Privacy Policy
Effective date: 9 September 2026
At The Bar (“the app”) lets you share with friends you have accepted that you are
out at a bar, pub or restaurant. This policy explains what the app collects, what
it never collects, and what you can do about it.
Contact: cam.schriefer@gmail.com
The short version
- Your phone works out which venue you are at. Your coordinates are never sent to
our servers and are never stored.
- Nothing about where you are is shared until you tap to confirm you are there.
- The only location facts we store are the venues you confirmed you were at: the
current one, and a list of previous check-ins used to show which places you go
to most. Both are venue names from a public catalog, never coordinates.
- You can delete any venue from that list, and it is only visible to friends you
accepted.
- We do not sell your data, we do not share it with advertisers, and we do not
track you across other apps or websites.
Location
The app asks for location permission, including background location, so that it
can notice when you arrive somewhere. Here is exactly what happens:
- Your device reads your location and compares it, on the device, against a
catalog of venues downloaded from OpenStreetMap.
- If you have stayed within about 0.1 miles of a venue for three minutes, the
app asks you — with a notification or a prompt in the app — whether you are
there.
- If you say yes, the app sends only the venue’s identifier to our server.
If you say no, or ignore it, nothing is sent.
- When you move away from that venue, the app clears your status. The check-in
is kept as a visit, which is what “frequently visited” on your profile counts.
Your latitude and longitude never leave your phone. Our database has no column
that could hold them: every location field on your account is a reference to a
venue in the public catalog, plus the time you arrived there. Closing the app,
tapping “Go offline”, or revoking location permission stops the process entirely,
and nothing is ever recorded for a venue you did not confirm.
What we store about you
| Data |
Why |
Who can see it |
| Email address |
Sign-in, and matching invites to accounts |
You; anyone who already knows your address can use it to invite you |
| Display name and profile photo |
So friends recognise you |
You and your accepted friends |
| Current venue and arrival time |
The core feature, only while you are checked in |
You and your accepted friends |
| Venues you checked into before, and when |
The “frequently visited” list on your profile |
You and your accepted friends |
| Friends and pending invites |
Deciding who may see your status |
You and the person on the other side |
| Drink photos, venue name, rating, notes |
Your gallery |
You and your accepted friends |
| Push notification token |
Sending you the “are you here?” prompt and letting friends know you are out |
Us only |
Photos are held in private storage and served through short-lived signed links;
they are not publicly addressable on the internet.
What we never do
- We never store your coordinates.
- We never record a place you did not explicitly confirm, and we keep no trace of
anywhere that is not a venue in the public catalog.
- We never share your location with anyone who is not an accepted friend.
- We never show a friend where you are when you are not checked in — they only
see that you are not out.
- We do not sell or rent personal data, use it for advertising, or use it to
track you across other companies’ apps and websites.
Who else processes your data
- Supabase hosts the database, authentication and photo storage.
- Expo push notification service and Apple/Google deliver notifications.
- OpenStreetMap is the source of the venue catalog. This is a one-way
download of public venue data; nothing about you is sent to OpenStreetMap.
These providers act on our behalf and are not permitted to use your data for
their own purposes.
Your choices and rights
- Stop sharing at any time: tap “Go offline” in the app, or turn off location
permission in your device settings.
- Forget a venue: tap “Forget” next to any bar under “Frequently visited” on
your profile and every visit we hold for it is deleted.
- Remove a friend: they immediately lose access to your status, visit history
and photos.
- Delete your account: email cam.schriefer@gmail.com and we will delete
your profile, status, friendships, invites and photos. Deleting your account
removes everything associated with it; the venue catalog itself is public data
and is unaffected.
- Access or correction: email the address above and we will provide a copy of
the data associated with your account, or correct it.
If you are in the EEA or UK, our lawful basis for processing this data is the
performance of our agreement with you (running the app you signed up for) and, in
the case of location, your explicit consent, which you may withdraw at any time.
If you are in California, we do not sell or share personal information as those
terms are defined by the CCPA.
Children
At The Bar is about places that serve alcohol and is not intended for anyone
under 17. We do not knowingly collect data from children. If you believe a child
has created an account, email us and we will delete it.
Data retention
Your status is transient — it exists only while you are checked in. Your profile,
friendships and photos are kept until you delete them or ask us to delete your
account. Unaccepted invites expire after 30 days.
Changes to this policy
If this policy changes materially, we will update the effective date above and,
where the change affects how your location is used, tell you in the app before it
takes effect.