Legal
Privacy Policy
The short version
- •We collect only what we need to run the service.
- •We never sell your data or share it with advertisers.
- •Your booking details are shared with the relevant venue so they can administer your ticket — that's it.
- •We use no analytics, advertising, or tracking cookies — only the cookies that keep you logged in.
- •You can ask us to delete your account at any time.
- •Questions? Email hello@seatfillers.co.uk.
Contents
1. Who we are
SeatFillers UK is a theatre papering platform that connects productions with spare seats to audiences who want free tickets.
SeatFillers UK is the Data Controller for all personal data processed through this platform. We are in the process of completing our registration with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) as a data controller.
You can contact us about any data protection matter at hello@seatfillers.co.uk. We do not have a statutory requirement to appoint a Data Protection Officer, but the same address handles all data queries and will receive a substantive response within five working days.
2. Who this policy covers
This policy applies to everyone whose personal data we process:
Members
People registered to receive complimentary tickets through the platform.
Venue Partners and Promoters
Theatres, production companies, and promoters that list shows and manage bookings.
Waitlist signups
People who have asked to be notified when we launch in their area.
Website visitors
Anyone who browses seatfillers.co.uk without an account.
Where we handle member personal data on behalf of a Venue Partner (for example, passing a member’s booking details to a venue), that processing is also governed by our Data Processing Agreement, which all venues accept when they register.
3. Members
What we collect
| Data | Why we need it |
|---|---|
| Name and email | Your identity and how we reach you. Your email is your login and the address we use to send ticket alerts. |
| Date of birth | To verify you are 18 or over, as required by our membership terms. |
| Postcode and county | To match you with shows in your area. We store your full postcode but share only the outward code (the first part, e.g. “SW1A”) with venues. |
| Travel radius | To set how far from home we should show you available tickets. |
| Phone number (optional) | For urgent operational messages — for example, if a show is cancelled at short notice and email is too slow. Providing it is entirely voluntary. |
| Show preferences | The types of performance you enjoy. Used only to prioritise and personalise the ticket alerts we send you. |
| Booking records | The shows you have attended or been allocated tickets for, including dates and venues. |
| Marketing consent | Whether you have opted in to receive updates and news from SeatFillers beyond operational ticket communications. Recording consent is a legal requirement. |
Our lawful basis
| Data | Legal basis |
|---|---|
| Name, email, postcode, county, travel radius, show preferences | Performance of contract — we cannot match you with shows or allocate tickets without this information. |
| Date of birth | Legitimate interests — verifying that members meet our 18+ age requirement is a necessary part of operating the platform responsibly. |
| Phone number | Legitimate interests — contacting you about urgent changes to a booking you have made. You are not required to provide it. |
| Booking records | Performance of contract and legal obligation (financial record-keeping requirements). |
| Marketing emails from SeatFillers | Consent — we will only send marketing communications if you have ticked the opt-in box. You can withdraw consent at any time by unsubscribing or emailing us. |
| Sharing your booking details with the venue | Legitimate interests — when you book a ticket, the venue must know who is attending in order to administer access. We share your name, email, and outward postcode only. See section 6 for detail. |
Venue mailing lists
When you book a ticket, you may be offered the option to join the venue’s own mailing list for future production news. This is entirely optional and separate from your SeatFillers membership. If you opt in, the venue will hold your contact details under their own privacy policy. You can withdraw consent directly with the venue at any time; they are required under our Data Processing Agreement to honour opt-out requests within five working days.
If you do not opt in, the venue may still contact you about matters that directly relate to a booking you have made — for example, show time changes or access information. This is permitted under the legitimate interests principle and does not require separate consent.
Automated decision-making
We do not use automated decision-making or profiling to make decisions that have a legal or similarly significant effect on you. Show matching is based on your stated preferences and location — it affects which alerts you receive, not whether you are permitted to book.
4. Venue partners and promoters
This section covers the personal data of individuals who represent venue partners or production companies — including the primary venue contact (“venue admin”) and any additional team members invited to the venue portal.
What we collect
| Data | Why we need it |
|---|---|
| Name, email, job title | To create and manage your venue portal account. Your email is your login. |
| Work phone number | For operational contact — for example, to discuss a listing or resolve a booking issue. |
| Venue details | Trading name, legal name, address, county, postcode, capacity, website, ticketing system, and optional profile fields (accessibility information, social handles, charity/company numbers, logo). Used to list and administer your shows on the platform. |
| Outreach and internal notes | Notes made by SeatFillers staff during the onboarding process, preserved for our internal audit trail. |
| Acceptance records | A timestamp recording when your venue accepted the Data Processing Agreement and (when published) Venue Partner Terms. |
| Marketing consent | Whether you have opted in to receive updates from SeatFillers. |
Lawful basis
The majority of venue partner data is processed on the basis of performance of contract — we cannot operate the venue portal, list shows, or administer bookings without it. Marketing communications are sent on the basis of consent only.
Member data you receive
When members book tickets for your shows, we share limited booking data with you (their name, email, and outward postcode) so you can administer access. Your obligations in respect of that data — including what you can and cannot do with it — are set out in the Data Processing Agreement, which forms part of your relationship with SeatFillers.
5. Website visitors and waitlist signups
Website visitors
If you browse seatfillers.co.uk without an account, we do not collect any personal data about you. We run no analytics software and use no advertising or tracking cookies. See section 9 for our full cookie disclosure.
Waitlist signups
If we are not yet serving your area and you join the waitlist, we collect your name, email address, county, and — if you opt in — marketing consent. We use this to notify you when we launch in your area and, with consent, to send you our theatre newsletter in the meantime.
The lawful basis for holding waitlist data is consent — you signed up voluntarily for a specific purpose. You can ask us to remove you at any time by emailing hello@seatfillers.co.uk. We will also proactively review and remove stale waitlist entries that have seen no activity for two years.
7. How long we keep your data
We keep personal data for as long as it is necessary for the purpose for which it was collected, and no longer. The table below gives our standard retention periods:
| Data | Retention period |
|---|---|
| Active member account | For as long as your account is active. We consider an account active if you have logged in or made a booking within the last three years. We will contact you before closing an inactive account. |
| Member account after closure | We delete your profile data within 30 days of account closure or a verified erasure request. Booking records are retained for 7 years for financial record-keeping purposes (UK law requirement), after which they are deleted. |
| Venue partner account | For the duration of the partnership. After the partnership ends, contact data is retained for 3 years to handle any residual contractual or legal matters, then deleted. |
| Booking records (all users) | 7 years from the date of the booking, in line with UK financial record-keeping requirements. |
| Waitlist signups | Until you ask to be removed, or 2 years from your signup date if no further activity, whichever comes first. |
| Invite and outreach records | 3 years from the date the invite was issued, for audit purposes. |
When data reaches the end of its retention period it is deleted or anonymised so that it can no longer be attributed to an individual. We do not archive personal data indefinitely.
8. International transfers
Some of our technology providers (Supabase, Vercel, Stripe) are based in or route data through the United States. The UK does not currently have an adequacy decision in respect of the USA, so we rely on appropriate safeguards for these transfers — specifically, the UK International Data Transfer Agreement (IDTA) or EU Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs) as adopted by UK law.
In each case we have verified that the provider has appropriate contractual protections in place. If you would like more information about the specific safeguards used for a particular transfer, please contact us at hello@seatfillers.co.uk.
We do not transfer personal data to any country that is not covered by an adequacy decision or appropriate safeguards without your explicit consent.
10. Your rights
Under UK GDPR, you have the following rights in relation to your personal data. We will respond to any request within one month (or notify you if we need more time, up to three months in complex cases). There is no charge for exercising these rights unless a request is manifestly unfounded or repetitive.
You have the right to ask us for a copy of the personal data we hold about you (a Subject Access Request). We will provide it in a structured, machine-readable format.
If any data we hold about you is inaccurate or incomplete, you have the right to ask us to correct it. For most profile data, you can do this directly in your account settings.
You have the right to ask us to delete your personal data. We will do so unless we have a legal obligation to retain it — for example, financial records which must be kept for 7 years. We will tell you clearly if an erasure request cannot be fulfilled in full and explain why.
You can ask us to pause processing your data while you contest its accuracy, object to how it is being used, or while we are considering an erasure request.
For data you provided to us on the basis of consent or contract, you can ask us to send you a copy in a structured, commonly-used, machine-readable format, or to transfer it directly to another service where this is technically feasible.
You have the right to object to processing based on legitimate interests or direct marketing. If you object to direct marketing, we will stop immediately with no questions asked. If you object to other legitimate-interests processing, we will weigh your interests against ours and stop if your interests override ours.
Where processing is based on consent (marketing emails, venue mailing list opt-ins), you can withdraw that consent at any time by unsubscribing or emailing us. Withdrawal does not affect the lawfulness of processing before you withdrew.
You have the right not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing that produces a legal or similarly significant effect. We do not make such decisions.
To exercise any of these rights, email hello@seatfillers.co.uk with the subject line “Data Rights Request”. We may ask you to verify your identity before processing your request.
11. Contact and complaints
If you have any questions about this policy or how we handle your personal data, please contact us:
SeatFillers UK
We aim to resolve all data protection queries directly. If you are not satisfied with our response, or if you believe we have handled your data unlawfully, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection:
Information Commissioner’s Office
ico.org.uk • 0303 123 1113
Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF
We recommend contacting us first — most issues can be resolved quickly and without involving a regulator.
12. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy from time to time — for example, when we add new features, start using a new service provider, or when data protection law changes. When we do, we will update the version date at the top of this page.
For material changes — for example, a new category of data sharing — we will notify active members by email before the change takes effect and give you the opportunity to object or close your account if you do not accept the new terms.
Questions about your data?
hello@seatfillers.co.uk