Privacy at Serve
Updated October 9, 2026 · Dwelling Place Volunteers
What we collect and why
Serve helps Dwelling Place receive volunteer applications, review next steps, follow up with applicants, and welcome people onto serving teams. We store your verified name and email, your application answers, required application photo, audition upload or YouTube link if provided, onboarding progress, consent and email preferences. Authorized church staff may record review notes and follow-up conversations.
If you choose Google sign-in, Clerk receives your basic Google identity: name, email address and profile information. We use that identity to create and authenticate your Serve account. Serve requests no Gmail, Drive, contacts or calendar access. Google sign-in is optional; email verification codes are also available. Your Google profile photo does not replace the required application photo.
Who can see your information
You can access your own applications. Authorized church coordinators, administrators and department reviewers can access information needed for their assigned responsibilities. Unsubmitted drafts remain private to you through the application. Protected safeguarding notes and clearance verification require separate permissions. Application photos and uploaded auditions have private storage and temporary access links for authorized viewers.
We use Clerk for authentication, Vercel for web hosting, Neon for application records, Cloudflare R2 for uploads, Render for media processing, and Resend for application emails. These providers process information to operate the service. Google also provides optional sign-in and website fonts. We do not sell applicant information or use it for advertising.
Photos, auditions and screening links
Uploads are checked and processed before they become available for review. Photos are resized and re-encoded without their original location metadata; auditions are converted to a browser-playable format. Approved processing removes the quarantined original when storage cleanup succeeds. A recipient can copy media or share an unlisted YouTube link, so choose what you submit carefully.
Background-check and training links may lead to a separate provider, with its own privacy practices. Do not put government identification numbers, detailed background reports, financial information or medical documents into general application answers or uploads. This app records onboarding and clearance progress; it does not run background checks itself.
Your choices and retention
You can edit a draft, withdraw an application, choose how you would like to be celebrated, and turn optional reminders and recognition emails on or off. Essential account and application messages may still be sent. Serve uses authentication cookies and limited browser storage to support sign-in and resumable uploads.
Application records and processed files remain stored until the church deletes them. Automatic retention periods are not currently configured. Contact john@dwellingplace.com to ask about your information, corrections, access or deletion. Account, application and uploaded-file requests require separate handling; withdrawing an application does not automatically delete them.