Route der Literatur takes your privacy seriously and follows this privacy policy to clarify what information we collect, process, and share to provide you with our service.

What information do we collect?

Personal Data

We collect all personal data that you provide in your account. This includes information you provide when registering on our website, such as your email address, name, address, phone number, mobile number, and an author photo.

This information may also include details about your preferences regarding consumption or production (metadata), such as the creation date of a document or the location where a photo was taken.

Order Information

We collect data about the orders you place on our website. This includes your contact information, billing and shipping addresses, the products purchased, and details about the payment methods.

Book Information

We collect all the information about books that you provide on the platform. This includes the title, subtitle, author, technical specifications of the book (such as size and paper type), description, content, cover, and pricing details. This information may include metadata about the content provided, such as the date the file was created, the user who created the file, and additional metadata associated with the book file you upload.

Particularly Sensitive Data

You have the option to specify your gender in your account. This information is completely optional and not required if you choose not to provide it. The gender information you provide is subject to special protection under European Union data protection laws.

Bank Information

Our website may ask you to provide your bank information. Providing this data is optional unless you choose to sell your books through our distribution channels. We handle your bank data with the utmost care.

Account Data Usage

We collect data on how you use our services, including account creation, login activities, book-related activities, and the frequency of these actions.

Cookies and Analysis Tools

We use cookies to enhance your user experience on our website. We employ the following types of cookies:

• STRICTLY NECESSARY COOKIES:
  • Authentication: To allow automatic login on each visit to our website, we store certain authentication data in cookies.
  • Current session data: We store unique keys related to your current visit on our website. These keys do not include behavioral information but solely aim to make your website usage more convenient without requiring multiple logins.
  • Language preferences: We store your selected language preference in a cookie to retain your language settings on our website.
• ANALYTICAL COOKIES:
  • Analysis and Research: We use these cookies to better understand how you use our website. They help us identify the most frequently used areas of the site and determine areas for improvement.

How do we use the information?

We use the information to deliver the services described in our terms and conditions. The implementation occurs as follows:

Providing and improving our services: We use the collected data to enable you to create, order, and sell your books. To make this process as easy as possible, we use your personal data and book information to help you edit and reorder your works easily. Additionally, we use book data to print books, distribute them through the channels you select, and deliver them to customers who purchase your books through these channels.

Royalty Payments: When your book is published and sold through our online store or one of our distribution partners, we use your bank account details to pay you the corresponding royalties. This is the only situation in which we use your bank information for this purpose.

Research and development of products: We are constantly striving to improve our services for you as an author. To this end, we use the provided information and usage data to research, enhance, and test our services.

For internal analysis: We use this data to create statistics about the number of users on our platform and how they use our services.

To communicate with you and provide support: We use the collected information to communicate effectively with you. This includes keeping you updated on news, sending personalized marketing messages, offering advice when you face difficulties, and providing effective assistance upon request.

How do we share the information?

We only share the information that is absolutely necessary and solely with trusted partners.

Payment processing

We ensure that you can make secure payments for orders or services. For this purpose, we transmit your order details to our payment provider, who processes and stores your data in compliance with EU regulations.

When selling your books, we transfer royalties directly to your bank account or through an intermediary of your choice. We share your banking details with our bank solely for this purpose.

Printing

To print and ship your books, we share the necessary book and order information with our printing partner. This partner processes and stores your book and order data in compliance with European Union data protection regulations. Additionally, your shipping details are shared with the courier responsible for delivering your books.

Publication

To sell your book, it must be available in our online store and through the distribution channels we collaborate with. We share your book information with these distribution channels. When deleting a book, we inform the channels that your book is no longer for sale. However, we cannot guarantee that all channels will delete all information about your book.

Law enforcement and legal requests

We share information with law enforcement authorities or respond to legal requests when necessary.

Social networks

We share selected data with social media platforms. This includes sharing the link to your book on various social media when you use our sharing feature.

This also includes sharing your address — without your name — with Google Maps if you provide your address in your account. We share your location with Google Maps to validate the provided address and display your location on a map. This helps us prevent future shipments to a non-existent address.

Use of data for public interest

We occasionally process your data to create anonymous statistics that serve the public interest. This includes providing statistics for newspapers, academic research, and market studies.

What is the legal basis for data processing?

We collect, use, and share your information based on the following legal grounds:

• Consent: By providing or removing your data, you can determine what information we currently store and share.
• Compliance with legal obligations: We process information when necessary to comply with our legal obligations.
• Fulfillment of business terms: We use the information as required to fulfill our terms of service.
• Legitimate commercial interests: We process information based on our legitimate commercial interests, including providing a user-friendly, innovative, and profitable self-publishing and book printing service.
• Protection of vital interests: We process information to protect your vital interests or those of another person.

How can you exercise your rights under the GDPR?

Under the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), you have the right to access, correct, delete, or transfer your data. By default, you have access to all your personal data as well as information about books and orders. You can review, correct, and download your data directly from our website by logging into your account.

Additionally, the GDPR allows you to object to data processing and restrict it, including objecting to the processing of your data for marketing purposes. You can exercise this right by unsubscribing from newsletters, which you can do directly through the emails you receive.

Data Storage and Account Deletion

We store your personal data only as long as necessary to provide our services or until you delete your account, whichever comes first. You can remove your personal data or delete book information from your account at any time.

To delete your account, please send us an email at [email protected] with your request. Make sure to send the email from the same address you used to register your account. When deleting your account, we will remove the following information:

• Personal data, including your bank account details;
• Book information;
• Order information;

We delete usage data where feasible. However, please note that some of this data is anonymized and therefore cannot be directly associated with your account.

We will not delete invoices, as we are legally obligated to retain them.

How do we respond to legal requests or prevent harm?

We may access and share your information with regulatory authorities, law enforcement, or other entities in cases such as:

• Receiving a legal request and being convinced that we are legally required to comply with the request in our jurisdiction or the jurisdiction where the request is made;
• Believing it is necessary to conduct investigations to prevent imminent death, physical injury, or harm to us, you, or others;
• Detecting, preventing, and combating fraud;
• Detecting, preventing, and combating unauthorized use of our services.

The information collected about you may be stored longer than stated in these terms if it is the subject of an ongoing legal request.

How do we use and transfer data?

We collaborate internationally with printing houses and distribution partners. Your data is only transferred to these parties when necessary to provide the services you have requested through our website. The transfer of your data is essential to deliver the service you requested. These companies may store your data outside the European Union.

For example, if you wish to print and deliver a book in a foreign country, we transfer the information of your book and order to a local printing house. Another example is the publication of a book: in this case, we transfer your book's information to the sales channels you selected.

Contacting Us with Questions

If you have questions about the privacy policy, how we collect, store, and process information, you can contact us by email or post:

Online

[email protected]

By Post

Pensática Unipessoal Lda

Rua Luís António Verney, 154 – São Domingos de Rana

2785-284 Cascais - Lisbon - Portugal

If you wish to file a privacy complaint, please direct your concern to the Data Protection Officer (DPO) of Route of Literature/Pensática or to the National Data Protection Commission (CNPD).