Cookie Policy

VIP Travel Scout
Website: www.viptravelscout.com
Effective Date: 18th June 2025
Last Updated: 18th June 2025

Table of Contents

1. Introduction

This Cookie Policy explains how VIP Travel Scout (“we,” “our,” or “us”) uses cookies and similar tracking technologies on our website www.viptravelscout.com (the “Website”). This policy should be read in conjunction with our Privacy Policy, which provides additional information about how we collect, use, and protect your personal information.

VIP Travel Scout is committed to being transparent about our use of cookies and providing you with meaningful choices about how your information is collected and used. This Cookie Policy explains what cookies are, how we use them, the types of cookies we use, how you can control cookie settings, and how our use of cookies may affect your privacy.

By continuing to use our Website, you acknowledge that you have read and understood this Cookie Policy and consent to our use of cookies as described herein, except where your consent is not required by law. If you do not agree with our use of cookies, you should adjust your browser settings to refuse cookies or stop using our Website.

We may update this Cookie Policy from time to time to reflect changes in technology, legislation, or our business practices. We encourage you to review this policy periodically to stay informed about our use of cookies and related technologies.

2. What Are Cookies

Cookies are small text files that are stored on your device (computer, tablet, smartphone, or other electronic device) when you visit a website. They are widely used to make websites work more efficiently and to provide information to website owners about how users interact with their sites.

2.1 How Cookies Work

When you visit our Website, our server sends a cookie to your device, which your browser stores in a designated file. The cookie contains a unique identifier that allows our Website to recognize your device when you return. Cookies can store various types of information, including your preferences, login status, items in your shopping cart, and other data that helps improve your browsing experience.

2.2 Types of Cookie Technology

HTTP Cookies: Traditional cookies that are sent between your browser and our web server with each request. These are the most common type of cookies and are what most people think of when they hear the term “cookies.”

Local Storage: A web storage method that allows websites to store data locally within your browser. Local storage can hold more data than traditional cookies and persists until explicitly cleared.

Session Storage: Similar to local storage but only persists for the duration of your browser session. Session storage is automatically cleared when you close your browser tab or window.

Web Beacons: Small, transparent image files embedded in web pages or emails that can track whether content has been viewed. Web beacons are often used in conjunction with cookies to gather information about user behavior.

Pixels: Similar to web beacons, pixels are small pieces of code that can track user interactions and gather analytics data. They are commonly used for advertising and marketing purposes.

2.3 First-Party vs. Third-Party Cookies

First-Party Cookies: These are cookies set directly by our Website. We have full control over these cookies and use them to provide core website functionality and improve your user experience.

Third-Party Cookies: These are cookies set by domains other than our Website, typically by third-party services we use, such as analytics providers, advertising networks, or social media platforms. We have limited control over these cookies, and they are governed by the privacy policies of the third parties that set them.

3. Why We Use Cookies

We use cookies for several important purposes that help us provide you with a better, more personalized, and more secure experience on our Website. Our use of cookies serves the following primary functions:

3.1 Essential Website Functionality

Cookies are essential for many basic functions of our Website. Without these cookies, certain features would not work properly, and you would not be able to use our services effectively. Essential functions that rely on cookies include maintaining your session as you navigate between pages, remembering your login status, storing items in your booking cart, and ensuring the security of your interactions with our Website.

3.2 User Experience Enhancement

We use cookies to remember your preferences and settings, which allows us to provide a more personalized and convenient experience. This includes remembering your language preferences, currency settings, search filters, and other customization options that make your visits to our Website more efficient and enjoyable.

3.3 Performance and Analytics

Cookies help us understand how visitors use our Website, which pages are most popular, how long visitors spend on different pages, and where visitors encounter problems. This information is crucial for improving our Website’s performance, identifying and fixing issues, and optimizing the user experience. We use this data to make informed decisions about website improvements and new features.

3.4 Security and Fraud Prevention

We use cookies to help protect our Website and our users from security threats and fraudulent activities. Security cookies help us detect suspicious behavior, prevent unauthorized access to user accounts, and protect against cross-site request forgery and other security vulnerabilities.

3.5 Marketing and Advertising

With your consent, we use cookies to provide more relevant marketing communications and advertisements. These cookies help us understand your interests and preferences, allowing us to show you travel offers and content that are more likely to be of interest to you. Marketing cookies also help us measure the effectiveness of our advertising campaigns and improve our marketing strategies.

3.6 Social Media Integration

When you interact with social media features on our Website, such as sharing content or logging in through social media accounts, cookies may be set by the social media platforms to facilitate these interactions and provide a seamless experience.

4. Types of Cookies We Use

We categorize the cookies we use into four main types based on their purpose and functionality. Each category serves different functions and has different implications for your privacy and user experience:

4.1 Strictly Necessary Cookies

These cookies are essential for the basic operation of our Website and cannot be disabled without significantly impairing your ability to use our services. Strictly necessary cookies do not require your consent under applicable privacy laws because they are essential for providing the services you have requested.

Session Management Cookies: These cookies maintain your session as you navigate through our Website, ensuring that you remain logged in and that your actions are properly attributed to your account. Without these cookies, you would need to log in again on every page, and any items you add to your booking cart would be lost when you navigate to a different page.

Security Cookies: These cookies help protect our Website and your account from security threats. They enable security features such as detecting when someone is attempting to break into your account, preventing cross-site request forgery attacks, and ensuring that sensitive actions require proper authentication.

Load Balancing Cookies: These cookies help distribute traffic across our servers to ensure optimal performance and prevent any single server from becoming overloaded. They ensure that your requests are routed to the appropriate server and that your session data is maintained consistently.

Accessibility Cookies: These cookies remember accessibility settings you have chosen, such as text size, contrast settings, or other accommodations that help make our Website more usable for people with disabilities.

4.2 Performance and Analytics Cookies

These cookies collect information about how visitors use our Website, helping us understand user behavior and improve our services. The information collected by these cookies is typically aggregated and anonymized, meaning it cannot be used to identify individual users.

Google Analytics: We use Google Analytics to collect detailed information about how visitors interact with our Website. This includes information about which pages are visited, how long visitors spend on each page, which links are clicked, and how visitors navigate through our site. Google Analytics helps us identify popular content, understand user journeys, and optimize our Website for better performance.

Heatmap and User Behavior Analytics: We may use services like Hotjar or similar tools to create heatmaps and record user sessions (in an anonymized manner) to understand how users interact with our Website. This helps us identify areas where users may be experiencing difficulties and optimize our design and functionality accordingly.

Page Load Performance: We use cookies to monitor the performance of our Website, including page load times, server response times, and other technical metrics. This information helps us identify and resolve performance issues to ensure a smooth user experience.

Error Tracking: We use cookies to track JavaScript errors and other technical issues that may occur on our Website. This helps us identify and fix problems quickly to maintain a high-quality user experience.

4.3 Functional Cookies

These cookies enable enhanced functionality and personalization features that improve your experience on our Website. While not strictly necessary for basic operation, these cookies significantly enhance the usability and convenience of our services.

Preference Cookies: These cookies remember your preferences and settings, such as your preferred language, currency, time zone, and other customization options. This allows us to provide a more personalized experience and saves you from having to reset your preferences each time you visit our Website.

Search and Filter Cookies: These cookies remember your search criteria and filter settings, making it easier for you to find relevant travel options. For example, if you frequently search for luxury hotels in specific destinations, these cookies can help us remember your preferences and provide more relevant results.

Booking Process Cookies: These cookies help streamline the booking process by remembering information you have entered in previous steps, such as traveler details, contact information, and payment preferences. This makes the booking process more efficient and reduces the likelihood of errors.

Chat and Customer Support Cookies: If you use our live chat feature or other customer support tools, these cookies help maintain the context of your conversation and provide a better support experience.

4.4 Targeting and Advertising Cookies

These cookies are used to deliver advertisements that are more relevant to your interests and to measure the effectiveness of advertising campaigns. These cookies require your explicit consent under applicable privacy laws.

Behavioral Targeting: These cookies track your browsing behavior across our Website and potentially across other websites to build a profile of your interests. This information is used to show you advertisements for travel services and destinations that are more likely to interest you.

Retargeting Cookies: These cookies enable us to show you relevant advertisements when you visit other websites or social media platforms. For example, if you view a particular destination on our Website but don’t make a booking, we may show you advertisements for that destination on other websites you visit.

Conversion Tracking: These cookies help us measure the effectiveness of our advertising campaigns by tracking whether visitors who click on our advertisements ultimately make bookings or take other desired actions on our Website.

Social Media Advertising: We may use cookies set by social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to deliver targeted advertisements to users of these platforms based on their interactions with our Website.

Affiliate Marketing: We work with affiliate partners who help promote our services. Cookies are used to track referrals from these partners and ensure they receive appropriate credit for bookings they generate.

5. Third-Party Cookies

Our Website uses various third-party services that may set their own cookies on your device. While we carefully select our third-party partners and require them to comply with applicable privacy laws, we do not have direct control over these cookies. The following are the main categories of third-party cookies used on our Website:

5.1 Analytics and Performance Services

Google Analytics: Google Analytics is a web analytics service provided by Google that tracks and reports website traffic. Google Analytics uses cookies to collect information about how visitors use our Website, including which pages they visit, how long they stay, and how they navigate through the site. This information is used to compile reports and help us improve our Website. Google’s use of this information is governed by Google’s Privacy Policy.

Google Tag Manager: We use Google Tag Manager to manage and deploy various tracking codes and marketing tags on our Website. Google Tag Manager itself does not collect personal information, but it enables other services to do so in accordance with their respective privacy policies.

Hotjar: We may use Hotjar to better understand our users’ needs and to optimize our Website experience. Hotjar uses cookies and other technologies to collect data on our users’ behavior and their devices, including device’s IP address, device screen size, device type, browser information, geographic location, and preferred language. Hotjar stores this information in a pseudonymized user profile.

5.2 Social Media Integration

Facebook Pixel: We use the Facebook Pixel to track conversions from Facebook ads, optimize ads, build targeted audiences for future ads, and remarket to people who have already taken some kind of action on our Website. The Facebook Pixel uses cookies to collect information about your visit to our Website and your interactions with our content.

Twitter Analytics: We may use Twitter’s analytics tools to understand how our content performs on Twitter and to optimize our social media marketing efforts. These tools use cookies to track interactions with our Twitter content and advertisements.

LinkedIn Insight Tag: We may use LinkedIn’s Insight Tag to track conversions from LinkedIn ads and to gather insights about our Website visitors who are LinkedIn members. This helps us optimize our LinkedIn advertising campaigns and better understand our professional audience.

5.3 Advertising Networks

Google Ads: We use Google Ads to display advertisements across Google’s advertising network. Google Ads uses cookies to serve ads based on your previous visits to our Website and your interests as inferred from your browsing behavior across the web.

Bing Ads: We may use Microsoft Bing Ads to display advertisements on the Bing search engine and Microsoft’s advertising network. Bing Ads uses cookies similar to Google Ads to provide targeted advertising and measure campaign performance.

Travel Industry Advertising Networks: We may work with specialized advertising networks that focus on the travel industry. These networks use cookies to display relevant travel advertisements and offers based on your browsing behavior and travel interests.

5.4 Customer Support and Communication

Live Chat Services: We may use third-party live chat services to provide customer support. These services use cookies to maintain chat sessions, remember your preferences, and provide a better support experience.

Email Marketing Platforms: We use email marketing platforms to send newsletters and promotional emails. These platforms may use cookies to track email opens, clicks, and other engagement metrics to help us improve our email marketing campaigns.

5.5 Payment Processing

Payment Gateway Cookies: Our payment processors may use cookies to facilitate secure payment processing and to prevent fraud. These cookies are essential for the payment process and help ensure the security of your financial information.

Fraud Prevention Services: We use third-party fraud prevention services that may set cookies to detect and prevent fraudulent transactions. These services analyze various factors to assess the risk level of transactions and protect both us and our customers from fraud.

6. Cookie Consent and Management

We are committed to providing you with clear information about our use of cookies and giving you meaningful choices about how your information is collected and used. Our approach to cookie consent is designed to comply with applicable privacy laws, including the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the ePrivacy Directive.

6.1 Cookie Consent Banner

When you first visit our Website, you will see a cookie consent banner that provides information about our use of cookies and asks for your consent to use non-essential cookies. This banner includes:

Clear Information: The banner provides clear, concise information about what cookies are, why we use them, and what types of cookies we use on our Website.

Granular Choices: You can choose to accept all cookies, reject non-essential cookies, or customize your cookie preferences by category. We provide separate options for different types of cookies so you can make informed decisions about which cookies you want to allow.

Easy Access to More Information: The banner includes links to this Cookie Policy and our Privacy Policy so you can get more detailed information about our data practices before making your decision.

Withdrawal of Consent: You can change your cookie preferences at any time by accessing our cookie preference center, which is available through a link in our website footer.

6.2 Consent Requirements

Essential Cookies: We do not require your consent to use strictly necessary cookies because they are essential for providing the services you have requested. These cookies are automatically enabled when you use our Website.

Non-Essential Cookies: We require your explicit consent before using performance, functional, and targeting cookies. You can choose to accept or reject these cookies, and you can change your preferences at any time.

Granular Consent: We provide separate consent options for different categories of cookies, allowing you to accept some types of cookies while rejecting others. This gives you fine-grained control over your privacy preferences.

Consent Records: We maintain records of your consent choices to demonstrate compliance with applicable privacy laws. These records include information about when you gave consent, what you consented to, and how you provided consent.

6.3 Cookie Preference Center

Our cookie preference center allows you to view and manage your cookie settings at any time. The preference center includes:

Current Settings: You can see which types of cookies are currently enabled or disabled on your device.

Detailed Descriptions: Each category of cookies includes a detailed description of what the cookies do, why we use them, and how they may affect your privacy.

Toggle Controls: You can easily enable or disable different categories of cookies using simple toggle controls.

Third-Party Information: We provide information about third-party cookies, including links to the privacy policies of third-party services that set cookies on our Website.

Save Preferences: Your preferences are saved and applied immediately when you make changes in the preference center.

7. How to Control Cookies

You have several options for controlling how cookies are used on your device. These options range from browser-level controls that affect all websites to specific controls for our Website and individual third-party services.

7.1 Browser Settings

All modern web browsers provide settings that allow you to control how cookies are handled. The specific steps vary depending on which browser you use, but generally, you can:

Block All Cookies: You can configure your browser to reject all cookies from all websites. However, this may significantly impact your ability to use many websites, including ours.

Block Third-Party Cookies: Many browsers allow you to block cookies from third-party domains while still allowing first-party cookies from the websites you visit directly.

Delete Existing Cookies: You can delete cookies that have already been stored on your device. This will remove any stored preferences and may require you to log in again to websites you have previously visited.

Receive Notifications: You can configure your browser to notify you when a website wants to set a cookie, allowing you to approve or reject each cookie individually.

7.2 Browser-Specific Instructions

Google Chrome: Go to Settings > Privacy and security > Cookies and other site data. Here you can choose to block all cookies, block third-party cookies, or see and delete cookies from specific sites.

Mozilla Firefox: Go to Settings > Privacy & Security > Cookies and Site Data. Firefox provides options to block all cookies, block third-party cookies, or block only tracking cookies.

Safari: Go to Preferences > Privacy. Safari allows you to block all cookies, block cookies from third parties and advertisers, or allow cookies from websites you visit.

Microsoft Edge: Go to Settings > Cookies and site permissions > Cookies and site data. Edge provides similar options to other browsers for managing cookie settings.

Mobile Browsers: Mobile browsers typically provide cookie settings in their privacy or security sections. The exact location may vary depending on the browser and operating system you use.

7.3 Third-Party Opt-Out Tools

Many third-party services provide their own tools for opting out of tracking and advertising cookies:

Google Ads Settings: You can visit Google’s Ads Settings page to control how Google uses your information for advertising purposes and opt out of personalized advertising.

Facebook Ad Preferences: Facebook provides ad preference settings that allow you to control how your information is used for advertising on Facebook and Instagram.

Network Advertising Initiative (NAI): The NAI provides an opt-out tool that allows you to opt out of behavioral advertising from many participating advertising networks.

Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA): The DAA provides similar opt-out tools for advertising networks that participate in their self-regulatory program.

7.4 Do Not Track Signals

Some browsers include a “Do Not Track” feature that sends a signal to websites requesting that they not track your browsing behavior. However, there is no universal standard for how websites should respond to these signals, and many websites do not honor them. Our Website does not currently respond to Do Not Track signals, but we provide other mechanisms for controlling tracking as described in this policy.

7.5 Mobile App Settings

If you access our services through a mobile app, you may have additional privacy controls available through your device’s operating system:

iOS: You can limit ad tracking by going to Settings > Privacy > Apple Advertising and turning on “Limit Ad Tracking.”

Android: You can opt out of personalized advertising by going to Settings > Google > Ads and turning on “Opt out of Ads Personalization.”

8. Impact of Disabling Cookies

While we respect your right to control how cookies are used on your device, disabling certain cookies may impact your ability to use our Website and services effectively. The specific impacts depend on which types of cookies you choose to disable:

8.1 Disabling Essential Cookies

If you disable essential cookies, you may experience significant functionality issues, including:

Login Problems: You may not be able to log in to your account or may be logged out frequently as you navigate through our Website.

Booking Issues: You may not be able to complete bookings or may lose items from your booking cart when navigating between pages.

Security Vulnerabilities: Disabling security cookies may make your account more vulnerable to certain types of attacks.

Performance Problems: The Website may load more slowly or may not function properly without essential cookies.

8.2 Disabling Performance Cookies

Disabling performance and analytics cookies will not significantly impact your ability to use our Website, but it may affect our ability to improve our services:

Reduced Personalization: We may not be able to provide personalized recommendations or remember your preferences as effectively.

Limited Improvements: We may not be able to identify and fix usability issues as quickly without analytics data.

Generic Experience: Your experience may be less tailored to your specific needs and interests.

8.3 Disabling Functional Cookies

Disabling functional cookies may reduce the convenience and personalization of your experience:

Lost Preferences: You may need to reset your language, currency, and other preferences each time you visit our Website.

Reduced Efficiency: Features like saved searches and personalized recommendations may not work properly.

Limited Customization: You may not be able to take advantage of personalized features that make our Website more convenient to use.

8.4 Disabling Targeting Cookies

Disabling targeting and advertising cookies will not affect the core functionality of our Website, but it may affect the relevance of advertisements you see:

Less Relevant Ads: You may see advertisements that are less relevant to your interests and travel preferences.

Repeated Ads: You may see the same advertisements repeatedly rather than a diverse mix of relevant content.

Limited Offers: You may miss out on personalized travel offers and promotions that would be of interest to you.

9. Updates to This Cookie Policy

We may update this Cookie Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our use of cookies, changes in technology, or changes in applicable laws and regulations. When we make significant changes to this policy, we will notify you through appropriate channels and give you an opportunity to review the updated policy.

9.1 Notification of Changes

Website Notice: We will post the updated Cookie Policy on our Website and update the “Last Updated” date at the top of the policy.

Email Notification: For significant changes that materially affect how we use cookies, we may send you an email notification if you have provided us with your email address.

Cookie Banner Updates: If we introduce new types of cookies or significantly change how we use existing cookies, we may update our cookie consent banner to reflect these changes and ask for your renewed consent where required.

9.2 Reviewing Changes

We encourage you to review this Cookie Policy periodically to stay informed about our use of cookies and related technologies. If you have questions about any changes to this policy, please contact us using the information provided below.

9.3 Continued Use

Your continued use of our Website after we post changes to this Cookie Policy constitutes your acceptance of the updated policy, except where additional consent is required for new uses of cookies.

10. Contact Information

If you have any questions, concerns, or requests regarding this Cookie Policy or our use of cookies, please contact us using the following information:

VIP Travel Scout
Email: info@pergiconsulting.com
Phone: +971.58.859.70.81

Cookie-Specific Inquiries:
For questions specifically related to cookies and tracking technologies, you can contact us at: info@viptravelscout.com

Data Protection Officer:
If you are located in the European Union and have questions about your data protection rights related to cookies, you may contact our Data Protection Officer at: iinfo@pergiconsulting.com

Response Time:
We will respond to your inquiries and requests within 30 days of receipt. For complex requests, we may extend this period by an additional 60 days and will notify you of any such extension.

Technical Support:
If you need technical assistance with managing your cookie preferences or accessing our cookie preference center, please contact our technical support team at: info@pergiconsulting.com

This Cookie Policy