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Cookie Policy

Last updated: 21/7/2026

About this policy

This policy explains the cookies and similar technologies used on thefreeassociation.co.uk, run by The Free Association (“FA”, “we”, “us”). It covers what we set, why, and how you can control it. For everything else we do with your personal data - accounts, orders, marketing and your rights - see our Privacy Policy. Questions: hello@thefreeassociation.co.uk.

Cookies are small text files a website stores in your browser. We also use your browser’s local storage, which works similarly but stays on your device and isn’t sent with every request. Both are covered here.

Essential cookies

These are always on, because the site doesn’t work without them. They are set by us (or by our payment provider during checkout) and are never used for advertising:

  • Session cookie - keeps your basket and login working as you move between pages. Expires when you close your browser.
  • Stay signed in (fa_remember) - set when you sign in, so you stay signed in on that device for up to 30 days. Signing out removes it.
  • Stripe - our payment provider sets its own cookies on checkout pages for payment processing and fraud prevention. See Stripe’s privacy policy.
  • Door scanning (fa_door_session) - a long-lived cookie set only on FA staff devices used to scan tickets at the door. Regular visitors never receive it.

Local storage we use

These stay on your device and aren’t used to track you across sites:

  • Your cookie choice - whether you accepted or rejected optional cookies, so we don’t ask again on every page.
  • Basket display - a cached count of your basket so the header badge shows without an extra request.
  • Purchase de-duplication - a flag per completed order so a refreshed confirmation page can’t double-count a sale in our analytics.

Analytics and advertising cookies (your choice)

With your consent, we use Google Analytics to understand how the site is used and how well our advertising works. These cookies (names beginning _ga) are set only if you choose “Accept” on our cookie banner. We use Google Consent Mode: until you accept, analytics and advertising storage stays switched off and no such cookies are set. The purchase statistics sent to analytics contain order values and items - never your name or email address.

You can change your mind at any time via the “Manage cookies” link in the site footer, which reopens the banner. Rejecting (or ignoring) the banner leaves the site fully usable.

Cookies set by embedded content

Some pages embed content from other companies, which may set their own cookies when the page loads, under their own policies:

  • YouTube - video players on some class pages.
  • Google Maps - the map on our visit page.
  • Tally - some of our forms are embedded from Tally.
  • Cloudflare - the bot-protection check on our forms.

How to control cookies

Beyond our banner, your browser lets you block or delete cookies for any site (usually under Settings → Privacy). Two things to know: blocking our essential cookies will break the basket and login, and deleting local storage clears your saved cookie choice, so the banner will ask again.

Changes to this policy

We’ll post any changes on this page and update the date at the top. The Privacy Policy has the wider picture of how we handle personal data.