Presently takes attendance: students scan a QR code in class and a P goes into their institute’s Google Sheet. This page explains what that involves: what Presently collects, why, where it’s kept and for how long.
Who this covers
Presently is used by institutes: colleges, training centres and anyone else who runs classes or cohorts. Three kinds of people use it:
- Admins set up cohorts, add rosters and connect the Google Drive that holds the attendance sheets.
- Instructors start classes and put the QR code on screen.
- Students scan the code to mark themselves present.
The institute decides to use Presently, decides whose details go into it and is responsible for its attendance records. Presently runs the service that keeps them. If you’re a student with a question about your own record, start with your instructor or institute. For anything about how Presently works, contact us.
What Presently collects
About admins and instructors
- Your name and email address, from your Google account when you sign in. Presently asks Google only for your basic profile.
- Your role, and the cohorts and classes you create or run.
- Your device’s location when you press Start class or Reopen check-in: latitude, longitude and how accurate the reading is. Students are measured from this spot. It’s read at that moment only.
About the admin who connects Google Drive
- The email address of the Google account that holds the sheets.
- A Google access token that lets Presently create attendance sheets and keep them up to date. It uses Google’s
drive.filepermission, which only covers files Presently itself created, so Presently can’t see anything else in that Drive. The token is stored encrypted.
About students
- From the roster: each student’s name and student ID, as the admin enters them.
- When a student checks in: the ID they typed; their phone’s location (latitude, longitude and accuracy), read once while they check in; their distance from the instructor; the time; and the result, such as marked present or turned away for being too far.
- A random device ID, kept in a cookie on the phone. The first student ID used from a phone is linked to it, so one phone can’t check in a group of friends. It identifies the browser, not the person.
Presently doesn’t ask students for an account, email address, phone number or photo.
About every visitor
- Presently uses Vercel Web Analytics to count page views, and Vercel Speed Insights to measure how fast pages load. They record things like the page, browser, device type and country. They don’t use cookies and don’t identify individual visitors.
- Like most websites, the servers that run Presently keep short-lived logs of requests, which include IP addresses.
How it’s used
Presently uses this information only to take attendance:
- to sign admins and instructors in, and show each person the cohorts they manage;
- to check that a student is close to their instructor, and to stop one phone checking in for several students;
- to write P and A into the cohort’s Google Sheet and keep its Scan log;
- to show the instructor who has checked in and who was turned away;
- to keep the service secure, working and fast.
Presently doesn’t sell personal information, doesn’t show ads, and doesn’t use it for marketing or profiling.
What goes into the Google Sheet
Each cohort gets one spreadsheet in the connected Google Drive.
- Each month’s tab lists every student’s ID and name, with a P or an A for each class.
- The Scan log tab lists every check-in attempt: the time, class date, student ID, name, distance from the instructor in metres, GPS accuracy and the result.
Latitude and longitude are not written to the sheet.
The sheet is shared with the cohort’s instructor. From then on it belongs to the institute: who else can open it is managed in Google Drive, under Google’s terms.
On the classroom screen, the instructor can show the names of students as they check in, or hide the names and show only the count.
Where it’s kept, and who else handles it
Presently relies on a few providers:
| Provider | What it does | What it handles |
|---|---|---|
| Neon | The database, on Amazon Web Services in Frankfurt, Germany | Everything listed above, except the sheets |
| Vercel | Hosts the website and runs the app; Web Analytics and Speed Insights | Every request passes through it, and its logs include IP addresses |
| Sign-in, and the Sheets and Drive services | Sign-in details, and the attendance sheets in the institute’s Drive |
They process data for Presently under their own terms and security practices, and may do so outside your country. Presently doesn’t share personal information with anyone else unless the law requires it.
How long it’s kept
- Cohorts: the roster, classes, check-ins and locations stay in Presently until an admin deletes the cohort. Deleting it removes all of them from Presently’s database straight away. The admin chooses whether the Google Sheet stays in Drive or goes to the Drive bin.
- Phone links: an instructor can unlink a student’s phone at any time.
- Staff accounts: kept until an admin removes the instructor, or you ask us to delete your account.
- The Google token: deleted when an admin presses Disconnect in Settings. To withdraw it at Google too, remove Presently at myaccount.google.com/permissions.
- Backups and logs: deleted data can stay in the database provider’s short-term backups, and requests in the host’s logs, for a limited time before they’re overwritten.
Keeping it safe
- Everything travels over HTTPS.
- The Google token is encrypted before it’s stored.
- Sign-in cookies are signed, and scripts on the page can’t read them.
- Only signed-in staff see attendance. Admins see every cohort; instructors see only their own.
- QR codes change every 30 seconds and stop working within a minute.
No system is perfectly secure. If Presently learns of a breach that affects personal information, it will tell the institutes affected promptly.
Your choices
Students
- You can say no when your phone asks to share your location. You won’t be able to check yourself in, but your instructor can mark you present.
- To see, correct or delete your attendance record, ask your instructor or institute: they manage the roster and the sheet. You can also contact us, and we’ll help or pass your request on.
Admins and instructors
- You can remove Presently’s access to your Google account at any time at myaccount.google.com/permissions. Admins can also disconnect Drive in Settings.
- You can ask us to delete your account.
Depending on where you live, the law may give you rights to see, correct or delete your personal information, or to object to how it’s used. Contact us and we’ll help, working with your institute where the record is theirs.
Google user data
Presently’s use and transfer of information received from Google APIs adheres to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.
In practice: Presently uses Google data only to sign you in and to create and update the attendance sheets you ask for. It doesn’t use that data for ads, doesn’t sell it, doesn’t use it to train AI models, and no one reads it unless you ask for help with a problem, it’s needed for security, or the law requires it.
Students under 18
Presently is built for colleges, training centres and adult cohorts. If an institute uses it with students under 18, the institute is responsible for telling parents or guardians and for getting any consent the law requires.
Changes to this policy
If Presently changes what it collects or how it uses it, this page will change and so will the date at the top. Admins will hear about significant changes before they take effect.
Contact
For questions or requests about privacy, email hello@presently.click. The rules for using Presently are in the terms of service.