Privacy,
made clear.

Account and profile information

House Mate processes the name, email address, account identifier and, where needed for security and delivery, device identifier associated with your account. This lets the app sign you in, restore access, recognise invitations and show your identity to the people you share a House or Circle with.

Your profile is visible only as the app indicates to authorised members of the relevant shared space. Do not add passwords, payment-card details or identity-document numbers to your profile.

House and Circle boundaries

A House is for shared-home information. A Circle is a separate group for a trip, event or other shared plan. They have separate membership, so being invited to one does not automatically give someone access to the other.

Before you add someone to a House or Circle, check that you are inviting the right person. Members may be able to view, add to or respond to information according to their role and the feature being used.

Shared content and financial records

Chores, shopping lists, bills, expense amounts, notices, repairs, events, visitor plans, photos and files you add are stored in the relevant House or Circle so that its members can use the shared feature. Expense and bill records are organisational information only; House Mate does not take payments or require bank-login credentials.

Only upload photos or files you are entitled to share. A person who leaves a House or Circle may have already seen information shared while they were a member.

Addresses: If you enter an address for a plan or another feature, we store it with the relevant record to provide that feature. Addresses added to a shared House or Circle are visible to authorised members of that space.

Messages and comments: We store comments and messages you post, together with sender information, timestamps, reactions and read receipts where supported. These are used to provide conversations and delivery status within the relevant shared space and are visible to its authorised members.

Personal Home and saved dates

Personal Home is a private space for one person. Its tasks, spending, documents, appliances and calendar are visible only to you and are not shared with the members of any House or Circle. You can save birthdays and key dates there. The names and dates you enter, including those of other people, are stored in your private calendar and used only to show them to you and to send your own reminders.

Only add what you are comfortable keeping, and do not put sensitive details about another person in the name of a date.

Service-provider details: You may optionally save a service provider’s name and phone number in maintenance records. These details are stored in your private Personal Home to help you manage repairs and servicing. Only enter details you are entitled to store.

Reminders, Live Activities and exports

Reminders and plan alerts are scheduled on your device as local notifications. The laundry countdown shown on your Lock Screen and in the Dynamic Island includes the machine or load name you chose. Spending reports in PDF or CSV are created on your device; House Mate does not upload them, and they leave your device only when you share them using the iOS share sheet.

Check a report before you share it: it lists expense descriptions and amounts, and the recipient and service you choose handle their copy.

Device calendars: With your permission, House Mate can read upcoming events from the device calendars you select and display them alongside your Personal Home calendar. These events are read on your device and are not uploaded to House Mate’s servers. You can disconnect calendars in the app or revoke access in iOS Settings.

Location and activity

House Mate does not track your precise device location. Home and Away status is manual, so it changes only when you choose it. Optional Activity Status is off by default and shows a broad label, such as active recently, to members of the same House rather than an exact last-seen time.

Services, notifications and international processing

House Mate uses Google Firebase (Authentication, Firestore, Cloud Messaging and Crashlytics) for sign-in, data storage, synchronisation, notifications and crash reporting, and Cloudflare Workers to process invitations, notifications, bill reminders and account deletion requests. Apple delivers push notifications and processes App Store purchases. These providers may process information in countries outside the UK under their own contractual and transfer safeguards.

Notifications contain only the information needed to tell you that something happened. You can manage notification permission in House Mate and iOS Settings.

If House Mate crashes or a request to our server fails, a diagnostic report is sent so the fault can be found and fixed. A report describes the failure, the device model and the app version, and is tied to your account identifier so repeated faults can be recognised. It never contains your name, your email address, anything you typed, or the contents of a House or Circle.

Retention and deletion

Shared information remains while it is needed to provide the House or Circle, or until it is deleted using the available controls. Removing the app from your device does not delete a cloud account, shared space or data that other members rely on.

You can permanently delete your account in the app: open Privacy & account and choose Delete account, or use Delete Account in the account menu on the Circles screen. This removes your sign-in account, your profile, your House and Circle memberships and your notification registrations. Content you added to a shared House or Circle, such as expenses, chores or notices, stays available to its remaining members. If you need help with deletion, contact support.

The House activity feed is a running history, not a permanent record: entries are automatically deleted once they are more than 6 months old. This does not delete the underlying expenses, bills, chores or other items.

How to read this policy

This policy covers personal information handled by MateTech for House Mate and direct support requests about it. It explains the app’s own processing alongside the information handled by services you choose, such as Apple, iCloud, the App Store or a sign-in provider. Those services have their own privacy notices and controls.

Why we use information

We use information to provide the feature you ask for, maintain the app, respond to support, prevent misuse and keep the service reliable. Depending on the feature, the legal basis may be providing the app to you, your consent for an optional permission or setting, or our legitimate interests in security and service improvement. We do not use sensitive app content for unrelated marketing.

Your choices and UK privacy rights

You can manage optional permissions in the app and iOS Settings, and can withdraw consent for an optional feature by turning it off. Depending on the circumstances, you may have rights to ask for access, correction, deletion, restriction, objection or a portable copy of personal information MateTech controls. You can make a request through the contact details below. You can also complain to the UK Information Commissioner’s Office at ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint.