Last updated: 8 August 2026
At Gemstars & Smiles, we respect your privacy and are committed to protecting your personal information. This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect when you visit or use our website, how we use it, who we may share it with, and the rights you have in relation to your personal data.
This policy applies to visitors, customers, parents, guardians and other users of the Gemstars & Smiles website.
1. Who We Are
Gemstars & Smiles is an educational website providing learning resources, digital educational products and interactive learning experiences for children, parents and educators.
Our website address is:
For questions about this Privacy Policy or how your personal information is handled, please contact us through the contact details or Contact page provided on our website.
2. Information We May Collect
Depending on how you use Gemstars & Smiles, we may collect information including:
- Your name
- Email address
- Billing address
- Delivery address, where applicable
- Telephone number, if provided
- Account username and account information
- Order and purchase information
- Information submitted through contact forms
- Comments you leave on the website
- IP address
- Browser and device information
- Website usage and analytics information
- Cookie preferences
- Information you voluntarily enter when using interactive features such as our AI Homework Tutor
We only aim to collect information that is reasonably necessary to operate our website, provide our services and meet our legal obligations.
3. How We Use Your Personal Information
We may use your personal information to:
- Process and manage purchases and orders
- Provide access to digital educational products and services
- Create and manage customer accounts
- Process payments
- Respond to questions and customer-support requests
- Provide and improve our educational services
- Operate interactive features such as our AI Homework Tutor
- Understand how visitors use our website
- Improve website performance and user experience
- Detect spam, fraud, abuse and security threats
- Maintain appropriate financial and business records
- Comply with legal, tax and regulatory obligations
We do not sell your personal information.
4. Our Lawful Bases for Processing Personal Data
Under UK data-protection law, we must have a lawful basis for processing personal information.
Depending on the circumstances, we may rely on:
Contract – when processing your information is necessary to fulfil an order or provide a service you have requested.
Legal obligation – when we need to retain or process information to comply with applicable laws, including accounting and tax requirements.
Legitimate interests – where processing is reasonably necessary for operating, protecting or improving our website and services, provided those interests are not overridden by your rights.
Consent – where you have actively agreed to a particular type of processing, such as certain non-essential cookies or analytics technologies where consent is required.
Where processing relies on consent, you can withdraw your consent at any time.
5. WooCommerce and Purchases
Gemstars & Smiles uses WooCommerce to provide its online shopping functionality.
When you make a purchase, we may collect information required to process and manage your order, including your name, email address, billing information, order details and other information you provide during checkout.
We use this information to:
- Process your order
- Provide purchased products or digital resources
- Communicate with you about your purchase
- Manage refunds or customer-service enquiries
- Prevent fraudulent transactions
- Maintain appropriate financial records
- Meet our legal and tax obligations
Order information may be retained for as long as reasonably necessary for business, accounting, tax and legal purposes.
6. Payments
Payments on Gemstars & Smiles are processed using WooCommerce Payments.
When you make a payment, information required to process the transaction may be provided to the payment-processing service.
Gemstars & Smiles does not intentionally store your full payment-card details on its own website systems where those details are handled securely by the payment provider.
Payment providers may process certain personal and transactional information in accordance with their own privacy policies and legal obligations.
7. Google Analytics
Gemstars & Smiles uses Google Analytics to help us understand how visitors use our website.
Google Analytics may collect information such as:
- Pages visited
- Time spent on the website
- General device and browser information
- Approximate location information
- How visitors arrived at our website
- Interactions with pages and website features
This information helps us understand website performance and improve our content and services.
Google Analytics may use cookies or similar technologies. Where consent is required, analytics technologies should only be activated after you have provided the appropriate consent through our cookie-consent system.
You can change or withdraw your cookie choices using the cookie controls available on our website.
8. Cookies
Gemstars & Smiles uses cookies and similar technologies to operate the website and, where permitted, understand how visitors use it.
Cookies are small files stored on your device when you visit a website.
Some cookies are essential for the website to function correctly. Others, such as analytics cookies, may require your consent.
If you leave a comment on our website, you may be given the option to save your name, email address and website in cookies for your convenience. This means you do not need to enter the same information again when leaving another comment. These cookies may remain for up to one year.
If you visit a website login page, a temporary cookie may be used to determine whether your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal information and is normally removed when you close your browser.
When registered users log in, cookies may also be used to remember login information and display preferences.
If you select a “Remember Me” option, your login may remain active for a longer period.
You can manage non-essential cookie preferences using the cookie controls provided on our website. You can also control cookies through your browser settings.
Blocking certain essential cookies may affect how parts of the website function.
9. Comments
When visitors leave comments on Gemstars & Smiles, we may collect the information entered into the comments form together with the visitor’s IP address and browser user-agent information to help with spam detection and website security.
An anonymised string created from your email address, sometimes called a hash, may be provided to the Gravatar service to determine whether you use the service.
After your comment has been approved, your Gravatar profile picture, if applicable, may be publicly visible alongside your comment.
Comments may also be checked using an automated spam-detection service.
10. Media
If users are permitted to upload images to Gemstars & Smiles, they should avoid uploading images containing embedded location information such as EXIF GPS data.
Other website visitors may potentially be able to download publicly accessible images and extract embedded location information from them.
Parents and children should therefore avoid uploading photographs or files containing unnecessary personal or location information.
11. AI Homework Tutor
Gemstars & Smiles may provide an AI Homework Tutor designed to support learning and help users understand educational topics.
When using the AI Homework Tutor, users may submit questions, prompts or other educational information. Information entered into the AI Homework Tutor may need to be processed by the technology providers used to operate the service.
Users should not enter unnecessary personal information into the AI Homework Tutor.
Children should not be encouraged to provide information such as:
- Their full name
- Home address
- Telephone number
- Personal email address
- School address
- Passwords
- Financial information
- Private family information
- Precise location
- Sensitive personal information
Parents and guardians are encouraged to supervise children’s use of the AI Homework Tutor where appropriate.
The AI Homework Tutor is intended to support learning. AI-generated answers may occasionally contain errors and should not automatically be treated as authoritative professional or educational advice.
As the AI Homework Tutor develops, this Privacy Policy may be updated to reflect the specific AI providers used, how information is processed and any applicable retention arrangements.
12. Children’s Privacy
Gemstars & Smiles provides educational content that may be useful to children. We take children’s privacy seriously.
Where possible, purchases, account management and other activities involving personal or financial information should be carried out by a parent, guardian, teacher or other responsible adult.
We do not encourage children to disclose unnecessary personal information publicly or through our interactive services.
Children using the website should avoid sharing their full name, home address, telephone number, passwords, precise location or other unnecessary personal information.
Parents and guardians are encouraged to supervise younger children’s use of interactive website features.
If you believe that a child has provided personal information to Gemstars & Smiles inappropriately, please contact us so that we can review the information and take appropriate action.
13. Embedded Content From Other Websites
Pages and articles on Gemstars & Smiles may contain embedded content such as videos, images, educational resources or other material provided by third-party websites.
Embedded content may behave in a similar way to visiting the third-party website directly.
Those third-party websites may collect information about you, use cookies, employ additional tracking technologies and monitor your interaction with their content.
Their processing of your information is governed by their own privacy policies.
14. Who We May Share Your Information With
We may share personal information with trusted service providers where necessary to operate Gemstars & Smiles.
Depending on the services you use, these may include:
- Website hosting and infrastructure providers
- WooCommerce and payment-processing services
- Google Analytics
- Website security and spam-detection services
- Providers supporting our AI Homework Tutor
- Professional advisers where necessary
- Government, tax, regulatory or law-enforcement authorities where legally required
We only aim to share information where there is a legitimate reason to do so.
If you request a password reset, information such as your IP address may be included in or associated with the password-reset process.
15. International Data Transfers
Some third-party technology providers used by Gemstars & Smiles may process information outside the United Kingdom.
Where personal information is transferred internationally, we aim to use service providers and arrangements that provide appropriate safeguards in accordance with applicable UK data-protection requirements.
16. How Long We Keep Your Information
We retain personal information only for as long as reasonably necessary for the purpose for which it was collected, including satisfying legal, accounting, security and reporting requirements.
Retention periods may vary depending on the type of information.
For example:
- Order and transaction information may be retained where required for accounting, tax, legal or fraud-prevention purposes.
- Account information may be retained while your account remains active and for an appropriate period afterwards.
- Customer-support communications may be retained where necessary to manage enquiries and maintain appropriate records.
- Comments and associated metadata may be retained for an extended period to help recognise and approve follow-up comments and maintain discussion history.
We may delete or anonymise information when it is no longer required.
17. Registered Users
If you create an account on Gemstars & Smiles, we may store the personal information you provide in your user profile.
Registered users may be able to view, edit or delete certain personal information through their account.
For technical or security reasons, some information, such as a username, may not be directly changeable.
Website administrators may also be able to access and edit user information where necessary for account administration, customer support, security or website management.
18. Your Data-Protection Rights
Depending on the circumstances, UK data-protection law may give you rights relating to your personal information.
These may include the right to:
- Ask for access to personal information we hold about you
- Ask us to correct inaccurate or incomplete information
- Ask us to erase your personal information in certain circumstances
- Ask us to restrict how your information is processed
- Object to certain processing
- Request transfer of certain information where applicable
- Withdraw consent where processing is based on your consent
These rights are subject to applicable legal requirements and exemptions.
If you have an account on Gemstars & Smiles or have left comments, you may also request information about personal data we hold about you and ask for eligible information to be erased.
We may need to retain certain information where required for legal, administrative, accounting, fraud-prevention or security purposes.
19. Complaints
If you have concerns about how Gemstars & Smiles handles your personal information, please contact us first so that we have an opportunity to address your concern.
You also have the right to raise a concern with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK’s data-protection regulator.
20. Keeping Your Information Secure
We take reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect personal information against unauthorised access, loss, misuse, alteration or disclosure.
However, no internet-based system can be guaranteed to be completely secure. Users should also take appropriate steps to protect their accounts, including using strong passwords and keeping login details confidential.
21. Third-Party Websites
Gemstars & Smiles may contain links to external websites.
We are not responsible for the privacy practices of websites operated by other organisations. We encourage users to read the privacy policies of third-party websites before providing personal information to them.
22. Changes to This Privacy Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes to our website, services, technology or legal obligations.
Any updated version will be published on this page with a revised “Last updated” date.
We encourage visitors to review this Privacy Policy periodically.
23. Contact Us
If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, wish to exercise your data-protection rights, or have concerns about how your personal information is handled, please contact Gemstars & Smiles using the contact information provided on our website.