Macaroon Privacy Policy

Macaron attaches great importance to the protection and respect of the privacy of its users. We will only use your personal information to administer your account, provide the products and services you have requested from us, and keep you informed about our products and services. The protection, confidentiality and integrity of your personal data are our main concerns. This privacy notice explains what personal information we collect when you use our products and services, and how we use that information.

Our services

Macaron provides a solution to find and pay for your parking sessions, on and off the street, via a mobile application. In addition, we also provide services related to parking subscriptions. This Privacy Notice applies to those services and corresponding platforms.

What personal data do we collect?

We need certain personal information to be able to offer you the best parking experience and to keep you informed about our products and services. You provide some of this data directly, such as when you create an account or enter your parking information into our mobile app. Additionally, we indirectly receive some of your personal data through your devices, by recording how you interact with our services (e.g. through cookies). This allows us to personalize and improve our products. When you create a Macaron account, start a parking session or use our services, we process the following details:

First and last name,
The registration number of your vehicle,
E-mail address,
Your phone number,
Your location details,
IP address,
Phone ID,
Payment and billing information, credit card, PayPal account,
The make/type of your vehicle (if applicable),

We also receive information from third parties with whom we work. Although the partners we work with change, they are mainly:

Operators of private, municipal, rail, airport, hospital and university car parks who, if you have chosen to use our service, provide us with the details of your parking sessions, so that we can facilitate your parking transactions. This information includes your vehicle registration number, parking location, parking fees, and the start and end time of your parking session.
Operators of parking equipment (e.g. parking meters) and license plate recognition systems (e.g. in car parks), so that your parking session can be identified and recorded. Please note that such automated license plate recognition services only apply if you have registered for such service.

Cookies and other similar technologies

We collect certain data using cookies, web beacons and similar technologies (eg web beacons, other beacons, device identifiers). Cookies are text files placed on your computer to collect standard Internet log information and visitor behavior information. This information is used to track visitors' use of the website and to compile statistical reports on website activity. We record your interaction with our services in order to improve our website, content and services. Our use of these technologies and the data collected are further described in our Cookies Policy.

Device and location

If you have enabled it in your phone and app settings, we receive data about your location. We use this information to verify and facilitate your parking transactions by, for example, helping you to identify your parking location and alerting you in case you have forgotten to end your parking session. You can always change your preferences in your settings.

How do we use your personal data?

We only use your data for the purposes for which it was collected and, where applicable, to comply with local legal obligations. We use your personal data for the following purposes:

Execution of agreements with users. To provide you with parking-related products and services of your choice, we process your information for example to perform parking transactions, facilitate the payment of relevant parking fees and communicate your parking status to relevant parking enforcement agencies.
Customer support. We use your information to assist you in the use of our products and services. This includes using personal information to diagnose product problems, rectify erroneous transactions, and provide other customer support-related services.
Customer engagement and communication. We use your information to communicate with you by email, text message or other electronic media, for example on service-related matters, such as invoices. Other examples where we communicate with you include confirming account opening, sending parking reminder messages, resolving complaints, and requesting participation in one of our surveys.
Marketing. We would like to send you information which may be of interest to you, relating to our products and services and those of other companies (provided you have consented to this). We communicate with you by email, text message or other electronic media. You have the right at any time to stop us from contacting you for marketing purposes. Depending on your preferences, you can unsubscribe, change your settings online, or contact our Customer Support team to do so.
Safety, security and dispute resolution. We use your contact information to protect the security, integrity and safety of our products, services and customers. This includes processing in the context of detecting and preventing fraud, theft and other misuse of our services. We may also use personal information in connection with the settlement of disputes, to enforce our agreement with you, to enforce our rights against third parties or to defend ourselves against any claim or allegation by third parties.
Legal obligations. We may process your information in connection with a legal obligation. This includes cases where we have to respond to requests from competent authorities, administrative obligations and in cases of disputes.
Improvement and customization of our products and services. We use your personal information to improve our products and services. For example, click patterns on our website and search results can help us prioritize or identify new product features.
Maintenance, development and incident management. If you have problems with one of our products or services, we may need to process some of your personal information, such as your name, vehicle registration number and customer number, in order to resolve the problem by question. We may also use your personal information in connection with certain system development processes, for example if we transfer customer data to a new database.
General execution of business processes, internal management and management reporting. To be able to run our business, we also use your personal information for general business processes. This includes processing your information for record-keeping, insurance and other purposes related to administration, management reporting or processing in connection with audits.

With whom do we share your personal data?

We share your personal data with third parties such as municipalities, car park operators, suppliers (eg accommodation, customer service and electronic marketing) and other partners. The third parties with whom we share your information depend on your location on the services you use. We share your information:

As necessary to operate our business, provide our services to you, perform all related transactions and collect related payments, provide customer service, and communicate with you in connection with our services. For example, to process payments and transactions.
For the purposes of parking regulations, we communicate your parking status to the relevant parking enforcement agencies, such as municipalities. In such cases, your vehicle registration number, location code and start and end time of your parking transaction are shared,
If you have given us explicit consent to do so,
In some cases, the transfer of data is necessary and mandatory as a security measure; for important reasons of public interest; for the establishment, exercise or defense of legal claims and for the protection of the vital interests of the data subject or of other persons, when the data subject is physically or legally unable to give consent ,
To enforce our agreement with you, for example in the event that you have not paid for your parking transactions, we may share your information with a debt collector,
To enforce our rights against third parties, or to defend ourselves against any claims or allegations by third parties,
To protect the security, integrity, or security of our Services.

Where is your personal data processed?

For hosting and maintenance, your personal data is located in the European Union, depending on your location. Your personal data is mainly processed by our staff at our main offices in France, depending on your location. Where appropriate, certain information is also processed by our other local offices, for example in the context of the enforcement of local parking rules or local marketing campaigns. Our affiliate offices are located in the European Union. To the extent that other personal data will be transferred to a country outside the European Union or an international organisation, we will ensure that this only happens to countries and international organizations guaranteeing an adequate level of protection, having put in place appropriate safeguards to protect your data and your rights in accordance with EU privacy legislation (GDPR), or as permitted by the GDPR. If you would like to receive more information about the safeguards we have in place, please contact our Customer Support team.

How long do we keep your personal data?

We will retain your personal information only as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes for which the information was collected, or as long as required by law. For example, to comply with legal administrative retention obligations, we must keep some of your account information (eg copies of invoices) for ten years. If you don't use your account for more than 18 months, we deactivate it in our database. We will then no longer actively use your account information, e.g. to inform you about our products and services, but we will archive the account so that you can easily reactivate it if you wish to use our services again in the future. In case you want to close your account, you can delete it from the Macaron app. Upon closure, we will delete your personal information without delay, except information that we are required by law to retain. For example, to comply with legal administrative retention obligations, we must keep some of your account information (eg copies of invoices) for ten years. Data may be retained longer in case it is used in connection with a legal claim or valid legal process

Access and management of your personal data

You can directly view and edit your personal information via your personal account. You can also make choices about our collection and use of your data. For example, you can always choose in your account settings whether you want to receive promotional emails, text messages, phone calls or notification emails from us. How you can access or control this personal data depends on the products and services you use. If you cannot access, rectify or erase certain personal data yourself, if you would like a copy of the personal data we process, if you wish to request a restriction of the processing of your personal data or object to its processing, please contact our Customer Service. We will respond to such requests within 30 days.

Legal basis for data processing

We collect and process your personal data only where there is a legal basis for doing so. The legal basis we rely on in this regard includes:

Contract: the processing is necessary to perform your service contract,
Legitimate interest: e.g. i) a legitimate business interest in processing some of your personal data, e.g. for the management of our business and the purposes of certain forms of direct marketing and profiling, (ii) the archiving of certain account information to help you reuse your account in the future, or (iii) if there is a legitimate interest from a business or security perspective, e.g. to prevent fraud or abuse of our services, or for network and information security purposes of our computer systems,
Legal obligation: processing necessary to comply with a legal obligation, e.g. the legal obligation to keep administrative records for a certain period, or the legal obligation to share certain data on a police order for the purpose of criminal investigation,
Task of public interest: processing necessary to assist in tasks of public interest. For example, assisting enforcement officers in verifying the validity of a parking action or parking permit,
Consent: where you have given us explicit consent to process the data concerned, for example – where applicable – to share your data with partners or other third parties for marketing purposes.

If you have given your consent to the processing, you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time. We will cease processing your information upon receipt of your withdrawal. However, any processing carried out before your withdrawal remains legitimate processing based on valid consent at that time. We will not be obliged to reverse the processing.

Questions, concerns and complaints

For any question relating to this privacy policy or for any request relating to your personal data, you can contact us by:

sending an email to the address hello@macaron.ai
or by sending us a letter to the following address: Macaron SAS – 55 Boulevard Pereire, 75017 Paris – France.

If you believe that a problem has not been properly resolved, you also have the right to file a complaint with the supervisory authority: Commission Nationale de l'Informatique et des Libertés (CNIL).

Responsible entity

Macaron SAS (whose registered office is located at 55 Boulevard Pereire, 75017 Paris – France), in its capacity as data controller. In some cases, we also process data on behalf of third parties, such as municipalities, e.g. for enforcement purposes and parking permits.