Data Protection

Frodshams Solicitors Limited (we/us) take your privacy very seriously. We are committed to protecting your information and privacy. This document sets out the basis on which any personal data that we collect from you or that you provide to us is used (processed) by us. Your rights are protected in line with UK Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA) and UK GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) (the regulations).

If you need further clarification do not hesitate to contact us via the email or address below.

What information do we collect and why do we need it?

To advise you properly and to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations, we have to obtain information from you including, but not limited to, information about your personal and financial circumstances. We may sometimes also have to obtain information about your family and their personal and financial circumstances.

This includes information provided by you when you submit an enquiry to us, request an appointment or a return telephone call, when you subscribe to our mailing list or book an event with us, as well as when you use our services.

This may include:

• Name
• Email address
• Telephone number
• Internet Protocol address and details of the web browser you use
• Information on how you use the site and cookies.

As an example of how this works, if you are buying a property, this information may include your current address, the location and price of the property you are buying, your contact details (email address and/or mobile and/or landline telephone numbers), your mortgage arrangements and details about anyone else with whom you might be buying.

Information may be collected via:

• Filling in forms on our website
• Telephone
• Email
• Information you provide when communicating with us. This information is used for replying to you and for any other purposes described or implicit from the context of that information.

The information that we collect from you is stored in the United Kingdom and for the purpose of the regulations we are a data controller, registered with the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) and our registration number is ZA14334. Our registered office address is Cowley Chambers, Cowley Hill Lane, St Helens, WA10 2AD.

How we will use this information

We use this information to enable us properly to act for and to advise you, to fulfil our contract with you and to enable us to ensure that we offer you the services that seem to be the most appropriate to your circumstances. It enables us to keep you informed about our services and about how they might affect you. Sometimes we ask for it because the law requires that we do so.

We will only collect and use your personal information where: –

• It is necessary to enable us to enter into and/or to perform our contract with you.
• It is needed for our legitimate business interests.
• There is a legal obligation on us to do so; or
• You have given us your consent to do so.

We use information for the purposes of fulfilling your requests; this includes providing you with information that may be of interest to you, to customise content that you see, or for technical website administration.

We may use subcontractors to maintain and service the website. Where these subcontractors require access to your information, we seek assurances that they comply with the UK GDPR, that your information will be kept confidential, and that they will not use your information except to fulfil their obligations to us.

By engaging our services, you acknowledge and agree that:

• any or all the information that we hold about you and/or your family can be held by us on our computer systems and/or paper files and records, and may be processed internally by third party processors/media service providers to whom we outsource our IT needs; and
• any or all the information that you give to us may be disclosed to such third parties (including credit reference agencies) as are required in the course of our acting for you.

Your data will only be used for marketing purposes via email, web/online, post or SMS if you have opted-in to such use. You can choose to restrict the collection or use of your personal information for this purpose. You can ask us to change your preference for receiving such communications, including legal updates and newsletters at any time. Whenever you receive marketing communications from us, you will be able to indicate whether you wish to update your details or preferences. If you would prefer not to receive this information, please let us know.

We will not pass your data to third parties for marketing purposes.

We may pass on your personal information to comply with any applicable law or valid legal process. This includes, but is not limited to:

• Requests by Government agencies
• Where the disclosure is required by or under any enactment, rule of law or by the order of a court
• To obtain professional advice or establishing, exercising, or defending legal rights.

This means that we may disclose your personal information to any employee or worker at Frodshams in the fulfilment of our contract with you. We may disclose your personal information to third parties, such as other parties to your transaction or matter, counsel, expert and lay witnesses, other advisers involved in your transaction or matter, the Legal Ombudsman and our regulatory authorities, our service providers, our service standard assessors and tracing agents, for example:

• If we are buying or selling an asset for you, when it is necessary to disclose personal information to your buyer/seller or lender
• If you are asking to attend an event that we are running in conjunction with a third party
• If we are under a duty to disclose or share such information to comply with a legal obligation such as under the anti – money laundering regulations
• If we need to enforce or apply our terms of engagement with you
• If we need to protect our rights, property, or interests, for instance if a claim or complaint is made against us in relation to your transaction or matter.

How long do we keep your personal information?

We only retain your information for as long as is necessary for the purpose for which it was obtained. This could include compliance with legal obligations (for example, in relation to anti money laundering regulations where we are required to keep information for minimum periods). It could also include conducting legal work as instructed or establishing or defending claims which could be made against us, for example for negligence in the performance of our obligations.

Information collected from you concerning other people

Where you provide personal information to us about other people, we accept it on the understanding that you have made the other person aware about how we will use and disclose their information.

Children

Our services are not aimed at children. In matters involving children they will be represented by parents or legal guardians. Where we are acting in matters involving children, we will explain why their personal data is needed and how it will be used.

Data storage and removal of your information from our records

We have implemented controls around how we protect and handle personal information. We aim to protect the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the personal information we handle whilst in our possession.

We and our service providers may store your data. We will do so in both electronic and paper form, on our computer systems and by way of paper files. These paper files are copied to our computer systems at the end of your case so that the paper copies can be securely destroyed or returned to you.

We keep our files (whether stored electronically or historically in paper format) for as long as we need to do so in line with the work that we have done for you. The actual length of time for which we keep it will depend on each individual case but is unlikely to be for less than 6 years and only in rare cases will it be for more than 15 years. We have what we call a ‘file retention policy’ which we use to help us to decide for how long each particular file and data upon it needs to be kept and you will be advised of the time limit in your particular case at the point at which your matter is completed and then archived.

You can ask us to delete or remove your data from our records when there is no compelling reason for its continued use but please note that certain data is needed by us to enable us to comply with our own regulatory requirements such as confirming your identity to comply with the anti – money laundering regulations. We are allowed to retain this data regardless of your right to ask us to delete all data we hold about you.

You can also sometimes restrict or prevent us from processing your information but that might mean we can no longer continue to act for you until we are again given access to that information.

Our website host is Hyve (www.hyve.com) and their Privacy Policy is located here.

Your data is further secured by means of an SSL certificate.

Contact forms and email links

Should you choose to contact us using the contact form or via our email link, none of the data that you supply will be stored by this website or passed to / be processed by any of the third-party data processors. Instead, the data will be collated into an email and sent to us over the SMTP. Our SMTP servers are protected meaning that email content is encrypted and then the content is decrypted via our local computers and devices.

Your rights

• You have the right to request details of personal information which we hold about you.
• You also have the right to correct or complete information held by us.
• If you think any information we have about you is incorrect, incomplete or needs updating please also let us know. We will update any information as soon as possible.

You may also in certain circumstances:

• Request that we erase the personal data we hold about you
• Restrict its processing whilst we continue to hold it
• Where we process your data by automated means, ask us to transmit that data to another data controller. If you wish to request this, we will let you know whether this is possible, taking into account compatibility of systems of the other data controller to whom you wish the transfer to be made
• Object to processing. If you raise such objection we must stop unless we can demonstrate (1) an overriding legitimate business interest or (2) such processing is necessary in relation to legal proceedings
• To have a decision taken by a human. We are however unlikely to take decisions which have a legal or similarly significant effect on you by automated means.
• Have a right to be notified of a personal data breach if it results in a high risk to your rights and freedoms.
• Right to withdraw your consent if you have given your consent to our processing of any of your personal data. (Please note that if you withdraw your consent, this will not affect the validity of any processing carried out prior to withdrawal).

These requests are free of charge.

Depending on the nature and extent of your request, we may be unable to continue acting for you. In this event, you will remain liable for our fees and disbursements incurred before the request was made.

Our contact information in connection with the exercise of these rights or other privacy issues appears below.

If you consider we have breached our obligations in respect of your personal data you may raise your concerns with us. Alternatively, you have the right to make a complaint to the Information Commissioners Office, (ICO) the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues. Further details can be found at ico.org.uk.

Changes/updates to our privacy policy

Technology and data privacy best practice are continually evolving areas. We reserve the right to revise this notice from time to time in consequence. Changes will be incorporated on this page. Please review it periodically.

Privacy support and data controller

If you have any queries please contact our data controller/protection officer at Frodsham’s s.bradley@frodshams.co.uk or via our address and telephone number:

Frodsham’s Solicitors
Morland House
18 The Parks
Newton le Willows
Tel: 01744 626 600

We will take reasonable steps to resolve or answer concerns as soon as possible and normally within 30 days.