Unsubscribe or delete baby club account: what still gets kept?

What is the difference between unsubscribe, cancel and delete?

Parents hear “take me off the list” and expect an empty database. Clubs and the ICO use three different actions.

The ICO’s object page is explicit: objecting to advertising “doesn’t automatically mean that organisations need to erase all your personal information.” Organisations can keep your name on a suppression list even after that objection.

What do Emma’s Diary, Bounty and Your Baby Club say they keep?

• Emma’s Diary. Data FAQs say that if you cancel membership, details are suppressed so they and their third parties no longer contact you. Partner mail is turned down in the Preference Centre, not by hoping cancel wipes partners automatically.
• Bounty. Three published buttons: edit details in the app, unsubscribe, and email [email protected] for removal. The privacy policy (20 May 2025) also says it retains and processes club information until a child reaches five, then deletes the family file — that is their retention story for a *live* member, not a substitute for an erasure request.
• Your Baby Club. The FAQ splits “unsubscribe from emails” and “delete your account” into two links. Their UK privacy notice says they generally keep personal data for four years from last use, and that claiming an offer hands a copy to that brand as its own controller.

A due-date typo is a different problem from “did they delete me”. Changing the date keeps you on the journey. Leaving the list, or asking for erasure, is what this page covers.

Which request should I send?

1. 1
   If you only want the emails to stop Use the footer and the club’s preference centre. That is an objection to direct marketing — an absolute ICO right. Expect a suppression record.
2. 2
   If you want the membership cancelled Use the club’s cancel / delete-account control where they offer one, and keep the confirmation. Read their wording. Emma’s Diary’s published outcome is suppress, not erase.
3. 3
   If you want fields deleted Send a written erasure request (Bounty: [email protected] with name, address, postcode; other clubs: the privacy email on their notice). Name the fields: due date, child’s date of birth, portraits, partner copies. Ask who they have shared with.
4. 4
   If they say no to a full wipe They must still reply, explain the exemption, and point you to the ICO. You can accept a suppression outcome for marketing and separately chase named fields they have no reason to keep.

Can I force them to delete every field?

No. The ICO lists grounds for erasure and a matching list of exemptions. A club can keep what it needs for a legal claim, a statutory duty, or — on their marketing guidance — a minimal suppression record so they do not mail you again. Objecting to marketing does not include a duty to delete every field.

Copies already sitting with a partner are a second letter. Bounty’s optional clubs and Your Baby Club offer-claims become separate controllers. A wipe at the first club does not pull those copies back.

In shortUnsubscribe or cancel = usually suppressed, still on a do-not-mail file. Delete = an erasure request they can meet in part. Ask which fields remain and why. Do not read a quiet inbox as proof the due date has gone.