Your data.
This notice explains how SmartCOG (Pty) Ltd, trading as El Capitan Marine ("ECM", "we"), collects, uses and protects your personal information under the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 ("POPIA").
What we collect
- Name, email and phone you give when booking or signing in.
- Booking details: vessel, trip type, date, party size, special requests.
- Payment confirmation from Paystack, never your full card details. We do not store card numbers.
- Server logs (IP, user agent) for security and abuse-prevention.
Why we collect it
- To deliver the charter you booked.
- To contact you about your booking: confirmations, weather, changes.
- To meet legal record-keeping obligations (SARS, SAMSA).
- To improve our service. We do not sell your data.
Who we share it with
- Paystack: only payment metadata required to take payment.
- SendGrid / Twilio: to send your booking emails / SMS.
- The skipper assigned to your trip: name + party size only.
- Statutory authorities when legally required.
Cookies and analytics
We use Google Analytics to understand how the site is used: which pages people read, where a booking gets abandoned, and which adverts brought someone here. Google LLC runs it on our behalf.
Analytics cookies only run if you accept them. The banner on your first visit offers a straight choice, with nothing pre-selected, and analytics stay switched off until you answer.
- Accept: Google sets two cookies, _ga and _ga_J7WEX12RME, which expire after two years. They hold a random identifier, never your name, email or phone number. We also link this to our Google Ads account so we can see which adverts lead to real bookings, and Google may use it to show you our adverts on other sites.
- Decline: nothing is stored on your device. Google still receives an anonymous signal that a page was viewed, carrying no identifier and no way to connect it to you or to anything you do later.
Either way, we never send Google your name, email, phone number or booking details.
Your answer is kept in a cookie called ecm_consent for six months. It covers both this site and the booking app, so you are only asked once. To change your mind, clear your cookies for ecmarine.co.za and reload; the banner will ask again.
Meta. We also use the Meta pixel to measure our Facebook and Instagram adverts. It follows the same answer as Google, on the same bar: accept and Meta may set its _fbp cookie and match a page view or a WhatsApp click to an advert; decline and nothing is stored. Your answer is kept in an ecm_consent cookie for six months so we do not ask on every visit.
Referral links. If you arrive through a partner's link, a small ecm_rid cookie remembers their code for 30 days so the booking is credited to them. It holds the code and nothing about you, and is set whatever you answer on the banner.
Where you are matters. If you are visiting from the EU, the UK or Switzerland, nothing is stored until you press Accept. Everywhere else, including South Africa, these cookies are on from your first page unless you press Decline on the bar; Decline switches them off and is remembered the same way.
The banner does not cover the cookies that keep you signed in and hold a booking in progress. Those are essential to the site working at all and carry no advertising or tracking function.
Google processes this data on servers outside South Africa, including in the United States. Analytics data is deleted after 14 months.
How long we keep it
Booking and payment records: 7 years for tax/audit. Account data: until you delete your account, then deleted within 30 days. Server logs: 90 days.
Your rights
- Access: request a copy of the personal information we hold about you.
- Correct: fix anything that's wrong.
- Delete: close your account and have us erase your details (subject to the 7-year tax record requirement above).
- Object: stop processing for marketing or other non-essential purposes.
- Complain to the Information Regulator if you think we've mishandled your data.
Contact
Email - info@ecmarine.co.za WhatsApp - +27 64 621 0795.