Privacy policy

1. Who we are

My Tomte is made by Happy Dance Project (ABN 65 880 973 057) (“we”, “us”), based in New South Wales. This policy covers My Tomte at mytomte.app, our website at meetmytomte.com, our help centre, and our emails and support.

My Tomte is a household organising tool. It helps households plan meals, shopping and calendars using the rules and preferences they set. It isn’t a health service, and it doesn’t assess, treat or give advice about anyone’s health.

We handle personal information in line with the Australian Privacy Principles in the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth).

2. What we collect

About you

• Your name and email address
• If you sign in with Google: your name, email address and profile picture from your Google account

About your household

• The names of the people in your household, and their birthdays if you add them
• Dietary details: dietary rules, allergies, intolerances (for example, coeliac disease), pregnancy if added as a dietary rule, and nutrition targets
• Food diary and personal targets: what each person ate, including food added by search, by barcode or as an estimate; and the body details used to suggest targets (date of birth, sex, height, weight, activity level, active days and a goal). A child’s diary never shows calories, and children never get a calorie target

• Food ratings (Love it, Like it, Not for us)
• Children’s profiles, created and managed by a parent or guardian: name, dietary needs, activities, chores and reward tokens
• Friends and family you add: names, birthdays and dietary needs
• Guest Wi-Fi network name and password, if you add them for the QR code
• The household’s location, if you add one for the weather: the suburb or address you type, which we turn into the map point of that place (not your street address). It’s optional

About your kitchen and meals

• Meal plans, recipes, and photos or PDFs you upload to create recipes
• What’s in your fridge, freezer and pantry
• Receipts you upload, including the store, items, prices and date
• Shopping lists, household tasks, events and notes

From calendars you connect

• Events from the Google, iCloud or Microsoft 365 calendars you choose, including titles, times, locations and notes
• With two-way sync, the family events we create or update in those calendars
• We only access the calendars you choose to connect, and we store only the events from them that My Tomte shows you. Disconnect a calendar at any time and syncing stops straight away.

About payments

• Your plan, subscription status and payment history
• From Stripe: card type, last four digits, expiry date and billing country. We never see or store your full card number.

When you use our sites and app

• Technical information: IP address, browser, device, and the approximate time of each request
• Error reports when something breaks (see section 7)
• Usage analytics (see section 7)

When you contact us or send feedback

• Your message, and anything you attach

3. Dietary details

You add dietary details so My Tomte can suggest meals that follow your household’s rules. Privacy law treats information about allergies, intolerances, coeliac disease, pregnancy and similar things as health information, a kind of sensitive information (and we treat the food diary and the body details used for targets the same way), even though My Tomte isn’t a health service. So we handle it with extra care:

• We collect it only with your consent, which you give when you add it (with the notice shown on that screen).
• We use it only to plan meals that follow your household’s rules (including meals you ask for with a Smart Action), and to show nutrition information.
• We never use it for marketing, never sell it, and never share it except with the service providers who store it for us. It isn’t sent to the AI providers that run Smart Actions.
• You can remove it at any time, and it’s gone from your household straight away.

My Tomte’s meal suggestions are guidance for your household, not medical or dietary advice. Always check ingredients and allergen labels.

4. Children

My Tomte accounts are for adults (18 and over). Children don’t have accounts or logins. A parent or guardian creates and manages each child’s profile, and we keep only what’s needed for meals, activities, chores and reward tokens. Children may see information from their profile when a parent or guardian chooses to show it to them on a household device; they can’t change settings or see anything outside their household.

A child’s profile can be seen only by the people in that household. We don’t collect analytics about individual children, and we never use children’s information for marketing. A parent can delete a child’s profile at any time.

5. How we use your information

• To run My Tomte: plan meals, build shopping lists, track your kitchen, sync calendars and show your household’s information to its members
• To apply each person’s dietary rules when planning
• To run Smart Actions when you ask for them (section 6)
• To take payments and manage your subscription
• To send service emails: your trial reminder, renewal reminders, payment notices and account changes
• To answer questions, support requests and feedback
• To keep My Tomte secure, find and fix problems, and improve it
• To send news and offers, only if you’ve agreed, with an unsubscribe link in every one

We don’t sell your information. We don’t use it for advertising, and we don’t allow advertising trackers on our sites or app.

6. Smart Actions and AI

Smart Actions (planning by asking, photo to recipe, receipt reading and food diary estimates) are processed by Google (Gemini) and Anthropic. When you use one, we send only what that request needs: the words you typed, the photo, PDF or receipt you uploaded, or the food you’re looking up. We never send the names, dietary rules or other details of the people in your household.

• Neither provider may use your information to train its AI models.
• Both may keep requests for a limited time to detect misuse, then delete them: Google for up to 55 days, and Anthropic for up to 30 days.
• Photos, PDFs and receipts you upload for a Smart Action are sent to the provider to be read, and we don’t keep a copy.
• AI can make mistakes. Always check a recipe or receipt the tomte has read for you.

7. Analytics and error reports

Analytics (PostHog). We count how features are used, so we can make them better. We’ve set this up to protect your privacy:

• Events are grouped by a one-way scrambled code for your household, never by person, and that code can’t be linked back to you by anyone holding only the analytics data
• Events never include names, recipe titles, ingredients, shopping items or any free text
• No automatic click tracking, and no screen recordings
• Page addresses are stripped of identifying details before they’re sent

Analytics are processed on PostHog’s EU region. In the app, analytics are on by default, because they can’t identify you, and you can turn them off at any time in Settings → Privacy. We also treat a Global Privacy Control signal from your browser as a no. On our website, analytics only run if you agree in the cookie banner. Turning analytics off stops collection from then on.

Error reports (Sentry). When something breaks, a technical report is sent so we can fix it. It doesn’t include your name or email, it’s filtered before it leaves your device, and we never record your screen. Error reports are processed in Sentry’s Germany (European Union) region.

8. Who we share information with

Only with the services that help us run My Tomte, and only what each one needs:

We also look things up in public databases (Open Food Facts for product barcodes and Open Library for cookbooks) without sending any personal information.

We may share information if the law requires it, to respond to a lawful request, or to protect someone’s safety. If Happy Dance Project is ever sold or merged, your information may pass to the new owner, who must keep protecting it under this policy, and we’ll tell you first.

9. Information handled overseas

Your household’s data lives in Australia, with a daily backup copy kept in Google Drive. Some services above process information in other countries, mainly the United States and the European Union. We choose providers with strong security and privacy commitments, and we take reasonable steps to make sure they protect your information.

10. Who at My Tomte can see your household

Only authorised members of the My Tomte team can access household information. Access is limited to what’s necessary to answer a support request or feedback you’ve sent, fix a problem, keep the service secure, or comply with the law, and it’s through a restricted admin console that only named administrators can open. Deleting or resetting a household there is logged.

11. Keeping it safe

Information is encrypted in transit, and at rest by our database and backup providers. Access is limited to what’s needed, and backups run daily. If a data breach is likely to cause you serious harm, we’ll tell you and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner, as the Notifiable Data Breaches scheme requires.

12. How the planner suggests meals

My Tomte uses a computer program to suggest meals. It uses each person’s dietary rules, allergies, nutrition targets, ratings and calendar (who’s home), and what’s in your kitchen. It leaves out any recipe that isn’t marked safe for someone eating, and ranks the rest. You can always see why a slot is empty, change any meal, or plan manually. The planner doesn’t make any decisions about you beyond suggesting meals, and its suggestions are guidance, not advice.

13. How long we keep it

• Your household’s information: for as long as your household exists
• When you delete your household: we remove it from our active systems straight away, with no recovery. Copies may remain in our backups for up to 12 months before they’re deleted.
• If your household is read-only (no plan is active): we keep it until you choose a plan or delete it. If it stays read-only for 6 months, we may delete it, after emailing you at least 30 days beforehand (see the Terms).
• Payment and tax records: 5 years, as the Australian Taxation Office requires
• Support requests: 2 years after the request is closed
• Analytics: 2 years
• Error reports: 90 days

14. Your choices and rights

• See or correct your information: most of it is in the app. For anything else, email [email protected].
• Get a copy of your information: email [email protected] and we’ll send it in a commonly used electronic format.
• Delete health information, a person, a child’s profile or your whole household at any time.
• Disconnect a calendar at any time; syncing stops straight away.
• Analytics: turn them off in Settings → Privacy in the app, or in Cookie settings on our website.
• Marketing emails: unsubscribe using the link in any of them.

We’ll respond within 30 days.

15. Complaints

Email [email protected], and we’ll respond within 30 days. If you’re not satisfied, you can contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (oaic.gov.au).

16. Changes to this policy

If we make an important change, we’ll tell you by email or in the app before it takes effect. The date at the top shows the latest version.

17. Contact

Happy Dance Project · ABN 65 880 973 057 · [email protected]