Plumbquill Privacy Policy

Effective: November 12, 2026. Publisher: Front Porch Puzzle Press ("we").

Plumbquill is a Google Docs™ add-on that checks a document for words, numbers and punctuation written more than one way (for example "color" and "colour", or "e-mail" and "email"), shows where each one is, and changes them to one form when you ask it to. It runs entirely inside Google Apps Script under your Google account and in your browser. We do not operate a server for Plumbquill, have no user accounts, and never receive your document content.

Google user data Plumbquill accesses

Plumbquill requests three Google OAuth scopes and nothing else:

The content of the document you open it in, and only that document (scope https://www.googleapis.com/auth/documents.currentonly): its text, headings, lists, tables, headers, footers, footnotes and tabs, the document's name, and the selection. Plumbquill cannot open, list or read any other document, and has no access to your Google Drive™.
Permission to show its menu and sidebar inside Google Docs™ (scope https://www.googleapis.com/auth/script.container.ui). This gives no access to data.
Permission to make outside requests (scope https://www.googleapis.com/auth/script.external_request), used for exactly one thing: checking a Plumbquill Pro license key with Gumroad (api.gumroad.com). The add-on's manifest allows no other address.

Plumbquill does not access your name, email address, profile, contacts, Gmail, Calendar, Drive or any other Google account data.

How Plumbquill uses Google user data

Plumbquill uses the document content above for one purpose only: to carry out the action you choose, at the moment you choose it. Specifically, it:

reads the document's text when you click Check (or when the sidebar opens, if you leave "Check as soon as Plumbquill opens" on), so the sidebar can find inconsistencies and count them;
selects a word or passage in the document when you click it in the sidebar;
changes text in the document only when you click a Fix or Change button, and only the characters that differ;
(Pro) adds a style sheet table to the end of the document when you ask it to.

It does not read your document in the background, does not keep a copy of its content, and does not use it for any other purpose: no advertising, no analytics, no profiling, no building of user databases, and no training or improving of AI or machine-learning models (generalized or otherwise). Plumbquill does not send your text to any AI service; every check is a fixed rule that runs in your own browser.

How Google user data is stored

Document content is not stored by Plumbquill anywhere outside your own Google account. It is processed in memory inside Google Apps Script and in your sidebar while you use it, and discarded when you close the sidebar.
Your house style (your choices, such as "US spelling", your list of preferred terms and the items you chose to ignore) is kept in the document's own add-on properties, so it stays with that document. Your preferences, your saved house-style library (Pro) and your license key are kept in Apps Script user properties. Both are stored by Google in your own Google account; we have no access to them.
Error reports. If an action fails, Google Apps Script records the error message (for example "The document changed since the last check") in our project's Google Cloud™ error log so we can fix bugs. These messages never contain your document text, and Google deletes them automatically after its standard log retention period.

How Google user data is shared

We do not share, sell, rent, transfer or disclose Google user data to anyone. Plumbquill has no servers of ours to send it to. The only third party Plumbquill contacts is Gumroad (api.gumroad.com), and only to confirm a Pro license key when you activate it and at most once a day after; that request contains the license key and Plumbquill's product ID, never any document content or Google account data.

How we protect your data

Least privilege. Plumbquill uses the narrowest Docs scope Google offers (documents.currentonly), so it can reach only the document it is opened in, and no Drive scope at all.
No copies, no servers. All processing happens inside Google's Apps Script environment and your browser, under your own account. Your document content never reaches us.
Encryption. Data moving between Google Docs™, Apps Script and Google's storage is protected by Google's infrastructure, which encrypts data in transit and at rest. The license check to Gumroad is sent only over HTTPS (TLS).
No human access. No person at Front Porch Puzzle Press can view your documents, house styles or settings.
Secure development. Plumbquill's code contains no third-party trackers or analytics libraries, loads no remote scripts, and is tested before each release.

Retention and deletion

Document content is never retained by us. A document's house style changes or goes away when you change or remove your choices and terms on the House style tab, or delete the document. Uninstalling Plumbquill from Extensions > Add-ons > Manage add-ons and removing its access at myaccount.google.com/permissions stops all access immediately. Because we hold no copy of your data, there is nothing on our side to delete; email us and we will walk you through clearing the few settings that stay in your own account.

Google API Services User Data Policy

Plumbquill's use and transfer of information received from Google APIs adheres to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements. Google Workspace™ API data is not used to develop, improve or train generalized AI or machine-learning models.

Changes and contact

We will post any changes on this page with a new effective date. Questions: hello@frontporchpuzzlepress.com.

Google Docs™, Google Drive™ and Google Workspace™ are trademarks of Google LLC. Plumbquill is not affiliated with or endorsed by Google.