Privacy policy

We collect only what we need to plan and look after your journey.

• Enquiries and requests. When you complete an enquiry form, request our guide, or write to us, we receive your name, email address, WhatsApp or phone number, country, and whatever you tell us about the trip you have in mind — dates, travelling party, interests and preferences.
• Booking details. If you go ahead with a journey, we collect what suppliers require to confirm it: full names as they appear on passports, dates of birth, passport and visa details, flight details, emergency contacts, and billing information.
• Special requirements. If you choose to tell us about dietary, religious, accessibility or medical needs, we use that only to arrange your journey properly, and we share it only with the people who need it to look after you.
• Our concierge. If you use the chat assistant on this site, the messages you type are processed to generate replies. Please don’t share passport, payment or health details in the chat.
• How you found us. When you arrive on the site, a small cookie records the source that referred you (for example, a partner or a creator’s link), so we can credit the referral if you later enquire.
• Site usage. Google Analytics and the Meta Pixel collect standard browsing information such as pages visited, device and browser type, approximate location and referring site.

We do not knowingly collect information from children except as part of a family booking made by a parent or guardian.

• to reply to your enquiry and design a proposal for you;
• to book and manage your journey with lodges, hotels, airlines, guides and transfer providers;
• to contact you before, during and after your travels;
• to issue invoices, take payment and keep financial records;
• to credit partners and creators who referred you to us;
• to send you news and journey ideas, only if you have asked for them — you can unsubscribe at any time;
• to understand how the site is used and improve it, and to measure our advertising; and
• to meet our legal, tax and regulatory obligations.

We process your information because you have asked us to (to take steps towards or perform a contract with you), because you have given consent (for marketing and non-essential cookies), because we have a legitimate interest in running and improving our business, or because the law requires it.

We never sell your personal information. We share it only where it is needed:

• Travel suppliers — lodges, hotels, airlines, guides, transfer and excursion operators — to confirm and deliver your journey;
• Service providers who help us run the business, such as website hosting (Vercel), form delivery (Web3Forms), email, analytics (Google), advertising measurement (Meta), our AI concierge provider (Anthropic), and accounting software — each bound to use your information only on our instructions;
• Referral partners, who see only that a referral they made led to an enquiry or booking, not the details of your journey; and
• Authorities, where we are legally required to disclose information.

Because we work between the UAE and South Africa and arrange travel across several African countries, your information will be transferred across borders — between our offices, to suppliers in the countries you visit, and to service providers who may store data in other countries, including the United States and the European Union. When we do this, we take reasonable steps to ensure your information receives a level of protection comparable to that required by POPIA and UAE law, including through contractual safeguards.

We use a small number of cookies:

• Referral cookie (amara_src) — records how you reached us, kept for 60 days;
• Analytics cookies from Google Analytics — help us understand how the site is used;
• Advertising cookies from Meta — measure the effectiveness of our ads and let us show relevant ads on Meta platforms.

You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings. The site will still work, though we may not be able to credit a referral.

We keep enquiry information for up to two years if no booking is made, so we can pick up a conversation where it left off. We keep booking and financial records for as long as tax and accounting law requires, generally five to seven years. After that, we delete or anonymise the information.

We protect your information with appropriate technical and organisational measures, including encrypted connections, restricted access, and trusted service providers. No system is completely secure, but if a breach occurs that affects you, we will notify you and the relevant regulator as the law requires.

Depending on where you live, you have the right to:

• ask what personal information we hold about you and receive a copy;
• ask us to correct information that is wrong or incomplete;
• ask us to delete your information, where we have no legal reason to keep it;
• object to or restrict how we use it, including for marketing;
• withdraw consent you have given us at any time; and
• complain to a regulator — in South Africa, the Information Regulator (inforegulator.org.za); in the UAE, the UAE Data Office.

To use any of these rights, email us at reservations@amarafrica.com. We will respond within 30 days.

We may update this policy from time to time. The date at the top of the page shows when it was last revised. Material changes will be highlighted on this page.

Questions about this policy or your personal information can be sent to our Information Officer at reservations@amarafrica.com, or by post to Amara Travel Group, Foreshore, Cape Town, South Africa.