Privacy Policy

The Cape Town Gem & Mineral Club ("the Club", "we", "us") respects your privacy. This policy explains what personal information we collect through this website, why we collect it, who we share it with, how long we keep it, and the rights you have under the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 ("POPIA").

1. Who is responsible for your information

The Club is the "responsible party" for the personal information described in this policy. We are a non-profit society based at the clubhouse in Bothasig, Cape Town, operating as the Mineralogical Society of Southern Africa.

Our Information Officer can be contacted at info@ctminsoc.org.za for any question, request or complaint about your personal information.

2. What information we collect

We only collect what we need to run the club and this website:

• Account details — your email address and password when you register on the site, plus your name. If you sign in with Google, Facebook, Microsoft or Apple, we receive your name and email address from that provider.
• Membership details — your full name, email address, phone number, residential address, date of birth and membership type, which you supply when you join or update your member profile.
• Membership records — your member-since date, subscription expiry, subscription status and auto-renew preference.
• Messages you send us — the name, email address, phone number and message you submit through the contact form or newsletter signup.
• Game and leaderboard entries — the display name you choose and your score in the Crystal Mining Adventure game.
• Payment confirmations — the fact that a payment was made, its amount and a reference number. Card details are entered on our payment provider's own secure page and are never stored by the Club.
• Technical information — basic log and security information generated when you use the site, such as the pages you visit and error records.

3. Why we collect it

• To create and manage your account and let you sign in.
• To process your membership, renewals and payments.
• To send club news, newsletters and notices about Open Days and events.
• To answer your enquiries and requests.
• To display the game leaderboard.
• To keep the site secure, prevent abuse and meet our legal obligations.

4. Our lawful basis for processing

POPIA allows us to process personal information where you have consented, where it is necessary to perform an agreement with you (for example your membership), where we have a legitimate interest in running the club, or where the law requires it. You may withdraw consent at any time, although this may mean we can no longer provide a service that depends on that information.

5. Who we share it with

We do not sell, rent or trade your personal information. We share it only with the service providers ("operators") that make the site work, and only as far as necessary:

• Hosting and database services that store the site and its data on our behalf.
• Our payment provider, which processes membership and shop payments.
• Social sign-in providers (Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple) if you choose to sign in with one of them.
• Our email service, used to send newsletters, receipts and notices.
• Club committee members who need access to administer memberships, payments and enquiries.
• Authorities, where we are legally obliged to disclose information.

6. Cross-border transfers

Some of our service providers store data outside South Africa. Where that happens, we take reasonable steps to ensure your information receives a comparable level of protection, as required by section 72 of POPIA.

7. How long we keep it

We keep membership and payment records for as long as you are a member and afterwards for as long as tax and club record-keeping rules require. Contact messages and newsletter signups are kept until you ask us to remove them or until they are clearly no longer needed. Leaderboard entries are kept while the game is running and may be reset from time to time.

8. How we protect it

Access to member information is restricted to signed-in members and club administrators, and is enforced by the site itself rather than by trust alone. Data is transmitted over encrypted connections. No system can be guaranteed completely secure, so please use a strong, unique password and let us know immediately if you suspect your account has been misused.

9. Children

Junior membership may be taken out for a child, and the information for a junior member should be supplied by a parent or guardian. We do not knowingly collect personal information directly from children without the involvement of a parent or guardian.

10. Your rights under POPIA

You have the right to:

• ask what personal information we hold about you and receive a copy of it;
• ask us to correct or update information that is wrong or out of date;
• ask us to delete information that we no longer have a lawful reason to keep;
• object to processing, or withdraw consent you previously gave;
• complain to the Information Regulator (see below).

You can update much of your own information from your member profile, or send a request to info@ctminsoc.org.za. We will respond within a reasonable time and will tell you if we are unable to comply and why.

11. Complaints

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your information, please contact us first so we can try to put it right. You may also lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator (South Africa):

• Email: complaints.IR@inforegulator.org.za
• Address: JD House, 27 Stiemens Street, Braamfontein, Johannesburg, 2001

12. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time. The date at the top of the page shows when it was last changed, and material changes will be announced on the site or by email.