Privacy Policy

1. Who we are

UL Pool Club is a student sports club operating within the University of Limerick's clubs and societies structure (UL Wolves). This policy explains what personal data we collect through this website and member platform, why we collect it, and what rights you have over it. For personal data processed through this platform, UL Pool Club is responsible for determining the purposes and means of the processing described in this policy. Where processing involves UL Wolves club membership records, that processing may also be subject to the data protection arrangements described in the UL Wolves Privacy Notice.

2. What we collect

When you register or sign in, our authentication provider (Amazon Cognito) collects:

• Your email address
• Your first name and surname
• Your login credentials (password), which we never see or store ourselves

Once your account exists, our backend keeps a member profile record containing your account ID, email, first name and surname, account role, and an optional profile picture link, and timestamps of when your record was created or last updated.

Separately, to verify current UL Pool Club membership, we check your student ID number against UL Pool Club's membership records, held by UL Wolves, who administer club membership. This check is made at the point you register, and is not logged or stored — we do not retain a copy of the membership list or the student ID numbers obtained from it. The automated check does not by itself make a final decision about your eligibility. If no match is found, your registration is referred to the committee for manual review rather than being automatically rejected. If you believe the result is incorrect, you can contact us for a review.

We don't currently collect payment details, analytics or advertising cookies, or any data beyond what's listed above and the technical/security information described in Section 9.

3. How we use it

We use this data to:

• Create and secure your member account
• Verify your identity when you sign in
• Determine your membership status and what areas of the platform you can access
• Send you transactional notifications about your own activity on the platform, such as an event you registered for starting, a team invite, or a fixture being forfeited

We don't send optional club news, newsletters, or promotional communications — only the transactional notifications described above.

4. Our legal basis for processing

We process your data on the basis of our legitimate interests in administering UL Pool Club membership, providing member services, maintaining account security, and operating the platform. This covers creating and verifying your account, determining what areas of the platform you can access, and sending you transactional notifications about your own activity on the platform (e.g. an event you registered for starting, a team invite, or a fixture being forfeited).

5. Where your data is stored

We use Amazon Web Services (AWS), including Amazon Cognito, to provide authentication and related cloud infrastructure, and Neon for database storage. AWS and Neon process personal data on our behalf where necessary to provide those services.

Our servers and backend processing run in AWS's eu-west-1 (Ireland) region, within the EEA. Our database, provided by Neon, is hosted in the United Kingdom — outside the EEA, but covered by the European Commission's adequacy decision for the UK. The platform is also delivered through Amazon CloudFront, AWS's global content delivery network, whose edge locations are distributed worldwide, so depending on where you access the platform from, your request may be served from outside the EEA. Where personal data is transferred outside the EEA, we rely on an appropriate transfer mechanism under applicable data protection law, such as an adequacy decision or appropriate safeguards.

6. Third parties

We use AWS and Neon to process personal data on our behalf where necessary to provide the platform. Where necessary to verify your eligibility for member-only features, relevant membership information is obtained from UL Wolves/UL Pool Club membership records, as described in Section 2. We do not sell your data or share it with advertisers, and we do not currently use any third-party analytics or tracking services on this site.

7. How long we keep it

We keep your member profile for as long as your account remains active. If you request deletion, we will delete or anonymise your account information within 7 days, unless we need to retain limited information to comply with legal obligations, resolve disputes, or protect the security and integrity of the platform. Technical and application logs are retained according to the retention periods described in Section 9.

8. Your rights

Depending on the circumstances, you may have the right to:

• Access the personal data we hold about you
• Have inaccurate data corrected
• Request the erasure of your personal data
• Restrict or object to how we process your data
• Receive your data in a portable format

To exercise any of these rights, contact us at pool@ulwolves.ie. You can also lodge a complaint with the Irish Data Protection Commission if you believe we haven't handled your data properly.

9. Technical and security information

Signing in uses browser storage and authentication mechanisms provided through Amazon Cognito and AWS Amplify to keep you signed in, and this is necessary for the platform to function and isn't used for tracking or advertising. Our infrastructure may also use cookies or similar browser technologies as part of delivering and securing the platform (e.g. distinguishing legitimate traffic from bots). Any such use is functional/security only, not for tracking or advertising.

When you use the platform, our hosting and application infrastructure automatically processes certain technical information about your requests. This may include your IP address, browser or device information, pages or resources requested, dates and times of requests, user or account identifiers, and information relating to errors or other technical events.

We use this information where necessary to operate, secure, troubleshoot, and protect the platform, including detecting and preventing malicious or unauthorised activity.

CloudFront access logs are retained for 14 days. Application and technical logs are retained for up to 30 days and are then deleted or otherwise disposed of securely.

We do not use these logs for advertising or behavioural tracking.

10. Who this service is for

This platform is intended for University of Limerick students and club members, who are generally adults. It is not directed at children.

11. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time as the platform develops. The date at the top of this page shows when it was last revised.

12. Contact us

Questions about this policy or your data can be sent to pool@ulwolves.ie.