1. Who we are
This Cookies Policy is issued by Tal-Fanal Village Ltd, trading as Fanal Holiday Homes ("Fanal Holiday Homes", "we", "us" or
"our"), in relation to www.fanalholidayhomes.com and the online booking and website services made available through that
site.
Contact details:
• Fanal Holiday Homes, Villagg tal-Fanal, Unit 1, Triq il-Fanal, Għasri, Gozo GSR 1206, Malta
• Telephone: +356 2388 9000
• Email: reservations@fanalholidayhomes.com
• Website: www.fanalholidayhomes.com
2. What are cookies?
Cookies are small text files or similar identifiers stored on, or accessed from, your computer, smartphone, tablet or other device when you visit a website. They may be used to make a website function, remember choices, maintain technical sessions, measure website use, support customer-service tools, or measure advertising and campaigns.
Some cookies last only for the browser session and are deleted when the browser is closed. Others are persistent and remain until their configured expiry date or until you delete them. This Policy also uses the term "cookies" to cover similar browser-storage technologies where the same privacy and consent principles apply.
3. The legal basis for using cookies
Under applicable Maltese electronic-communications law and the EU privacy framework, storing information on or accessing information from a user’s device generally requires prior informed consent unless the technology is strictly necessary to transmit a communication or to provide an information-society service explicitly requested by the user.
Accordingly, we distinguish between strictly necessary cookies and optional cookies. Optional cookies are used only after the visitor has made an affirmative choice through our cookie controls, where consent is required.
4. Cookie categories used on our website
Our current consent interface groups cookies into the following categories:
| Category | Status | Purpose | Consent position |
| Necessary |
Always active where required |
Website security, technical sessions, requested services and cookie-consent settings. |
Consent not required where strictly necessary. |
| Functional | Optional. | Supports non-essential features, preferences, language selection, customer-service tools and interface functionality. |
Used only after consent where required. |
| Statistics & Analytics | Optional. | Measures website use, performance and interaction so that we can understand and improve the website. |
Used only after consent. |
| Marketing | Optional. | Measures advertising and campaigns and supports advertising-related visitor measurement. |
Used only after consent. |
5. Current cookie register
The following register reflects cookies observed in the live Fanal Holiday Homes website and its integrated Avantio booking environment during a technical review on 15 August 2026. The same cookie name may appear more than once because separate instances are set on the Fanal Holiday Homes and Avantio domains.
For third-party technologies, the duration shown is the normal or default lifetime published by the provider where available.
Providers and website configuration may shorten, refresh or otherwise change a cookie’s expiry. For Fanal/website cookies, the duration reflects the current configuration observed during the review.
| Cookie / pattern | Provider | Category | Purpose | Duration | Domains observed |
| acceptedCookies |
Fanal website |
Necessary | Stores the visitor’s cookie-consent choices so the site remembers which optional categories were accepted or rejected. |
Approx. 70 days | www.fanalholidayhomes .com |
| PHPSESSID | PHP / Fanal website | Necessary | Maintains the technical server-side session required for website functions during the current browsing session. |
Session | www.fanalholidayhomes .com |
| wp- wpml_current_language |
WPML | Functional | Stores the current website language so multilingual/AJAX functionality can operate consistently. |
Session | www.fanalholidayhomes .com |
| idleTime | Fanal / website integration |
Functional | Stores an inactivity timing value used by the website interface and exit-intent functionality. |
Session | www.fanalholidayhomes .com |
| exitintentClient | Fanal / website integration |
Functional | Records the state of the website’s exit-intent function so the related interface is not repeatedly triggered unnecessarily. |
Approx. 7 days | www.fanalholidayhomes .com |
| intercom-device-id-* | Intercom / Avantio | Functional | Identifies a unique device interacting with the Intercom Messenger and supports abuse prevention and service continuity. |
270 days | avantio.pro |
| intercom-session-* | Intercom / Avantio | Functional | Maintains the Intercom Messenger session and enables continuity of prior support conversations. |
7 days | avantio.pro |
| _ga | Google Analytics | Statistics & Analytics | Distinguishes visitors for website measurement and analytics. |
Up to 2 years | fanalholidayhomes.com; avantio.com; avantio.pro |
| _ga_* | Google Analytics | Statistics & Analytics | Maintains analytics state for the relevant Google Analytics property or data stream. |
Up to 2 years | fanalholidayhomes.com; avantio.com; avantio.pro |
| _gid | Google Analytics | Statistics & Analytics | Distinguishes visitors for short-term analytics measurement. |
24 hours | avantio.pro |
| _clck | Microsoft Clarity | Statistics & Analytics | Persists a pseudonymous Clarity user identifier and preferences so visits and interactions can be associated for analytics. |
Persistent; normally up to 1 year |
fanalholidayhomes.com; avantio.com |
| _hjSessionUser_* | Hotjar | Statistics & Analytics | Persists the Hotjar user identifier so subsequent visits to the same site can be associated with the same pseudonymous user. |
365 days | avantio.com; avantio.pro |
| _gcl_au | Google Ads / Google tag | Marketing | Supports advertising conversion measurement by storing information used to attribute conversions to advertising interactions. |
Up to 90 days | fanalholidayhomes.com |
| _uetvid | Microsoft Advertising UET |
Marketing | Stores a pseudonymous visitor identifier used for Microsoft Advertising conversion measurement and remarketing/visitor measurement. |
Up to 13 months | fanalholidayhomes.com |
Cookie names containing an asterisk (*) represent a family of cookies whose final identifier varies by analytics, Hotjar or Intercom property. Multiple Google Analytics and Hotjar property-specific cookies were observed because the website and booking environment use more than one domain or integrated service.
6. Strictly necessary cookies
Strictly necessary cookies are limited to technology needed to provide a function or service you have explicitly requested or to facilitate transmission over an electronic communications network. On our website, this includes the technical session cookie and the cookie used to store your cookie-consent choices.
Because these cookies are necessary for the requested service or for recording your privacy choice, they may be set without consent. They are not intended to be used for unrelated analytics or advertising purposes.
7. Functional cookies
Functional cookies support optional features and personalisation that are not strictly necessary for the core website service. The current configuration includes cookies associated with language handling, interface/exit-intent behaviour and Intercom Messenger functionality in the Avantio booking environment.
Where consent is required, functional cookies are used only after you select the Functional category in the cookie settings.
8. Statistics and analytics cookies
Our website and booking environment currently use analytics technologies including Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity and Hotjar. These technologies help us understand website visits, navigation, interactions and performance so that we can improve the website and booking experience.
These cookies are optional and are intended to remain disabled unless you consent to the Statistics and Analytics category.
9. Marketing cookies
The current website configuration includes advertising or campaign-measurement technologies associated with Google and Microsoft Advertising. These cookies may be used to measure whether advertising interactions lead to enquiries, bookings or other relevant website actions and, where enabled, may support remarketing or audience measurement.
Marketing cookies are optional and are intended to remain disabled unless you consent to the Marketing category.
10. Third-party technologies and the Avantio booking environment
The Fanal Holiday Homes website uses an Avantio booking environment and related technology. During the 15 August 2026 review, cookies were observed on fanalholidayhomes.com as well as the integrated avantio.com and avantio.pro domains.
These are included in the register above because they form part of the visitor’s website and booking journey.
Third-party technologies currently observed include Google Analytics, Google advertising/conversion measurement, Microsoft Clarity, Microsoft Advertising UET, Hotjar, Intercom and WPML. These providers may process information under their own privacy arrangements in addition to any processing carried out on our behalf.
11. How we obtain your consent
When you first visit the website, the cookie banner provides controls to accept all optional cookies, reject them, or open Settings to choose individual categories. Necessary cookies remain active where they are strictly required for the requested website service.
Consent must result from a clear affirmative choice. Merely continuing to browse, scrolling, inactivity or pre-selected optional
boxes are not treated as consent. If you save the cookie settings without enabling an optional category, that category remains
disabled.
12. Changing or withdrawing your consent
You can change or withdraw your cookie consent at any time through the cookie settings available on our website, including through the Cookies Policy page or any persistent cookie-settings control made available by the website.
Withdrawing consent does not affect the lawfulness of processing carried out before withdrawal. Once you withdraw consent, optional cookies are no longer set or accessed for the withdrawn purpose. Existing cookies may remain on your device until they expire or are deleted, and you may also delete them through your browser settings.
13. Cookie duration and refresh
Session cookies normally expire when you close your browser. Persistent cookies remain for the period configured for that cookie or until you delete them. Some analytics and advertising cookies can have their expiry refreshed when you revisit the website, depending on the provider’s configuration.
The durations in the cookie register are therefore stated as normal/default or current configured lifetimes rather than fixed expiry dates for every visitor.
14. Browser controls
Most browsers allow you to view, block or delete cookies. Browser settings are separate from the consent choices you make on our website. Blocking all cookies may affect functions that depend on strictly necessary cookies, including parts of the booking or guest-area experience.
15. Personal data collected through cookies
Cookie identifiers and related online information may constitute personal data when they relate to an identifiable or distinguishable device, browser, account or individual. Where personal data is processed through cookies or similar technologies, our Privacy Policy explains the relevant data-protection rights, sharing arrangements, international transfers, security measures and contact details.
16. International transfers
Some of the technology providers identified in this Policy may process information outside Malta or outside the European Economic Area. Where personal data is transferred internationally, the transfer is handled in accordance with the safeguards described in our Privacy Policy and applicable data-protection law.
17. Updates to this Cookies Policy and register
Cookies can change when the website, booking engine, consent-management platform, plugins, analytics or advertising services are updated. We therefore review this Policy and the cookie register periodically. The current version will be published on our website and will display the date of its latest update.
18. Contact us
Questions about our use of cookies or other website technologies can be addressed to:
• Fanal Holiday Homes - Tal-Fanal Village Ltd
• Villagg tal-Fanal, Unit 1, Triq il-Fanal, Għasri, Gozo GSR 1206, Malta
• Telephone: +356 2388 9000
• Email: reservations@fanalholidayhomes.com
• Website: www.fanalholidayhomes.com
Legal framework referenced by this Policy: Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (GDPR), the Data Protection Act (Chapter 586 of the Laws of Malta), the Processing of Personal Data (Electronic Communications Sector) Regulations (S.L. 586.01), and applicable ePrivacy rules.
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