Cookie Policy
Last Review Date: January 2022
This notice explains to you the use of cookies and similar tracking technologies on heatmerchants.ie
What is a Cookie?
A cookie is a small text file stored on your computer or mobile device that contains data related to a website you visit. Cookies have a number of uses. They are used to ensure that a website functions properly as you might expect it to. Cookies also allow websites to ‘remember’ your browsing habits or preferences over a period of time. Cookies may be set by Heat Merchants as the website operator directly (“first-party cookies”) or in some cases, by another third-party service provider (“third-party cookies”). In the latter scenario, cookies are deployed for, preference, advertising or analytics purposes amongst others. Heat Merchants will only be able to directly recognise and read the information contained on first-party cookies.
Other Tracking Technologies
There are other technologies which we deploy which track behaviour on our website. ‘Tracker Pixels’ are a means of allowing us to check whether you have viewed our content. These “pixels” are essentially tiny, invisible images on our web pages that, once loaded, will communicate your interaction with our content. This allows Heat Merchants and our partners to gauge the validity of material being presented to you.
Third Parties
We avail of third-party technologies across our site. These technologies help us to understand how you use the site and the ways in which we can improve your user experience. These technologies may track certain information such as the pages you visit across our site as well as how long your visit lasts. This allows us to continue providing engaging content.
In order for these technologies to work, trusted third parties will set cookies and tracker pixels throughout our site. Once enabled, these technologies may be used to enhance your profile or to contribute to the data they hold for various purposes outlined in their respective privacy policies. For any third-party technology used on our site, we will provide a link to that third-party’s respective cookie/privacy policy for your information. We encourage our visitors to review these policies in advance of granting consent to deployment.
What Information Do We Obtain from You?
For each visitor to our site, we automatically gather certain potentially identifying information and store it. This information includes your Internet Protocol (IP) address, your browser type, internet service provider (ISP), referring/exit pages, your operating system, date/time stamp, processor or device serial number, unique device identifier, and clickstream data. We collect this information on an individual basis and in aggregate, or combined form.
Our Use of Cookies and Similar Tracking Technologies
We use cookies to provide you with the best user experience on our website, this includes:
- Network Optimisation.
- Remembering you when you wish to log in to your account.
- Providing customer support.
- Maintaining site security.
- Analysing visitor traffic across our site.
- Providing you with more relevant advertising content.
- Remembering your cookie status
Categories of Tracking Technologies That We Set
We avail of both first and third-party technologies across our site. Heat Merchants takes our visitors’ right to privacy seriously in keeping with our obligations. Should you consent to the deployment of any category of optional technology, we will record your consent for a period of no longer than 6 months subject to interaction; at which point these technologies will be disabled. You will then be prompted to refresh you consent. You may change your settings at any time.
Necessary Cookies
These cookies are necessary for the website to function. They are set for security purposes and in response to actions made by you which amount to a service request such as logging in to our platform or as you fill out forms on our site. You have the option to disable these cookies via your browser settings, but should you do so, certain aspects of our site will no longer function. For more information about the specific technologies we use for this purpose, please see below.
Should you wish to disable these cookies via your browser settings, please see the following links relating to your particular browser.
- Google Chrome Browser
- Microsoft Internet Explorer Browser
- Mozilla Firefox Browser
- Apple Safari Browser
- Opera Web Browser
| Host | Name | Description | Lifespan |
| tubstiles.ie | form_key | This HTTP cookie ensures visitor browsing-security by preventing cross-site request forgery. This cookie is essential for the security of the website and visitor. | 1 Day |
| nr-data.net | JSESSIONID | This HTTP cookie is used in session tracking to maintain the health and stability of our server performance. | Session |
| tubstiles.ie | mage-banners-cache-storage | This HTML cookie is necessary for the cache function. A cache is used by the website to optimize the response time between the visitor and the website. The cache is usually stored on the visitor’s browser. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | mage-cache-sessid | This HTTP cookie is used in context with load balancing - This optimizes the response rate between the visitor and the site, by distributing the traffic load on multiple network links or servers. | 1 Day |
| tubstile.ie | mage-cache-storage | This HTTP cookie is used in context with load balancing - This optimizes the response rate between the visitor and the site, by distributing the traffic load on multiple network links or servers.. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | mage-cache-storage-section-invalidation | This HTTP cookie is used in context with load balancing - This optimizes the response rate between the visitor and the site, by distributing the traffic load on multiple network links or servers. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | mage-messages | This HTTP cookie is necessary for the functionality of the website's chat-box function. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | OptanonAlertBoxClosed | This cookie is set after visitors have seen a cookie information notice and in some cases only when they actively close the notice down. It enables the website not to show the message more than once to a user. The cookie has a one year lifespan and contains no personal information. | 6 Months |
| tubstiles.ie | OptanonConsent | This cookie stores information about the categories of cookies the site uses and whether visitors have given or withdrawn consent for the use of each category. This enables site owners to prevent cookies in each category from being set in the users browser, when consent is not given. The cookie has a normal lifespan of one year , so that returning visitors to the site will have their preferences remembered. It contains no information that can identify the site visitor. | 6 Months |
| tubstiles.ie | PHPSESSID | This HTTP cookie preserves user session state across page requests. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | product_data_storage | This HTML cookie is necessary for the recently viewed/compare-products function on the website. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | recently_compared_product | This HTTP cookie is necessary for the compare-products function on the website. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | recently_compared_product_previous | This HTTP cookie is necessary for the previously compare-products function on the website. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | recently_viewed_product | This HTTP cookie determines which products the user has viewed, allowing the website to promote related products. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | recently_viewed_product_previous | This HTTP cookie collects information on which products have been viewed by the visitor - This is used for optimizing the specific visitor's navigation on the website. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | section_data_ids | This cookie is used to facilitate content caching on the browser to make pages load faster. It stores customer-specific information related to shopper-initiated actions such as display wish list and checkout information. | 1 day |
| pubble.io | AWSALB | This HTTP cookie registers which server-cluster is serving the visitor. This is used in context with load balancing, in order to optimize user experience. | 6 days |
| pubble.io | AWSALBCORS | This HTTP cookies registers which server-cluster is serving the visitor. This is used in context with load balancing, in order to optimize user experience. | 6 days |
| pubble.io | JSESSIONID | This HTTP cookies is used to maintain an anonymous user session by the server in Java™ 2 Platform Enterprise Edition web applications. It is a necessary cookie that expires at the end of a session. | Session |
| tubstiles.ie | _dc_gtm_UA-xxxxxxxx | This cookie is associated with sites using Google Tag Manager to load other scripts and code into a page. Where it is used it may be regarded as Strictly Necessary as without it, other scripts may not function correctly. The end of the name is a unique number which is also an identifier for an associated Google Analytics account. | 0 days |
| tubstiles.ie | epubconsent | This cookie is used by the IAB Europe Transparency & Consent Framework to store the user's consent to the data collection Purposes. The cookie holds an encrypted consent string that vendors participating in the framework can read and determine the user's consent. | 1 year |
Preference/Functional Cookies (optional)
These cookies enable our website to provide additional functionality and personalisation. The primary use of such cookies is to enable our support chat function and to enable cross-site comparison of products. If you disable this category of cookies our site will still work, however, certain content may not load as expected. For more information about the specific technologies we and our partners use for this purpose, please see below.
| Host | Name | Description | Lifetime |
| pubble.io | pubble_gen_uid | This HTTP cookie is used to identify the user across the session and return visits in the same browser. Used to identify activity, such a posting, with that user/session. | 1 Year |
| pubble.io | pubble_session_time | This HTTP cookie tracks how long the user has been on the site. It is used for any time based triggers. Like the Greeting messages. | Session |
| pubble.io | pubble_site_time | This HTTP cookie tracks how long the user has been on the site. | Session |
| cdn.pubble.io | pubble_trigger | This HTTP cookie tracks interaction with trigger messages (greeting rules). | 1 day |
| tubstiles.ie | pubble_trigger | This HTTP cookie tracks interaction with trigger messages (greeting rules). | 0 days |
| tubstiles.ie | X-Magento-Vary | This cookie is used by Magento to highlight that the version of a page requested by a user has been changed. It allows having different versions of the same page stored in cache e.g. Varnish. | Session |
Analytics Cookies (optional)
These technologies allow us to determine the number of visits to our site as well as where that traffic originates. This helps us understand which pages are most popular as well as how it is that you come to view them. For example, when enabled, we use Google Analytics for aggregated, anonymized website traffic analysis. In order to track your session usage, Google drops a cookie with a randomly-generated ClientID in your browser. This ID is anonymized and contains no identifiable information like email, phone number, name, etc. We also send Google your IP Address. We use GA to track aggregated website behaviour, such as what pages you looked at, for how long, etc. This information is important to us for improving the user experience and determining site effectiveness.
This information will not be combined by Heat Merchants for profiling purposes, however, certain third parties such as Google may use this information in aggregate form for the purposes outlined in their respective privacy notices. If you disable this category of cookie our site will still work, though its improvement over time will be hampered.
For more information on Google Analytics as well as how you may opt-out of being tracked on this and other sites, please see the following links:
- Information for visitors of sites and apps using Google Analytics
- Google Analytics Opt-Out
- Google Privacy Policy
For more information on the specific technologies we and our partners use for this purpose, please see below.
| Host | Name | Description | Lifespan |
| tubstiles.ie | __utma | This HTTP cookie collects data on the number of times a user has visited the website as well as dates for the first and most recent visit. Used by Google Analytics. | 2 Years |
| tubstiles.ie | __utmb | This HTTP cookie registers a timestamp with the exact time of when the user accessed the website. Used by Google Analytics to calculate the duration of a website visit. | 1 Day |
| tubstiles.ie | __utmc | This HTTP cookie registers a timestamp with the exact time of when the user accessed the website. Used by Google Analytics to calculate the duration of a website visit. | NA |
| tubstiles.ie | __utmt | This HTTP cookie is used to throttle the speed of requests to the server. | 0 days |
| tubstiles.ie | __utmz | This HTTP cookie is used to collect data on where the user came from, what search engine was used, what link was clicked and what search term was used. Used to facilitate Google Analytics service. | 6 Months |
| tubstiles.ie | _utmv######### | This cookie is used by Google Analytics to understand how the site was reached (search, direct link, organic or a paid link). The number is randomly-generated. | 0 days |
| tubstiles.ie | _ga | This cookie is used by Google Analytics to distinguish unique users by assigning a randomly generated number as a client identifier. It is included in each page request in a site and used to calculate visitor, session and campaign data for the sites analytics reports. | 2 years |
| tubstiles.ie | _gid | This cookie is used by Google Analytics to distinguish unique users by assigning a randomly generated number as a client identifier. | 0 days |
Targeting/Marketing Cookies (optional)
These cookies may be set throughout our site with your consent. They may be used to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on both our own and other sites. These technologies operate by uniquely identifying your browser and internet device such as your phone or desktop and monitor specific activity across our site.
For more information on the specific technologies we use for this purpose, including how your information may be further processed, please see below.
| Host | Name | Description | Lifespan |
| doubleclick.net | IDE | This domain is owned by Doubleclick (Google). The main business activity is: Doubleclick is Googles real time bidding advertising exchange | 1 year |
| doubleclick.net | test_cookie | This HTTP Cookie is used to check whether the user's browser supports cookies. | Session |
| youtube.com | GPS | YouTube is a Google owned platform for hosting and sharing videos. YouTube collects user data through videos embedded in websites, which is aggregated with profile data from other Google services in order to display targeted advertising to web visitors across a broad range of their own and other websites. | 0 days |
| youtube.com | VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE | This cookie is used as a unique identifier to track viewing of videos | 180 days |
| youtube.com | YSC | YouTube is a Google owned platform for hosting and sharing videos. YouTube collects user data through videos embedded in websites, which is aggregated with profile data from other Google services in order to display targeted advertising to web visitors across a broad range of their own and other websites. | Session |
| youtube.com | CONSENT | This cookie carries out information about how the end user uses the website and any advertising that the end user may have seen before visiting the said website. YouTube is a Google owned platform for hosting and sharing videos. YouTube collects user data through videos embedded in websites, which is aggregated with profile data from other Google services in order to display targeted advertising to web visitors across a broad range of their own and other websites. | 2 years |
| tubstiles.ie | _fbp | This cookie is used by Facebook to deliver a series of advertisement products such as real time bidding from third party advertisers | 3 months |
Further Information:
We regularly scan our website using a third-party tool to maintain a record of the tracking technologies we deploy. Heat Merchants only processes your personal information in accordance with this notice as well as our Privacy Notice.
Should you require additional information then you can contact our Data Protection Lead at the following email address: dataprotection@heatmerchants.ie
You may also contact our Data Protection Lead by writing in to:
Data Protection Lead,
Heat Merchants Group,
Moydrum Road,
Athlone,
Co. Westmeath
Should you wish to make a complaint regarding the processing of your personal data or are unsatisfied with how we have handled your information, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Irish Supervisory Authority. You may lodge a complaint with the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner via their online form
