Privacy policy
Last updated 19 October 2026
Who we are
Teacup Test is a trading name of Highfold Group Ltd (company number 17521208, registered in England and Wales). Registered office: Office 21848, 182-184 High Street North, East Ham, London, E6 2JA. The "controller" of the personal data described here ("we", "us") is Highfold Group Ltd.
Questions about your data? Email hello@teacuptest.co.uk. We read every message and reply by email, usually within 2 working days.
What we collect
- Details you give us - learners: your email address, your name if you give it at checkout, your test date and any resit date, your answers, scores and flashcard progress, your language, voice and text-size settings, your email choices, whether you told us you passed or are resitting, and any share card you make (with your practice average only if you choose to show it); the words you agreed to at checkout about when your course starts and the right to cancel, and when you agreed; Tea for two: the email address of the person you invite; free mock tests: your answers and score, kept with a random code; your email address only if you ask us to email your results; reports about a question: the question, what you tell us, a code so repeated reports from one person count once (your account if you are signed in, otherwise a scrambled code made from your internet connection; the scrambled code is deleted after 7 days) and, if you give it, your email address.
- Payment details - handled entirely by Stripe. We never see or store your full card number.
- Messages - what you send us by email or through our contact forms.
- Basic usage data - we count page views without cookies. To count unique visitors we use a one-way, daily-changing hash of your IP address and browser; we can't use it to identify you and it resets every day. For each visit we keep the pages viewed, the kind of device, the country (worked out from your IP address, which isn't stored) and whether the visit ended in a purchase, chat or message, for 90 days, without cookies.
- Security logs - like most websites, our web server and mail server keep logs of each request: your IP address, the date and time, the page or service requested and your browser details (and, for emails, the sender and recipient addresses). We use them only to keep our services secure and working.
- Live chat - the messages you type into our chat assistant and any details you choose to send through it (see Live chat below).
Why we use it, and our lawful basis
| Purpose | Lawful basis (UK GDPR Art. 6) |
|---|---|
| Providing what you've ordered or signed up for, and talking to you about it | Contract |
| Replying to your messages and enquiries | Legitimate interests (or steps you ask us to take before a contract) |
| Taking payment, keeping accounts and tax records | Legal obligation |
| Keeping our services secure and preventing fraud and abuse | Legitimate interests |
| Improving our website using cookieless statistics | Legitimate interests |
Who we share it with
We never sell your data. We share it only with the suppliers below, who help us run Teacup Test. Suppliers that act for us may use it only on our instructions, under contracts that require them to protect it. Where a supplier also uses data for its own purposes (as the table says), its own privacy policy covers that use.
| Supplier | What for |
|---|---|
| Contabo GmbH (servers in United Kingdom) | hosting: the server that runs this website and stores its database and files, and our own mail server on it, which sends and receives our emails |
| Stripe Payments UK Ltd | card payments and billing (Stripe is also an independent controller for fraud prevention and its own legal obligations) |
| Abacus.AI, Inc. (USA) | re-tests a question you report, writes and tests practice questions, translates explanations and reads GOV.UK changes; it receives the question and your note, never your name or email address. Abacus sends the text to the AI model it uses (from Anthropic, Google or OpenAI) to get the answer |
| Abacus.AI, Inc. (USA) | AI processing of live chat messages to write the assistant's replies |
Some of these suppliers may process data outside the UK (for example in the USA). Where they do, the transfer is protected by UK adequacy regulations (including the UK–US data bridge), or the ICO's International Data Transfer Agreement or the UK Addendum to the EU standard contractual clauses.
How long we keep it
- Free mock tests without an account: 30 days, then deleted
- Your course progress and settings: until 12 months after your course ends and you last signed in (we email you 14 days before we delete them)
- Reports about a question: we use your email address only to tell you the outcome, then remove it from the report (at the latest after 90 days). A copy of your report reaches our inbox and is kept like any other message to us
- Tea for two: the email address of the person you invite: until they claim the place or it closes, then deleted
- Challenge links and share cards: 90 days, or until you delete them
- Checkouts you started but didn't pay for (the email, any second person's email and the test date you typed): 30 days, then deleted
- Payment records (what you bought, when and how much): 6 years, for tax. If you delete your account we keep them without your email address.
- Enquiries that don't lead anywhere: 2 years.
- Emails to and from our hello@teacuptest.co.uk mailbox: deleted from our mail server 2 years after they arrive.
- Our log of the emails we send you (address, subject and whether it was delivered): 1 year.
- Security logs on our servers: 14 days.
- Cookieless page-view and visitor counts: about 13 months (400 days).
- Backups: anything we delete stays in our nightly backups for up to 14 days, then it's gone.
- Live chat conversations: 180 days after the last message; details you send through the chat, with the recent part of the conversation, are kept like other enquiries.
Live chat
Our website has a chat assistant. It is an automated AI assistant, not a person: it answers questions using Teacup Test's own web pages and information we've written for it, and it can make mistakes. If it can't help, it can take your details so our team can reply to you by email.
- What we keep - the messages you type, the assistant's replies, the page you started the chat on, when it happened, and a one-way hash of your IP address that changes every day (only to stop one connection using up the assistant - we don't use it to identify you). Please don't type card details or sensitive personal information into the chat; card numbers are removed automatically, from the chat and from details you send.
- AI processing - to write its replies, your messages and the relevant parts of our website are sent to Abacus.AI, Inc. in the United States, which acts as our processor under a contract that requires it to protect your data. The transfer is protected by UK adequacy regulations (including the UK–US data bridge), or the ICO's International Data Transfer Agreement or the UK Addendum to the EU standard contractual clauses.
- Details you send us - if you choose to leave your details (for example your name, email address and phone number) they reach the Teacup Test team in the same way as a message through our contact form, together with the recent part of your conversation (so the team has the context), we email you to confirm we've got them, and we reply by email. Nobody from the team joins the chat itself.
- Why (lawful basis) - legitimate interests (answering questions about our Life in the UK test practice course), and steps you ask us to take before entering into a contract when you ask us to get back to you.
- How long - chat conversations are deleted 180 days after the last message. If you send your details, they and the recent part of the conversation that goes with them are kept like other enquiries (2 years).
- On your device - once you start a chat, your browser keeps the conversation (in local storage, not a cookie) so it stays open as you move between pages. It's cleared the next time you visit after 24 hours without using it, or straight away when you choose "Start a new chat" or clear this site's data. Once you've sent your details, your browser no longer keeps them.
Your course, your language and read-aloud
- The language you choose for explanations is stored only to show you translations. We never send it to advertising tools or use it for anything else, and there are no advertising tags on the course pages.
- Read-aloud uses your device's own voices. In some browsers an online voice may be used: the text being read (a question or an explanation, never your details) is then sent to that browser's maker.
- Free mock tests are kept with a random code and no account. If you ask us to email your results, we use your address for that one email. Like every email we send, it is in our email log (the address and the subject) for a year, and we keep a scrambled copy of the address for up to 3 days so we don't send twice.
- Tea for two: the person you invite gets one email from us with the link to their place, telling them you gave us their address. We delete their address once they claim the place (their own account then holds it) or once the place closes.
- Course reminders are part of your course. Turn them off at any time with the link in each email or in your course settings.
Teacup Test is for adults
Teacup Test is for adults. We don't knowingly collect personal data from children: the free mock tests need none, and a course is for people aged 18 and over.
Your rights
You can ask us for a copy of your data, to correct it, to delete it, to restrict or object to how we use it, or to receive it in a portable format. You can withdraw consent at any time. If you have an account you can delete it yourself from your account page. Email hello@teacuptest.co.uk for anything else - we'll respond within one month.
If you're unhappy with how we've handled your data, you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk or on 0303 123 1113. We'd appreciate the chance to put things right first.
Changes
If we make important changes we'll update the date above and, where appropriate, tell you by email.