Privacy, in plain language

Who we are

Deed is operated by ONDEED (PTY) LTD, registration number K2026637325, a company incorporated in South Africa. For POPIA, ONDEED (PTY) LTD is the responsible party for your account data, and the operator for the client data you load into Deed.

Our Information Officer is reachable at hello@ondeed.co.za. Any privacy question, request or complaint can go straight to that address.

What we collect

Your account details: name, email address and, if you link it, your WhatsApp number.

Your workspace content: the contacts, listings, deals, notes and messages you bring into Deed or connect through channels like WhatsApp, your email inbox, your calendar or portal imports.

If you join the waitlist through an agent's referral link, whose link it was, so our staff can see who referred you. The agent who shared it sees how many people joined through it, never who.

If you join the waitlist: your name, your email address, how you work and, if you leave it, your WhatsApp number. We use them only to contact you about your access.

Technical basics: sign-in events and logs that keep the service secure and let us fix problems.

When you visit ondeed.co.za: how the site is used, described under Website analytics below.

Giving us this information is voluntary, but Deed cannot run without an email address to sign you in, and connected channels only work with the details those channels need.

Why we collect it

Only to run Deed for you: drafting replies for your approval, keeping your book tidy, showing your diary, and letting your team work together.

We never sell your data, we never share it with advertisers, and we don't use your book to market to your clients.

How the AI handles your data

When Deed drafts a reply, the message is processed by an AI model. Before that happens, personal identifiers such as ID numbers, card numbers, email addresses and phone numbers are automatically redacted.

If you have connected a calendar and a client is asking to view a property, Deed also tells the model the times you are free to hold a viewing: dates and hours only. It never sends what your appointments are, where they are, or who is in them.

These requests go only to AI service providers we have selected and contracted with, and only on zero data retention terms: the provider may not keep what it receives or use it to train a model. If a request cannot be sent on those terms, Deed does not send it.

Voice notes are turned into text by a transcription provider on the same zero data retention terms, and Deed does not keep the audio.

Nothing is ever sent to a client without you approving it first, unless you have explicitly switched on a rule that says otherwise. Every AI action is recorded in an audit trail, and we will show you the record for your account on request.

Who helps us run Deed

A small set of service providers process data on our instructions, as POPIA operators:

Vercel and Supabase, which host Deed and store its data. Meta's WhatsApp Business Platform, which carries WhatsApp messages. Resend, which carries sign-in codes and the email you forward to Deed. OpenRouter, which passes drafting requests to Amazon Bedrock or Google Vertex AI, and Groq, which turns voice notes into text, both on the terms described above. Cloudflare, whose rendering service reads public listing pages on property portals for your imports: it receives the listing's web address, never your clients' details. Paystack, which takes subscription payments: your card details stay with Paystack, and Deed never sees your full card number. PostHog, which measures how ondeed.co.za is used (see Website analytics).

If you connect your Microsoft 365 or Google account, those companies process your calendar and mail under the access you granted, which you can revoke at any time.

Each of them is bound by contract to protect your data and to use it only to provide their service to us.

Data from your Google account

If you connect Google Calendar, Deed reads your calendar's events (their times, titles, locations and status) and your Google account's email address. It uses them only to show your diary in Deed, to work out when you are free for a viewing, and to put what you book on your Schedule in Deed onto your calendar. Deed only ever creates, moves or deletes events it created itself.

If you connect Gmail, Deed looks at new mail in your inbox by its sender, subject and message ID. It opens a message only when it comes from a property portal Deed recognises, or, if you switch on email conversations, from someone who is already a client in your own book. Those messages become a lead or join that client's conversation in Deed, with a reply drafted for you. Everything else in your mailbox is skipped: Deed does not open it and keeps nothing about it. Deed never changes, labels or deletes your mail.

If you let Deed send from Gmail, it uses that for one thing: when you approve a reply to someone who emailed you, Deed sends it from your Gmail address, in the same thread, so it sits in your Sent folder. Deed never sends email on its own, and never sends bulk or marketing email.

Who it is shared with. Your calendar, and the emails Deed keeps, are stored and processed for you by the cloud providers that host Deed, under contract and only on our instructions. The only parts that go anywhere else are the free viewing times described above and the text of an email Deed drafts a reply to, with personal identifiers redacted first, which our AI service providers use to draft a reply for you. We do not transfer or disclose Google user data to anyone else, or for any other purpose. We never sell it and never use it for advertising, and no one at Deed reads it except with your permission, to keep the service secure, or where the law requires it.

How it is protected. Your data is encrypted in transit and at rest, and the access Google grants Deed is separately encrypted before it is stored. Your calendar is readable only by you, not by your team or anyone else using Deed. An email Deed keeps is part of that client's record, visible to you and to anyone in your office who can already see that client. Access is tightly controlled, and changes are audited. When you disconnect Google Calendar, Deed asks Google to revoke its access and deletes its copy of your calendar straight away. When you disconnect Gmail, Deed asks Google to revoke its access and stops reading your mailbox at once; emails already filed on a client stay part of that client's record until you delete them.

Google Workspace API data is not used to develop, improve, or train non-personalized AI or machine learning models. Deed's use and transfer of information received from Google APIs adheres to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements, and its use of raw or derived user data received from Google Workspace APIs adheres to the Google Workspace API User Data and Developer Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.

Where your data lives

Your data is stored, and the servers that run Deed operate, in Ireland, in the European Union, where data protection law offers safeguards substantially similar to POPIA. Pages reach you through a global network, so a request may pass through a server near you on its way.

Some of our providers process data in the United States: the AI and transcription providers, the email provider, WhatsApp, the website analytics described below, and Google or Microsoft if you connect them. Each transfer rests on contracts that hold the recipient to obligations consistent with POPIA, as section 72 requires.

Website analytics

When you visit ondeed.co.za, PostHog, an analytics service in the United States, records how the site is used: the pages you view, how far down a page you scroll, the buttons you press, the site that sent you, and at times a recording of the visit, with anything typed into a form hidden. It sets a cookie to tell one visit from the next. It does not know who you are, and we do not link it to a Deed account.

We use it only to make the site clearer. The Deed app itself, at app.ondeed.co.za, does not use analytics.

Your clients' data

Your book stays yours. As the agent or agency, you are the responsible party for the client information you load into Deed; we process it on your instructions as your operator, and protect it accordingly.

Your rights under POPIA

You can ask what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, ask us to delete it, or object to how we process it. Email hello@ondeed.co.za and we'll act on it promptly, and at no charge for a first request.

If you believe we've handled your information badly and we haven't put it right, you can complain to The Information Regulator (South Africa), JD House, 27 Stiemens Street, Braamfontein, Johannesburg, 2001, or by email to POPIAComplaints@inforegulator.org.za.

Keeping and protecting data

We keep your data while your account is active and delete it on request when you leave. Data is encrypted in transit and at rest, access is tightly controlled, and changes are audited.

Information sourced from the Deeds Registration System is kept only as part of your own client file, for as long as that file is active, and is deleted with it or on your request. It is never held in a shared store across customers.

Access to records (PAIA)

Our manual under the Promotion of Access to Information Act, which explains how to request records we hold, is published at ondeed.co.za/paia.

Changes

Deed is in early access, so this policy will grow with the product. When it changes, the update lands on this page with a new date at the top.