Privacy

Your bill

• We read it on your device, in your browser.
• We keep a copy with your name, addresses, account, invoice, payment and meter numbers, phone numbers, email addresses, barcodes and QR codes blacked out. We also keep the figures we read: your plan, the dates, your usage and the charges.
• We keep it even if we can’t read it, so we can learn to.
• That blacked-out copy is also emailed to our own mailbox when it arrives, so we see every bill.
• Your original file, and its name, never leave your device.

Why: real bills help us read more kinds of bill, keep our prices up to date and check our estimates.

A usage file

• If we can read it, we work out your answer from its readings on your device.
• We keep the readings with your saved report (below), for five years. We never read in your meter number, name or address, so none of them is kept.
• If its layout is new to us, we keep its layout so we can learn to read it: its headings and the shape of a sample of its rows. Every reading is masked, and meter numbers, names, addresses, emails and phone numbers are removed. Your original file never leaves your device.

Why: real readings show us how close our estimates are (below).

Your answers

• Your answers save as you go, so we can see where people get stuck.
• We note which questions you saw, whether your bill could be read, the kind of device (phone, tablet or computer) and the website that sent you here.
• We don’t ask for your name or email, and we never keep your internet address.

Your report

When your report first shows, a summary of it is emailed to us from Sydney, so we can see what people are finding. It has the sizes, plans and figures on the three cards, your bill’s plan, dates and usage, your answers about the home or business, and your state and power network. It never has your postcode, suburb or town, your name or address, your account or meter numbers, or the bill or file itself. It carries your visit’s code, which matches it to your answers in Sydney, and the link to your saved report (the page saves each report so you can come back to it), which opens the same figures and answers. It’s sent once a visit.

Where, and for how long

• In a private, encrypted store in Sydney, run by Amazon Web Services. None of it goes overseas.
• Bill copies, saved reports (with your answers and your usage file’s readings), and the layouts of usage files we couldn’t read, for five years. The record of your visit as you go, for twelve months.

Improving our estimates

We use what we keep (your bill’s figures, your usage file’s readings and your answers) to check and improve how Should We works out your year and its answer. For example, we work out a year from a bill alone, then compare it with the real year in a usage file, to find where our estimates are wrong for each kind of home and business. Only we use it. We never publish anyone’s bill or readings: anything we build from them, such as a typical day for a kind of business, is made from many homes or sites.

Who sees it

Only us, unless you ask for a quote (below). We don’t sell it or share it, and we don’t send your bill or your usage to an AI service.

Using Should We from ChatGPT or Claude

If your chat asks Should We to work out a battery, it sends us the figures it read from your bill and your answers, never the bill itself. We use them for the calculation and keep none of it. What you type or upload in the chat goes to OpenAI or Anthropic under your own account. The report link the chat gives you holds those figures and your postcode, so anyone you share it with sees them.

Saving a calculation

Each report is saved so that the address in your browser is a link back to it: we keep your answers, the figures read from your bill, the copy of your bill with the identifying parts blacked out, your usage file’s readings, and the finished report itself (its figures, assumptions and sources, so the link shows what you saw whatever prices change later), in the same store in Sydney, for five years, under a random link that is the only way back to it. A change on the report is saved under a new link. Nothing in it says who you are. We also use it to improve our estimates (above). Anyone with the link can open the report, so share it only with people you’d show it to. “Share” copies that link, or emails it: if you ask us to email the link, your address is used once, to send that one email from Sydney, and isn’t kept.

A reminder before your insurance renews

On the car and home insurance answers you can ask us to email you three weeks before your cover ends. We keep your email address and that date, in Sydney, inside the one email we’ll send, with this year’s premium and insurer if the page read them; nothing else, and your renewal notice still never leaves your device. We email you a confirmation straight away with a link to cancel. Once the reminder is sent, or you cancel it, it’s deleted.

Your account, and paying for the business report

The business battery report needs an account and a subscription; nothing else on Should We does. To sign in you give your email address, and we email you a six-digit code from Sydney. We keep no list of accounts: your address travels in a signed cookie on your device, for 90 days or until you sign out, and the code’s email isn’t kept. Payments are taken by RevenueCat, a subscription service in the United States, with card payments through Stripe: we never see your card. RevenueCat knows you by a code made from your email address, not the address itself, unless you give it your address at the checkout for its receipt. When you open a business report we ask RevenueCat whether that code has a subscription, and keep the answer for a few minutes. Your visit’s progress record notes that you signed in or opened the payment page, never your address.

Asking for a quote

If you press “Get quotes” on the report, your name, email address, phone number and postcode (and a note, if you add one) are emailed to us from Sydney, with the report’s summary: the sizes, plans and figures on the cards, your answers, and your state and network, never your bill or your readings. We pass that to a battery installer so they can quote you, and to no one else; we use your details only to arrange the quote, keep the request only in our email for as long as that takes, and never add you to a mailing list. Your visit’s progress record notes that a quote was asked for, not who by.

Requests and feedback

If you send a request from the home page, or feedback from “Feedback” at the bottom of a page, it’s emailed to us from Sydney, with your email address if you give one. Feedback also says which page it came from and, on the calculator, which question you were on. We use your address only to reply, and never add it to a mailing list. On the calculator, your visit’s progress record notes that feedback was sent, never what it said.

Page views

We count visits with Vercel Analytics. It uses no cookies and never sees what you type.

Having it deleted

We keep nothing that identifies you, so we can’t look you up by name. Email us the day and rough time you used Should We and your postcode, and we’ll find what you gave and delete it. For a saved calculation, send us its link; for a quote request, email us from the address you gave.

Questions or complaints

Email hello@shouldwe.com.au. If you’re not happy with our answer, you can go to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.