Privacy policy

1. Who we are

In short: Pearnify Group Ltd runs Pearnify and looks after your information.

Pearnify Group Ltd ("Pearnify", "we", "us") runs the Pearnify app, the Pearnify web app and this website. We are a company registered in Ghana (company number CS206581026). Our address is Naa Leekai Road, Mataheko, Accra, Ghana.

Under the Data Protection Act, 2012 (Act 843), we are the "data controller" (the company that decides why and how your information is used). We are registered with the Data Protection Commission of Ghana. Our registration number is [DPC registration number].

You can reach us about privacy at hello@pearnify.com. Our data protection supervisor is [name of our data protection supervisor].

2. What this policy covers

In short: This policy covers everything you do on Pearnify.

This policy covers the Pearnify app on phones, the Pearnify web app, this website, and the emails and text messages we send you. It covers you whether you post work, earn, sell, buy, offer services or deliver.

It does not cover other websites or apps, even if Pearnify links to them. Our terms of use explain the rules for using Pearnify.

3. What we collect

In short: We collect what you give us, what your phone sends when you use Pearnify, and what our partners tell us.

What you give us

What your phone or computer sends

• Sign-in details. The internet address (IP address) a sign-in comes from, the kind of phone or browser, and the time. We use the IP address to guess the rough town, so we can warn you about a sign-in that is not yours.
• Location during a delivery. While you carry a parcel for someone, the Pearnify app sends where you are. It does this only between pick-up and delivery.
• How the app is used. Which screens are opened and which buttons are pressed. We record this ourselves, with no outside tracking company, and without names or contact details.

What others tell us

• Smile ID tells us if your identity check passed, and what it read from your document (see section 5).
• Paystack tells us if a payment or a payout worked.
• Other people on Pearnify may rate you, report you or tell us about a problem with a job or an order.

4. Why we use it, and the law that allows it

In short: We use your information to run Pearnify for you, to keep people safe, to follow the law, and with your agreement where the law asks for it.

The Data Protection Act allows us to use your information when one of these is true. We call each one a "legal basis" (the reason the law accepts):

• Contract: we need it to give you the service you signed up for.
• Law: a law says we must.
• Fair interest: it is needed for a fair business reason of ours or of another person, and it does not harm your rights. The law calls this a "legitimate interest".
• Consent: you have clearly said yes.

We only use your information for a new purpose if it fits with why we collected it, or if we first ask you.

5. Checking who you are

In short: Before you do more than look around, we check your ID with Smile ID. Others only see a Verified tick. We do not keep your date of birth or the photo of your ID.

When we ask

Anyone can make an account, look around and buy goods from a seller's listing. Before you post or pay for work, take any work, buy a service, sell, offer a service or send messages other than about an order, we ask you to check who you are. People pay each other, let each other into their homes and hand over goods, so knowing that everyone is a real adult keeps everyone safer. We only check you if you agree.

What happens

1. You choose your Ghana Card or your Ghana passport.
2. You take a photo of the front of it.
3. For a Ghana Card, you also type its number.
4. You agree to the check.
5. You take a selfie. The app takes a few extra frames at the same time, to show it is really you and not a photo of a photo.

We send the photo of your document, the selfie and the frames to Smile ID (Smile Identity), our identity checking partner. Smile ID checks that the document is real and that your selfie matches the photo on it.

For a Ghana Card, if that first check passes, Smile ID also checks the card number with the National Identification Authority (NIA) of Ghana. The NIA confirms the name that goes with the number. It sends back no photo.

What comes back to us

Smile ID tells us if the check passed or failed, and why. It also tells us what it read from your document: your full name, date of birth, document number and expiry date. We use these to:

• check that the names match the legal names on your Pearnify account;
• check that you are 18 or older;
• check that the Ghana Card number read from the card is the one you typed;
• make sure one person has only one verified account, and one document verifies only one account.

What we keep, and what we do not

Why do we keep the selfie from a passed check? On a job in person or a delivery, it lets the two people see who to expect at the door, once the job is agreed. It is never shown on your public profile, and it is hidden again when the job ends.

Other people only ever see a Verified tick. They never see your document, its number or your selfie.

Smile ID handles your information for us, under our instructions. [Lawyer to confirm: how long Smile ID keeps the photos on its side, and that our contract with it covers Act 843.]

Saying no, or changing your mind

You do not have to check who you are. If you do not, you can still look around and buy goods from a listing, but you cannot post or pay for work, take work, buy a service, sell, offer a service or send other messages. You can try the check three times in any 24 hours. [Lawyer to confirm: what happens to a passed check if you later withdraw your consent.]

6. Addresses and location

In short: Your exact address is shared only with the person doing the job, after it is agreed. We follow a courier only during a delivery, and delete the route after 30 days.

• Your town or neighbourhood is public on your profile. Your street and house are never public.
• The exact address of a job is private. Only the person who takes the job sees it, and only after the job is agreed.
• During a delivery, the courier's phone sends its position, but only between pick-up and delivery. The sender can follow the parcel on a map. For an order, the buyer and the seller can follow it. The courier does not see their own trail.
• After delivery, the people who could follow the parcel can replay the route for 30 days. Then we delete the route and keep only the distance and how long it took. If there is a dispute about the delivery, we keep the route until it is settled.
• At each handover, when a pick-up or delivery code is entered, we keep a photo and the position at that moment, as proof of what happened. [Lawyer to confirm how long we keep handover proof.]

On phones, maps come from Google Maps (Android) or Apple Maps (iPhone). On the web, maps come from OpenFreeMap, using OpenStreetMap. These map services can see which part of the map your device asks for. If we later use Google to estimate arrival times, we will send it the courier's position and the destination area, and nothing else about you.

7. AI help

In short: AI tidies the words in your posts and draws cover pictures. It never gets your contact details. Nobody trains AI on your information.

• Tidying words. When you post work, list something to sell or offer a service, AI improves the spelling and wording. This uses Claude, a model made by Anthropic, running on Amazon Bedrock in the European Union. We keep your own words beside the tidied ones, so you can put yours back.
• Cover pictures. For work posts and services, AI draws a cover picture. We send the picture maker (OpenAI, and Black Forest Labs if OpenAI is not available) only a short description of the scene. It has no names, contact details or addresses in it.
• Ask Pearnify. Our help assistant answers questions about Pearnify. It can look at your own posts, jobs and money to answer you, but never anyone else's. It never sees addresses, phone numbers or names. We do not store the conversation; your phone keeps it.

We do not let AI companies train their models on your information. We do not train our own models on it either.

8. Automatic checks and decisions

In short: Some checks are done by computer. You can always ask a person at Pearnify to look again.

Some things are checked by computer, without a person looking first:

• Phone numbers, email addresses and links are blocked in posts, and in messages before a job is agreed. This protects you from being taken off Pearnify, where we cannot help.
• Photos are checked by Amazon Rekognition for things that are not allowed, like nudity or violence.
• The identity check in section 5 is decided by Smile ID's systems.
• We limit how often some things can be done, like trying codes, to stop misuse.

If you think an automatic decision about you is wrong, write to hello@pearnify.com. A person on our team will look at it again.

9. What other people see

In short: Others see your @username and your public profile. More is shared only with the person you agree a job or order with.

• Signed-in members can see your public profile: your @username, photo, bio, town or neighbourhood, Verified tick, ratings, and your services and listings. People who are not signed in cannot see profiles.
• Once a job or order is agreed, the two people also see each other's first name and the first letter of the last name (for example "Ama K."). The person doing the job sees the exact address.
• In messages, after a job is agreed, you may share your phone number if you want to. Before that, contact details are blocked.
• Ratings are public on profiles once both people have rated, or after 14 days.

Your email address, phone number, full name, Mobile Money details and ID are never shown to other members by Pearnify.

10. Who we share it with

In short: We share only what each partner needs to do its job for us. We never sell your information.

We use trusted companies to run Pearnify. They are called "processors" (companies that handle information for us and only as we tell them). Each one gets only what it needs.

We may also share information:

• with other members, as section 9 explains;
• with the police, courts or regulators, when the law requires it, or when someone is in danger;
• with our lawyers, accountants and auditors, who must keep it secret;
• with a new owner, if Pearnify is ever sold or joins another company. They would have to protect your information as this policy says, and we would tell you first.

We never sell your information. We do not use advertising companies or show you adverts based on what you do.

Your phone number, and your agreement to receive text messages from us, are never sold or shared with anyone for their own marketing. The partners who send our texts use your number only to deliver them.

11. Information sent outside Ghana

In short: Our systems are in London. We protect your information the same way wherever it is.

Our servers and database are run by Amazon Web Services in London, in the United Kingdom. This means your information leaves Ghana. Some partners in section 10 also work outside Ghana.

To keep it safe, we:

• lock your most private details with encryption before they are stored;
• use partners who must protect your information by contract;
• send each partner only what it needs;
• keep strict limits on which of our own staff can see anything (section 13).

[Lawyer to confirm the safeguards Act 843 asks for when information is sent abroad.]

12. How long we keep it

In short: We keep your information while your account is open. When you delete your account, we erase your personal details 30 days later, but keep records the law or other people need.

You cannot close your account while you have work in progress, open posts, or money still to be paid out. This protects you and the people you work with.

13. How we protect it

In short: We lock private details, limit who can see them, and record every time staff look.

• Encryption. Phone numbers, email addresses, last names, Mobile Money names, private addresses, messages and ID numbers are locked by the app before they are stored. Someone who reached the database directly would see only scrambled text.
• Private files. Photos and documents are kept in private stores and shown only through links that stop working after a short time. We remove hidden details, like the place a photo was taken, from every photo.
• Staff access. Our staff see personal details hidden by default. Seeing one in full needs a reason, and is recorded. Looking at live data needs an owner to approve it, for one hour at most. Every step is recorded in logs that nobody at Pearnify can erase.
• Your messages. Our staff do not read your conversations. They only read one when it is reported, or when it is needed to settle a dispute about that job or order.
• Your account. We send codes to check your email and phone, offer two-step sign-in, and email you when your account is used from a new phone or browser.
• A high standard. We build our security to the SOC 2 standard (a well-known set of rules for keeping customer information safe).

No system is perfectly safe. Keep your password to yourself, and tell us at once if you think someone else is using your account.

14. Your rights

In short: You can see, correct and delete your information, and object to how we use it. Write to us. If you are not happy, you can complain to the Data Protection Commission.

Under the Data Protection Act, you have the right to:

• know what information we hold about you, and get a copy;
• correct information that is wrong or out of date;
• ask us to delete information we no longer need, or should not have;
• object to how we use it, including stopping any marketing messages;
• ask a person to look again at a decision made only by a computer;
• withdraw your consent where we rely on it;
• complain to the Data Protection Commission.

How to use your rights

• You can see and change most of your details yourself in the app, under your profile and settings.
• You can close your account yourself in settings.
• For anything else, email hello@pearnify.com from the email address on your account. We may ask you to prove it is you, to protect your information.

We will answer as soon as we can, and within [time limit, to be confirmed by our lawyer]. It is free.

If you are not happy with our answer, you can complain to the Data Protection Commission of Ghana, at www.dataprotection.org.gh. We would like the chance to put things right first, so please write to us too.

15. Cookies and tracking

In short: This website uses no cookies. The app only keeps what it needs to keep you signed in. No advert trackers.

A "cookie" is a small file a website saves in your browser. This website does not use any cookies, and has no tracking or advertising tools.

The Pearnify app keeps you signed in by saving a sign-in key on your device: in your phone's secure storage, or, on the web app, in a cookie that only our server can read. This is needed for Pearnify to work, so you cannot switch it off. Signing out removes it.

We count how the app is used ourselves (section 3). We do not use outside analytics or advertising tools.

16. Children

In short: Pearnify is only for adults aged 18 or over.

You must be 18 or older to use Pearnify. We do not knowingly collect information about children. If you think a child has an account, please tell us and we will close it and delete their details.

17. If something goes wrong

In short: If your information is ever exposed, we will tell you and the Data Protection Commission.

If someone gets into your information without permission, we will tell the Data Protection Commission and you as soon as we reasonably can. We will say what happened, what information was involved, what we are doing about it, and what you can do to protect yourself.

18. Changes to this policy

In short: We will tell you before any important change.

We may change this policy when Pearnify or the law changes. The date at the top shows when this page last changed, and the list at the bottom says what changed. If a change is important, we will tell you in the app or by email before it starts.

19. Contact us

In short: Email hello@pearnify.com.

Pearnify Group Ltd, Naa Leekai Road, Mataheko, Accra, Ghana.
Email: hello@pearnify.com

We find the rough town of a sign-in with IP Geolocation by DB-IP, shared under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence.