Last updated: December 2024

1. Introduction

Spence Attorneys, Notaries & Conveyancers ("we", "our", or "us") is committed to protecting your privacy and ensuring the security of your personal information. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you use our website, services, or interact with us.

We comply with the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) and other applicable South African privacy legislation.

2. Information We Collect

We may collect personal information that you voluntarily provide when you:

Complete contact forms or enquiry forms on our website
Request a consultation or quote
Subscribe to our newsletter or updates
Engage our services as a client
Communicate with us via email, phone, or other channels

This information may include your name, email address, phone number, physical address, and any other details you choose to share with us.

3. How We Use Your Information

We use your personal information to:

Respond to your enquiries and requests
Provide legal services you have requested
Send you relevant information about our services
Comply with legal and regulatory obligations
Improve our website and services
Communicate important updates regarding your matter

4. Information Sharing

We do not sell, trade, or rent your personal information to third parties. We may share your information with:

Service providers who assist us in operating our business (e.g., IT support, cloud hosting)
Professional advisers and consultants when necessary for your matter
Regulatory authorities when required by law
Courts and other parties involved in legal proceedings on your behalf

5. Data Security

We implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your personal information against unauthorised access, alteration, disclosure, or destruction. However, no method of transmission over the internet is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

6. Your Rights

Under POPIA, you have the right to:

Request access to your personal information
Request correction of inaccurate or incomplete information
Request deletion of your personal information (subject to legal requirements)
Object to the processing of your personal information
Lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator

7. Cookies and Analytics

We use cookies and similar technologies to operate this website, remember your preferences, and understand how visitors use our services. Strictly necessary cookies are used to keep you signed in, secure forms against abuse, and remember your cookie choice. These cannot be disabled.

With your consent we also collect analytics data so we can measure traffic, see which pages are useful, and improve the service. This consists of two parts:

First-party analytics (consent-gated). When you accept analytics cookies, your browser sends events - such as page views, CTA clicks, and form submissions - to our own server. We store an anonymised, hashed form of your IP address (never the raw IP), the page URL, the document referrer, and any UTM campaign parameters present in the link you arrived from. These rows are retained for 90 days and then permanently deleted.
Operational conversion records (legitimate interest). When you complete a transaction - such as booking a consultation, paying an invoice, or submitting a portal intake form - our server records that conversion event regardless of your analytics cookie preference. This is necessary to operate the service (for example, to reconcile payments and track matter intake). These server- side records are subject to the same 90-day retention window and are tagged separately from consent-gated analytics so they can be isolated or deleted on request.
Google Analytics 4 (consent-gated). If you accept analytics cookies, we load Google Analytics with IP anonymisation enabled to aggregate traffic statistics. Google acts as our processor for this data. You can read Google's privacy notice at policies.google.com/privacy. GA4 events are only forwarded from your browser when your consent is set to "accepted"; operational server events are not forwarded to Google.

You can withdraw consent at any time by clicking "Cookie preferences" in the site footer and choosing essential cookies only. Doing so stops new browser analytics events being collected and stops GA4 from loading. Operational records for completed transactions are retained under legitimate interest and are not affected by your cookie preference. You may request deletion of your data by contacting us below.

8. Contact Us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or wish to exercise your rights, please contact us at:

Spence Attorneys, Notaries & Conveyancers
6 Mead Way, Pinelands, Cape Town, 7405
Email: info@spencelaw.co.za
Phone: +27 21 532 9224

9. AI Crawlers and Generative-AI Training

We allow a defined list of generative-AI and AI search crawlers - including GPTBot, ChatGPT-User, Google-Extended, PerplexityBot, ClaudeBot, Applebot-Extended, Meta-ExternalAgent, Bytespider and cohere-ai - to access the public, informational pages of this website so that AI-powered search tools can find and cite our published legal content. The full crawler policy is published at /robots.txt and our LLM-readable site briefs are at /llms.txt and /llms-full.txt. Administrative routes, the client portal, our internal API and any personal-data submission paths (intake forms, calculators that capture an email address, contact and consultation flows) are excluded for all crawlers, including AI crawlers, and personal data submitted through this site is never included in any AI-readable brief or training corpus we control.

10. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. The updated version will be indicated by a revised "Last updated" date. We encourage you to review this policy periodically.