Privacy Policy

Himalayan Trekkers Choice Pvt. Ltd. (Himalayan Trekkers Choice), a trekking operator registered in Nepal under company registration 40128/98, at Thamel, Kathmandu, Nepal. We decide why and how your personal data is handled, which makes us the data controller for it.

For anything in this policy, write to support@himalayantrekkerschoice.com.

We ask for as little as the trek allows. Everything below is collected because something concrete cannot happen without it — no field exists here for profiling or advertising.

Account

Your name and email address, so we can show you your bookings and contact you about them. Your password is held by Google’s Firebase Authentication and is never sent to us or stored on our servers.

Booking

The trek, package, departure date and party size, plus a contact name and email for the booking. This is the contract between us and it is what our Kathmandu office works from.

Each trekker

Full name, date of birth, gender, nationality and passport number for every person in the party, plus a phone number and email for the lead trekker.

Technical

Ordinary web server logs — IP address, browser and the pages requested — kept briefly to keep the site running and to spot abuse.

Passport numbers, dates of birth and nationality are collected for one reason: national park entry permits, TIMS cards and restricted-area permits are issued in your name by the Nepali authorities, and we cannot obtain them without those details. We ask for them at the point they are needed and we do not use them for anything else.

If you are in the UK or the European Economic Area, the UK GDPR and GDPR require us to name a lawful basis for each use:

• Contract — your account, your booking and every trekker detail needed to run the trek and obtain permits.
• Legal obligation — booking and payment records we are required to keep for tax and tourism licensing in Nepal.
• Legitimate interests — server logs and security measures that keep the site available and your account safe.

We do not rely on consent for any of this, because none of it is optional to the service — which also means there is no marketing list to unsubscribe from. We do not send marketing email.

Your details are not sold, rented or shared for anyone else’s marketing. They reach exactly four kinds of recipient:

Google (Firebase Authentication)

Holds your sign-in credentials and verifies them. We never see or store your password. Processes data in the United States.

Amazon Web Services (EC2)

Runs the site and the database that holds your booking and trekker details. Processes data in the United States (N. Virginia).

Amazon Web Services (SES)

Delivers booking confirmations and account email. Processes data in the United States (N. Virginia).

Nepali authorities

Trekker names, dates of birth, nationalities and passport numbers are submitted to the Nepal Tourism Board and the relevant national park or conservation area to obtain your permits. This is unavoidable — a permit is issued in your name.

Our guides and Kathmandu office staff see the trekker list for the departure they are running, and nothing else.

Our servers and database run in the United States (AWS, N. Virginia), and Firebase Authentication is likewise operated by Google in the United States. If you are in the UK or the EEA, that means your personal data — including your passport number — is transferred outside your country.

Those transfers rely on the standard contractual clauses our providers offer, together with encryption in transit. If you would rather not have your passport details held this way, tell us before you book and we will arrange permits from documents you send our office directly instead.

This site sets one cookie, htc_session. It signs you in and nothing else. It is marked HttpOnly, so no script on the page can read it, and it expires after fourteen days or as soon as you sign out.

There is no analytics, no advertising pixel and no third-party tracker anywhere on this site. That is why you have not been asked to accept cookies: a cookie strictly necessary to deliver a service you asked for does not require consent, and we do not set any other kind.

Booking records are kept while your account is open and for as long afterwards as Nepali tax and tourism licensing require us to hold them. Trekker permit details are kept for the season the permit covers and are not needed after your trek is complete.

If you close your account or ask us to erase your data, we remove what we are not legally obliged to retain and tell you what remains and why.

You can ask us to do any of the following, free of charge, and we will respond within 30 days:

• Send you a copy of everything we hold about you.
• Correct anything that is wrong — a misspelled name on a permit is worth catching early.
• Erase your data, where we are not required to keep it.
• Export your booking history in a machine-readable file.
• Object to or restrict a particular use.

Write to support@himalayantrekkerschoice.com and say which. If you are in the UK or EEA and we have not handled your request properly, you may complain to your national data protection authority.

Accounts are for adults. Under-18s trek with us regularly, but as part of a party booked by a parent or guardian who provides their details and consents on their behalf.

If this policy changes materially we will update the date at the top and, where the change affects a booking you have already made, email you about it. Previous bookings stay governed by the terms in force when you made them.

See also our booking terms and conditions.