Qchirp — Privacy Policy

Last updated: 22 June 2026

Qchirp (“we”, “us”) is a daily family-feedback tool used by early-learning services (childcare centres) to gather quick parent/carer feedback and turn it into Quality Improvement Plan (QIP) evidence. This policy explains what personal information we handle, how, and your choices. It applies to our website, our admin dashboards, and the Qchirp Kiosk app.

1. The short version

• The kiosk question screen used by families is anonymous. We do not ask for, or store, any name, contact detail, child’s information, or device identifier that identifies a family member.
• The only personal information we hold is staff account information for the centre’s directors and educators (e.g. work email, name) so they can log in and use the dashboards.
• We do not sell personal information. We do not use it for advertising.

2. Information we collect

a) Family kiosk responses (anonymous). When a family taps an answer at the kiosk, we store the chosen answer, the question, a timestamp, the kiosk device’s internal label, and (if a non-English language was selected) which language was used. None of this identifies an individual. We do not collect names, children’s details, contact information, photos, or precise location.

b) Staff account information. For directors and educators we store a work email address, a display name, a securely hashed password or PIN, role/access level, and basic login timestamps. Centres provide this when they invite staff.

c) Educator reflections. Educators may write reflective notes about their practice. These are attributed to the educator and visible to their centre’s leadership. They are the centre’s records; we process them on the centre’s behalf.

d) Technical information. Like any web service, our servers record standard log data (e.g. IP address and browser type) for security and reliability. The Qchirp Kiosk app sends periodic “heartbeats” (a pairing token, app version, and device status) so a centre can see whether its kiosk is online.

3. How we use information

• To provide the service: show the right question, record responses, generate QIP evidence reports and analytics for the centre.
• To authenticate and secure staff accounts.
• To translate questions into a centre’s enabled languages (see “AI features” below).
• To maintain, debug, and protect the service.

4. AI features

Some optional features use a third-party AI provider (Anthropic’s Claude) to (a) translate question text into a centre’s chosen languages, (b) help educators polish their own reflective writing into a professional register, and (c) translate an educator reflection spoken or written in another language into English for the centre’s records. The AI assists with wording — it does not make decisions about individuals, and a human always reviews any AI-assisted content before it is used as evidence. Machine-translated reflections are labelled as translated and the educator’s original-language words are preserved alongside them. Question text and educator-authored text may be sent to the AI provider for these purposes. Educators may also optionally speak or record a reflection aloud; that audio is sent to a transcription provider (OpenAI) to convert it to text, and is never stored by us. We use two transcription methods, and in both the audio is processed in the United States and is not used to train OpenAI’s models: (1) live transcription (words appear as the educator speaks) uses OpenAI’s Realtime API — per OpenAI’s API data controls, audio sent to this endpoint may be retained by OpenAI for up to 30 days solely for abuse monitoring and is then deleted; (2) whole-clip transcription (used as a fallback, and for reflections spoken in another language) uses OpenAI’s audio-transcription endpoint, where the audio is not retained at all. We do not send family-identifying information (there is none) to either AI provider.

5. Who we share information with

We share information only with service providers who help us run Qchirp, under contract and only as needed:

• Hosting: Render (application + database hosting; servers located in Singapore).
• Email delivery: Postmark (staff invite, password/PIN reset, and notification emails) — United States.
• AI processing: Anthropic (Claude), for the optional translation and writing-assist features above — United States.
• Voice transcription: OpenAI, to transcribe an optionally-spoken or -recorded reflection into text. Live-transcription audio may be retained by OpenAI for up to 30 days for abuse monitoring only; whole-clip transcription audio is not retained. Neither is used for training — United States.

These providers process data outside Australia (Singapore and the United States). By using Qchirp you acknowledge this overseas processing. We do not sell or rent personal information to anyone, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.

6. Children’s information

Qchirp is designed so that families do not enter any child’s information. The kiosk is anonymous. Our accounts are for adults (centre staff). The app is not directed to children and is rated for a general/adult audience.

7. Security

Passwords and PINs are stored only as secure hashes, never in plain text. The service is served over HTTPS. Each centre’s data is isolated to that centre, and staff can only access their own centre’s information.

8. Retention

We keep a centre’s data for as long as the centre’s account is active, because QIP evidence is, by design, a historical record. If a centre closes its account, we will delete or de-identify its personal information within a reasonable period, except where we must keep it to meet a legal obligation. Anonymous family responses may be retained as aggregate QIP evidence.

9. Your choices and access

Centre staff can view and update their own account details in the dashboard. If you want to access, correct, or delete personal information we hold, or you have a privacy concern, contact us at hello@qchirp.com and we will respond within a reasonable time. If you are not satisfied, you may contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) at oaic.gov.au.

10. Changes

We may update this policy. We will post the new version here and update the “Last updated” date.

11. Contact

Elvis Juric (trading as Qchirp) — ABN 60 088 029 550
hello@qchirp.com
Australian Capital Territory, Australia