Privacy Policy

1. Introduction

At Aari Clothing ("we," "our," "us"), we are deeply committed to protecting the privacy and security of your personal information. This Privacy Policy ("Policy") provides a comprehensive overview of how we collect, use, process, store, disclose, and protect your personal data when you engage with our website located at [Your Website URL, e.g., www.aariclothingcompany.com], make purchases, or otherwise interact with us.

We process personal data in accordance with applicable data protection laws, including but not limited to the Information Technology (Reasonable Security Practices and Procedures and Sensitive Personal Data or Information) Rules, 2011 ("SPDI Rules") under the Information Technology Act, 2000 of India, and for our international users, the General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679 ("GDPR") and the UK General Data Protection Regulation ("UK GDPR"), as well as other relevant international privacy laws.

By accessing or using our services, you signify your understanding and acceptance of the terms outlined in this Policy. If you do not agree with any part of this Policy, please refrain from using our website and services.

2. Data Controller

For the purposes of applicable data protection laws, Aari Clothing, located at [Your Full Business Address, e.g., 10A, Antheri founder street, Mangalam Road, Palladam, Tamil Nadu 641664], is the data controller responsible for the processing of your personal data described in this Policy. This means we determine the purposes and means of processing your personal data.

3. Information We Collect and How We Collect It

We collect various types of information to provide and improve our services, fulfilling our obligations to you. This information is collected directly from you, automatically through your interaction with our website, and occasionally from third-party sources.

3.1. Information You Provide Directly to Us

This includes personal data you voluntarily provide when you:

• Create an Account: Your full name, email address, password.
• Place an Order: Full name, billing address, shipping address, email address, phone number, payment method details (e.g., credit/debit card number, expiry date, CVC - *processed by third-party payment gateways, not stored by us*), product selections, order notes.
• Contact Customer Support: Your name, email address, phone number, and any information you provide in your communication (e.g., order details, inquiries, feedback, complaints).
• Sign up for Newsletters or Marketing Communications: Your email address, name, and preferences.
• Participate in Surveys, Contests, or Promotions: Name, email, demographic information, and any specific data required for the activity.
• Submit User-Generated Content: Such as product reviews or comments, which may include your name/username and the content itself.

3.2. Information Collected Automatically (Usage Data / Derivative Data)

When you visit our website, certain information is collected automatically through various technologies. This information is primarily used for analytics, improving user experience, and ensuring website security.

• Device Information: IP address (anonymized where required), browser type and version, operating system, device type, screen resolution.
• Log Data: Pages viewed, access times, referring/exit pages, clickstream data, date and time stamps.
• Geolocation Data: General location derived from your IP address. We do not collect precise geolocation without your explicit consent.
• Interaction Data: Information about your interaction with the website, such as scrolling, clicks, and mouseovers.

3.3. Cookies and Tracking Technologies

We use cookies, web beacons, pixels, and similar tracking technologies to enhance your Browse experience, analyze site usage, manage shopping carts, and for marketing purposes.

• Essential Cookies: Necessary for the website to function (e.g., remembering login status, shopping cart contents).
• Performance/Analytics Cookies: Collect information about how you use our website (e.g., pages visited, time spent). We use Google Analytics 4 (GA4) for this purpose, which helps us understand user behavior and optimize our site. GA4 anonymizes IP addresses.
• Functionality Cookies: Remember your preferences (e.g., language, region) to provide a more personalized experience.
• Advertising/Targeting Cookies: Used to deliver more relevant advertisements to you based on your interests.

For more detailed information about the types of cookies we use, their purpose, and how you can manage your cookie preferences, please refer to our dedicated Cookie Policy.

3.4. Information from Third Parties

In certain situations, we may receive information about you from third-party sources. This typically occurs when these services integrate with our website or provide data that enhances our services.

• Payment Processors: When you make a purchase, our payment gateways (e.g., Razorpay, Stripe, PayPal - if applicable) will provide us with confirmation of your payment, but do not share sensitive financial details like full credit card numbers with us. They might share a tokenized version or transaction ID.
• Third-Party Forms: If we use a third-party form builder (e.g., Tally.so, Google Forms) for surveys or contact, the data you submit through these forms will be collected by them and then transferred to us.
• Social Media Platforms: If you interact with our social media accounts or use social login features (if available), these platforms may share information with us in accordance with your privacy settings on those platforms.
• Data Analytics Providers: As mentioned, Google Analytics processes data on our behalf for analytics purposes.

4. How We Use Your Information (Purposes and Legal Bases)

We use the information we collect for specific, legitimate purposes. For users in the EEA/UK, each processing activity is underpinned by a defined legal basis under the GDPR/UK GDPR.

• To Provide and Maintain Our Services:
  • Purpose: To operate our website, process and fulfill your orders, manage your account, and provide requested services.
  • Personal Data Involved: Name, address, contact details, payment information (tokenized), order history.
  • Legal Basis (EEA/UK): Performance of a contract with you or to take steps at your request before entering into a contract.
• To Process Transactions and Payments:
  • Purpose: To facilitate and complete your purchases securely.
  • Personal Data Involved: Payment details (processed by third-party gateways), billing address, transaction history.
  • Legal Basis (EEA/UK): Performance of a contract.
• To Communicate with You:
  • Purpose: To respond to your inquiries, provide customer support, send order confirmations, shipping updates, and service-related announcements.
  • Personal Data Involved: Name, email address, phone number, communication content.
  • Legal Basis (EEA/UK): Performance of a contract (for service-related), Legitimate Interests (for general inquiries/support).
• For Marketing and Promotional Purposes:
  • Purpose: To send you newsletters, promotional offers, and information about new products or services that may be of interest to you.
  • Personal Data Involved: Email address, name, product preferences.
  • Legal Basis (EEA/UK): Consent (where required), or Legitimate Interests (for existing customers under certain conditions, with clear opt-out).
• To Improve and Personalize Your Experience:
  • Purpose: To understand your preferences, analyze trends, and customize our website content and product recommendations.
  • Personal Data Involved: Usage data, Browse history, product views, demographic information (if collected).
  • Legal Basis (EEA/UK): Legitimate Interests (improving our service, enhancing user experience).
• For Analytics and Research:
  • Purpose: To monitor and analyze usage and activity trends to enhance the functionality of our website and services.
  • Personal Data Involved: Anonymized/aggregated usage data, IP address.
  • Legal Basis (EEA/UK): Legitimate Interests (understanding our audience, optimizing business performance).
• To Ensure Security and Prevent Fraud:
  • Purpose: To protect our website, users, and business from fraudulent transactions, unauthorized access, and other illegal activities.
  • Personal Data Involved: IP address, transaction details, device information.
  • Legal Basis (EEA/UK): Legitimate Interests (security, fraud prevention), Legal Obligation (where required by law).
• To Comply with Legal Obligations:
  • Purpose: To fulfill our legal, regulatory, and tax obligations (e.g., maintaining transaction records for tax purposes, responding to lawful requests from public authorities).
  • Personal Data Involved: All relevant data as required by law.
  • Legal Basis (EEA/UK): Legal Obligation.

5. Disclosure of Your Information to Third Parties

We may share your personal data with third parties under specific circumstances, always ensuring appropriate safeguards are in place and only for the purposes outlined in this Policy.

• Service Providers: We engage third-party companies and individuals to facilitate our services ("Service Providers"). These Service Providers perform tasks on our behalf, such as:
  • Payment processing (e.g., Razorpay, Stripe, PayPal).
  • Shipping and fulfillment (e.g., [Your Shipping Partners]).
  • Website hosting and maintenance (e.g., [Your Hosting Provider]).
  • Email marketing and communication (e.g., [Your Email Marketing Platform]).
  • Customer support and CRM platforms (e.g., [Your CRM or Helpdesk Provider]).
  • Analytics services (e.g., Google Analytics).
  • Professional advisors (e.g., lawyers, accountants).
  These Service Providers are bound by strict contractual obligations to handle your data securely and confidentially, and are only permitted to use your data for the specific purposes we define.
• Business Transfers: In the event of a merger, acquisition, restructuring, sale of assets, or bankruptcy, your personal data may be transferred as part of the transaction. We will provide notice before your personal data is transferred and becomes subject to a different privacy policy.
• Legal Requirements and Law Enforcement: We may disclose your personal data if required to do so by law or in response to valid requests by public authorities (e.g., a court order, government request) to comply with legal obligations, enforce our terms and conditions, or protect our rights, property, or safety, or the rights, property, or safety of others. This includes compliance with Indian laws such as the Information Technology Act, 2000.
• With Your Consent: We may disclose your personal data to other third parties if you have given us your explicit consent to do so.
• Aggregated or Anonymized Data: We may share aggregated or de-identified information that cannot reasonably be used to identify you with third parties for various purposes, including business analysis, marketing, or research.

6. International Data Transfers

Aari Clothing primarily operates from India. Your personal information may be stored, processed, and transferred to and from servers and facilities located in India or other countries where our Service Providers operate. Please be aware that data protection laws in these countries may differ from those in your country of residence.

For transfers of personal data originating from the European Economic Area (EEA) or the UK, we implement appropriate safeguards to ensure your data receives a level of protection equivalent to that in the EEA/UK. These safeguards may include:

• Transferring data to countries deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data by the European Commission or the UK government.
• Using Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs) approved by the European Commission or the UK government, which impose contractual obligations on the recipient to protect the data.
• Implementing supplementary technical and organizational measures (e.g., encryption, pseudonymization) where necessary to enhance data security during transfers.

By using our services, you understand and acknowledge that your personal information may be transferred to and processed in countries outside your country of residence, including India.

7. Data Security

We implement a range of robust administrative, technical, and physical security measures to protect your personal data from unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration, and destruction. These measures include:

• Encryption: Using Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology and Transport Layer Security (TLS) to encrypt data in transit (e.g., when you submit payment information).
• Access Controls: Restricting access to personal data to authorized employees and Service Providers who have a legitimate business need to access it, and who are subject to strict confidentiality obligations.
• Firewalls: Employing firewalls and other network security technologies to protect our systems from external threats.
• Regular Security Audits: Conducting periodic security assessments and vulnerability scans.
• Data Minimization: Collecting only the personal data that is strictly necessary for the stated purposes.
• Pseudonymization/Anonymization: Where appropriate, using techniques to obscure personal identifiers.

While we strive to use commercially acceptable means to protect your personal data, no method of transmission over the Internet or electronic storage is 100% secure. Therefore, we cannot guarantee its absolute security. We encourage you to also take steps to protect your personal information, such as using strong, unique passwords and avoiding sharing them.

8. Data Retention

We retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes for which it was collected, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements.

• For account holders: We retain your data for the duration your account is active and for a reasonable period thereafter to facilitate account recovery or respond to inquiries.
• For transactional data: We retain data related to transactions for tax, audit, and legal compliance purposes, typically for [e.g., 7-10 years] as required by Indian tax laws.
• For marketing communications: We retain your contact details until you unsubscribe or withdraw your consent.
• For analytics data: Aggregated or anonymized data may be retained indefinitely.

When personal data is no longer required, we will securely delete, anonymize, or de-identify it to prevent its recovery or reconstruction.

9. Your Data Protection Rights

Depending on your jurisdiction, you may have various rights concerning your personal data. We are committed to facilitating the exercise of these rights.

9.1. General Rights (Applicable to all users, where legally permissible)

• Right to Access: You have the right to request confirmation as to whether or not personal data concerning you is being processed, and, where that is the case, access to the personal data.
• Right to Rectification: You have the right to request the correction of inaccurate or incomplete personal data we hold about you.
• Right to Object to Processing: You have the right to object to the processing of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this ground.
• Right to Restrict Processing: You have the right to request the restriction of processing of your personal data in certain circumstances (e.g., if you contest the accuracy of the data).
• Right to Opt-out of Marketing: You have the right to opt-out of receiving marketing communications from us at any time by following the unsubscribe instructions provided in our emails or by contacting us directly.

9.2. Specific Rights for EEA/UK Users (Under GDPR/UK GDPR)

In addition to the general rights, if you are located in the EEA or UK, you have the following enhanced rights:

• Right to Erasure ("Right to be Forgotten"): You have the right to request the deletion or removal of your personal data when there is no compelling reason for its continued processing. This is not an absolute right; for example, we may need to retain data for legal obligations.
• Right to Data Portability: You have the right to receive your personal data in a structured, commonly used, and machine-readable format and to transmit that data to another controller without hindrance from us, where technically feasible.
• Right to Withdraw Consent: Where we rely on your consent as the legal basis for processing your personal data, you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time. Withdrawal of consent does not affect the lawfulness of processing based on consent before its withdrawal.
• Right to Lodge a Complaint: You have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority, particularly in the Member State of your habitual residence, place of work, or place of the alleged infringement, if you believe your rights under GDPR/UK GDPR have been violated.
  For the UK, the supervisory authority is the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).
  For EEA countries, please find your relevant supervisory authority here.

9.3. How to Exercise Your Rights

To exercise any of these rights, please submit a request to us using the contact details provided in Section 13 ("Contact Us"). We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it.

We will respond to all legitimate requests within [e.g., 30 days for GDPR, or as required by local laws]. Occasionally it may take us longer than 30 days if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests. In this case, we will notify you and keep you updated.

10. Children's Privacy

Our website and services are not directed at, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from, children under the age of 13. If you are under 13, please do not provide any personal information on or through our website. If we become aware that we have inadvertently collected personal information from a child under 13 without verifiable parental consent, we will take immediate steps to delete that information from our records. If you believe we might have any information from or about a child under 13, please contact us at [Your Support Email].

11. Third-Party Websites and Services

Our website may contain links to third-party websites, products, or services that are not owned or controlled by Aari Clothing. These links are provided for your convenience. We have no control over, and assume no responsibility for, the content, privacy policies, or practices of any third-party sites or services. We strongly advise you to review the privacy policies of every site you visit.

12. Automated Decision-Making and Profiling

We do not use automated decision-making (i.e., decisions made solely by automated means without any human involvement) that produces legal effects concerning you or similarly significantly affects you.

We may engage in limited profiling for purposes such as personalizing product recommendations or showing you targeted advertisements based on your Browse history and preferences. This profiling does not produce legal or similarly significant effects on you. If you wish to opt out of such profiling, please manage your cookie preferences as described in our Cookie Policy or adjust your browser settings.

13. Changes to This Privacy Policy

We reserve the right to update or modify this Privacy Policy at any time to reflect changes in our practices, legal requirements, or regulatory landscape. When we make changes, we will revise the "Last Updated" date at the top of this Policy. Significant changes will be communicated to you by email (if you have provided your email address) or by prominent notice on our website prior to the change becoming effective. Your continued use of our services after any changes to this Policy constitutes your acceptance of the updated terms. We encourage you to review this Policy periodically to stay informed about how we are protecting your information.

14. Contact Us

If you have any questions, concerns, or requests regarding this Privacy Policy, our data practices, or if you wish to exercise your data protection rights, please contact our Data Protection Officer (DPO) or privacy team at:

• Email: support@aariclothingcompany.com
• Postal Address: Aari Clothing, 10A, Antheri founder street, Mangalam Road, Palladam, Tamil Nadu 641664, India

For more contact options, please visit our Contact Us page.