Privacy Policy

1Who we are

Orelle (“Orelle,” “we,” “us”) is based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. We built Orelle to help you see where your money goes, and we built it to respect the information you share with us.

Our privacy officer is accountable for how Orelle collects, uses and protects your personal information. You can reach them at hello@orelle.io with “Privacy” in the subject line.

This policy applies to the Orelle website (orelle.io), the Orelle web app, and any related services. It explains how we collect, use, store, share and protect your personal information, and the choices you have.

2Applicable privacy laws

Orelle complies with the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA), Canada’s federal private-sector privacy law. Under PIPEDA, we collect only the personal information we need, are transparent about how we use it, safeguard it appropriately, and provide you with access to it on request.

For residents of Quebec, Orelle also complies with the Act respecting the protection of personal information in the private sector, as amended by Law 25. This provides additional rights, including the right to receive your personal information in a structured, commonly used technological format.

Wherever you use Orelle, we apply these standards to your personal information.

3What we collect

We collect only the information Orelle needs to work. Here is what that includes and where it comes from.

Information you provide

• Account details. Your email address. Orelle doesn’t use passwords: you sign in with a link we email you. You may also add your first name.
• Setup answers. Your goals, spending style, country and province, how you’re paid and your take-home pay, the kinds of accounts you have, and a yearly travel amount if you travel, which Orelle uses to tailor your check-up.
• Bank or credit card statements. PDF or CSV files, or screenshots from your banking app. Uploading is optional; you can use Orelle fully by entering numbers yourself.
• Numbers you enter yourself. Income, bills, spending, debts, savings, investments, goals and net worth entries.
• Ask Bijou. The questions you ask Bijou in the app: your last two, so you can ask them again, and how many you’ve asked this month. Bijou’s answers are calculated from your own numbers and aren’t saved.
• Communications. Any messages you send to hello@orelle.io.

Information we derive from your statements

When you upload a statement, Orelle extracts the date, merchant name, description and amount of each transaction and assigns a spending category (for example, “subscriptions” or “delivery fees”). Before any of this is saved, account numbers, card numbers and your bank’s customer identifiers are removed or masked. The original file is never stored: a PDF is split into pages in your browser and each page is read in memory, and a CSV file or screenshot is read in memory too.

Information collected automatically

• Usage data. Orelle doesn’t use an analytics tool yet. If we add one, we’ll update this policy first.
• Device and connection data. Browser type, device type, approximate region, IP address and error reports, used only for security and troubleshooting.
• Cookies. A small number of strictly necessary cookies to keep you signed in and remember your settings. We do not use advertising or tracking cookies. See section 11.

4How we use your information

We use your information with your consent, and only for the purposes below:

• To run your money check-up. Find your leaks, build your budget, track your goals and show you what your money could become.
• To give you insights. Categorize your transactions, surface patterns in your spending and answer your Ask Bijou questions. Orelle calculates the figures in Bijou’s answers from your own numbers; an AI model writes the answer from those figures.
• To keep your account working. Sign you in, save your data and send essential emails such as sign-in links, receipts and renewal reminders.
• To process payments. If you subscribe to Orelle Plus, we use your payment details to bill you and manage your subscription.
• To keep you informed. With your permission, send occasional emails about new features. You can opt out at any time, and we’ll still send essential account emails.
• To improve Orelle. Understand how features are used in aggregate. We do not review individual users’ transactions or budgets to do this.
• To keep Orelle safe. Detect and prevent fraud, abuse and security incidents.
• To meet our legal obligations. Including tax, accounting and regulatory requirements.

We use your information only for purposes you would reasonably expect from a money check-up app. If we ever want to use it for something new, we will explain why and ask for your consent first.

5Automated processing and AI

Orelle uses AI to read your statements, categorize your transactions and write Bijou’s answers to your questions. Here’s how we keep that responsible:

• Minimal data. To read a PDF statement or a screenshot, we send it to Anthropic, usually one page at a time. A CSV file is read by Orelle itself and isn’t sent. A page shows whatever your bank printed on it, which can include your name, address and account numbers; account numbers are masked in what comes back, before anything is saved. To answer an Ask Bijou question, we send Anthropic your question, the screen you asked it from, the names of your goals and of the Bijou noticed item you asked about, and the figures Orelle calculated to answer it, such as Left to spend, a goal’s monthly amount, or a total by category or merchant. Your transactions and statements are not sent to answer a question. We never send your email address or login details.
• A trusted provider, bound by contract. Analysis is performed by Anthropic, the maker of Claude, through its commercial API. Under Anthropic’s commercial terms, your data is not used to train its AI models.
• Suggestions, not decisions. Orelle’s insights and Bijou’s answers are suggestions based only on your numbers. They are not financial, investment, tax or legal advice, and Orelle never makes a decision with a legal or similarly significant effect on you automatically.
• A person you can reach. If you have questions about how a result was produced, or would like someone to review it, email hello@orelle.io.

6Who we share your information with

We don’t sell, rent or trade your personal information, and we never share it with advertisers or data brokers. We share it only with the service providers that help us run Orelle, and each receives only what it needs to do its job.

Each provider is bound by contract to protect your information and to use it only to provide its service to us. We review our providers regularly and will update this table if they change.

We may also disclose information where the law requires it, to respond to a valid legal request, to protect the safety of a person, or as part of a business transfer such as a merger or acquisition. In that case, this policy will continue to apply to your information, and we will notify you before any change takes effect.

7Where your information is stored

Orelle is a Canadian company, and your account and financial data are stored on servers located in Canada.

Some of our service providers process information outside Canada. Statements and screenshots are read, and Bijou’s answers written, in the United States by Anthropic, the app runs on Vercel’s servers in the United States, and payments are processed in the United States by Stripe. While information is in another country, it may be subject to that country’s laws and accessible to its courts and government authorities under lawful requests.

We choose providers with strong security standards, limit what each one receives, and hold every provider to contractual commitments to protect your information. Questions about where your data is stored can be sent to hello@orelle.io.

8How we protect your information

We treat your financial information as sensitive and protect it accordingly.

• Encryption everywhere. Your data is encrypted in transit (TLS 1.2 or higher) and at rest (AES-256).
• No passwords to steal. Orelle doesn’t use passwords. You sign in with a link we email you, which works for an hour.
• Masked before saving. Account numbers, card numbers and bank identifiers are removed from your transactions before anything is stored.
• Statements never stored. Uploaded files are read in memory and never saved. A PDF is split into pages in your browser before it’s sent.
• Strictly limited access. Only the people who need access to run Orelle have it, through authenticated and logged sessions, and never to browse individual users’ data.
• Continuous upkeep. We keep our systems updated, review our security practices regularly, and act on new risks as they emerge.

No system is perfectly secure. If a breach occurs that creates a real risk of significant harm to you, we will notify you promptly and report it to the relevant privacy regulator, as Canadian law requires.

9How long we keep your information

We keep your information only as long as it’s needed to run your account, and no longer.

• Uploaded statements. Never stored. Each file is read in memory and discarded once it’s read.
• Transactions, budgets, goals and net worth entries. Kept while your account is active so your history and trends keep working. You can delete a statement with its transactions, or any budget row, goal or account, at any time.
• Ask Bijou questions. Your last two are kept so you can ask them again; each new question replaces the oldest, and they’re deleted with your account. Bijou’s answers aren’t saved.
• Account details. Kept while your account is active.
• Payment records. Kept by Stripe for seven years, as required by Canadian tax law.

Inactive accounts. If you haven’t signed in for 24 months, we’ll email you first, then delete your account and its data if we don’t hear back within 30 days.

When you delete your account. Your personal information is permanently removed from our active systems within 30 days and from backups within 90 days, except for records we are legally required to keep, such as payment history.

10Your rights and choices

Your information belongs to you. At any time, you can:

• Access it. View everything Orelle holds about you in the app, or request a complete copy by email.
• Take it with you. Download your transactions, budget and goals as a CSV from Settings. This is your right to data portability.
• Correct it. Edit any entry in the app, or ask us to correct something you can’t change yourself.
• Delete it. Remove a statement and its transactions in the app, or delete your entire account from Settings → Privacy and data → Delete my account and all data.
• Withdraw consent. Stop using any feature that relies on your data, or close your account, at any time. Withdrawing consent may mean some features no longer work.
• Control your emails. Every non-essential email includes an unsubscribe link. We will still send essential account emails such as receipts and renewal notices.
• Ask questions or raise a concern. Email hello@orelle.io with “Privacy” in the subject line. We respond within 30 days, and we don’t charge for these requests.

If you’re not satisfied with our response, you have the right to contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (priv.gc.ca). If you live in Quebec, you can also contact the Commission d’accès à l’information du Québec (cai.gouv.qc.ca).

11Cookies

Orelle uses only the cookies it needs to work:

• Essential cookies keep you signed in and keep your session secure.
• Preference cookies remember settings such as your time zone.
• Payment cookies are set by Stripe during checkout to prevent fraud, if you subscribe to Orelle Plus.

Orelle doesn’t use an analytics tool yet. We don’t use advertising cookies, and we don’t track you across other websites. You can clear or block cookies in your browser, but Orelle won’t be able to keep you signed in without the essential ones.

12Children

Orelle is for adults. You must be 18 or older to create an account. We don’t knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 18. If you believe someone under 18 has created an account, email hello@orelle.io and we will delete the account and its data.

13Changes to this policy

We may update this policy as Orelle grows. If we make a meaningful change to how we collect, use or share your information, we’ll email you and show a notice in the app at least 30 days before it takes effect, so you can review it and decide whether to keep using Orelle. Minor updates, such as clarifications or a new provider name, take effect when posted. The “Last updated” date at the top tells you when the policy last changed.