Last Updated: 27 August 2026
Welcome to the Mekanyk Sync Platform ("Platform", "Services"), developed and operated by Mekanyk Tech ("we", "us", "our"), a company based in South Africa. The Platform consists of our customer mobile application, our workshop administration application, and our website (including public workshop and vehicle-listing pages).
We are committed to protecting your privacy and handling your personal information responsibly and in compliance with the Protection of Personal Information Act, 4 of 2013 ("POPIA") and other applicable data protection laws. For personal information processed through your Platform account, Mekanyk Tech is the responsible party.
This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you use our Platform. Please read it carefully. If you do not agree with the terms of this policy, please do not access or use our Services.
What we collect depends on how you use the Platform and whether you use it as a vehicle owner ("Customer") or as an automotive workshop ("Workshop").
We use the information we collect to:
Under POPIA, we process your personal information where it is necessary to perform our contract with you, where we have a legitimate interest (such as securing and improving the Platform and keeping Workshop content within the law), where you have consented (such as location access and optional marketing), and where the law requires it (such as tax record-keeping). Direct marketing from a Workshop that has serviced your vehicle through a booking is sent on an opt-out basis under POPIA section 69(3), which allows a business to market its own services to its existing customers provided they can object at collection and in every message; anyone who is not the Workshop's customer receives marketing only with consent. For that marketing the Workshop is the responsible party and Mekanyk Tech acts as its operator, applying the controls described in section 15.
We may share information we have collected about you in the following situations:
We do not sell your personal information.
Workshop subscription payments are processed by Paystack. Your card details are entered directly with Paystack and are protected under its security certifications; we never receive or store full card numbers. To support automatic monthly renewals, Paystack issues us a secure authorization token linked to your subscription. You can manage your subscription in the workshop application. Customers do not pay for vehicle services through the Platform — payment for services is arranged directly between you and the Workshop.
The Mekanyk AI assistant and related AI features are powered by third-party AI providers (currently Google's Gemini models and OpenAI). The content you submit to these features is processed by those providers to generate responses. Please do not share personal information in AI conversations beyond what is needed for your question. AI outputs are informational and may be inaccurate — see our Terms and Conditions.
We also use Google's Gemini models to generate images for Workshops from their prompts, and to help check Workshop content against our content standards. Content checks are described in section 7.
Every piece of content a Workshop publishes — including profile text, posts, images, and broadcasts — is checked before it reaches Customers. The check combines automatic rules, an AI classification, and, where the result is unclear or is appealed, review by a person. We keep a record of each check: the content examined (as a fingerprint and short excerpts), the categories and confidence the check assigned, the version of our content standards applied, the model used, and any human decision and appeal. These records exist so that we can explain every decision to the Workshop concerned, apply our repeat-breach rules fairly, and demonstrate compliance with the CPA, NCA, POPIA, and NRTA.
Under POPIA section 71, you will not be subject to a decision with legal or similarly significant effect based solely on automated processing without the chance to make representations against it: any withheld content comes with a plain-language reason and can be appealed to a person, and a publishing pause applied under our repeat-breach rules can be appealed to — and lifted by — a person. Moderation records are visible to our staff and, for a Workshop's own content, to that Workshop; they are not published. If you report content, the Workshop is not told who reported it.
We use administrative, technical, and physical safeguards to protect your personal information, including encryption of data in transit, hashed password storage, tokenized payment authorizations, request-integrity verification on our apps, and role-based access controls. While we take reasonable steps to secure your information, no security measures are perfect, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.
Workshops can record and manage their own customers' information on the Platform (for example when creating a walk-in booking). For those records, the Workshop is the responsible party under POPIA and must have a lawful basis for using that information; Mekanyk Tech processes it as an operator on the Workshop's behalf, under the Workshop's instructions and our security safeguards. If a Workshop has recorded your details and you want them corrected or deleted, please contact that Workshop first; we will support their compliance, and you may also contact us directly.
In accordance with POPIA, you have the right to:
To exercise these rights, contact us using the details below. You can also request account deletion from within the app or by contacting us.
We retain your personal information for as long as your account is active and as needed to provide the Services. After account closure we delete or anonymize personal information, except where we must keep it to meet legal obligations — for example, tax invoices and related billing records, which South African tax law requires us to keep for at least five years — or to resolve disputes and enforce our agreements. Records of marketing opt-outs are kept for as long as needed to keep honouring them. Moderation records are kept for as long as needed to operate our repeat-breach rules, resolve appeals, and demonstrate compliance, and thereafter only as the law requires.
Our Platform and Services are not intended for use by children under the age of 18. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 18. If we become aware that we have collected personal information from a child under 18, we will take steps to delete such information.
Our primary application infrastructure is hosted in the European Union, and some of our service providers (such as our SMS, email, push notification, AI, and error-monitoring providers) process information in other countries, including the United States. Where your information is transferred outside South Africa, we take the steps required by POPIA's cross-border transfer rules to ensure it receives an adequate level of protection.
Our website uses cookies and similar technologies for essential functionality and, with your consent where required, analytics (Firebase Analytics and Vercel Analytics) to understand how the site is used and to improve it. You can manage cookie preferences through our cookie banner and your browser settings. Our apps use analytics and error monitoring to keep the Platform reliable.
Service communications (such as OTPs, booking updates, and billing notices) are necessary to provide the Platform and cannot be opted out of while your account is active.
Marketing from Mekanyk Tech is optional. You can opt out at any time via the unsubscribe link in emails, your device's notification settings for push, or by contacting us.
Marketing from your Workshops — on by default, off whenever you say. A Workshop that has serviced your vehicle through a booking on the Platform may send you promotions, updates, and reminders about its own services through the Platform — as cards in its space in the app and by push notification and WhatsApp. For these messages the Workshop is the responsible party and Mekanyk Tech is its operator. WhatsApp messages come from the Mekanyk Sync number on the Workshop's behalf, always name the Workshop, and are delivered only during the hours the Consumer Protection Act regulations allow. You do not need to opt in. POPIA section 69(3) allows a business to market its own services to its existing customers on an opt-out basis, provided it offered you the chance to object when it collected your details and offers it again in every message — which is why our Terms tell you at booking, and why every WhatsApp marketing message ends with how to stop. The Platform records the basis for each Workshop and automatically skips anyone who has opted out, and anyone who is not the Workshop's customer unless they have opted in. You can opt out of a Workshop's marketing at any time, free of charge — reply STOP on WhatsApp, use the notification and offer settings in the app (per Workshop), or contact us — and your opt-out takes effect immediately and is final for that Workshop until you opt back in. Workshops cannot override an opt-out. Opting out never affects your bookings or the service messages about them.
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of changes by posting the new Privacy Policy on this page and updating the "Last Updated" date, and for material changes we will provide additional notice through the Platform. You are advised to review this Privacy Policy periodically.
If you have questions or comments about this Privacy Policy, or wish to exercise your rights, please contact us at:
Mekanyk Tech info@mekanyk.com
