Privacy Policy

• SpendTune never sends your financial data anywhere. Transactions, amounts, merchants, accounts, balances, budgets, notes, receipts and the people you link are stored only in SpendTune's private storage on your device. They leave it only in a file you export or share yourself. StarlithLab cannot access them.
• No account, no sign-in, no cloud sync. We don't ask for your name, email address or phone number.
• Reading payment notifications is optional. You can record everything by hand. If you choose to let SpendTune read payment notifications, it is a best-effort convenience: it does not work on every phone, Android version or app, so it may miss payments or read one wrongly.
• Analytics and crash reports are off until you agree. SpendTune asks you once, when you set it up. If you say yes, it sends feature-usage events and crash reports, tied to a random identifier, that are designed so they cannot carry an amount, a merchant, a note or notification text. You can change your answer at any time in Settings → Diagnostics.
• Two requests are made either way. When it starts, SpendTune asks RevenueCat for your Pro status and, at most every 12 hours, Firebase Remote Config for app settings. Each carries a random identifier and basic device details, such as the app version and language, and none of your data.
• What SpendTune reads from notifications is kept only while it is useful. Once a payment is settled, the message of the notification that reported it is cleared from the transaction after 90 days (you can choose 30 to 365 days); what was read from it, such as the amount and merchant, stays. The detection log keeps an entry for 14 days (you can choose 3 to 30 days).
• No location, no address book. SpendTune does not ask for location permission or contacts permission. People are picked one at a time with Android's own contact picker.
• No ads, no advertising ID, no selling of data. SpendTune shows no ads and does not collect your device's advertising ID. We never sell, rent or trade information about you.
• Purchases go through Google Play. If you buy SpendTune Pro, Google Play handles the payment and our service provider RevenueCat verifies it using a random customer ID that is not linked to your name or email address. We never see your card, UPI or bank details.

StarlithLab develops and publishes SpendTune. This policy applies to the SpendTune Android app and to any support we give you when you contact us.

It does not cover the apps and services SpendTune works alongside, such as Google Play, or the payment, banking and messaging apps whose notifications SpendTune can read. Those are governed by their own privacy policies.

Most of what SpendTune handles never reaches us. It is stored and processed only on your device, and you control it completely. For the limited technical information described in Section 4, StarlithLab decides how it is used. That makes us the "Data Fiduciary" under India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023, and the "controller" under the EU and UK General Data Protection Regulation where those laws apply.

"Processed on your device" means SpendTune reads, stores or calculates with the information inside the app, on your phone. It is not transmitted to StarlithLab or to anyone else.

2.1 Your financial records

This means everything you enter, or that SpendTune reads from a notification you allow it to read, to track your money:

• transactions: amount, date and time, merchant or payee, category, account, payment method, reference numbers, notes and tags;
• accounts and balances (including credit card dues and due dates), budgets, savings goals, subscriptions and recurring transactions;
• people, shared expenses (splits) and money owed to or by you;
• your preferences, such as currency, theme and notification times.

This information is kept in SpendTune's private app storage, which Android does not let other apps read. It is used only to show you your dashboard, reports, budgets, reminders and spending summaries. All calculations happen on your device, including the figures in the daily, weekly and monthly summary notifications and in credit card due-date reminders.

2.2 Notifications (optional, best-effort payment capture)

Reading notifications is optional; everything in SpendTune can be recorded by hand, and nothing here applies unless you turn it on. If you grant Notification access, Android lets SpendTune see all the notifications that appear on your phone. SpendTune uses this access only to try to recognise payments in them. This is a best-effort feature, not a guarantee: it depends on your phone, your Android version, your phone maker's battery settings and what other apps show, so on some phones it works only partly or not at all, and SpendTune may miss a payment or read one wrongly. Please check what it records.

• Only the sources you enable are looked at. These are supported payment apps, banking apps, bank SMS as they appear in your messaging app's notifications, and, only if you switch it on, a general fallback for other apps. Every other notification is ignored straight away and never recorded.
• Bank SMS, from bank senders only. SpendTune reads an SMS only through the notification your messaging app shows, and only when the sender is a bank. Messages from people and phone numbers are dropped before they are read or stored. SpendTune does not request SMS permission and never opens your SMS inbox.
• What is extracted. From a payment notification, SpendTune works out the amount, the merchant or payee, whether money went out or came in, the time, a reference number and, where shown, the last digits of the account or card. A payment it recognises is saved as a transaction for you to review.
• Evidence kept with each transaction. The notification or notifications that produced a transaction are stored with it: which app or bank sent each one, when, its title and its message (with any one-time password masked), and what SpendTune read from it — the amount, the merchant or payee, the reference number, the last digits of the account or card where shown, and, for a bank SMS, the bank's sender ID. That way you can see why it was recorded, and undo a merge if two notifications were wrongly combined.
• How long the evidence is kept. Once a payment is settled, the notification's message is cleared 90 days after it arrived (you can choose 30, 90, 180 or 365 days in Settings → Detection). A payment still waiting for you — in Needs review, pending, possibly a duplicate, or possibly a credit card bill — keeps its messages until you have dealt with it. The title (often just the app's name, the bank's sender ID or a line such as "₹450 paid to Swiggy", which is also what the transaction's description starts as) and what was read from the message stay with the transaction until you delete it. A backup includes the evidence as it is when the backup is made.
• A short detection log. SpendTune keeps a log entry for each notification from your enabled sources: the app, the time and what SpendTune decided. For its first day an entry also keeps what was read from the notification — the amount, the merchant, the reference number, the account's last digits and, for a bank SMS, the sender — so that the same payment reported twice is recognised; after that, only the app, the time and the decision remain. The log never contains the notification's text. Entries are deleted after 14 days by default (you can choose 3 to 30 days), the log never holds more than 400 entries, and it is never included in a backup. You can clear it at any time in Settings → Detection, and Erase all data clears it too.

SpendTune never sends any of this notification content anywhere. It leaves your device only inside a backup file you export yourself (Section 2.7).

2.3 The review sheet ("Display over other apps")

If you allow it, SpendTune shows a small review sheet on top of other apps just after it recognises a payment from a notification, so you can confirm or categorise it immediately. The sheet only shows information already on your device. SpendTune does not read or capture what is on your screen.

2.4 People and contacts (optional)

You can link a transaction, split or debt to a person by picking them with Android's contact picker. SpendTune receives only the name, phone number and contact reference of the one contact you pick, and stores them on your device, and in any backup you export. It never requests the Contacts permission and cannot see or copy your address book. You can always type a name instead.

2.5 Location

This version of SpendTune does not request location permission and does not read your location. If a future version offers to record where a payment happened, it will be optional, off by default, and explained in the app and in this policy before you are asked.

2.6 Receipts and attachments (SpendTune Pro)

Files you attach to a transaction, such as a receipt photo or an invoice, are copied into SpendTune's private storage. They are never uploaded. They are not included in backup files; a backup records only that they exist. Deleting the attachment or its transaction deletes the file.

2.7 Backups

• What a backup contains. Backup files you export (Settings → Backup & restore) contain your transactions, with the notification evidence still kept on them (Section 2.2), and your accounts, categories, budgets, people, recurring transactions, subscriptions, goals, tags, attachment records, merchant rules, detection sources, places and settings. A backup also records when it was made, the app version and the phone model it was made on. Restoring one never changes your diagnostics choices.
• What a backup never contains: the detection log, the attachment files themselves, your backup password, or any of the identifiers described in Section 4. Backups made by earlier versions of SpendTune can also contain the detection log; SpendTune ignores it when it reads one.
• Where it goes. You choose where the file is saved, for example your phone's storage or a cloud drive app. Once exported, the file is in your hands, and wherever you store it applies its own terms. A backup keeps everything as it was when it was made: the retention described in Section 2.2 applies to SpendTune's own records, not to backup files already written.
• How backup files are protected. Every backup is compressed and sealed in a SpendTune-specific format, which stops it being read as plain text and detects a file damaged by accident. That seal uses a key built into the app — the same in every copy — so on its own it does not keep a backup private: without a backup password, anyone who has a backup file can open it with SpendTune, on any phone. If you set a backup password, new backups are encrypted with a key derived from that password and can be opened only by someone who knows it, on any phone. The phone you set it on keeps that key, protected by Android's keystore, so it can write automatic backups and open your protected backups without asking again; a new phone, a reinstall or erasing SpendTune's data needs the password. We never receive your password and cannot recover it: a backup protected by a forgotten password cannot be opened by anyone.
• Automatic backups (SpendTune Pro). If you choose a folder for automatic backups, SpendTune writes a backup into that folder on the schedule you pick and keeps the number of copies you choose there. The folder is one you pick with Android's folder picker; SpendTune can write only to that folder, and only while you allow it.
• Safety copies. Before an import changes your data, SpendTune saves a safety copy in its private storage and keeps a small number of these on your device (five by default). Like any backup, each keeps the data as it was when it was made.
• Android backup and phone transfer. Your SpendTune data is excluded from Android's automatic cloud backup to your Google account. If you use Android's direct device-to-device transfer while setting up a new phone, your SpendTune data may be copied straight to that phone.

2.8 Exports, the home screen widget and things you choose to share

• Exports (SpendTune Pro). You can export your transactions as a CSV, Excel or PDF file: date, time, type, payee, category, account, the account a transfer went to, payment method, amount (also with a minus sign for money out), currency, status, source, person, tags, notes and reference — never notification text. These files are not encrypted. You choose where they are saved or which app they are shared with.
• Home screen widget (SpendTune Pro). If you add the widget, it shows this month's spending and budget figures on your home screen, where anyone who picks up your phone can see them. You can switch on Hide amounts for the widget.
• Sharing. If you use Share on a transaction, an export or a backup, SpendTune hands that content to the app you pick, such as an email or messaging app. What happens next is governed by that app. We do not receive a copy.

• We do not collect, store or have access to your financial records, notification content, contacts or attachments.
• We do not create accounts or ask for your name, email address or phone number. You only share those if you contact us.
• We do not sell, rent or trade information, and we do not share it with advertisers, data brokers, lenders, credit bureaus or insurers.
• We show no ads, do not collect your device's advertising ID and do not use any information for ad targeting.
• We do not build credit scores or profiles about you, and we make no automated decisions about you.
• We do not request SMS, call-log, contacts or location permissions, open your SMS inbox or read your conversations with people.
• We cannot access your bank or payment accounts. SpendTune cannot make, approve or move any payment.

SpendTune connects to the internet for four purposes, and none of them carries your financial records. Two of them — analytics and crash reports — happen only if you agree.

4.1 Usage analytics (Google Analytics for Firebase) — only with your consent

Why: to understand how SpendTune is used so we can improve it. For example, how many people finish setup, whether reading payment notifications is working, which features are used and whether a new release has caused problems.

What we send: events that describe which feature was used, never what you entered. For example: "setup step completed", "budget created", "payment read from a notification (confidence: high)" or "backup exported". The details attached to an event can only be one of a fixed set of labels built into the app, such as the transaction type ("expense") or the kind of filter used. By design, these events have no field that could hold an amount, a balance, a merchant, a bank, an account, a category name, a note, search text, a contact, a location or notification text.

What Google Analytics collects automatically once you agree: a random app-instance identifier; device model, Android version, app version and language; an approximate location (country, region or city) worked out from your IP address; standard events such as first open, session start, time spent in the app and app updates; where available, purchases of SpendTune Pro; and how the app was installed, for example from Google Play, as reported by Google Play. SpendTune also attaches a few settings to the app-instance identifier: the theme and appearance you chose, whether reading payment notifications and notification access are on, whether the review sheet may be shown, whether setup is finished and whether Pro is active.

What is not collected: your advertising ID. We do not link analytics to your identity, and we do not use analytics for advertising.

Your choice: analytics is off until you agree. SpendTune asks you when you first set it up, and you can change your answer at any time in Settings → Diagnostics → Share usage analytics. The change takes effect straight away, and SpendTune works exactly the same either way.

4.2 Crash reports (Firebase Crashlytics) — only with your consent

Why: to find and fix crashes and errors.

What is sent when SpendTune crashes, or hits an error it recovers from:

• technical details of the error, including a stack trace showing which part of the app's code failed;
• device model, Android version, available memory and storage, screen orientation and whether the device is rooted;
• app version, a Crashlytics installation ID, a Firebase installation ID and the time of the error;
• a few facts we add to make the report useful: whether reading payment notifications, the review sheet and notification access are on, whether Pro is active, and the rough size of your data as a range only (none, 1–9, 10–99, 100–999, 1,000–9,999, or 10,000 or more transactions);
• short technical notes written by us, using fixed wording.

Crash reports are designed never to include your amounts, merchants, notes or notification text. An error's own message, which can quote whatever the app was reading when it failed, is removed on your phone before a report is sent: what is sent is the kind of error and where in the app's code it happened. If a report ever did carry something of yours, we would treat it as confidential, use it only to fix the problem, and it is deleted with the rest of the report.

Your choice: crash reporting is off until you agree, on the same setup question as analytics, and you can change it at any time in Settings → Diagnostics → Send crash reports, separately from analytics.

4.3 App settings (Firebase Remote Config)

Why: to adjust a few app settings without releasing a new version. For example, whether SpendTune Pro is offered, or whether to suggest that you update the app.

What is sent: a Firebase installation ID and its access token, the app's ID and version, Android version, device language, country and time zone, and your IP address as part of the connection. If you have agreed to analytics, Firebase may also include the settings described in Section 4.1, which can be used to choose which values a device gets.

This request is made when the app starts, at most every 12 hours, even if analytics and crash reporting are switched off, because the app needs it to behave correctly. It contains none of your data. Firebase also records basic usage and performance information about these requests and the SDK itself (Google lists Remote Config as collecting device identifiers, app interactions and diagnostics), which Google uses to provide and improve Firebase.

4.4 SpendTune Pro (Google Play and RevenueCat)

• Google Play processes every purchase, subscription, renewal, cancellation and refund. Your payment details go to Google under Google's own terms and privacy policy. StarlithLab never receives them.

• RevenueCat, Inc. is our service provider for verifying purchases and telling the app whether Pro is active. When SpendTune starts, it checks your Pro status with RevenueCat, even if you have never bought anything. RevenueCat receives:

  • a random customer ID created on your device the first time the app runs, which is not linked to your name or email address;
  • purchase history: the purchase token, product, price, currency, and purchase, renewal and expiry dates;
  • app version, Android version, device language and store country;
  • your IP address, as part of the connection.

  RevenueCat never receives your financial records, and we never give it your name or email address.

4.5 When you contact us

If you email us, we receive your email address and whatever you choose to tell us. We use it only to reply and help you. If you use Send feedback in the app, SpendTune drafts the email in your own email app with your SpendTune version, Android version and phone model filled in, so we can understand the problem; you can see and edit everything before you send it. Please don't send backup files or screenshots showing your finances unless we specifically need them to solve your problem.

Where India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 applies, we process this information on the basis of your consent, given and withdrawn through the choices in the app, or for a legitimate use the Act permits.

We share the limited information in Section 4 only with the service providers that handle it for us. They may use it only to provide their services to us:

• Google LLC: Google Analytics for Firebase, Firebase Crashlytics, Firebase Remote Config and Google Play.
• RevenueCat, Inc.: purchase verification for SpendTune Pro.

We may also disclose information if the law requires it, or to protect the rights, property or safety of our users, the public or StarlithLab. If StarlithLab is involved in a merger, acquisition or sale of assets, the limited information in Section 4 may be transferred, and this policy will continue to apply to it. Your financial records are never part of any of this, because we don't have them.

Google and RevenueCat may process information in the United States and in other countries where they or their subprocessors operate. They protect it under their data processing terms, including the standard contractual clauses where those apply.

SpendTune applies these limits when it starts, as notifications arrive, and once a day in the background; Android may delay the background run while your phone is idle, so something can be cleared a little after its limit, never before.

Erase all data (Settings) deletes everything SpendTune keeps on your phone — your records, receipts, the detection log, its own safety copies and any backup password — resets the analytics identifier on the phone and discards any crash reports not yet sent. It cannot reach reports that were already sent; those expire as shown above. Uninstalling SpendTune also deletes everything in its private storage. Backup and export files you saved elsewhere stay wherever you put them until you delete them. Erasing does not cancel a SpendTune Pro subscription; see the Terms.

• Your data is kept in SpendTune's private app storage, protected by Android's app sandbox, and is excluded from Android's automatic cloud backup.
• Analytics events are built so they cannot contain financial values, as described in Section 4.1.
• Backups are encrypted with your own password if you set one; without one, anyone who has a backup file can open it with SpendTune (Section 2.7).
• All communication with Google and RevenueCat is encrypted in transit (HTTPS).

No system is perfectly secure, and the security of your phone matters most. Use a screen lock, keep Android updated, avoid rooted or modified devices, and store exported files carefully — set a backup password if your backups are kept anywhere others could reach them, and remember that CSV, Excel and PDF exports are not encrypted.

In the app, you can:

• switch Share usage analytics and Send crash reports on or off (Settings → Diagnostics);
• remove any permission in Android settings. SpendTune keeps working, and manual entry needs no permissions at all;
• switch individual detection sources off, choose how long notification messages and the detection log are kept, and clear the detection log (Settings → Detection);
• edit or delete any transaction or record;
• export all of your data (Settings → Backup & restore);
• delete everything with Settings → Erase all data, or by uninstalling the app.

Your rights: depending on where you live, including under India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023, the EU and UK GDPR, and US state privacy laws such as California's, you may have the right to:

• access, correct, delete or receive a copy of your personal data;
• withdraw consent or object to processing;
• nominate someone to exercise your rights (in India);
• have your grievances addressed;
• complain to a data protection authority, such as the Data Protection Board of India or your local supervisory authority in the EU or UK.

We don't sell or share personal information for targeted advertising, as those terms are defined by US state privacy laws.

How this works in practice: because SpendTune has no accounts, and analytics and crash reports are not linked to your name, we usually cannot find which records relate to you. Your on-device data is entirely under your control through the options above. Switching off analytics and crash reporting stops future collection, and existing reports expire as described in Section 8. For purchase records, contact us with the Google Play order number from your receipt and we will help.

To exercise a right, email starlithlab@gmail.com. We'll respond within 30 days, or sooner if the law requires.

SpendTune is intended for adults aged 18 and over. It is not directed at children, and we don't knowingly process children's personal data. If you believe a child has used SpendTune in a way that sent us information, contact us and we will delete what we can.

SpendTune does not request SMS, call log, contacts, location, camera, microphone or account permissions, and does not ask to be exempted from battery optimisation (Settings can open Android's own battery screen for you if you choose to change it there). Files and folders are opened and saved only through Android's pickers, where you choose each one.

• Google Privacy Policy: https://policies.google.com/privacy
• How Google uses information from apps that use its services: https://policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites
• Firebase privacy and security: https://firebase.google.com/support/privacy
• RevenueCat Privacy Policy: https://www.revenuecat.com/privacy

Names of banks, payment apps and other services mentioned in SpendTune belong to their owners. StarlithLab is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by any of them. The open-source software SpendTune uses, and its licences, are listed in Settings → Open-source licences.

We may update this policy as SpendTune changes or as the law requires. We'll change the "Last updated" date above, and for significant changes we'll tell you in the app before they take effect.

We make one promise in particular: we will not start sending your financial records off your device without first telling you clearly and asking for your permission.

StarlithLab
Email: starlithlab@gmail.com
Address: Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India

Grievance Officer: Deepak Arya
Email: starlithlab@gmail.com

We aim to acknowledge every privacy question or complaint within 7 days and resolve it within 30 days.