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Effective 2 November 2026

Your data. Your call.

Plain English. No tricks. This page tells you exactly what Talkgate collects, how we use it, and what we never do with it.

01 Who we are

Who runs this thing

Talkgate is operated by Talkgate AI, a New Zealand company. When this policy says "we", "us" or "Talkgate", that is who we mean. "You" is the partner or client business using Talkgate. Talkgate is sold through partners, so your partner may also hold and use your information under its own privacy policy. You can reach us any time at [email protected].

02 What we collect

The data that lands on our servers

To run an agent for you we need a small amount of information. Here is the full list, nothing hidden:

  • Account details given when an account is set up: names, business name, email and phone number.
  • Agent configuration: the brief you provide, your hours, your services, your escalation rules.
  • Conversation metadata: the caller's or sender's number, the time, the duration, the outcome (booked, escalated, voicemail).
  • Call content: recordings and transcripts of calls handled by your agent, but only if they are switched on.
  • Messages: the texts, WhatsApp messages, website chats and emails your agent sends and receives, kept so the conversation can carry on and you can read it.
  • Meetings: if you use the meeting notes agent, the transcript, summary and actions of the meetings it joins.
  • Data from systems you connect: if you connect a calendar, Xero, a CRM or a booking system, the specific records your agent needs to do its job. See section 06, and section 07 for Google Calendar in particular.
  • Mobile app data: if you use the Talkgate mobile app, see section 08.
  • Basic analytics from the website (Google Analytics) so we know which pages people read.

03 Recordings and transcripts

We do not store calls unless you say so

By default Talkgate keeps call metadata only (who called, when, how long, what happened). Recordings and full transcripts are off until the client switches them on.

Storage of recordings, transcripts or both can be enabled per account or per agent. You can turn it back off at any time. When you turn it off, new calls are not stored. You can also delete older calls from your dashboard.

If your agent handles bookings or quotes, we keep a short structured summary of the call (for example "booked Tuesday 10am, name Jane, mobile xxx") so the booking actually shows up in your calendar. That summary is treated the same as your other account data.

04 What we never do

Things you will never catch us doing

  • We do not sell your data. Not to advertisers, not to data brokers, not to anyone. There is no version of Talkgate where your data is the product.
  • We do not train AI models on your transcripts. Your conversations are not folded into any training set, ours or anybody else's. The voice and language models we use are pre trained by their vendors, and we use them via inference only.
  • We do not share your data with other Talkgate customers. Your agent's brief, calls and contacts stay inside your account. A partner's named person is let into a client's account only when the client ticks the box, and the client can remove them at any time.
  • We do not read your calls for fun. Talkgate staff only access call content when you ask us to (for example to fix a problem with an agent) or when we are legally required to.
  • We do not mine your accounts. If you connect Xero or another business system, we use it to run your agent and nothing else. We do not build a picture of your finances, benchmark you against other customers, or pass anything to lenders, insurers, credit agencies or debt collectors.

05 Third party services

The other companies in the loop

Running a live agent needs a few moving parts. We use the following providers, and your data may pass through them so we can deliver the service. A partner or client can also bring its own account with some of these, in which case that account's terms apply as well.

  • Talkgate (our own systems): calls are handled in the client's own region, in New Zealand and Australian, UK or US data centres, and nowhere else. The processing and storage of call logs, summaries and results happen on our own systems.
  • Your own AI keys: depending on your plan, a client may enter its own keys to direct call logs, transcripts or skills to third party models in other countries, such as ElevenLabs, Anthropic or OpenAI. That is the client's choice, and that provider's own terms and privacy policy apply to whatever is sent to it.
  • Telephony carriers: SIP and PSTN providers that connect your phone number to our agent. Standard call records (CDRs) are held by them for billing and regulatory reasons.
  • Text message carriers and gateways (including SMS Global): only for the texts your agent sends and receives. The number and the words of the message pass through them.
  • Meta (WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram): if WhatsApp is switched on, the person's number and the words of the message pass through the WhatsApp Business Platform, run by Meta, so the message can be delivered. If you connect Facebook lead forms or a Facebook Page, we receive the leads and messages you ask for. Meta's own terms and privacy policy apply to data on its platforms.
  • Recall.ai: if you use the meeting notes agent, it joins Teams, Google Meet and Zoom meetings through Recall.ai to capture the transcript.
  • Google (Calendar and OAuth): if you connect a Google Calendar so your agent can check availability and make bookings, we use Google's official Calendar API with two permissions and no others: see and edit events, and see your list of calendars. We never ask for Gmail, Drive or Contacts. You can revoke access from your Google account at any time and we stop receiving data immediately. Section 07 sets out exactly what we hold and what we do with it.
  • Microsoft (Outlook Calendar): same story as Google if you connect a Microsoft 365 calendar.
  • CRM and booking systems (HubSpot, GoHighLevel, Pipedrive, LinkedIn lead forms, Calendly, Trello and similar): only if you choose to connect one. We send the data needed to create the booking or lead and nothing else.
  • Xero and MYOB: only if you connect one. With Xero we read your contacts and approved sales invoices so your agent can recognise callers and answer account questions, and we add a note to an invoice after a reminder call. See section 06, and revoke access any time from the provider or from your Talkgate dashboard.
  • Payment and billing providers (Stripe, Windcave, GoCardless, PayPal, Xero and MYOB): to take payments and issue invoices. Card numbers are typed on the payment provider's own page, and neither we nor your agent see them.
  • Amazon Web Services (AWS) and SendGrid: our infrastructure and email delivery.
  • Cloudflare and Fly.io: Cloudflare routes and protects traffic to our services, and Fly.io hosts this website and its enquiry form.
  • Firebase Cloud Messaging: push notifications to the Talkgate mobile app. Only the device token and the notification payload (for example "new call summary ready") are sent.
  • Google Analytics: usage of our website.

Each of these providers has its own privacy policy. We pick providers that are reputable and we hold them to the same standards we hold ourselves to.

06 Connected business systems

Your Xero, CRM and booking systems

You can connect Talkgate to systems you already run your business in: Xero, a CRM such as HubSpot or GoHighLevel, a booking system, a calendar. Connecting one is always your choice, and everything below only happens once you have connected it and switched the feature on.

We read, we do not harvest. When you connect a system we ask for the narrowest access that makes the feature work, and we read what we need at the moment we need it. We do not take a copy of your accounts, your ledger, your customer database or your financial position, and none of it is used for anything beyond running your own agent. With Xero specifically we read your contacts and your approved sales invoices. We do not read bills, payroll, bank transactions, budgets or reports, and we never ask for the permission to.

What we do hold on to. To answer a call in under a second we keep a short lived working copy of your contact list (names, numbers, email addresses) so the caller can be recognised before your agent speaks. It refreshes automatically and is deleted when you disconnect. If you switch on overdue invoice calling, we also keep the working list your agent needs to make those calls: the invoice number, the amount owing, the due date, the customer's name and number, and what happened on each call.

Your phonebook, only if you ask. There is an off by default option to save a recognised customer's contact details into your own Talkgate phonebook, so repeat callers are recognised instantly by any of your agents. Contact details only: their name, number and email. No invoice, amount, balance or payment history is ever copied into your phonebook, and existing entries are never overwritten. Leave the option off and nothing is copied at all.

We only write one thing back. If your agent makes an overdue invoice reminder call, we add a note to that invoice in Xero recording what was said and any promise to pay. Nothing else in your Xero is ever created, edited, approved, voided or deleted, and the agent cannot take a payment.

It stays yours. Data from a connected system is treated exactly like the rest of your account data: it is not sold, not shared with other Talkgate customers, and not used to train AI models. Disconnect the system at any time from your dashboard, or revoke access from the provider's end, and we stop receiving anything immediately and delete the working copies.

Talking to your customers about their account. Where your agent can discuss an account on the phone, it will only do so with a caller whose number matches a contact in your system. It will not confirm a balance to somebody who quotes a name or an invoice number, and you choose how much detail it may give out.

ServiceM8. If you connect ServiceM8, we read your staff, your clients and their contacts, your jobs, your dispatch board and who is on leave, so the agent can recognise a caller, answer where a job is up to, and offer a genuinely free time. If you switch the writing abilities on, the agent can add a first time caller as a client, lodge a new job with the site address on it, and book a visit. It cannot read or write anything about pricing, materials, invoices or payments, because those permissions are never requested. We also keep a small index of your customers' phone numbers so a caller can be recognised without a lookup every time they ring: it holds a one way code for each number, not the number itself and not any names, and it expires on its own. Disconnect ServiceM8 from your dashboard at any time and we stop reading from it immediately.

Health and clinic records. If you are a clinic and you connect a practice management system such as Cliniko, a stricter set of rules applies and they are not optional settings. Your agent is never given a treatment note, a clinical note, a patient case, a medical alert, a result, a referral or a diagnosis, and there is no code path that reads one. It is not told what an appointment is for, only the day, the time and the practitioner, because the name of an appointment type is very often a condition by another word. It is reception: it books, moves, cancels and takes a message. It does not triage, advise, reassure or confirm anything clinical, and it will only discuss an appointment with the person whose number it is booked under.

How we recognise a patient without keeping a patient list. Some clinic systems cannot be searched by phone number at all, so to greet a caller by name we hold an index. That index deliberately holds no names, no email addresses, no dates of birth and not even the phone numbers: it maps a one way keyed hash of each number to the patient reference in your system, and nothing else. The caller's first name is read live from your system at the moment your agent says it, and is never written down by us. The index expires by itself and is rebuilt from your system, so disconnecting stops it.

07 Google API user data

Limited use of Google data

If you connect a Google Calendar, Talkgate reads and writes it through Google's official Calendar API. This section is the whole story: what we ask permission for, what we hold, who sees it, and how to end it.

The two permissions we ask for, and no more. When you connect, Google asks you to approve exactly two things. See and edit events on all your calendars is how your agent checks whether a time is genuinely free before it offers it, and how it writes the booking in afterwards. See the list of calendars you have subscribed to is how we show you your diaries so you can choose which ones Talkgate uses. We deliberately do not ask for Google's full calendar permission, so Talkgate cannot share, rename or delete a calendar. We never ask for Gmail, Drive, Contacts or anything else in your Google account.

Only the diaries you tick. The permission Google grants covers every calendar on the account, because Google has no narrower one. We do not use it that way. The moment you come back from Google we show you what is on the account and read nothing until you have ticked the diaries Talkgate may use. Everything else is left alone, and taking a tick off later deletes what we had copied from that diary.

What we hold. Two things, and only for the diaries you ticked. The connection itself, meaning the access and refresh tokens Google issues us, encrypted with a key held separately from the database. And a working copy of your events covering a rolling window around today, roughly a month back and three months ahead, so your agent can answer while the caller is still on the line rather than waiting on Google mid call. That copy holds what the event holds: its title, description, location, times and attendees. It refreshes continuously and events outside the window drop out of it.

What your agent is actually told. On a call, your agent is given whether a person is free or busy and when they are next free. It is never given a meeting title, a location or who else is in the room, so a caller cannot be told any of it. When it books a time, the caller's own details go to Google to create the event, and nothing else does.

Who else sees it. One type of party, and only during a call. To speak to a caller at all, your agent uses speech and language models, which may be the third party models a client has chosen with its own keys (section 05). When somebody asks whether a person is free, the free or busy answer goes to those models for the seconds it takes your agent to say it out loud. Nothing else from your calendar goes with it: no meeting title, no location, no attendee. We do not use it to train or improve any model ourselves. Beyond that, Google Calendar data is never shared with other Talkgate customers, never passed to anyone else, never sold, and never used for advertising.

How it is protected. In transit, TLS 1.2 or higher, every hop. At rest, AES 256, with the Google tokens encrypted a second time at the application layer using a key held apart from the database, so they stay unreadable even to somebody holding the database itself. Access to production is limited to a small number of engineers, each with their own account and multi factor authentication, and it is logged. Section 09 has the rest.

Talkgate's use and transfer of information received from Google APIs to any other app will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements. In plain terms:

  • We use Google user data only to provide and improve the calendar features you switched on.
  • We do not transfer it to anyone else, except as needed to provide those features, to comply with the law, or in connection with a merger or acquisition, and you would be told.
  • We do not use it for advertising, and we never sell it.
  • No human at Talkgate reads it unless you have asked us to, you have given consent, it is necessary for security, or the law requires it.

Ending it is one click. Disconnect the calendar from your dashboard, or revoke Talkgate directly at myaccount.google.com/permissions. Either way we stop receiving anything immediately, the stored tokens are deleted, and the working copy of your events is deleted with them.

08 The Talkgate mobile app

What the app sees on your phone

The Talkgate mobile app (iOS and Android) is an extension of your Talkgate account. It may carry your partner's brand. The same privacy rules in this policy apply to it. On top of that:

  • Account session: the app stores a secure login token so you don't have to sign in every time. You can sign out from the app at any time.
  • Push notifications: we use Firebase Cloud Messaging to alert you when there is a new call summary, a booking, an escalation or an incoming call. You can disable notifications in your device settings.
  • Microphone: only used during a call you make or answer in the app. We do not record in the background, ever.
  • Contacts: only accessed if you choose to import a contact into your phonebook. The app does not silently upload your address book.
  • Photos: only accessed if you choose a picture, such as your profile photo.
  • Device identifiers: a randomly generated install ID and the push token. No advertising IDs.
  • Crash and performance logs: anonymous, used only to fix bugs.

If you uninstall the app, the push token is invalidated and we stop sending notifications to that device.

09 Security

How we keep it safe

Data in transit is encrypted with TLS 1.2 or higher. Data at rest is encrypted with AES 256. Access to production systems is limited to a small number of engineers, protected by multi factor authentication, and logged.

No system is bulletproof. If we ever have a breach that affects you, we will tell you promptly and in plain English, along with what we are doing about it. More on our security page.

10 How long we keep things

Retention

  • Account information: while your account is active, plus 12 months after closure for accounting and audit reasons.
  • Call metadata, and recordings and transcripts if enabled: as set in the "How it works" map in your dashboard, which shows where every piece of information goes and how long the platform keeps its copy.
  • Working copies from a connected system (the contact list your agent matches callers against): refreshed continuously and deleted when you disconnect.
  • Calendar connection tokens (Google or Microsoft): held while the calendar is connected, deleted the moment you disconnect.
  • The working copy of your calendar events: a rolling window of about a month back and three months ahead, refreshed continuously and deleted when you disconnect that calendar.
  • Overdue invoice call lists and their outcomes: kept while the integration is connected, then deleted with it.
  • Billing records: 7 years, as required by NZ tax law.
  • Backups: rolled and overwritten on a regular cycle.

When you close your account, we delete everything outside the legal retention periods listed above.

11 Your rights

What you can ask us to do

Under the NZ Privacy Act 2020 (and equivalents in other countries you may be in), you have the right to ask us:

  • What personal information we hold about you.
  • To correct anything that is wrong.
  • To delete your account and the data we hold for it.
  • To export your data in a portable format.

Email [email protected] and we will action your request within 10 working days. If you are not happy with how we handle a privacy issue, you can complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner.

12 Children

Not for kids

Talkgate is a business tool. It is not intended for anyone under 16. If you think a child has signed up, email us and we will delete the account.

13 Changes

When this policy changes

We will update this page if we change how we handle your data. Material changes get an email to your account address at least 14 days before they take effect. The date at the top of this page is always the current effective date.

Questions

Just ask

Email [email protected] or use the contact page. We answer in plain English, usually within a few hours during NZ business hours. See also our terms of service.