John Gaunt & Partners Data Privacy Notice

John Gaunt & Partners (JG&P) take your privacy very seriously and we ask that you read this privacy notice carefully as it contains important information on who we are, how and why we collect, store, use and share personal data, your rights in relation to your personal data and on how to contact us and supervisory authorities in the event you have a complaint.

If you have any queries with regard to this the first instance we hope you will contact us directly with any questions or complaints.

Who we are

John Gaunt & Partners are a Partnership, our head office is based at 372-374 Cemetery Road, Sheffield, S11 8FT. We also have a second office: Units 39-41, Haslar Marine Technology Park, Haslar Road, Gosport, Hampshire, PO12 2AG.

John Gaunt and Partners collects, uses and is responsible for certain personal data about you. When we do so, we are required to comply with data protection regulation and we are responsible as a data controller of that personal data for the purposes of those laws.

John Gaunt & Partners are authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority - SRA No. 173393.

The personal data we collect and use

In the course of providing you with our services, we may collect the following personal data when you provide it to us:

• Contact information
• Identity information
• Financial information
• Employment status
• Health information
• Data about criminal convictions or offences
• Photographs & Media & CCTV
• Business Data
• Policy Documents

In addition to the personal data we collect from you we may obtain personal data from other sources in the course of providing our services to you. Where we obtain information from another party it is their responsibility to explain that they will be sharing personal data with us and where necessary ask permission before sharing information with us.

The personal data we obtain from other sources may include the following:

• From your employer
• Contact information
• Identity information
• From identification and verification checking agencies
• Identity information
• Criminal record information
• From third parties
• Police
• Administrative bodies
• Enforcement agencies
• Interested parties

How we use your personal data

We may share your personal information with third parties where required by law, where it is necessary to fulfil the legal work we are instructed to do or where we have another legitimate interest in doing so. In most cases it will be to a third party providing data storage services, email processing services or relevant bodies of the application process.

The below table sets out:

• How we use your personal data
• The lawful bases upon which we collect and use your personal data
• Who we routinely share your personal data with

Generally, we do not rely on consent as a legal basis for processing your personal data although we may do this when we are directly marketing to you outside of a business context or when collecting information about criminal records.

Special category data

Certain types of personal data are considered more sensitive and so are subject to additional levels of protection under data protection legislation. These are known as ‘special categories of data’ and include data concerning your health, racial or ethnic origin, genetic data and sexual orientation. Data relating to criminal convictions or offences is also subject to additional levels of protection.

We may process criminal conviction or offence information during the course of the legal work we are instructed to do.

In addition to the lawful basis for processing this information set out in the above table, we will be processing it to advise you on legal matters relating to your conviction, or how your conviction affects other matters.

Marketing

We may use personal data we hold about to you to help us identify, tailor and provide you with details of products services from us that may be of interest to you. We will only do so where we have obtained consent or have a legitimate business reason to do this.

Whether information has to be provided by you, and if so why

We will tell you if providing some personal data is optional, including if we ask for your consent to process it. In all other cases you must provide your personal data in order for us to provide you with legal services.

How long your personal data will be kept

We will hold your personal data for differing periods of time depending upon the reason we have for processing it. These retention periods are set out below.

Transfer of your information out of the EEA

From time to time we may pass personal data such as your name and email address to other services that we use to send out newsletters and other communications (both electronic and print) or two our extranet. However, your personal data will remain in the EU or countries considered by the EU to have equivalent policies such as Jersey, Guernsey, Switzerland, New Zealand and Canada. Companies based in the USA that have certified with the EU-US Privacy Shield programme are also considered to be permitted destinations by the EU (this includes popular US products like Gmail, DropBox and CampaignMonitor).

Your rights

You have legal rights under data protection regulation in relation to your personal data, these are set out under the below headings:

• To access personal data
• To correct / erase personal data
• To restrict how we use personal data
• To object to how we use personal data
• To ask us to transfer personal data to another organisation
• To object to automated decisions
• To find out more about how we use personal data

We may ask you for proof of identity when making a request to exercise any of these rights, we do this to ensure we only disclose information or change your details where we know we are dealing with the right individual.

We will not ask for a fee, unless we think your request in unfounded repetitive or excessive. Where a fee is necessary we will inform you before proceeding with your request.

We aim to respond to all valid requests within one month. It may however take us longer if the request is particularly complicated or you have made several requests. We will always let you know if we think a response will take longer than one month. To speed up our response, we may ask you to provide more detail about what you want to receive or are concerned about.

We may not always be able to fully address your request, for example if it would impact the duty of confidentiality we owe to others or if we are otherwise legally entitled to deal with the request in a different way.

To access personal data

You can ask us to confirm whether or not we have and are using your personal data, you can also ask to get a copy of your personal data from us and for information on how we process it.

To correct / erase personal data

You can ask that we rectify any information about you which is incorrect. We will be happy to rectify such information but would need to verify its accuracy of the information first.

You can ask that we erase your personal data if you think we no longer need to use it for the purpose we collected it from you.

You can also ask that we erase your personal data if you have either withdrawn your sonnet to us using your information (if we originally asked for you consent to use your information), or exercised your right to object to further legitimate use of your information, or where we have used it unlawfully or where we are subject to a legal obligation to erase your personal data.

We may not always be able to comply with your requires, for example where we need to keep using your personal data in order to comply with our legal obligation or where we need to use your personal data to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.

To restrict our use of personal data

You can ask that we restrict our use of your personal data in certain circumstances, for example:

• Where you think the information is inaccurate and we need to verify it;
• Where our use of your personal data is unlawful but you want us to erase it;
• Where the information is no longer required for the purpose for which it was collected but we need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or
• Where you have objected to our use of your personal data but we still need to verify if we have overriding grounds to use it.

We can continue to use your personal data following a request for restriction where we have your consent to use it; or we need to use it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims, or we need to use it to protect the rights of another individual or company.

To object to use of personal data

You can object to any use of your personal data which we have justified on the basis of our legitimate interest, if you believe your fundamental rights and freedoms to data protection outweigh our legitimate interest in using the information. If you raise an objection, we may continue to use the personal data if we can demonstrate that we have compelling legitimate interests to use the information.

To request a transfer of personal data

You can ask us to provide your personal data to you in a structured, commonly used, machine-readable format or you can ask to have it transferred directly to another data controller (e.g. another company).

You may only exercise this right where we use your personal data in order to perform a contract with you, or where we asked for your consent to use your personal data. This right does not apply to any personal data which we hold or process outside automated means.

To contest decisions based on automated decision making

If we made a decision about you based solely by automated means (i.e. with no human intervention), and the decision made by us produces a legal effect concerning you, or significantly affects you, you may have the right to contest that decision, express your point of view and ask for a human review. These rights do not apply where we are authorised by law to make such decisions and have adopted suitable safeguards in our decision making processes to protect your rights and freedoms.

You can contact us for more information

If you are not satisfied with the level of information in the privacy notice, you can ask us about what personal data we have about you, what we use your information for, who we disclose your information to, whether we transfer it abroad, how we protect it, how long we keep it for, what rights you have how you can make a complaint, where we got your data from and whether we have carried out any automated decision making using your personal data.

If you would like to exercise any of the above rights, please: email info@john-gaunt.co.uk

Keeping your data secure

We have appropriate security measures in place to prevent personal data from being accidentally listed, or used or accessed in unauthorised way. We limit access to your personal data to those who have a genuine business need to know it. Those processing your information will do so only in an authorised manner and are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

We also have procedures in place to deal with a suspected data security breach. We will notify you or any applicable regulator of a suspected data security breach where we are legally required to do so.

Our supervisory authority

If you are not happy with the way we are handling your information, you have a right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioners Office. It has enforcement powers and can investigate compliance with data protection regulation (www.ico.org.uk).

We ask that you please attempt to resolve any issues with us before the ICO.