This page explains the small files this website stores on your device, what each kind is for, and how to change what you have agreed to. It sits alongside the privacy policy, which covers personal information more broadly.
Questions go to info@sunspireskylightschelmsford.co.uk.
What a cookie actually is
A cookie is a short text file that a website asks your browser to keep, and which the browser hands back on your next visit. It usually holds an identifier and little else. The identifier is the point: it lets a site recognise that two page views came from the same browser, which is how a site remembers a preference across pages or counts one visitor rather than five.
Related technologies do the same job by different means. Local storage and session storage hold data in the browser without sending it back automatically. Pixels are tiny images whose retrieval records that a page was opened. UK law treats all of these the same way, and so does this page. Where it says cookie, read it as covering any of them.
The rules that apply in the UK
The relevant law is the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003, usually shortened to PECR, working alongside the UK GDPR. Between them they set a straightforward test.
Cookies that are strictly necessary for a service you asked for may be set without permission. Everything else, including anything that measures how a site is used, requires consent given beforehand. That consent has to be a positive action. A pre-ticked box is not consent, continuing to scroll is not consent, and a banner offering no way to refuse is not consent. Refusing has to be as easy as agreeing.
Strictly necessary cookies
These make the site work and are set regardless of what you choose, because without them there is no site to have a preference about.
They cover things like the record of your own cookie choice, which has to be stored somewhere or the banner would reappear on every page, and any security or load balancing token the hosting provider issues. They hold no information that identifies you personally and they are not used to build a profile.
Analytics cookies
Analytics cookies count visits and record which pages get read, in aggregate. On a site of this kind the useful output is prosaic: which technical pages people actually finish, which town pages get found, and whether the quote page is being reached from the guides or from search.
These are set only if you agree. Declining them changes nothing about how the site behaves for you. The current analytics provider and the specific cookie names and lifetimes it sets: [to be confirmed].
Content embedded from elsewhere
Where a page carries content served by another organisation, such as an embedded map or video, that content can set its own cookies once it loads. Those cookies are governed by the other organisation’s policy, and it receives the request directly, which means it can see your IP address and which page the content was embedded in.
Embedded third party content on this site, and the providers involved: [to be confirmed].
How long cookies last
Two kinds, and the difference is worth knowing.
| Type | Lifetime | Typical use here |
|---|---|---|
| Session | Deleted when the browser closes | Security and load balancing tokens |
| Persistent | Expires on a set date, or when deleted | Remembering your cookie choice, analytics counting |
A persistent cookie carries an expiry date written into it when it is set. Once that date passes the browser discards it without being asked.
Changing your mind
A choice made in the banner is not permanent. The cookie settings can be reopened from the link in the footer of any page, and whatever you select there replaces what you selected before, in either direction.
Withdrawing consent stops further optional cookies being set. Cookies already on the device can be cleared through your browser, which is covered below.
Controlling cookies in your browser
Every current browser lets you see what is stored, delete it, and set rules for the future. The controls sit under privacy or site settings, and they generally allow you to clear everything, clear cookies for one site only, block cookies from other sites while allowing the one you are visiting, or clear the lot automatically each time the browser closes.
Browser controls apply to every site you visit, which makes them a blunter instrument than the banner on any one of them. Blocking cookies broadly will log you out of sites that rely on them and can stop shopping baskets and similar features working. That is a general observation about the web rather than about this site, which reads perfectly well with optional cookies switched off.
Do Not Track and global privacy signals
Some browsers send a signal asking sites not to track. There is no agreed standard behind Do Not Track and sites treat it inconsistently, so the reliable control remains the banner and your own browser settings. How this site responds to Global Privacy Control and similar signals: [to be confirmed].
Complaints about cookies
Raise anything by email first. The Information Commissioner’s Office regulates PECR in the UK and takes complaints through ico.org.uk, and it also publishes readable guidance on cookies for anyone who wants the source rather than a summary.
Updates to this page
This page is updated when the cookies used on the site change or the guidance does. Where a change adds a new category of cookie, consent is asked for again rather than assumed from a previous choice. Date of this version: [to be confirmed].
Tell us about your roof
We start with the building, the covering and the slope. Then we tell you what will suit it, and what it will cost, as a fixed written number.
- Surveyed before it is priced
- 10-year workmanship guarantee
- Building Control notification handled
- New installations and replacements