Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how Thomas Beach Photography ("we," "us," "our") collects, uses, and protects information when you visit thomas-beach.com, book a session at book.thomas-beach.com, view a gallery at clientgalleries.thomas-beach.com, or otherwise interact with our services.

Information We Collect

We collect only what we need to deliver photography services and respond to inquiries:

• Contact information you give us via the contact form, booking form, or email: name, email address, phone number, and any details you include in your message.
• Booking details: session type, date, location, and any notes you provide.
• Payment information: processed by Stripe; we never see or store your card numbers. We retain only Stripe's transaction reference and the amount charged.
• Gallery access logs: when you view a client gallery, we record the email you used (if any), favorites, and download activity, so we can help you find your photos and fix problems in the gallery.
• Print order details: if you order prints from a gallery, the recipient name, email, and shipping address you enter, which we pass to our print lab to produce and ship the order.
• Standard technical data: IP address and basic browser information when you submit a form, used to prevent abuse. Our analytics and advertising tools (described under "Cookies, Analytics, and Advertising" below) also collect device and usage information on every visit, not just form submissions.

How We Use Your Information

• Respond to inquiries and schedule sessions.
• Send transactional emails (booking confirmations, balance payment links, gallery delivery, expiration reminders).
• Send transactional SMS messages if you opted in (see "SMS Messaging" below).
• Process payments through Stripe.
• Provide ongoing client support.

We do not sell your information, and we do not give your name, email, phone number, or session details to advertisers. We do use advertising and analytics tools that set cookies in your browser; see "Cookies, Analytics, and Advertising" below.

SMS Messaging

SMS program

Thomas Beach Photography operates a transactional SMS program to support the booking, payment, and delivery flow for photography sessions. This is the SMS Privacy Policy that applies to that program.

How you opt in

You opt in to SMS messages by explicitly checking an unchecked box on the booking form at book.thomas-beach.com, labeled "Text me about my session." Opting in to SMS is optional; you can book a session without it, and every message we send via SMS is also delivered via email.

What messages you'll receive

After opting in, you may receive:

• Booking request confirmations
• Appointment reminders (24 hours and 2 hours before your session)
• Balance payment links when your session balance is due
• Gallery delivery notifications with access link and PIN
• Cancellation acknowledgments

Message frequency

Message frequency varies based on your booking activity. A typical booking results in up to 5 messages across the lifecycle of a session (booking, reminders, payment, gallery delivery). We do not send recurring promotional or marketing SMS.

Cost

Message and data rates may apply. Standard messaging charges from your mobile carrier may apply to each SMS you receive. We do not charge any fee for SMS notifications.

Help and opt-out

Reply HELP for assistance. Reply STOP, CANCEL, UNSUBSCRIBE, QUIT, or END to stop receiving SMS messages at any time. Once you opt out, we will not send further SMS messages and we will record your opt-out preference so future bookings using the same phone number remain opted out unless you explicitly opt back in.

How We Protect Your Information

• All website traffic is served over HTTPS.
• Gallery PINs are stored encrypted at rest (AES-256-GCM).
• Payment information is handled directly by Stripe; we never see card numbers.
• Bookings and contact submissions are stored in access-controlled databases on Amazon Web Services.
• Access to administrative tools requires authentication.

Information Sharing

We do not sell, rent, or trade your personal information. We share information only with service providers strictly necessary to operate the business:

• Stripe: payment processing
• Twilio: SMS delivery (only for users who opted in)
• Amazon Web Services: hosting and email delivery
• Cloudflare: CAPTCHA verification on form submissions
• Google: website analytics (Google Analytics), ad conversion measurement and remarketing (Google Ads), and the YouTube video player on our YouTube page, as described below
• Microsoft: anonymized session replay and heatmaps (Clarity), as described below
• WHCC (White House Custom Colour): print fulfillment; receives the recipient name and shipping address for print orders only

Each of these providers is bound by their own privacy commitments and is used only to deliver the service you requested.

Data Retention

We retain booking records and contact submissions for as long as needed to provide ongoing service and to comply with legal and accounting requirements (typically seven years for records tied to payments, to meet tax rules). Analytics data is retained on Google's and Microsoft's default schedules (14 months for Google Analytics, about 30 days for Clarity recordings). You may request deletion of your information at any time by emailing thomasbeach@thomas-beach.com; we will honor the request unless retention is required by law (e.g., tax records).

Your Rights

You may request a copy of the information we hold about you, ask us to correct inaccurate information, or request deletion, by emailing thomasbeach@thomas-beach.com. We will respond within 30 days.

Cookies, Analytics, and Advertising

We use cookies and similar storage for a few purposes:

• Essential website functionality: session state, gallery access tokens, admin authentication.
• Analytics: we use Google Analytics 4 (which sets _ga and _ga_* cookies) to understand which pages visitors read and how they arrive at the site. Analytics data is aggregated and is not used to identify you personally. IP addresses are anonymized by default.
• Session insights: we use Microsoft Clarity (which sets _clck and _clsk cookies) to record anonymized session replays and heatmaps. This helps us understand which parts of the site work well and where visitors get stuck. Form-field text (including names, emails, phone numbers, and message content) is automatically masked by Clarity's default privacy controls and is not recorded. We use these insights to improve usability, not to identify individual users.
• Advertising and conversion measurement: we use Google Ads conversion tracking and remarketing, which run through the same Google tag as our analytics and set the _gcl_au cookie and similar identifiers. This lets us see which ads led to an inquiry or booking, and lets us show our ads to people who have visited this site before. It also means Google may collect information about your activity on this site and combine it with your activity on other sites over time. You can turn off personalized ads at Google Ads Settings or via optout.aboutads.info.
• Payments and spam prevention: on the booking and print checkouts, Stripe sets its own cookies to process payment and detect fraud, and Cloudflare Turnstile sets a short-lived cookie to confirm you are not a bot.
• Convenience storage: the homepage caches recent Instagram photos in your browser's local storage (tb-ig-photos) for a day so the strip loads fast; those thumbnails load from Instagram's image servers.
• YouTube videos: our YouTube page shows video thumbnails from YouTube's image servers. A video player loads only after you press play, and it uses YouTube's privacy-enhanced mode (youtube-nocookie.com). Once a video is playing, YouTube's own privacy policy applies to that player.

You can opt out of Google Analytics by installing the official Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on. You can opt out of Microsoft Clarity by enabling "Do Not Track" in your browser (Clarity honors DNT), by using an ad-blocking extension that blocks clarity.ms, or by visiting the Microsoft privacy controls.

Children

Our services are intended for adults (18 and older). We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe we have inadvertently collected such information, please contact us and we will delete it.

Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. Changes are effective when posted to this page; the "Last updated" date at the top reflects the most recent revision. We will not retroactively reduce the protections that apply to information already collected.

Your Nevada Privacy Rights

Thomas Beach Photography is a sole proprietorship based in Reno, Nevada. Under Nevada law (NRS Chapter 603A), Nevada consumers may submit a verified request directing a website operator not to sell their covered information. We do not sell your covered information, and we have no plans to. To submit such a request, or to review or change the information we hold about you, email thomasbeach@thomas-beach.com with "Nevada privacy request" in the subject line. We respond within 30 days (up to 60 days for verified opt-out requests, as the statute allows).

Some of the third-party tools described above (Google Analytics, Google Ads, and Microsoft Clarity) may collect information about your activity on this website over time and across other websites.

Contact

Questions about this Privacy Policy or how we handle your information:

• Email: thomasbeach@thomas-beach.com
• Phone: (775) 354-8112