Updated: 25th May 2018
What are cookies?
Cookies are very small text files that are stored on your computer when you visit some websites. Cookies are used by nearly all websites and do not harm your system.
Cookies are either:
- Session cookies: these are only stored on your computer during your web session and are automatically deleted when you close your browser. They usually store an anonymous session ID allowing you to browse a website without having to log-in to each page but they do not collect any personal data from your computer; or
- Persistent cookies: a persistent cookie is stored as a file on your computer and it remains there when you close your web browser. The cookie can be read by the website that created it when you visit that website again. For example we use persistent cookies for Google Analytics.
Cookies can also be categorised as follows:
- Strictly necessary cookies: These cookies are essential to enable you to use our website effectively, such as when buying a product and / or service, and therefore cannot be turned off. Without these cookies, the services available to you on our website cannot be provided. These cookies do not gather information about you that could be used for marketing or remembering where you have been on the internet.
- Performance cookies: These cookies enable us to monitor and improve the performance of our website. For example, they allow us to count visits, identify traffic sources and see which parts of the site are most popular.
- Functionality cookies: These cookies allow our website to remember choices you make and provide enhanced features. For instance, we may be able to provide you with news or updates relevant to the services you use. They may also be used to provide services you have requested such as viewing a video or commenting on a blog. The information these cookies collect is usually anonymised.
Please note that third parties who advertise on our website (including, for example, advertising networks and providers of external services like web traffic analysis services) may also use cookies, over which we have no control. These cookies are likely to be analytical/performance cookies or targeting cookies. Targeting cookies enable them to show you customised adverts based on your preferences.
How we use cookies
- We use cookies to collect anonymous data via Google Analytics on how visitors use our site (such as numbers, where from, time spent, pages viewed, visitor returns). This helps us improve the site. It enables us to know which types of content, such as blog posts, are most popular. We then know to create more of that type of content because it’s what our website visitors want to see. We also know which content is least popular so we stop wasting time writing about things that our website visitors aren’t interested in! This knowledge also helps us improve our products and services tailoring them to what our customers want or need.
- We use cookies to enable you to easily share pages or blog posts on social media.
- We use cookies to keep our website secure so that it’s safe for you to browse.
- We use cookies for advertising and marketing purposes. We use the marketing platforms such as Google and Facebook to occasionally show you adverts for services which we think might interest you. This helps us acquire new work, which in turn helps us stay in business. This means we will still be here in the future to help our customers whenever they need help!
By using our website, you are consenting to us placing cookies on your devices for these purposes.
If you do not consent, you must disable cookies in your browser, but this may stop our website from functioning properly on your device. If you use your browser settings to block all cookies (including essential cookies) you may not be able to access all or parts of our site.
How you can manage your cookies
The browsers of most computers, smartphones and other web-enabled devices are typically set up to accept cookies. If you wish to amend your cookie preferences for this website or any other websites, you can do this through your browser settings. Your browser’s ‘help’ function will tell you how to do this.
Please note: if you use multiple internet browsers/computers/mobile devices, you’ll need to update your settings on each in order to disable cookies completely.
However, please remember that cookies are often used to enable and improve certain functions on our website. If you choose to switch certain cookies off, it is likely to affect how our website works for you.
More information about how to disable cookies can be found on allaboutcookies.org.
If you would like to prevent data being used by Google Analytics you can download and install the Google Analytics opt-out browser add on from https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.
Thank you for visiting our website and we hope you choose to stay 🙂