Privacy and accessibility

Privacy statement

What the contact form collects

When you send a message through our contact form, we receive the information you type: your name, organization, email address, phone number, the type of help you need and your message. With it we record the time, your IP address and your browser type, and how long the page was open before you sent it, which helps us tell people from automated spam and limit repeated submissions.

What the chat window collects

The "Chat with us" window connects you with a person on our team, not a chatbot. Starting a chat passes a bot-protection check and sends your name, email address and message, with the page you were on, the time and your IP address, to our team in our workplace messaging system and by email. While the chat is open, the conversation is kept on our web server so replies can reach your window; it is deleted automatically 24 hours after the last message, or right away when you choose End chat. If you leave before we answer, we email our reply to the address you gave. When the chat ends or you disconnect, we email a transcript to our support team, and a copy to you if you ask for one. Copies in our messaging system and support mailbox are kept as part of our client records.

To help us answer, the chat also sends our team some technical details about your visit. None of them needs your permission or triggers a prompt; they are things your browser shares with any website that asks:

• Your connection: your IP address and the network name it belongs to.
• How you found us: the site that referred you, any ad or campaign tags in the link you followed (for example, from a Google ad), and the pages you viewed on this site during the visit. Your browser keeps this list only until you close the tab.
• Your device: browser, operating system and version, device model where your browser reports it, language, time zone and clock, screen size and color depth, number of processor threads, approximate memory, graphics chip, whether you use dark mode or reduced motion, and whether your browser sends a Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track signal or is being run by automation software.
• A device fingerprint: a short code calculated from those details and from how your browser draws a small test image. It doesn't contain your name or the details themselves, and we don't use it to follow you around the web; it only lets us notice when a chat comes from a device we've chatted with before.

We collect these only if you start a chat, never just because you're browsing. They go only to our team, and we don't sell or share them.

How we use it

We use what you send to reply to you and, if you ask us to, to prepare a quotation or schedule a visit. Messages are emailed to our support team; the website itself does not keep a copy. Messages may be kept in our business records for as long as we are working with you or reasonably expect to.

Job applications

If you apply through our careers page, we receive the details you enter and any resume you attach. Your application, with any resume, is emailed to our team; nothing you send is stored on the website. We use it only to consider you for current and future openings, keep it for up to one year, and delete it sooner if you ask. Please do not send your Social Security number, date of birth or other sensitive personal details with an application.

What we do not do

• We do not sell, rent or trade your information.
• We do not share it with third parties except the service providers that deliver our email and team messages, and then only to deliver them.
• We do not add you to a marketing list because you contacted us.

Server logs

Like almost every website, our web server keeps standard log files: the pages requested, the time, the IP address of the request, the browser type and the referring page. We use these logs to keep the site running and to investigate abuse. They are not combined with the contact form data to identify you.

Cookies and tracking

We use Google Analytics to count visits and see which pages are useful: pages viewed, approximate location (city level), device and browser type, and how you arrived. Google Analytics sets first-party cookies to tell new visits from returning ones. We have turned off Google signals and ad personalization, we do not send names, email addresses or form contents to Google, and we do not run advertising or social-media trackers. You can block these cookies in your browser settings or with the Google Analytics opt-out add-on, and the site works the same either way. The contact and careers forms may also use a bot-protection check from a third-party provider, which may set a cookie needed for that check to work.

Your choices

To see, correct or delete the information you sent us, email support@engineeraustin.com from the address you used and tell us what you would like done. We will confirm when it is complete.

Clients under contract

Data we handle for clients is governed by our written agreement with each client, including HIPAA business associate terms where they apply, and by applicable Texas and federal law, not by this web page.

AI tools and client data

We use AI assistants in our engineering work to draft and check configurations, analyze logs and inventories, and write and cross-check reports (see how we use AI). Client data, credentials and documents are never placed in public AI tools. Work is done in controlled sessions with access limited to what the task needs, every AI-assisted change is logged with a timestamp and a rollback, and a person reviews and approves it before it runs. We do not use messages sent through this website to train any AI model, and we do not pass them to AI services.

Photo credits

Photographs on this site are Engineer Austin's own work from our projects, except two public domain photos: the RV park page uses a photo by Carol M. Highsmith (Library of Congress) and the event networks page uses a National Park Service photo. Diagrams and illustrations are original to Engineer Austin.

Accessibility statement

We want everyone to be able to use this site, including people who rely on screen readers, keyboard navigation, magnification or high-contrast settings. Our target is conformance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 at level AA.

To that end the site is built with semantic HTML, a skip-to-content link, visible keyboard focus, labeled form fields, text that can be resized, and color contrast checked against the AA threshold. We do not use carousels, auto-playing media or content that flashes.

Some parts of the site are harder for us to guarantee, such as a third-party bot-protection check on the forms and downloadable PDF documents. If one of them gets in your way, email or call us and we will take your request directly or provide the content in another format.

If you find a page or feature that is difficult to use, please tell us. Email support@engineeraustin.com or call (512) 481-2710 and describe the page and the problem. We will reply within one business day and fix what we can.