Help & FAQs

Tidy Affairs is a secure digital platform that lets you write and store important information in one secure place. At the right time, the people you trust — your “key holders” — can access it. Perfect for a modern, digital letter of wishes or for any strict sharing of confidential information.

Visit the Get Started page and enter your email address. We send you a secure link to verify your email. Once verified, you can begin setting up your account — no passwords needed.

No. You can use Tidy Affairs entirely at your own pace. Once your account is created you can return any time to continue where you left off.

You can delete your account at any time from your account settings. Refunds are available within 14 days of purchase — all account data is deleted immediately on receipt of a refund request.

A key holder is a trusted person you nominate to access your vaults at the right time. You add key holders to your account, we send an invitation and, once accepted, you can add them to your vaults in any combination. Key holders don’t need their own Tidy Affairs accounts.

You need at least one key holder assigned to a vault if you want to share it. However, we strongly recommend assigning at least two to each vault and enabling the two-person rule — this ensures no single person can access a vault on their own, adding an important layer of behavioural security.

Yes. You can add new key holders or remove existing ones at any time from within your account. Removing a key holder immediately revokes all their vault access.

Yes. The same key holder can be assigned to as many vaults as you like.

Invited key holders remain visible in your account but you cannot add them to a vault until they accept the email invitation to be a key holder.

No. Key holders can be anywhere in the world. They each verify their identity independently via email and can complete the collection process from wherever they are.

We send key holders an annual reminder about their role. These reminders include instructions on how to collect from your vaults. Key holders can unsubscribe from these reminders.

A vault is a secure container for your end-to-end encrypted documents. You can create separate vaults for different topics or different recipients. You create documents inside your vaults.

When you create a vault, you give it a label and set a security question and answer. Make it something personal that only your key holders would know — your key holders will need to be able to answer it to open the vault.

Common examples include: messages to family, account details, subscription information, funeral wishes, financial details, important contacts, and practical instructions.

No. You could just leave instructions about where to find things. For example, you might describe where you keep your bank statements rather than listing account numbers. Your key holders would then need physical access to your property to retrieve them. You decide what level of detail feels right for you.

Yes. Individual plan members have lifetime editing access. Business plan members can edit their documents while their subscription is active.

Each document can hold up to 1 MB, which is enough for tens of thousands of words of formatted text. The editor supports rich text with headings, bold, bullet points and numbered lists. We warn you if a document becomes too large and, if you need to manage your storage, you can spread information across multiple documents within the same vault.

Photo and video uploads require extra computing power and significantly more storage than text-based files. We don’t rule out adding media uploads as a future feature but it would likely come with an additional cost.

Tidy Affairs is designed for sharing organised, text-based information. If you want to share photos or videos with your key holders you can include links to media on other platforms.

Yes, we recommend it. Tidy Affairs is designed as a secure way to share important information with your key holders — not as a primary storage or backup solution. Many users prepare their documents separately (for example, in a word processor or notes app) and copy the content into Tidy Affairs when updating. This gives you the convenience of secure sharing while ensuring you always have your own copy of your information.

Word documents often contain hidden formatting code that would bloat your vault size if we didn’t do anything. Tidy Affairs automatically strips out this code to protect the system and ensure that you can maximise the use of your vaults. Our document editor supports basic formatting (heading, bold, bulleted and numbered lists) which you can re-apply after pasting.

Your documents are encrypted on your device before they leave your browser. Decrypting them requires three things held in three separate places: your security answer, a cryptographic salt that is stored on a separate, secure server, and the encrypted data itself. No single system holds everything needed to read your documents.

No. Your documents are encrypted on your device before they reach our servers — we only ever see encrypted data. There are no secret backdoors, no master keys, and no exceptions.

A passkey is a modern, passwordless login method that uses your device’s built-in security (fingerprint, face recognition or PIN) to verify your identity. Passkeys are optional — you can always log in using a magic link sent to your email.

The two-person rule is our recommended vault security setting. It requires two key holders to act together before your vault can be opened. When one key holder requests access at least one other key holder must verify their identity and answer your security question for the collection process to proceed. This adds behavioural security on top of technical security.

Key holders visit the collection page, they confirm the account holder's email address and verify their own identity via a secure email link. They then open vaults by answering each vault's security question. If the two-person rule is enabled on a vault, then two key holders must complete the verification steps before the vault can be opened.

Yes. An email notification is sent to the account holder's email address whenever a collection attempt is made.

Your documents remain available to your key holders until either you delete your account or it is classed as inactive. For full details on data retention, see our Privacy Policy.

When enabled, the time-lock feature adds a delay between when a collection attempt is made and when a vault can actually be opened. The length of delay can be configured in account settings.

During the delay period, an email notification is sent with a one-click link to block the collection attempt if needed. This gives time to intervene if a collection request is made prematurely or in error.

Tidy Affairs offers two plans: Individual (£100 one-time payment) for personal and family use, and Business (£100 per year subscription) for commercial use. See our pricing page for full details.

Online purchase is currently available to UK customers only, due to the burden of international digital tax requirements. We hope to expand to other countries in future.

Business accounts are available worldwide via invoice. If you’re based outside the UK, get in touch and we’ll set you up directly. For customers outside the UK, the reverse charge mechanism applies: no VAT is added to your invoice and you handle any local tax obligations directly.

Yes. Tidy Affairs is free for people receiving end-of-life or hospice care, those with progressive cognitive conditions, and veterans. Access is provided through secure voucher codes from partner organisations.

If you choose not to renew, your account becomes disabled. Your vaults and documents remain intact and your key holders can still collect information — you just won’t be able to login and edit documents until you renew. Your account may be deleted if it becomes sufficiently inactive. For full details on data retention, see our Privacy Policy.

If you notice unexpected usage on your voucher codes, just let us know. We’ll disable any affected codes and issue you new ones straight away. If usage is disputed, we’ll work with you to identify and close any unknown accounts. We will aim to resolve things quickly and fairly.

You can delete your account from your account settings. This permanently removes all your data including vaults, documents, key holder assignments, and activity history. This action cannot be undone.

Your email address is used in authentication, encryption and collection, so changing it isn’t straightforward. If you need to use a different email address, get in touch — we’ll provide a free code to set up a new account, and you can move your documents and key holders across.

Inactive accounts are automatically deleted after a period of inactivity. Retention periods vary by account type. A warning email is sent before deletion. For full details, see our Privacy Policy.

You can reach us through our contact page.

We maintain a reserve fund equivalent to 10 years of hosting costs. We also have contractual agreements in place with trusted third parties to ensure Tidy Affairs can continue even if our whole team became unavailable.