1. About This Policy
This Cookie Policy explains how AusStayGuide.com uses cookies, localStorage and similar browser technologies to support website functionality, remember privacy choices and manage optional website features. It should be read together with our Privacy Policy, which provides broader information about how personal information may be handled when you use the website or contact AusStayGuide.
Browser technologies can perform different functions. Some are necessary to operate a website reliably, while others can remember preferences, measure website use or support marketing activities. AusStayGuide separates these purposes into categories so that visitors can make informed choices about optional technologies.
The exact technologies present on a page may change as website features are updated. The Cookie Settings panel is the primary interface for expressing your current preference for the categories made available through AusStayGuide.com.
2. What Cookies Are
A cookie is a small text file or piece of data that a website or related service can ask your browser to store. Cookies can contain identifiers, settings, timestamps or other limited information that helps a website remember something between page requests or visits.
Cookies can be described in several ways. Session cookies generally expire when the browser session ends, while persistent cookies can remain for a longer period. First-party cookies are associated with the website you are visiting, while third-party cookies can be set or read in connection with a service provided by another organisation.
Not every browser-storage function uses a traditional cookie. Modern websites may also use localStorage, sessionStorage or comparable technologies. This policy uses the term “browser technologies” as a convenient way to refer to these related methods where the distinction is not important to the visitor's choice.
3. Essential Browser Storage
Essential technologies support functions that are required for the website to operate as expected. They may be used for security, basic navigation, accessibility features, interface state or remembering whether you have already made a privacy choice.
Because these technologies are linked to core operation, they are treated differently from optional analytics or marketing technologies. Disabling essential browser functions through browser-level controls may cause parts of the website to stop working correctly or may cause privacy choices to be forgotten.
Essential storage should be limited to information necessary for the relevant function and should not be used merely to create advertising profiles. Where a technology is used for another purpose, it should be classified according to that purpose rather than described as essential.
4. Preference Storage
Preference technologies can remember choices that affect how the website behaves for you. On AusStayGuide.com, cookie selections are stored in localStorage under the key ausstayguide_cookie_preferences. This lets the website remember whether optional preference, analytics and marketing categories were accepted or rejected.
Preference storage can also be used for future interface choices such as language, display or accessibility settings where those features are offered. These settings are intended to improve convenience and should not be used for unrelated purposes.
If you clear browser data, switch browsers, use a private-browsing session or change devices, saved preferences may no longer be available. In that case, the privacy banner may appear again and you can make a new selection.
5. Analytics
Analytics technologies can help website operators understand how visitors use a site. Depending on the analytics service used, information may include page views, navigation paths, device category, approximate location derived from network information, referral source, interaction events and general performance data.
AusStayGuide treats analytics as an optional category. The Cookie Settings panel provides a separate Analytics control so that a visitor can express whether analytics technologies may be used where they are configured. Essential website access does not depend on accepting analytics.
Where analytics are used, the aim should be to understand broad website performance and improve content rather than to collect more information than is necessary. Configuration choices such as data minimisation, retention settings and IP handling should be reviewed in the relevant analytics service.
6. Marketing Technologies
Marketing technologies can be used to measure campaign performance, understand whether advertising led to a visit, limit repeated advertising or support the delivery of more relevant promotional messages. Such technologies may involve identifiers that operate across more than one website or service.
AusStayGuide treats marketing as an optional category. A visitor can reject non-essential technologies without losing access to the main website content. The Marketing control in Cookie Settings is intended to record the visitor's preference for technologies that fall within this category.
Where a marketing provider is used, its own privacy information may explain how identifiers, advertising measurements and audience information are handled. Visitors should review those notices where they want additional detail about a specific external provider.
7. Third-Party Content
Some website pages may load resources from external providers. These can include fonts, icon libraries, map services or other content needed to present a particular feature. When your browser requests a third-party resource, technical information such as your IP address, browser information and the page making the request may be visible to that provider.
Third-party services may use their own cookies or comparable technologies according to their settings and policies. AusStayGuide does not control a third party's independent systems. Where a third-party feature is optional, it may be made subject to an appropriate privacy choice.
Links that simply take you to another website are different from embedded third-party resources. After following an external link, cookies and other technologies used by the destination website are governed by that website's own policies.
8. Embedded Maps
The Contact page includes embedded map content to provide location context for visitors. The map is supplied by an external mapping provider and may cause your browser to communicate directly with that provider when the map loads or when you interact with it.
Map services may process information such as IP address, device information, browser type, map interactions and location-related settings under their own terms. If you do not want to interact with an embedded map, you can use the written address and contact details on the Contact page instead.
Browser privacy controls may also affect whether external map content is displayed. Blocking a map provider's scripts or cookies can limit map functionality without preventing access to the rest of AusStayGuide.com.
9. Managing Your Preferences
When the privacy banner appears, you can choose Accept All, Reject Non-Essential or Manage Preferences. The detailed preference panel lets you review the available categories and save a more specific choice.
Essential technologies are shown as always active because they support core functions. Optional categories are controlled separately. Saving your preferences records the selection in your browser so that the same choice can be applied on later page views.
You can also use browser settings to delete cookies, block specific websites from storing data, clear localStorage or restrict third-party tracking. Browser-level controls may override website preferences and can affect how individual features work.
10. Reopening Cookie Settings
You can change your choice at any time by selecting Cookie Settings in the website footer. The preference panel will reopen and display controls for Preferences, Analytics and Marketing together with the status of Essential technologies.
After you save a new selection, the stored preference is updated. If optional technologies are active on a page, changes to preference may require a page refresh before every element of the website reflects the new selection.
If Cookie Settings does not appear to remember your choice, check whether the browser is clearing site data automatically, using a private-browsing mode, blocking localStorage or applying an extension that removes stored website preferences.
11. Browser Controls and Do-Not-Track Signals
Most modern browsers provide controls for cookies, site data, cross-site tracking and permissions. The names and locations of these controls differ by browser and device. You can usually find them under privacy, security or site-settings menus.
Some browsers or devices also send privacy-related preference signals. Website support for these signals can vary according to the technology being used. The controls provided directly on AusStayGuide.com remain the clearest way to manage the categories shown in our Cookie Settings panel.
Blocking all cookies or site storage may reduce website convenience. For example, the website may no longer remember that you rejected optional technologies and may need to ask for your preference again.
12. Retention of Browser Preferences
The duration of browser-stored data depends on the technology used and the settings applied by the browser. The AusStayGuide cookie preference value can remain in localStorage until it is replaced, removed by website logic, or deleted through browser controls.
Third-party cookies, where present, may have their own expiry periods that are determined by the provider. Those periods can also be affected by browser privacy protections, device settings and changes made by the provider.
We aim to avoid retaining optional browser data for longer than is reasonably useful for its stated purpose. Retention settings may be reviewed when website services or providers change.
13. Policy Updates
We may update this Cookie Policy when browser technologies, website features, external providers or privacy controls change. The latest version will be posted on this page and the “Last updated” date will be revised accordingly.
Where a change materially affects available choices, the privacy banner or Cookie Settings interface may be presented again so that visitors can review the updated categories. Routine wording changes may not require a new choice where the underlying use of technologies remains the same.
14. Contact
If you have questions about cookies, localStorage, privacy controls or the categories described on this page, please contact [email protected].
AusStayGuide
24 Coastal View Avenue
Broadbeach QLD, Australia
Telephone: +61 7 0000 1846
For broader questions about personal information, please also review the Privacy Policy available from the footer of every page.