Privacy Policy

Effective September 29, 2026

You can use SpendQuery without an account. There are no ads, no analytics or advertising scripts and no tracking cookies. This page explains what we do collect, why, who else sees it and how to delete it.

What we collect

• Your questions and how they were answered. Each question is logged with how it was interpreted, the query that ran, timings and whether it worked, under a random trace number. The log does not include your name, e-mail or IP address.
• Your account, if you sign in. Sign-in is handled by our authentication provider, Clerk. We receive your verified e-mail address and keep it with your role, plan and when you last visited. Clerk keeps the account itself (and whatever you give it, such as your name) under its own privacy policy.
• Saved searches and alerts. When you save a search we keep it, what it found and, if you are signed in, the e-mail address digests go to. Without an account, saved searches are tied to a random key stored in your browser, not to you. If you set up My market, we keep the industries, agencies, places and competitors you chose.
• Your pursuit desk, if you use it. The company you link (its public SAM.gov record is read, not stored), the opportunities you track and your decisions, notes, dates, checklist, submission log and pricing sheets; solicitation files you add (public attachments; files marked CUI, FOUO, export-controlled or classified are never sent to the AI or shared); your company library (capability statements, past-performance write-ups, resumes you add); proposal and capability drafts; and, if you work as a team, the members' e-mail addresses, roles, invitations and comments. Everyone on a team sees the team's desk. Your library and drafts are never shown to anyone outside your desk and never used to train an AI model. Public solicitation files and their AI read may be shared with other users tracking the same notice; your own uploads only if you tick "share".
• Feedback. If you click thumbs up or down, we store the rating, any note and the question it was about, plus your e-mail address if you are signed in.
• Snapshot links. If you create a snapshot link to cite an answer, we store that question and answer so the link keeps working. Anyone with the link can see it, so don't make one of anything private.
• IP address, briefly. Your IP address is used in memory to apply rate limits; we don't write it to our logs. Standard server logs kept by our hosting provider (request times, errors) may include IP addresses, as on most websites.

Who else processes it

• The AI model provider, currently DeepSeek, receives the text of each question (and, for follow-ups, the previous question's interpretation) to turn it into a query, and public records when it writes a summary such as an opportunity brief. On the pursuit desk it also receives the text of the solicitation files it reads and, when you ask for a proposal or capability draft, your company's SAM.gov record and the library texts chosen for that draft. It processes that text under its own terms and privacy policy and may do so outside the United States. That's why you shouldn't type personal or confidential information into the question box. The queries themselves run on our own copy of public records.
• Clerk runs sign-in (see above).
• Our e-mail provider delivers alert digests to the address on your account.
• A web search provider (Serpex) receives the name of the company or agency whose profile or answer you open, to find related news and a description of what a company does (the AI model provider then summarizes those public search results). Nothing about you is sent with it.
• Our hosting provider runs the servers and stores the data above.

We don't sell or rent personal information, don't use it for advertising and don't share it for cross-context behavioral advertising. We share it only with the service providers above, to run SpendQuery, or when required by law.

Why we use it

To answer your questions, run the features you set up (alerts, My market), keep the service working and fair (rate limits, abuse prevention), find and fix wrong answers, and improve how questions are understood.

Stored in your browser

SpendQuery keeps a few things in your browser's local storage so the site remembers them: your light/dark theme, the role you pick on the home page (resident, contractor and so on), recently viewed pages, pages you watch, the random key for saved searches without an account, and a sign-in token for staff. The current conversation is kept in session storage and cleared when you close the tab. If you sign in, Clerk sets the cookies it needs to keep you signed in. None of these are used for tracking or advertising, and you can clear them in your browser settings.

How long we keep it

• Question logs: deleted after 12 months.
• How a question was read (its text and the query it became, not who asked): kept 30 days so the same question is answered again without a new AI call. A thumbs-down deletes it.
• Your account, saved searches, alerts and My market settings: until you delete them (see below) or ask us to.
• Your pursuit desk (pursuits, files, library, drafts, pricing, comments): until you remove them or use Delete my data. A team's desk stays with the team while anyone is on it; the last person to leave takes it with them.
• Feedback and snapshot links: as long as they are useful for running and improving the service.
• Server logs follow our hosting provider's retention.

Your choices and rights

You can delete a saved search at any time, and delete all your saved searches, alerts, My market settings, your pursuit desk (pursuits, files, company library, drafts, pricing; on a team, you leave it), the e-mail on your feedback and your SpendQuery user record with Delete my data on the Alerts page. You can delete your sign-in account from its account page. Depending on where you live (for example California, under the CCPA/CPRA), you may also have rights to know about, correct or delete personal information about you; write to [email protected] and we will respond as the law requires. Since question logs aren't tied to identities, tell us the question and roughly when you asked it and we'll look.

Security

Connections are encrypted, staff tokens are stored as hashes and access to the data above is limited to the people who run SpendQuery. No system is perfectly secure, so please don't put sensitive information in questions, notes or saved-search names.

Children

SpendQuery is a general-audience research tool and isn't directed to children under 13.

Changes

We'll update this page if what we collect or how we use it changes, and change the effective date at the top. See also the Terms of Use.

Questions about these terms or your data: [email protected]. See also: Terms of Use · Privacy Policy · Where the numbers come from