Privacy & Cookies

What are Cookies?

A Cookie is a small piece of information which a web-site stores on your computer. For instance, the items that you put in a web-based shopping trolley could be stored as cookies on your machine. Generally, Cookies are quite benign but some sharp operators are using them in clever and devious ways that you may not approve of.

For example, they can be used to track your interests as you browse the web. Have you ever looked at some obscure product on one site only to have them specifically promoted to you a few days later by another seemingly un-related site? It's not a coincidence; someone has recorded your interest using Cookies and sold your information on.

Cookies and the Law

In May 2011 the law relating to Cookies changed making it illegal to record them on a computer without the user’s specific consent - unless the Cookie is essential for the current transaction. This is equivalent to ticking the box at the bottom of an order form allowing the supplier or their partners to contact you with further offers.

It remains to be seen how effective the law becomes but it is reasonable to expect that UK based suppliers will generally comply.  Foreign-based companies and multi-nationals may take a more 'flexible' approach.

The Solwise Way

Whilst developing Solwise's web presence we try our best to minimise the use of cookies and set only first-party cookies (cookies explicitly set by ourselves) that we have deemed absolutely necessary for the operation of the websites, or that provide a justifiable improvement in usability.
We also feel ethically obliged to diminish or eradicate the unnecessary transmission of any personal or otherwise sensitive information to third parties.

As such, Solwise have not needed to make any significant changes to comply with the new law. 
We have added this page of information and will be more careful about links to third-party sites in future.

This is a list of the Cookies which may be set by the Solwise web pages showing what each one is for.

solwise.co.uk

• accounttype: If logging into the solwise.co.uk main website, this cookie stores non-sensitive information about your account type so that we can provide a personalised view of the website.
  This cookie is essential for logging in and viewing a personalised version of the solwise.co.uk main website.

secure.solwise.co.uk

• PHPSESSID: This data is required for the PHP language to operate by identifying your current browser session with the website.
  If cookies are disabled on your web browser, the PHPSESSID data will be propagated onto the URL automatically by the server and so will not affect the operation of the website.
• NodeID: A token identifier used by our secure.solwise.co.uk online services to link application sessions (such as the shopping trolley) to your computer which is independent from the PHPSESSID data for security and usability reasons. This allows you to, for example, start building an order in the shopping trolley, leave it (say over-night) and return to complete the order at a later time. This cookie may persist for up to one month from your last activity on the secure.solwise.co.uk website.
  This cookie is absolutely essential for the correct operation of the solwise-secure online services and so explicit consent for the use of this cookie will not be required.
  If you are having problems with the solwise-secure online services, the chances are that this cookie is failing to set; possibly due to the disabling of cookies by either your web browser or internet security package.
• UserID; SessionID: When logging into the solwise-secure website you are presented with the option to 'Remember Me'. This option keeps your browser logged in to the solwise-secure website for up to a month from your last activity negating the need to enter your username and password each visit during this period. These cookies take the form of hashes and do not contain any sensitive or personal information.
  Ticking the 'Remember Me' checkbox is not required for you to log in to the website, instead, the authenticated state data will be stored on the server and you will be automatically logged out from solwise-secure when you end your web browser session.
  By ticking the 'Remember Me' checkbox when logging into the solwise-secure website you are providing explicit consent to set these cookies in accordance with the law.