Your tax details are sensitive, and we treat them that way. Here's exactly what we collect, why, and what you can do about it — in plain English.
Version 2.0 · Last updated 14 October 2026
This policy explains how Filed Tax looks after your personal information when you use our website and our service. It sits alongside our Terms & Conditions.
The "data controller" for your information is Gazelle Accountancy Ltd (company number 17128689), trading as Filed Tax, of Office 63GA, 321–323 High Road, Chadwell Heath, Greater London, RM6 6AX. We're registered with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) under reference ZC223205.
If you have any questions about your data, email us at trevor@filedtax.co.uk. We have not appointed a separate Data Protection Officer; Trevor Smeed is our named contact for data questions.
To prepare and file your tax, we collect:
Some of this is "special category" or sensitive information. We only collect what we need to do your tax properly.
Under UK data-protection law we must have a lawful basis for using your information. Ours are:
We use software — including AI-assisted tools — to help organise your information, draft answers to your questions, and prepare your submissions more quickly. This helps us keep the service simple and affordable.
Where a business name appears on a bank or card statement you send us, we may look up that business's public identity (for example its trading name) using an AI-assisted web search, so your records are described accurately; only the merchant's printed name is ever used in the lookup — never your name, your account details or any amounts — and the result is kept in our own directory so the same business need not be looked up twice.
A real person always reviews your return before it's filed. We don't make solely-automated decisions that have a legal or similarly significant effect on you. Any guidance our tools produce is checked by us before anything is relied on or submitted — as explained in our Terms.
We never sell your data. We share it only with those who help us deliver the service, and where the law requires:
Everyone we share your data with is required to keep it secure and use it only for the purpose we've asked them to.
Transfers outside the UK. Some of our providers may process your information on servers outside the UK, including in the United States: Google (our email, document storage and client-record system, and advert measurement on this site and in the client portal, section 9), WhatsApp / Meta (messaging) and Anthropic (the AI tools in section 4). Transfers to Google in the United States are covered by the UK–US data bridge. For our other providers, we make sure your data is protected by an approved safeguard, such as the UK International Data Transfer Agreement (IDTA) or the UK Addendum to the EU Standard Contractual Clauses, together with additional protections where they're needed.
Your records are stored in Google Workspace, which may hold data in the UK, Europe or the United States, and our client portal is hosted on UK-based servers. We protect your information with appropriate technical and organisational measures, including encryption in transit and at rest, and we limit access to those who need it to do your tax.
We keep your information for as long as you're a client and afterwards for as long as the law requires. In particular, anti-money-laundering rules require us to keep identity and transaction records for five years after our relationship ends, and tax records are kept in line with HMRC's requirements. When we no longer need your data, we delete or anonymise it securely.
Under UK data-protection law you have the right to:
Some of these rights are limited where we have a legal duty to keep your records (for example, tax and anti-money-laundering rules). To exercise any right, email trevor@filedtax.co.uk. If you're unhappy with how we've handled your data, you can complain to the ICO at ico.org.uk or on 0303 123 1113 — though we'd appreciate the chance to put things right first.
Our website sets very few cookies. Specifically:
_ga and _ga_*) that tell us, in aggregate, which pages are read and which links are clicked. They do not identify you to us. We also record whether you clicked a "Sign up now", "Log in", pricing or contact link, so we can see which pages lead to enquiries. No name, email or tax information is ever sent to Google Analytics from this site._gcl_au (a reference to your browser, kept for three months) and, if you arrived by clicking one of our Google adverts, _gcl_aw and other _gcl_* cookies (references to that click). Google is told which pages you view, and receives the technical details any website visit involves, such as your IP address and browser type. No name, email address, message or tax figure is ever sent to Google Ads from this site. Google uses this information under its own advertising and privacy policies. You can stop the advertising measurement at any time: choose "Turn it off" on the cookie notice, or use "Cookie settings" in the footer of every page. Once you do, we tell Google's tag (through Google's consent mode) that advertising cookies and advertising use are refused, so it sets none and your visit is not matched to an advert; Google Analytics carries on as described above. To remember that choice across this site and the client portal we set one cookie of our own, ft_consent. It exists only if you have turned advertising measurement off, it holds nothing but the word "declined", and it lasts for up to a year. If you have a Google account, you can also manage how Google uses this in Google's My Ad Centre. We no longer use the OpenAI (ChatGPT ads) or Meta (Facebook and Instagram ads) pixels on this site: since 14 October 2026 nothing is loaded here from OpenAI or Meta, and we send neither of them anything about your visit or your enquiry._ga and _ga_* cookies) and the same Google Ads tag (so the same _gcl_au and _gcl_* cookies), so we can see how people move through sign-up and the portal, and which adverts lead to someone becoming a client. From the portal we send Google three things: which page you are on, with anything that could identify you or a document removed from the address; during sign-up, which question you have reached, so we can see where people get stuck or give up (the question, never your answer); and a note of three moments — an account being created, sign-up being finished, and a payment method being set up. The sign-up record carries an internal account reference number. No name, email address, phone number, tax figure or document is ever sent to Google. If you have turned advertising measurement off on this site, the portal tells Google’s tag the same (through Google’s consent mode) on every portal page, so it sets no advertising cookies there and your portal visit is not matched to an advert; Google Analytics carries on as described above. The OpenAI (ChatGPT ads) pixel the portal carried until 14 October 2026, with its __oppref and __obref cookies, has been removed: nothing is loaded from OpenAI in the portal any more. One more cookie, ft_internal, is set only on our own team’s browsers so that our visits are left out of these figures; it is never set for a client.You can block or delete cookies through your browser settings, and you can opt out of Google Analytics across all websites with Google's browser add-on. Blocking analytics cookies does not affect anything on this site.
We communicate with you by email and, where you've opted in, by WhatsApp — for example to remind you when information or a deadline is due, to confirm a filing, or to answer your questions. These are service messages about your account and your filings, and we'll send them as we need to in order to run your service.
We'll only send you marketing — news, offers or tips that aren't about your own account — if you've separately agreed to it. You can opt out of marketing at any time, using the unsubscribe link in our emails, replying STOP to a WhatsApp marketing message, or contacting us, without affecting the service messages we still need to send you. You can also change how we contact you, or ask us to stop using WhatsApp, at any time.
The calculators on this site (for example the Self Assessment tax estimator and the Making Tax Digital timing checker) work entirely in your browser. The figures you type are not sent to us and are not stored anywhere unless you ask us to email you the result.
If you ask for your result by email, we use the figures you entered to work out the result on our server and send it to the address you give us. Basis: our legitimate interest in providing the result you asked for. We keep a record of the request — your email address, the calculator used, the page, the date and a broad income band (for example "£30,000 to £50,000") but not the exact figures you entered — together with the wording of any consent you gave and the address it came from, so we can show what you agreed to.
We'll only send you deadline reminders and occasional tax tips if you separately choose "Yes, remind me" — that box is never pre-selected. Basis: consent. Every email carries a one-click unsubscribe link, and you can also reply STOP. We keep these records for up to 24 months after the last email we send you, then delete them. If you become a client, your details move to your client record and section 7 applies instead.
WhatsApp messaging with Filed Tax (Gazelle Accountancy Ltd) is optional and always something you choose. We'll only message you on WhatsApp once you've given us your mobile number and opted in — for example by ticking the WhatsApp option when you sign up, or by messaging us first. When you opt in, we tell you it's Filed Tax you'll hear from and the kinds of messages you'll get:
WhatsApp is provided by Meta Platforms Ireland Limited. When you message us on WhatsApp, your phone number and the content of your messages are also processed by WhatsApp/Meta under WhatsApp's own Privacy Policy. We use the WhatsApp Business Cloud API, which means Meta hosts our side of the conversation. Your messages are encrypted in transit, but they are decrypted on Meta's servers before they reach us, so a WhatsApp conversation with us is not end-to-end encrypted in the way a personal WhatsApp chat is. Meta keeps WhatsApp messages, including any photos or documents you send, on its servers for up to 30 days. If you would rather your documents did not pass through Meta, upload them through the Filed Tax portal instead, which puts them straight into your client file without going through WhatsApp. We only use the information we get through WhatsApp to message you in connection with your tax and our service to you — we don't use it for anything else. Because WhatsApp/Meta may process data outside the UK, this involves an international transfer protected by an approved safeguard (see section 5).
You can opt out of WhatsApp at any time — reply STOP, ask us to switch you to email, or contact us at trevor@filedtax.co.uk — and we'll stop messaging you there. Opting out of WhatsApp won't stop the essential service messages we're still required to send you by another channel, such as email.
We may update this policy from time to time. If we make an important change, we'll let you know and update the date at the top of this page.
For anything about your privacy or this policy, email trevor@filedtax.co.uk or write to us at Gazelle Accountancy Ltd, Office 63GA, 321–323 High Road, Chadwell Heath, Greater London, RM6 6AX.
Filed Tax. — done-for-you Self Assessment and Making Tax Digital for anyone with a personal tax return.