Privacy Policy

Who this policy covers

Production Engine is production-management software for commercial video production companies: estimates, crew and client contacts, schedules, call sheets, budgets, invoices, and related workflow. This policy covers the account holders and team members who sign in to a Production Engine workspace ("tenants"), and the people whose information a tenant stores in that workspace, such as crew, cast, clients, and vendors.

Production Engine is operated by Geared Like A Machine LLC, a Texas limited liability company.

What we collect

We collect:

• Account and workspace data: name, email, password hash, and role for each signed-in user; company name and workspace settings for each tenant.
• Production data you or your team enter: client and crew contacts, estimates and rate cards, schedules, call sheets, budgets, invoices, purchase orders, and uploaded files (contracts, W-9 forms, location photos, and similar documents).
• Billing status from Stripe: plan, subscription state, and invoice history. Production Engine does not receive or store card numbers; Stripe's hosted checkout handles those directly (see Security, below).
• Support messages you send us and records of email we send you (password resets, document sends, W-9 requests, and similar transactional mail).
• Technical and usage data: IP address, browser and device information, pages viewed, and the request logs every web application generates for debugging and abuse prevention.
• On public marketing pages, limited usage events such as page views and request-access or estimator actions, without page content or arbitrary URL parameters.
• Inside the signed-in workspace, content-free usage metrics such as event counts and operation timing. See Analytics, below.

How we use it

We use this information to:

• Authenticate users and keep each tenant's data isolated from every other tenant.
• Operate the product: render schedules, generate estimates and documents, send the emails a tenant's workflow triggers (a call sheet send, a W-9 request, a password reset), and process subscriptions through Stripe.
• Maintain and improve reliability, including diagnosing errors from request logs.
• Understand how the product is used on real productions, so we can improve its design and usability. Analytics, below, describes exactly what is recorded.
• Prevent abuse: for example, rate-limiting repeated requests to public endpoints like password reset and file upload.
• Respond to support requests and legal or compliance obligations.

We do not sell tenant data, and we do not use a tenant's production data to train any AI model.

AI processing

Production Engine's built-in Assistant and estimator send your instructions, relevant workspace context, and selected tool results through Vercel AI Gateway to a model provider. The built-in Assistant uses Anthropic to answer questions and carry out requested production tasks. This can include the contents of Google Drive files that the Assistant reads for your request. Estimate generation can also include your brief and workspace rate configuration. Knowledge retrieval uses OpenAI embedding models through Vercel AI Gateway to process search queries derived from your request or brief.

We do not use this content to train AI models. For built-in language-model requests using Vercel-managed credentials, we require routes that disallow prompt training. Requests using our own provider credentials rely on the provider agreement instead of that routing restriction. Our Anthropic API connection is governed by its commercial terms, which prohibit model training on customer content. These protections do not mean zero retention: providers may retain data to operate and secure their services under their applicable terms.

Embedding requests are separate from this language-model routing protection. OpenAI's API data policy states that API data is not used for model training by default unless the customer opts in to sharing it. Search queries can include text from an imported record or brief when you use that content in a requested workflow.

We store built-in Assistant conversation history, including responses and tool results, in the workspace. Tool results can contain text retrieved from a connected Google file. Stored conversation history may be included in later requests so the Assistant can continue your conversation. See Data retention for deletion requests.

A workspace owner or admin can connect an AI assistant, such as Claude or ChatGPT, to their workspace by signing in and approving it. The assistant can then read that one workspace's projects, schedules, crew, deliverables, bids, budgets, actuals, purchase orders, invoices, vendors and contacts (and, for Claude, the connected bank feed and any projects and transactions imported from Saturation) when someone asks it a question. If the owner or admin also approves estimates, it can start an AI estimate from a job description, which adds a draft brief and estimate to the workspace. It cannot change anything else. What it reads is sent to that assistant's provider and handled under the provider's own terms and privacy policy, not this one. Production Engine keeps a record of each connection (which assistant, who approved it, when, and when it was last used) and stores only a fingerprint of its credentials. Disconnect an assistant at any time in Company Settings, then Integrations.

Google integrations and Limited Use

Connecting Google is optional. The permissions you grant determine which features are available. We access the connected account's identity and email address to label and manage the connection, and store encrypted credentials so authorized features can continue working without asking you to sign in for every request.

• Google Contacts: read names, email addresses, phone numbers, addresses, organizations, and profile links to import and sync contacts into your workspace directories when you enable the connection.
• Google Drive: read metadata and supported file contents for files you authorize, so you can find and use production documents and ask the built-in Assistant about them. New connections use access to files selected or created with the app. Older connections may retain permissions previously granted; you can review or revoke those permissions in your Google Account settings.
• Google Calendar: read and manage event information needed to publish production schedule days, including titles, dates, times, locations, and descriptions.
• Google Sheets: check spreadsheet metadata to verify app access, and read cell values only for files created with Production Engine or explicitly selected through Google's file chooser, and create or update a connected workbook with workspace projects, budgets, and invoices when you enable that feature.

We use Google user data to provide the features you request. Relevant Google file content may be transferred to Vercel AI Gateway and Anthropic when you ask the built-in Assistant to use it, as described under AI processing. Imported records become workspace data and may be included in later tasks you request. We do not sell Google user data, use it for advertising, or use it to develop, improve, or train generalized AI or machine-learning models.

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

Disconnect Google in Company Settings, then Integrations, to remove the workspace's stored Google connection credentials and stop future connected access. You can also revoke access in your Google Account settings. Disconnecting does not delete contacts, imported spreadsheet records, or Assistant history and tool results already stored in Production Engine. Contact us to request deletion of those records, subject to the retention obligations described below.

Analytics

Production Engine uses PostHog for content-free usage metrics and coarse page counts. We record approved event names, numeric usage and timing metrics, and opaque identifiers generated by Production Engine for account and workspace attribution.

Analytics does not receive Google-derived file contents, imported contact details, or Assistant prompts and responses. The same content exclusion applies to other workspace data. Session replay, automatic interaction and copied-text capture, console recording, and network request and response body capture are disabled. Analytics events exclude names, email addresses, arbitrary page titles, query strings, and unreviewed event properties.

Public-page PostHog analytics does not create person profiles or persist a browser identifier. Signed-in analytics may use browser storage and opaque account identifiers to measure workspace usage. Application hosting, security logs and error diagnostics are separate operational processing described elsewhere in this policy.

Subprocessors

We use the following service providers to operate Production Engine. Each processes data only as needed to provide its service to us:

• Vercel: application hosting, edge functions, and file storage (Vercel Blob) for uploads such as W-9 forms.
• Neon: the Postgres database that stores tenant and account records.
• Resend: transactional email, including password resets, document sends, and W-9 requests.
• Stripe: subscription billing and payment processing.
• Vercel AI Gateway, Anthropic, and OpenAI: built-in Assistant, estimate generation, and embedding-based knowledge retrieval, described under AI processing above.
• PostHog: content-free product usage metrics, described under Analytics above.

A tenant may also connect optional third-party integrations (for example Google Calendar, Google Drive, Google Contacts, Vimeo, or QuickBooks) from inside their own workspace. Those integrations only run, and only share data with that third party, if and when a tenant turns them on, and are scoped to that tenant's own connection.

Data retention

We keep a tenant's data for as long as the workspace is active. If a subscription lapses or is canceled, the workspace becomes read-only rather than being deleted immediately, so a tenant that reactivates does not lose its records. There is currently no automated self-service deletion; if you want your account or a specific record deleted, contact us (below) and we will process the request, subject to what we are required to retain for security, billing, or legal reasons (for example, financial records tied to a completed subscription).

QuickBooks is the one exception with automated deletion: when a tenant disconnects QuickBooks, we immediately delete the QuickBooks data we had copied into our database for that workspace, including report snapshots (profit and loss, balance sheet, and accounts receivable/payable aging) and cached QuickBooks account and term lookups. We do not delete a tenant's own invoices, bills, customers, vendors, or payments, since those are our records, not QuickBooks'; only the internal reference used to link them to QuickBooks is affected, and it stays in place so reconnecting does not recreate duplicate records in QuickBooks.

Your rights

Depending on where you are located, applicable law may give you rights to access, correct, export, or delete personal information we hold about you, or to object to certain processing. To exercise any of these, contact us below. We will need to verify your identity, or your relationship to the tenant workspace in question, before acting on the request.

International data transfers

Our subprocessors (listed above) may process data in the United States and other countries where they operate. Where applicable law requires a specific transfer mechanism, we rely on the mechanism our subprocessor makes available (such as standard contractual clauses) for that transfer.

Children's privacy

Production Engine is a business tool for production companies and is not directed at children. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 16.

Changes to this policy

We will update the effective date above when we make a material change to this policy. Continued use of Production Engine after a change takes effect means you accept the revised policy.

Governing law

This policy is governed by the laws of the State of Texas, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules.

Contact

For privacy questions, data requests, or deletion requests, email joey@gearedlikeamachine.com, or reply to any email you have received from Production Engine.