Cookies Policy
Our website & service requires you to have cookies enabled on your browser.
What is a cookie?
Cookies are harmless pieces of information stored on your computer. They may contain information such as the username you use when visiting a particular site, or keep track of the number of times you have visited a site. Cookies can only be read by you, or the web site that created the cookie in the first place.
Why do you use cookies?
We use cookies to store a unique identity code for you . This allows us to securely enable us to provide a members only area. Cookies enable you to stay logged in whilst you browse the members-only areas.
This hasn't been a problem with other sites!
Most websites don't use cookies as they are 'static', ie they just display information. Most 'dynamic' sites where the information changes according to the choices you make on the website use cookies to store information about you.
Nearly all shopping sites and other highly functional websites use cookies. The exceptions are those sites (e.g. eBay, online banks and some very large shopping sites) where membership is usually required before you can purchase. With these sites the information normally stored in a cookie is stored against the customer's account on the webserver instead and this is arguably a greater privacy issue than cookies!
The Cookies We Set
- Used to prevent cross site scripting attacks when submiting forms. No personal information is captured.
- Used to identify your device to our website. No personal information is captured.
- We set this to help mitigate the risk of a client side script accessing a protected cookie.
Are cookies a security risk?
No, they are not. Some people believe that they are, however, this is a common misconception, propagated largely by an ill-informed press. In reality, the worst security risk you are likely to face from cookies is that a website owner will be able to 'tag' your browser when you enter their site and find out how often you visit and, perhaps, what pages you like to look at.
You may see this as an invasion of your privacy, but it is hardly a security risk. That website owner still cannot access any information about you, except what you knowingly give them by filling in forms. What's more, cookies can generally only be accessed by the web server that set them. So, you still have control over what information you give out, and to whom.
I've been told that cookies are spyware. Is this true?
No. Cookies are NOT spyware. Cookies are information sent by the server to the browser to be stored in a text file on the user's hard drive. Cookies cannot: be viruses; steal credit card information; steal banking information; or see what software you have on your computer. A cookie is just a file with textual information set by the server. As explained above, the most a cookie can do is to pass information between pages within a single website/domain. Some companies use this to provide targeted adverts and/or popups.
The main reason some people object to cookies being used is that they provide an indication (to people who have direct access to your PC) to which websites you have visited, but then again, so do the temporary Internet files that your browser generates. If you have been browsing websites that you don't potentially want others to know about, simply delete the temporary files and cookies once you have finished (under tools, internet options).
Do cookies take up space on my hard-drive?
Yes, but it's only a tiny amount and your browser will limit the size of your cookies folder automatically. Also, bear in mind that every webpage you visit is stored temporarily in your browser's cache directory and, depending on your system settings, this can occupy several MegaBytes. Cookies, however, usually won't occupy more than, say 100 Bytes. As a rough guide, that's about 1/400th of the size of an average webpage and 1/50,000th of the size of an average cache directory.
What should I do to enable cookies?
To access the members login on our site, you must ensure that your computer will accept cookies. Most internet browsers (for example Google Chrome) will allow you selectively allow and disallow cookies. If you use Google Chrome, then you can manage cookies by:
- Click on the three-dot Menu icon in the upper-right corner, and select Settings. Once the new tab opens, scroll to the bottom of the page and click on Advanced. This will expand the Settings page to include additional options.
- The first expanded window you should see is the Privacy and security panel. Look to the bottom and click on Clear browsing data.
- Decide whether it’s just cookies you want to clear or everything and select how far back you want to clear them using the drop-down menu.
- When ready, click the blue Clear data button.
I've updated my settings, but it's still not working
If you have enabled cookies, and you still cannot use our shopping system, then please do one of the following:
- Ensure that your firewall, anti-spyware and other security software are not blocking all cookies.
- Try updating/reinstalling Google Chrome or installing another browser such as Microsoft Edge or Mozilla Firefox.
- Try using a different computer - another computer may be setup differently and will allow you to use the shopping basket.
Third Party Cookies
In some special cases we also use cookies provided by trusted third parties. The following section details which third party cookies you might encounter through this site.
- This site uses Google Analytics which is one of the most widespread and trusted analytics solution on the web for helping us to understand how you use the site and ways that we can improve your experience. These cookies may track things such as how long you spend on the site and the pages that you visit so we can continue to produce engaging content.
- For more information on Google Analytics cookies, see the official Google Analytics page.
- We also use social media buttons and/or plugins on this site that allow you to connect with your social network in various ways. For these to work the following social media sites including: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+ and YouTube, will set cookies through our site which may be used to enhance your profile on their site or contribute to the data they hold for various purposes outlined in their respective privacy policies.
More Information
Hopefully that has clarified things for you and as was previously mentioned if there is something that you aren't sure whether you need or not it's usually safer to leave cookies enabled in case it does interact with one of the features you use on our site.