Privacy Policy

1. Who we are

Hostly is a product of Vero Dawn, based in North Carolina, United States. Hostly is software for independent restaurants in the United States. It reads your restaurant's public Google reviews, uses AI to draft replies in your voice, and holds every draft until you approve it.

When this policy says "we" or "us," it means Vero Dawn operating Hostly. When it says "you," it usually means the restaurant owner or manager who uses Hostly. Where this policy talks about reviewers, it means the members of the public who wrote reviews of your restaurant on Google.

Questions about any of this go to hello@hostly-reviews.com.

2. What we collect

We keep this short on purpose. Here is the whole list.

Information you give us

• Your name and email address, so we can create your account and sign you in.
• Your phone number, optional. You do not have to give it.
• Your business name and address, so we can find the right Google listing.
• Your monthly revenue estimate, optional and self-reported. We use it to size the revenue-at-risk figure in your audit. If you skip it, we use a general industry estimate instead.

Information we collect about your business

• Your restaurant's public Google reviews, including the star rating, the review text, the date, and the reviewer display name as Google publishes it publicly.
• Your Google star rating, review counts, and related public listing details.
• The replies you approve and when you approved them.

Information we collect automatically

• Basic usage and technical data, such as sign-in times, pages used inside the app, and error logs. This is how we keep the service working and find bugs.

We do not collect your card number. See Payments below. We do not collect sensitive personal information such as government ID numbers, health data, or precise geolocation, and we do not ask for any.

3. Categories of information, in the legal terms

California law asks us to describe what we collect using its own category names, where we get each category, and who we share it with. Here is that same list, mapped to those terms.

We collect each category for the business purposes described in Why we collect it. We do not sell or share any of it. See We do not sell or share your data.

4. Why we collect it

• To run the service. Read your public reviews, draft replies, show you the queue, and hand you each approved reply to paste onto Google.
• To sign you in. We email you a sign-in code rather than making you remember a password.
• To send you what you asked for. Your audit report, your digests, and account notices.
• To size your estimates. Your revenue figure, if you give one, feeds the revenue-at-risk number.
• To bill you. Through our payment processor.
• To support you and improve the product. Fixing errors, answering your questions, making the software better.

That is it. We do not use your information to build advertising profiles, and we do not use it for anything you would not expect from the list above.

5. Review content and reviewer names

Reviews of your restaurant are published publicly on Google by the people who wrote them. Hostly reads that public content so it can draft a reply. That includes the reviewer's display name exactly as Google shows it publicly, because a good reply usually uses the person's first name.

We do not go looking for anything else about a reviewer. We do not try to identify them, find their email, or match them to other records. We only handle what Google already publishes on your listing.

If you are a reviewer, not a Hostly customer, you still have rights here.

If your name and review were processed by Hostly because you reviewed a restaurant that uses us, you can email hello@hostly-reviews.com to ask what we hold and to ask us to delete it from our systems. We cannot change or remove your review on Google itself, since that lives on your Google account and the restaurant's listing, not with us. We store review data only for restaurants that are active Hostly customers. We do not keep the review text of a business that only took a free audit and never signed up.

6. How AI is used, and what we send to Anthropic

Plainly stated: review text is sent to Anthropic, the maker of the Claude API, for processing.

Hostly sends the text of your reviews, along with your brand voice settings and your business name, to Anthropic's Claude API. Claude does two jobs with it. First, it drafts a reply for you to consider. Second, it reads across your reviews to spot recurring themes, for example slow service on weekends or a dish that keeps getting praised.

Anthropic processes that text on our behalf so we can return a result to you. We do not use your data to train generalized AI models, and we do not permit our sub-processors to do so with data we send them. Our full AI Policy explains this in more detail.

Nothing is ever posted automatically. Every draft waits for your approval, and you can edit it or throw it away.

AI drafts can get things wrong. Read every draft before you approve it. Once you approve a reply, it is your reply.

8. Who we share information with

We use a small set of service providers to run Hostly. Each one only gets what it needs to do its job, and none of them get more than that. Here are the categories of provider we rely on, what each category does, and where those providers operate. We keep a current, itemized list of the specific companies in each category, and we will send it to you on request.

If we add or change a provider in a way that affects how your data is handled, we will update our list and, for significant changes, email you before it takes effect so you have a chance to raise a concern or cancel.

We may also disclose information if the law requires it, if we need to protect someone's safety or our legal rights, or if Hostly is ever sold or merged. If ownership changes, we will tell you before your information moves to a new owner.

9. We do not sell or share your data

We do not sell your personal information, your business information, or your review data. Not to advertisers, not to data brokers, not to anyone, ever.

We also do not "share" it for cross-context behavioral advertising, which is a specific thing California law defines. In the past 12 months, Hostly has not sold and has not shared personal information as those terms are defined under the California Consumer Privacy Act. We are telling you that plainly because the law asks us to say so when it is true, and it is.

10. Payments

Hostly costs $99 per month per location. We use Stripe as our payment processor. When you enter your card details, they go straight to Stripe. Your card number never touches Hostly's servers and we never see it or store it. We see only what we need for billing, such as the last four digits, the card brand, and whether a payment succeeded.

11. How long we keep it

We keep your data while your account is active. Here is what happens to each kind of information, and when it is deleted.

The 90-day window gives you time to change your mind or ask for an export before anything is gone. Deletion runs automatically on a schedule, so it happens whether or not you remind us.

12. Your choices and your rights

Your data is yours. You can ask us to:

• Send you a copy of the information we hold about you and your restaurant.
• Correct anything that is wrong.
• Delete your data. We will delete it and confirm when it is done.
• Stop the review pull at any time. Cancel, or ask us to stop reading your public reviews, and we will.
• Stop marketing email. Every marketing email has an unsubscribe link. Account and billing emails still have to reach you while you have an account.

To make any of these requests, email hello@hostly-reviews.com. We aim to respond within a few business days, and in any case within 45 days as the law requires, and we will not charge you for it. We will not treat you differently for exercising any of these rights.

13. Your California privacy rights

If you are a California resident, the California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended by the California Privacy Rights Act, gives you specific rights over your personal information. This applies whether you are a Hostly customer or a reviewer whose name and review we processed. Here they are, and how to use each one.

• The right to know. You can ask for the categories and specific pieces of personal information we have collected about you, where we got it, why we collected it, and the categories of third parties we disclosed it to. See Categories of information for the standing answer.
• The right to delete. You can ask us to delete personal information we collected from you. We will delete it and direct our service providers to do the same, except where the law lets us keep something, for example a billing record.
• The right to correct. You can ask us to fix personal information about you that is inaccurate.
• The right to opt out of sale or sharing. We do not sell or share personal information, so there is nothing to opt out of. If that ever changes, we will post a clear way to opt out before it does.
• The right to limit the use of sensitive personal information. We do not collect sensitive personal information, so there is nothing to limit.
• The right to non-discrimination. We will never deny you service, charge you a different price, or give you a lower quality of service because you exercised any of these rights.
• The right to data portability. When you ask for a copy, we will provide it in a portable, readily usable format where technically feasible.

How to make a request

Email hello@hostly-reviews.com with what you want. Because Hostly operates entirely online and deals with you directly, email is our request method. We will respond within 45 days. If we need more time, we will tell you and may take up to another 45 days, for a maximum of 90.

How we verify you

To protect your information, we will confirm your identity before we act. If you have a Hostly account, we verify you through your account sign-in. If you do not, for example if you are a reviewer, we verify you by matching the details in your request, such as the email address you contact us from and the review or name in question. We will only use the information you give us for a verification request to verify you.

Authorized agents

You may use an authorized agent to make a request for you. We may ask the agent for proof that you gave them permission, and we may still ask you to confirm your identity directly.

Global Privacy Control

Some browsers can send an opt-out preference signal, such as Global Privacy Control. Since we do not sell or share personal information, there is nothing for that signal to switch off, but we mention it so you know we are not quietly ignoring it.

14. Security

Data is encrypted in transit and at rest by our hosting and database providers. Access to production systems is limited to people who need it. We sign you in with a one-time emailed code rather than a stored password, which removes a common way accounts get broken into. Our full Security page explains what we do in plain English.

No system is perfectly secure, and we will not pretend otherwise.

15. If there is ever a breach

If a security breach affects your personal information, we will tell you without undue delay, and no later than 72 hours after we confirm it, unless the law directs us to wait. We will tell you what happened, what information was involved, and what we are doing about it, and we will notify any authority the law requires us to notify.

16. Children

Hostly is a business tool for adults. It is not directed at anyone under 18, and we do not knowingly collect information from children. If we learn we have, we will delete it.

17. Changes to this policy

If we change this policy, we will update the "Last updated" date at the top. If the change is significant, for example a new sub-processor or a new use of your data, we will email you at least 14 days before it takes effect. Continuing to use Hostly after a change means you accept the updated policy.

18. How to reach us

Hostly, a product of Vero Dawn
PO Box 5093
Mooresville, NC 28117
United States
hello@hostly-reviews.com

Write to us with any privacy question, and a real person will answer.