Legal

Privacy policy.

Plain-English version: we collect what's necessary to run the books, encrypt it at every step, never sell it, and never use it to train models for anyone else. Below is the legally-binding version with all the specifics.

Effective May 1, 2026 · Last updated Apr 18, 2026

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01Scope & controller

This Privacy Policy describes how BooksGPT, Inc. ("BooksGPT," "we," "us," or "our"), a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in Oakland, California, collects, uses, and protects information when you use our Services. The BooksGPT web application, mobile app, API, and connectors (Claude Desktop MCP, ChatGPT custom GPT, and others).

BooksGPT is the data controller for personal information you submit to your account. If you connect BooksGPT to a third-party service (your bank, payment processor, or AI assistant), the data BooksGPT receives from that service is governed by the integration scope you authorize.

02Information we collect

Plain English

We collect three buckets: account info (email, name, business name), books data (transactions, invoices, vendors), and usage info (clicks, requests). We don't collect anything outside those three. We never collect your bank password. Plaid does, in a token we never see.

Account data

Your name, email address, and password (hashed).
Your business name, mailing address, EIN, and entity type (sole prop / LLC / S-corp / partnership).
Billing data. Last 4 digits of the card and the Stripe customer ID. Stripe holds your card; we don't.

Books & financial data

Transactions imported from connected banks (date, amount, merchant, memo, our category).
Invoices you create, send, and receive payments on.
Customer and vendor lists, including the W-9 information you upload.
Documents you attach to transactions (receipts, contracts, statements).

Usage data

Pages viewed, buttons clicked, API endpoints called.
Device fingerprint (browser, OS, IP address truncated to the /24 network).
Crash reports and performance traces (no personal data included).

03How we use information

We use your information for these defined purposes only:

Purpose	What we do with it
Run the Service	Show your books to you. Categorize new transactions. Send your monthly close report.
Improve the Service	Aggregate, anonymized usage stats. We never use one customer's data to improve another's experience.
Security	Detect fraud, abuse, and credential-stuffing attacks. Notify you of suspicious sign-ins.
Support	Answer your questions. Read-only access by a support agent requires a signed support session token logged to your audit trail.
Legal compliance	Respond to lawful subpoenas. We will tell you about any government request unless legally prohibited.

We share data only in these specific situations:

Sub-processors. A short list of vendors we use to run the Service. Listed on our sub-processors page. Examples: AWS for hosting, Stripe for billing, Plaid for bank connections, Resend for email. Each is bound by a Data Processing Agreement.
Your CPA. When you click "Send to CPA" on year-end handoff, we share the package you select with the email you specify. The CPA gets read-only ledger access if you grant it.
Connectors you authorize. If you install our Claude Desktop / ChatGPT / API connector, we share the books data those connectors request, scoped to read-only and revocable.
Legal compliance. If we receive a valid subpoena or court order. We push back on overbroad requests.
Corporate transactions. If BooksGPT is acquired, your data goes to the acquirer under the same terms. You'll be notified 30 days in advance.

We do not sell your data. We have never sold customer data. There is no scenario in which we will. We don't run an ads business.

05Bank & financial data

BooksGPT does not store your bank credentials. We use Plaid as the bank-connection provider for US customers. When you connect a bank account:

You authenticate with your bank directly through Plaid's interface.
Plaid issues a read-only access token, scoped to transaction data only.
BooksGPT stores the token and uses it to fetch your transactions.
We cannot initiate transfers or move money from your accounts. The token does not grant write access.

You can revoke the bank connection at any time from Settings → Connections. Revoking immediately invalidates the Plaid token.

06AI training & your data

Plain English

Your transactions are never used to train AI models for anyone else. The categorization model was trained on a separate, opt-in dataset of historical transactions where customers explicitly consented to model training, with all personal identifiers removed.

Specifically:

We do not use your live transactions, invoices, or documents to train the production AI models that other customers use.
When the AI categorizes your transaction, it reads your data to produce an output. That inference call is not stored as training data.
The eval set we publish numbers from is a separate, voluntarily-contributed dataset where customers opted in via an explicit consent flow and where all merchant strings have been de-identified.
Anthropic, OpenAI, and any other model providers we use for inference operate under zero-retention agreements: they cannot train on the data we send for inference.

07Security

We hold a Type II SOC 2 attestation, audited annually. Key controls:

Encryption in transit: TLS 1.3 for all client connections; mutual TLS between our services.
Encryption at rest: AES-256 with envelope encryption; per-customer data keys rotated quarterly.
Access controls: Single sign-on with hardware key required for all employee access to production. Just-in-time elevation for production reads, with every read logged to your audit trail.
Backups: Point-in-time recovery to any moment in the last 30 days, encrypted backups retained for 90 days.
Vulnerability management: Quarterly third-party penetration test. Public bug-bounty program at security.booksgpt.ai.

If we ever discover a security incident affecting your data, we will notify you within 72 hours of detection.

08Retention & deletion

We retain your books data for as long as your account is active, plus 90 days after closure (so you can come back if you change your mind). After 90 days, your data is permanently deleted from our production systems. Encrypted backups age out by 180 days.

You can request immediate deletion at any time by emailing [email protected]. Note that some records (billing invoices, signed contracts) are retained for 7 years to meet US tax-law requirements; the rest is deleted within 30 days of your request.

09Your rights

Depending on where you live (US/CCPA, EU/UK/GDPR, or elsewhere), you may have these rights:

Access: Get a copy of every piece of data we hold about you. Settings → Data → Export covers this; we'll respond to written requests within 30 days.
Correction: Fix anything wrong. You can edit most of this directly in the product.
Deletion: See section 8.
Portability: Export your full ledger as PDF, CSV, or QBO journal format. Anytime. No lock-in.
Opt-out of sale: Not applicable. We do not sell data.

To exercise any of these, email [email protected]. We will not retaliate or charge you for exercising your rights.

10International transfers

BooksGPT is a US company and our servers are in the United States (AWS us-east-1 and us-west-2). If you access the Service from outside the US, your data will be transferred to and processed in the United States. Where required (EU/UK customers), we rely on the Standard Contractual Clauses approved by the European Commission.

11Children

The Service is not directed at children under 16. We do not knowingly collect data from anyone under 16. If you believe we have, email [email protected] and we will delete it.

12Changes

We update this Policy when our practices change. If a change is material (affects how we collect, use, or share your data), we will notify you by email at least 30 days before it takes effect. The "Last updated" date at the top of this page always reflects the most recent change. Prior versions are archived; ask us if you want one.

13Contact

Privacy questions, requests, or complaints:

Email: [email protected]
Mail: BooksGPT, Inc. · Attn: Privacy · 1455 Market St #600, Oakland, CA 94612
EU representative: BooksGPT EU GmbH, Berlin (details on request)

If you're not satisfied with our response, you can complain to the data protection authority in your country. For US customers, you can file a complaint with the FTC; for EU customers, with your national DPA.