1. What cookies do
Cookies are small text items saved by a browser. They can remember a choice, support a session or provide aggregated information about page use. Trenvol does not use cookies to sell products or create a profile for advertising. In practice, a cookie is simply a short piece of text stored by the browser and sent back to the site on a later request, which allows a page to recognise a returning visitor without needing to ask the same question twice. Some cookies are set directly by trenvol.info, known as first-party cookies, while others may be set by an embedded third-party service such as the map on the contact page, known as third-party cookies; this policy covers both categories and explains which apply on this site today. Because Trenvol is an editorial platform rather than a retailer, no cookie on this site is used to build an advertising profile, to track a reader across unrelated websites, or to support the sale of any product, and this remains true even if optional analytics are introduced in the future as described in section 4 below.
2. Essential choice cookie
cookieChoice records whether a visitor selected Accept All or Reject. It lasts for 12 months. Without it, the banner may appear again on a later visit. This cookie stores only a short value indicating the reader's selection, such as "accepted" or "rejected", and does not contain a name, email address or any other personal identifier. Because it is classed as strictly necessary to remember a reader's own preference, it does not itself require separate consent under the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations, even though it is not used for any purpose beyond remembering that single choice. An edge case worth noting is a reader who clears their browser storage or switches to a different device or browser; in either case, the cookieChoice item will not carry over, and the cookie banner will appear again so the reader can make a fresh choice on that browser.
3. Session storage
Session items may be used by hosting or form infrastructure to maintain basic operation. They normally expire when the browser session closes. These items typically support functions such as keeping a multi-step form working correctly while a reader completes it, or helping the underlying hosting platform distinguish one visitor's browser from another during a single visit. Because a session item expires automatically once the browser is closed, it does not persist across separate visits in the way that cookieChoice does, and no separate consent banner entry is needed for this category under current UK guidance on strictly necessary storage. If a reader's browser is configured to block all storage, including session items, some interactive elements on the site, such as the contact form's submission confirmation, may not function correctly, though the underlying articles will remain fully readable.
4. Optional analytics
If optional analytics are introduced, they will load only after consent. An analytics item may last for up to 13 months and will be configured to reduce direct identification. This policy will be updated before such a feature is enabled. Should this feature be introduced, the intention is to use a privacy-conscious analytics configuration, such as IP address truncation or anonymisation, so that aggregate information about which articles are read most often can inform editorial planning without building an identifiable profile of any individual reader. The thirteen-month upper limit mirrors common industry guidance for consent-based analytics cookies and ensures that consent is refreshed at least once a year rather than persisting indefinitely. Until this policy is updated to name a specific analytics provider and its exact cookie names, no such cookie is active on trenvol.info, and selecting Accept All on the current banner does not enable any analytics tracking that is not already described in this policy.
5. Preferences
Preference storage can remember accessibility or display choices where that feature exists. A preference item may last for 12 months. Clearing browser storage removes it. An example of the type of setting this category might cover in the future is a font-size or contrast adjustment for readers who prefer a larger typeface, though no such feature is currently active on the site. Where a preference item is introduced, it will be scoped narrowly to the specific display setting it supports and will not be combined with any browsing history or article-reading data. As with the essential choice cookie, clearing site data in the browser, switching devices, or using a private or incognito browsing window will all remove any stored preference, meaning the reader will see the site's default display settings again on that browser.
6. Third parties
Embedded maps on the contact page may set items under the provider's own policy when loaded. Readers can avoid loading the map and can review Google's documentation separately. The map embed on the contact page is served directly from Google's own infrastructure, which means that once the map loads, Google may set its own cookies in the reader's browser according to Google's separate privacy and cookie notices, entirely outside Trenvol's control. A reader who prefers not to load this embed can still find the full postal address, telephone number and opening hours printed in plain text elsewhere on the contact page, so avoiding the map does not prevent a reader from finding Trenvol's location. We link to Google's own cookie and privacy documentation from the contact page as a matter of transparency, since Trenvol cannot alter or override the cookies that a third-party embed sets once it has loaded in a reader's browser.
7. Browser controls
Most browsers let you delete or block cookies. Blocking essential items may affect saved consent, but the editorial pages remain available. Browser help pages explain the controls for each device. Common desktop and mobile browsers, including Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Edge, each provide a settings menu where a reader can view, delete or block cookies on a per-site or global basis, and the specific menu path differs slightly between browsers and versions. An edge case worth noting is a browser configured to block all third-party cookies by default; in that configuration, the Google Maps embed on the contact page may not load correctly, though the first-party cookieChoice item set directly by trenvol.info would typically be unaffected. If a reader blocks or deletes the cookieChoice item specifically, the practical consequence is simply that the cookie banner will reappear on the next visit, asking the reader to make their selection again; it does not affect access to any article or page on the site.
8. Consent
Optional items are not placed before a visitor makes a choice. Selecting Reject does not remove access to articles. Consent can be changed by clearing site data and revisiting the page. This reflects the requirement under the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations that non-essential cookies must not be set until a reader has given informed consent, and Trenvol's cookie banner is built to respect that sequencing by default. A reader who initially selects Reject and later wishes to allow optional cookies, once such a feature exists, can do so by clearing the cookieChoice item from their browser storage and revisiting trenvol.info, which will cause the banner to appear again with both options available. Because no optional analytics or advertising cookie is currently active on the site, selecting either Accept All or Reject today has no practical difference in terms of tracking, though the choice will still be respected once such a feature is introduced.
9. Contact
Questions about cookies can be sent to [email protected]. Include the browser and page involved, but do not include sensitive personal health information. Providing the browser name and version, along with the specific page where an issue was noticed, helps our editorial team reproduce and understand a technical query without needing several rounds of follow-up correspondence. We aim to respond to cookie-related queries within the same working days described in our Disclaimer's contact procedure, since these messages are reviewed by the same editorial team during Mon–Fri 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM GMT. As with any other message sent through the contact page, information included in a cookie query is retained and handled according to the retention periods set out in the Privacy Policy, rather than under any separate arrangement specific to cookie questions.
10. Review date
This policy was reviewed on 24 September 2026. We will update it when the site's storage, embeds or analytics arrangements change. A previous review, completed shortly after the site's initial launch, confirmed that the only browser storage in active use at that time was the essential cookieChoice item described in section 2, with no session, preference or analytics items yet deployed. We intend to review this page at least once a year even if no change is planned, so that the review date remains a reliable indicator of how current the policy is, and any introduction of a new cookie category, such as the optional analytics described in section 4, will trigger an update to this page before that feature goes live rather than afterwards.