Privacy Policy

The short version

This policy covers two apps: Bench Buddy (substitution rotations for football teams) and Bench Buddy Cricket (scoring, line-ups, live scores and availability for junior cricket clubs). Both store the information that coaches, clubs and parents type in, so the apps can do their job. It is never sold, never used for advertising, and there is no advertising or tracking in either app. Children's information is entered by the adults around them, and the apps show children by first name only (football) or first name and last initial (cricket).

Who we are

Bench Buddy and Bench Buddy Cricket are run by Jared Rakich, trading as Bench Buddy Sports, based in New Zealand (“we”, “us”). Contact: hello@benchbuddysports.com.

In Bench Buddy Cricket, a cricket club decides what goes into its own part of the app. We provide the tool and store the information on the club's behalf. The club is responsible for having the right to enter its players' information, normally through the registration it already runs with parents.

What Bench Buddy (football) holds

• What you type in: your team's name, the names and shirt numbers of the players you add, and the game settings you choose (squad size, game length, sub interval, goalkeeper rules).
• Your account: if you sign in (for example with Google), the app receives the basic profile information that sign-in method provides, typically your name and email address, so your teams are saved to your account rather than lost when you close the app.
• Emails the app sends for you, for example when you hand over a match.

Bench Buddy does not ask for a child's date of birth, address, photo, or any contact details for a player. A player's entry in a roster is a first name and, optionally, a shirt number, entered by the coach running the team, not by the child. Your teams are readable only by your own signed-in account.

What Bench Buddy Cricket holds

• Club information that a club's administrators enter: the club's name, crest and colours, home ground, a contact person for match days, its competitions, fixtures, squads and teams.
• Players (children): a club or coach enters each player's first and last name, which squad and team they are in, and, through parents, whether they can play each week. The app shows children as a first name and last initial. It does not ask for a child's date of birth, address, photo, or contact details. Players do not sign in themselves.
• Match records: batting orders, who bowled, every ball, scorecards and results, with the names of the players involved.
• Coaches and club administrators: name, email address, and the role and squads they have been given.
• Parents and guardians: an email address (checked when they sign in), the name Google provides if they use Google sign-in, which child or children they have linked themselves to, and their replies about whether a child can play each week, with the time they replied.
• Scorers: anyone who scores a match, whether an umpire, a coach or a parent, signs in first, with Google or an emailed one-time link. The match records the email address they signed in with, so the club can see who scored it. If a coach emails someone a link to score a match, we send that email; it contains the recipient's email address, the match name and the club's name.
• Visitors who only watch: someone with a live scores link can watch without signing in. The app gives them an anonymous identifier so it can remember that they entered a valid link. It holds no name or email for them, and with it they cannot change anything.
• Technical information: if the app crashes, it sends a short report (the error, the web address, the type of phone or browser, and the anonymous identifier) so we can fix it. To stop misuse, the app briefly keeps a scrambled (hashed) record of how many sign-in emails an address has asked for in the past hour. The app also keeps a few small items on your device so it works: the email you asked a sign-in link for until you finish signing in, the last club you used, and a device identifier.

Neither app uses advertising or analytics cookies or trackers.

Why we use it

Only to run the apps: building rotations, line-ups, scoring, live scores, availability, signing people in, recording who scored a match, and sending the emails the apps need to send (sign-in links, scorer invitations, match hand-overs). We do not use it for advertising, we do not build profiles, and we do not sell or rent it.

Who can see it

In Bench Buddy, only the signed-in account that owns a team can read it. In Bench Buddy Cricket:

• Coaches see the squads they look after. Club administrators see their own club. Neither can see another club.
• Parents who have linked a child see that child's team's fixtures and can reply about that child. They cannot see other families' details.
• Anyone with the club's live scores link can see fixtures, scores and the names of the players in them (as first name and last initial).
• Anyone with a squad's parent invite link can see the squad's children listed as first name and last initial, so a parent can choose their own. Clubs should share these links only in private team chats.
• Scoring or changing a match always needs a signed-in email address, and the match shows whose it was. Watching does not.

We can reach the information when needed to run the services and to help a club or coach.

Other organisations we use

These handle information only to provide the services, and only on our behalf:

• Google (Firebase and Google Cloud) runs the apps, stores their data, and handles sign-in. The data is stored in Sydney, Australia. Google sign-in gives us your name and email address.
• Resend, a US email delivery service, sends the emails described above. It receives the recipient's email address and the email's content.
• GoDaddy holds our domain name and handles its web address records. It receives no app data.

We do not share information with anyone else, except where the law requires it.

Keeping it and removing it

We keep information until the coach, club or person who entered it removes it, or asks us to. Coaches and clubs can remove players, teams and coaches inside the apps. If you want information about you or your child removed, ask the club or coach first, or contact us. We will respond to any request within 20 working days. If you ask us to remove a child's information from Bench Buddy Cricket, we will remove it and replace their name in past match records with “Player”, so the scorecards still make sense.

Crash reports are deleted automatically after 90 days. The records that limit sign-in emails are deleted within a day.

Your rights

Under the New Zealand Privacy Act 2020 you can ask to see the information we hold about you, and ask us to correct it. Parents can ask about their child's information. Contact the club or us at the address below. If you are not happy with our response, you can complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner (privacy.org.nz).

Keeping it safe

Access is restricted by role, as described above, and enforced by the apps' server rules rather than just what the screen shows. Everything travels over encrypted connections. No system is perfect. If there were a privacy breach likely to cause serious harm, we would tell the people affected and the Privacy Commissioner, as the law requires.

Children's information

These are tools for coaches, clubs and parents, not apps aimed at children, and they collect nothing directly from a child. Adults (coaches, clubs and parents) enter and manage children's information. If you are a parent or club with a concern about a child's information, contact us (below) and we will help.

Changes to this policy

If this policy changes in a meaningful way, the date at the top of this page will change with it. If a change affects how children's information is handled, we will tell club administrators directly.

Contact

Our privacy contact is Jared Rakich. Questions about your information or this policy: hello@benchbuddysports.com.