Privacy

Help Is Near is designed so you can look for support without creating an account, giving your name, or telling us anything you don't want to.

What we ask for

To search, you can optionally tell us what's happening and roughly where you are (a town or postcode). Neither is required — you can browse all support without giving either.

What we don't ask for

We never require an account, login, name, email address, or phone number to search for support. If you choose to share a phone number when contacting an organisation directly, that's between you and them — it isn't collected by this site.

What we do with a postcode or town

If you give us something that looks like a UK postcode, we keep only its outward code (the first part, such as "YO1" from "YO1 4AB") — never the full postcode, and never the exact address you typed. If what you give us doesn't look like a postcode, we treat it as a town or area name and use that as given, since a town name on its own isn't the same privacy concern as a full postcode. If we can't make sense of what you typed, or it's too long to be a sensible area code, we don't use or store any location for that search at all.

Search activity we record

We record search activity as individual, timestamped rows — which broad situation a search related to, and which coarse area (never a full postcode or address) — along with whether it returned any results. This helps the CrisisConnect Network understand where support is needed and where there are gaps. We currently keep this data for a limited period and then delete it — see "How long we keep this" below.

This information is not tied to your name, account, device, or identity. A search represents a moment of search activity — not a confirmed individual need, and not a unique person. If a search couldn't be completed because of a technical problem reaching the CrisisConnect Network, we don't record it as if it were a real zero-result search.

How long we keep this

Search activity records are deleted after a limited retention period (currently 90 days) via a regular database maintenance task. We don't keep an indefinite history of searches.

Cookies

This site does not use advertising or tracking cookies. We don't run third-party analytics. A small, non-identifying technical value may be stored in your browser to avoid double-counting one search during a single visit — it contains no personal information and isn't used to build a profile of you.

Sensitive searches

We take extra care with searches that may relate to sensitive situations, such as domestic abuse. We never record the exact words you typed, and we apply the same location-minimisation approach described above to every search, regardless of subject.

Organisation information

Organisations listed on this site control what information about their services is published here. We never publish confidential information, such as the addresses of refuges or other locations that need to remain private.

Your safety

If you're concerned that someone else might see what you've looked at on this device, see Using this site safely.

Questions

If you have questions about this privacy information, you can contact CrisisConnect Network CIC — see About.