Privacy Policy

The short version

Chefo connects home chefs with neighbours who want to eat their food. To do that we collect a small amount of personal information, we use it only to run the service, and we never sell it. This policy explains what, why, and your rights under South Africa’s Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA).

Honesty note: Chefo is currently in an early test phase. This policy is written in plain language and will be reviewed by a lawyer before any public launch.

What we collect

• Account details — your email address and a display name (and a phone number, only if you sign up by phone).
• Rough location — the city and suburb you choose. We work at suburb level: we never show your exact address in the public feed, only approximate distance.
• Orders — what you reserved, from which chef, the price, a delivery address if you enter one, and the allergen acknowledgement you tick when ordering.
• Chef information — if you cook on Chefo: your kitchen details, dishes, photos, and (optionally) a Food Handler Certificate, which is stored privately and never shown publicly.

How we use it

• Signing you in and keeping your account secure.
• Showing live kitchens near your chosen area.
• Fulfilling reservations — when you order, the chef sees your display name, your order, your note, and the delivery address you entered (nothing more).
• Surfacing allergen and food-safety disclosures at the point of ordering.

We do not sell your personal information or share it with advertisers. Data is stored with our infrastructure provider (Supabase) and protected by row-level security — customers can only read their own orders; chefs can only read orders placed with them.

Payments are processed by Paystack. Your card details go directly to Paystack and never touch Chefo’s servers — we store only the transaction reference and amount.

How long we keep it

Your account data stays until you ask us to delete it. Order history is kept as a record of what was agreed between you and the chef. Live cooking sessions expire automatically within hours.

Your POPIA rights

• Ask what personal information we hold about you (access).
• Ask us to correct it if it’s wrong (correction).
• Ask us to delete your account and data (deletion).
• Withdraw consent you previously gave.
• Complain to the Information Regulator (South Africa) if you believe we’ve mishandled your information.

Contact

For any privacy request, contact the Chefo team at akashpatel1792@gmail.com (a dedicated support address will replace this before public launch). Chefo is the Responsible Party under POPIA.