- Legitimate interests: to secure and improve the service, prevent fraud and abuse, diagnose errors (including session replays), understand how the product is used, run the tournament directory, alert our team to new sign-ups, keep records of grassroots clubs, and contact clubs and their officials about Playlee. Our interest is running a safe, working service for grassroots sport and telling clubs about it. You can object to this use at any time.
- Legal obligation: to keep financial records and respond to lawful requests.
- Consent: for Google Analytics, and for marketing emails to account holders who have agreed to receive them. You can withdraw consent at any time.
Where we process data for a club or organiser, we use it only on their instructions and to provide the service to them.
Some directory submissions are checked and then published or declined automatically. If you think a decision about your submission is wrong, contact us and a person will look at it again. We do not make any other decisions about you solely by automated means that have legal or similarly significant effects on you.
Children and sensitive information
Playlee is used to run youth sport, so it holds information about children. Children do not normally have their own Playlee account: their details are added by a parent or guardian, or by a club or organiser. Clubs and organisers are responsible for having a lawful basis for that information and for collecting any consents they rely on. Under-18 referees can take part in tournaments, and an organiser can require a parent's or guardian's consent, which we ask for through a link sent to the parent or guardian.
Medical, allergy and accessibility information is collected by clubs to keep players safe. Health information is special category data, and the club is responsible for having a condition for it under data protection law, such as the explicit consent of a parent or guardian. It is not public: only the family and the people the club has given access to in Playlee Clubs can see it. Player photos and identity documents uploaded for league registration are kept in private storage, not on public pages.
Clubs can use a tool to prepare a player's registration photo, such as cropping it or tidying the background. The photo is prepared on the device first; if that does not give a good result, the photo is sent to OpenAI to prepare it.
We do not use children's information for our own marketing or advertising.
Grassroots club records
To build the tournament directory, link fixtures between clubs and tell clubs about Playlee, we keep records of grassroots clubs and of the officials whose contact details have been published for a club role, for example on league, county FA, governing body or club websites. We hold their name, role and club, the contact details published for that role, and where and when we found them.
We contact clubs by email, using the secretary's or the club's general contact details. If an official has published a personal email address for their club role, we may use it. We do not use contact details published only for a welfare or safeguarding officer for marketing, and we do not send marketing text messages to personal mobile numbers. Each email says where we found the address and how to stop further emails.
We rely on legitimate interests: telling grassroots clubs about a service built for them. Some of this work uses automated tools, including OpenAI and TypeSafe, to check public club information and to draft emails. You can object, ask us to stop contacting you or ask us to delete your details at any time, by replying to our email, using its unsubscribe link or emailing support@playlee.com. If you ask us to stop, we keep a note of your email address so that we do not contact you again.
A publicly available contact address is not, by itself, consent to marketing. Legitimate interests under data protection law do not replace any consent required by electronic-marketing law.
The referee directory
Referees can choose to list themselves in the Playlee referee directory so that tournament organisers near them can find and invite them. Listing is opt-in: you tick a box to be listed, and you need a Playlee account with a verified mobile number.
- What organisers see: your first name and surname initial, your town, a distance band (for example "within 10 miles"), your level, County FA, whether you are a registered referee, a "mobile verified" tick and, if it applies, an "Under 18" badge.
- What stays private: your mobile number, email address, home postcode and exact distance. Your postcode is used only to work out which tournaments are within your travel distance. Contact goes through Playlee messages until you accept an organiser's invite; the organiser of a tournament you accept then sees the contact details needed to run it.
- Under-18s: a referee under 18 is listed only after a parent or guardian confirms by email. We record their name, email address and answer, and they can withdraw consent at any time, which removes the listing straight away.
- Stopping: you can stop listing yourself at any time from your referee account on the website or in the Playlee app. You leave the directory immediately.
Retention: your directory listing (postcode, town, travel distance, level and bio) is deleted when you delete your Playlee account. Messages between you and an organiser are kept with that tournament's records for 12 months after they are sent and then deleted.
International transfers
Our database and private file storage are in the EU (Frankfurt). Some providers are based in, or process data in, countries outside the UK and the EEA, including the United States: for example Vercel, Stripe, Google, Apple, OpenAI, TypeSafe, Twilio and Telegram.
Transfers may be covered by an applicable UK or EEA adequacy decision, including a relevant Data Privacy Framework certification where it covers the recipient and the transfer. Where adequacy does not apply, a restricted transfer needs another valid route: for example, the UK International Data Transfer Agreement or UK Addendum for UK transfers, or EU standard contractual clauses for EEA transfers, with any additional safeguards required. You can ask us which route applies to a provider and how to obtain a copy of the relevant safeguards.
How long we keep data
- Account data is kept while your account is open. When you delete your account, we remove your sign-in details, contact information, device tokens and notification settings, and the account is marked as deleted.
- Club and tournament records are kept for as long as the club or organiser uses Playlee, unless they delete them sooner. Clubs can anonymise a member who leaves; payment records are kept, labelled as a deleted member.
- Financial and payment records are kept for as long as tax and accounting law requires, usually six years in the UK.
- Directory listings drop out of search once the tournament has finished.
- Grassroots club records are kept while the club and the published contact details remain current. If you ask us to stop contacting you, we keep only what we need to make sure we do not contact you again.
- Support conversations, error reports and analytics are kept only for as long as we need them to answer you, fix problems and understand how Playlee is used.
- Your cookie choice is stored in a 12-month cookie and in local storage without an automatic expiry. You can change it through the cookie controls or clear this site’s browser storage.
Your rights
Depending on where you live, you can ask to access, correct or delete your data, restrict or object to how it is used, receive it in a portable format, and withdraw consent. You can object to our use of your data for marketing at any time, and we will stop. To make a request, email support@playlee.com. We may need to confirm your identity first. Making a request is free, and we will respond within one month, or tell you within that month if a complex request needs longer.
If your request is about data a club or organiser controls, we will pass it to them and help them respond. Clubs can export a member's data and anonymise a member from within Playlee Clubs. You can delete your Playlee account from the account settings in the Playlee app, or see our account deletion page.
Complaints and regulators
If you are unhappy with how we have handled your data, please contact support@playlee.com first so we can try to put things right. We will acknowledge your complaint within 30 days and tell you the outcome without undue delay.
You can also complain to your data protection authority. In the UK this is the Information Commissioner's Office. In the Netherlands it is the Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens. In Austria it is the Datenschutzbehörde. In Germany it is usually the data protection authority of your federal state. In Ireland it is the Data Protection Commission. In Belgium it is the Data Protection Authority (Gegevensbeschermingsautoriteit / Autorité de protection des données). In France it is the CNIL. In Spain it is the Agencia Española de Protección de Datos (AEPD). In Italy it is the Garante per la protezione dei dati personali.
Changes to this policy
We will update this policy when the way we handle data changes, and show the date of the latest version at the top of this page. Translations are intended to give the same information. If you find a difference, contact support@playlee.com for clarification. No language-precedence rule limits your data protection rights.