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Cookie Policy

Effective Date: 1 MAY 2025

1. Introduction

This Cookie Policy explains how ALLEY BOOKINGS LTD ("Alley Bookings," "we," "us," or "our") uses cookies and similar tracking technologies (like web beacons, pixels, and local storage) when you visit our website (www.alleybookings.com) or use our mobile applications (collectively, the "Platform"). It explains what these technologies are, why we use them, and your rights to control our use of them.

This policy should be read together with our Privacy Policy, which provides more detailed information about how we process personal data. By using our Platform and consenting via our cookie banner or settings tool (where applicable), you agree to the use of cookies and similar technologies as described in this Policy.

2. What Are Cookies?

Cookies are small text files containing a string of characters that are placed on your computer, mobile phone, or other device when you visit a website or use an app. Cookies allow a website or app to recognize your device on subsequent visits. They can store user preferences, login information, and other details to enhance your experience and help analyse website traffic and usage patterns.

3. Why We Use Cookies and Similar Technologies

We use cookies and similar technologies for several purposes, including:

  • Operating our Platform: To enable core functionalities like navigation, accessing secure areas (like your account), processing bookings, and facilitating payments.
  • Improving Your Experience: To remember your preferences (like language or currency), login details (so you don't have to re-enter them), and search criteria to make your use of the Platform smoother and more personalised.
  • Analysing Platform Usage: To understand how visitors interact with our Platform, which pages are most popular, how users navigate the site, identify errors, and measure the effectiveness of our features. This helps us improve the Platform's performance and design.
  • Marketing and Advertising: To track your browsing habits and interactions with our Platform and potentially third-party sites to deliver advertising that is more relevant to your interests, measure the effectiveness of advertising campaigns, and limit the number of times you see an ad.

4. Types of Cookies We Use

We use the following types of cookies on our Platform:

  • Strictly Necessary Cookies:
    • Purpose: These cookies are essential for the Platform to function correctly. They enable basic functionalities like page navigation, security, user authentication (logging in), and completing core tasks such as making a booking or processing payments.
    • Consent: These cookies are typically active by default as the Platform cannot operate properly without them. Legal regulations often permit placing these without explicit prior consent, but we still inform you about them.
    • Examples: Session cookies (deleted when you close your browser), authentication cookies, security cookies, cookies managing your booking process steps.
  • Performance Cookies (Analytics Cookies):
    • Purpose: These cookies collect information about how you use our Platform, such as which pages you visit most often, how long you stay on a page, AppLinks you click, and if you encounter any errors. The information collected is usually aggregated and anonymised (or pseudonymized) and used solely to improve how our Platform works.
    • Consent: We typically require your consent to place these cookies.
    • Examples: Google Analytics cookies, cookies used by other analytics tools monitoring site performance.
  • Functionality Cookies (Preference Cookies):
    • Purpose: These cookies allow the Platform to remember choices you make and provide enhanced, more personalized features. For example, they can remember your username, language preference, currency setting, or region. They might also be used to provide services you've requested, like remembering items in a 'saved list'.
    • Consent: We typically require your consent to place these cookies.
    • Examples: Language preference cookies, login persistence cookies, cookies remembering search filters.
  • Marketing Cookies (Targeting/Advertising Cookies):
    • Purpose: These cookies are used to track your activity on our Platform and potentially other websites to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant advertisements on our Platform or on third-party sites. They may also be used to measure the effectiveness of advertising campaigns and limit the frequency with which you see certain ads. These cookies are often placed by third-party advertising networks with our permission.
    • Consent: We require your explicit consent to place these cookies.
    • Examples: Cookies set by advertising partners (like Google Ads, Facebook Pixel), social media platforms for advertising purposes.

5. Third-Party Cookies

Some cookies on our Platform are set by third-party companies (not Alley Bookings). These third parties may include:

  • Analytics Providers: (e.g., Google Analytics) who help us understand Platform usage.
  • Advertising Partners: (e.g., ad networks, social media platforms) who help deliver targeted advertising.
  • Payment Processors: (e.g., Paystack) who may use cookies for security and fraud prevention during payment processing.
  • Service Providers: (e.g., flight API providers like Kiwi.com, GDS systems like Amadeus) whose integrations might place functional or necessary cookies.

These third parties have their own privacy and cookie policies, and we do not have direct control over the cookies they set. We recommend you review their policies to understand how they use cookies and process data.

6. Similar Technologies

In addition to cookies, we may use other similar technologies like:

  • Web Beacons (Pixels/GIFs): Small graphic images embedded in web pages or emails that allow us to track user actions, such as whether an email was opened or a AppLink was clicked, and collect analytics or measure ad campaign effectiveness.
  • Local Storage: Allows websites or apps to store data locally on your device (similar to cookies but can store larger amounts of data) to improve performance or remember preferences.

These technologies are often used in conjunction with cookies and are managed by similar consent and control mechanisms.

7. Managing Your Cookie Preferences

You have several ways to manage your cookie preferences:

  • Our Cookie Consent Tool: When you first visit our Platform (or after clearing your cookies), you will likely see a cookie banner or pop-up. This tool allows you to accept all cookies, reject non-essential cookies, or customize your preferences for different cookie categories (Performance, Functionality, Marketing). You can usually change your preferences at any time by accessing the tool again via a AppLink in the website footer or app settings "Cookie Settings" or "Manage Cookies".
  • Browser Settings: Most web browsers allow you to control cookies through their settings. You can usually configure your browser to:
    • Accept all cookies.
    • Reject all cookies.
    • Notify you when a cookie is set.
    • Delete existing cookies.

    You can find instructions for managing cookies in popular browsers here (AppLinks are subject to change):

    • Google Chrome
    • Mozilla Firefox
    • Microsoft Edge
    • Safari (Desktop)
    • Safari (Mobile)
    • Opera

    Please Note: If you choose to block or delete cookies, especially Strictly Necessary cookies, some parts of our Platform may not function properly or securely, and your user experience may be affected.

  • Third-Party Opt-Out Tools: For advertising cookies, you may be able to opt-out of interest-based advertising from participating companies through industry opt-out programs like the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) (http://optout.networkadvertising.org/) or the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA) (http://optout.aboutads.info/).

8. Changes to This Cookie Policy

We may update this Cookie Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices, technology, legal requirements, or other factors. When we make changes, we will update the "Effective Date" at the top of this Policy and post the revised version on our Platform. We encourage you to review this Policy periodically. For significant changes, we may provide more prominent notice (e.g., via email or a notification on the Platform).

9. Contact Us

If you have any questions about our use of cookies or this Cookie Policy, please contact us using the details provided in our Privacy Policy or by emailing privacy@alleybookings.com.