Cookie Policy

A cookie is a small file a website asks your browser to store. Some are needed to make the site work at all. Others watch how the site is used, or let something from another company, such as a map, appear on the page.

This policy covers the Spectra website at spectraholdings.co.uk. It does not cover the client portal, which is a separate system run for us by another company on its own address, with its own cookies and its own terms.

The only cookies set when you arrive are the strictly necessary ones listed below. Analytics, functional and marketing cookies are not set unless you accept them, and the tools behind them are not loaded at all until you do.

You can accept everything, refuse everything, or choose category by category. Refusing is one click, in the same place as accepting, and refusing costs you nothing beyond the map on the contact page, which you can still load by hand.

Strictly necessary

Always on. This is the cookie that remembers your cookie choice, and the spam protection on our enquiry form. Without the first, we would have to ask you on every page. Without the second, the form would be filled with automated rubbish.

Analytics

Google Analytics, and our search optimisation platform, Hike SEO. These tell us which pages, case studies and articles are read, and where people leave. We use it to decide what to write and what to fix. Neither runs unless you accept this category.

Functional

The Google map on our contact page. Loading a map means asking Google for it, which lets Google set its own cookies, so we hold it back until you agree. If you would rather not, the page still shows our address and a link to open it in Google Maps.

Marketing

This controls the advertising features inside Google Analytics. We do not run any advertising or social media tracking pixel on this website, so switching it on adds no cookie of our own. If that changes, this policy and the consent banner will change with it.

That is the only cookie this website sets by itself. Everything else below belongs to a third party.

These are set by the companies named, not by us, and only in the circumstances given. Durations are as published by each provider and can change without notice to us.

Google explains what it does with this data in its privacy policy.

Our search optimisation platform, Hike SEO, loads a script on our pages when you accept analytics cookies. We are asking Hike to confirm exactly what, if anything, it stores in your browser, and this table will be updated with the answer.

The map is a Google Maps embed. It is not loaded when the page opens. If you have accepted functional cookies it loads normally; if you have not, you see our address, a link to open the location in Google Maps, and a button to load the map on the page.

Pressing that button loads the map for that visit only. It does not change your saved cookie preferences, and the next page you open will behave as before.

Our enquiry form is protected by Google reCAPTCHA, which scores whether a submission looks automated. Without it the form is a target for bulk spam.

We treat this as strictly necessary, so it is not behind the consent banner, but it is loaded only when you actually start using the form rather than on every page you visit. If you never touch the form, reCAPTCHA is never loaded and sets nothing. Using it means Google receives your IP address and some information about your browser, and reCAPTCHA is governed by Google's privacy policy and terms of service.

Use the Cookie settings tab at the foot of every page. It opens the same panel you saw when you arrived, where you can switch categories on or off individually, accept everything, or reject everything in one click.

Withdrawing is as easy as agreeing, and takes effect immediately. Cookies already placed by a third party are not removed by refusing them afterwards, so clear your browser cookies as well if you want them gone.

We ask again after 12 months.

Every browser lets you block or delete cookies, and that works whatever we do. It is a blunter instrument: blocking all cookies will stop this site remembering that you refused ours, so you will be asked again on every visit, and other websites may break.

The Information Commissioner's Office publishes plain guidance on cookies and how to control them at ico.org.uk.

If we add or remove a tool that uses cookies, we will update this page and, where the change affects what we are asking you to agree to, ask for your consent again. The date at the top always shows when this version was published.

If you have a question about this policy, or want to know more about anything listed here, please contact:

How we handle personal data more generally is covered in our Privacy Policy.