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What are cookies and what do they do?

Cookies are small text files placed on your device or in your browser memory when you visit a website. Cookies can recognise your device or browser when you return to a website or app. Cookies help our website recognise your device.

Why do we use cookies?

We use cookies to:

  • protect you from fraud and secure your online activity
  • improve the security of our websites and apps
  • understand how people use our websites and apps so we can improve them
  • personalise the products and services we offer you
  • personalise the marketing you see on social media, apps and other websites
  • customise what you see on our website
  • store login details
  • temporarily remember some of your information on applications
  • check the effectiveness of our advertising and marketing

We may update the cookies we use and their purpose. If it's a big change, we'll ask you to consent again before placing the cookie.

What cookies do we use?

Some cookies are essential and do not require your consent. Others are optional. For optional cookies we ask for your consent before we place them on your device or browser. We use our own 'first-party' cookies. We also drop partner 'third-party' cookies. Here’s a list of all the cookies we use at Virgin Money.

Essential cookies

These cookies cannot be turned off. They make the website work and stay secure. They remember your preferences and help manage your security. They help our tools and calculators work. Finally, they also make sure you see the correct product information as you move around the site.

Analytics

These cookies help us understand how our customers use our website so we can improve it. For example, the pages customers visit and the links they click on. We also use analytics to understand what customers are interested in.

Functional

These cookies aren't essential but help us give you the best experience on our site. For example, they'll remember the info you give us as you move through your application. When you revisit these cookies help the site to remember your preferences.

Advertising

Advertising cookies allow our partners to serve you our adverts across the web. They help us measure the effectiveness of our advertising campaigns. Our partners might collect info such as the browser you're using, your location and IP address.

Social media

We use social media providers to serve relevant adverts to you on your social networks. For example, Facebook might use cookies to understand your interests and serve relevant ads to you.

Performance

We use third party partners to check and measure the performance of our site. These cookies track info like how long the site took to load.

How long do the cookies stay on my device?

Essential cookies and those you consent to are held in your browser until they expire. 'Session cookies' expire when you close your browser. 'Persistent cookies' expire at a future date. You can also clear cookies at any time from your browser settings.

We store your cookie consent choices for 12 months. We'll then ask for your consent again. You can change your cookie consent at any time - tap the 'Cookie settings' option on the bottom of your screen.

Turn cookies on or off in your browser

You have some options when it comes to receiving cookies.

You can set your browser to:

  • reject all cookies
  • allow only 'trusted' sites to send them
  • accept only those cookies from websites you are currently using

We recommend that you don't block all cookies because parts of our website rely on them to work properly.

To find out how to turn cookies on and off in your browser, click on your browser's link below:

If you choose to reject all cookies you won't be able to use our online application or our online service. Both rely on cookies to function.

Opting out of remarketing advertising

Remarketing cookies allow us to recognise devices (people) that have visited our website. We use this info to match the right devices with the right message when we advertise online. This may affect how third-parties, like Google, show you ads on sites across the Internet.

You can opt out of Google's use of cookies by visiting Google's Ads Settings Link opens in a new window

Find out how to update your Twitter account Link opens in a new window to opt out of tailored ads.

Manage your Facebook Ads Settings Link opens in a new window to opt out of their advertising programme.

Update your Amazon Advertising Preferences Link opens in a new window to opt out of their personalised ads.

You can opt out of GlobalWide Media's use of cookies by visiting GlobalWide Media Opt-Out Link opens in a new window