We take your privacy very seriously. Please read this privacy policy carefully as it contains important information on who we are and how and why we collect, store, use and share your personal data. It also explains your rights in relation to your personal data and how to contact us or supervisory authorities in the event you have a complaint.
If you would like this policy in another format (for example audio, large print, braille) please contact us (see ‘How to contact us’ below).
It would be helpful to start by explaining some key terms used in this policy:
| We, us, our | Raworths LLP of Eton House, 89 Station Parade, Harrogate, North Yorkshire, HG1 1HF |
| Personal data | Any information relating to an identified or identifiable individual |
| Special category personal data | Personal data revealing racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious beliefs, philosophical beliefs or trade union membership
Genetic and biometric data Data concerning health, sex life or sexual orientation |
This policy covers those whose personal data we process as set out in the categories below and any individuals who work for any of them:
| · Our clients (including prospective clients);
· Our business contacts; · Our service providers/suppliers; · Parties to a claim or other legal proceedings including claimants and defendants; · Witnesses; · Experts; · Counsel (Barristers); · Insurers (including their insured); · Third party solicitors; · Third parties; · Individuals involved in court proceedings and other legal proceedings; · Any party or person who is involved in a transaction and contract we are working on; · Our regulators, insurers, auditors, and professional advisers; and · Those who attend our seminars or receive our newsletters; |
The table below sets out the personal data we will or may collect, store and use in the course of providing legal services. This may include special category personal data.
| Personal data we will collect, store and use
|
Personal data we may collect, store and use depending on why we are instructed |
| Your name, address and telephone number
Information to enable us to check and verify your identity, e.g. your date of birth, name, proof of address or passport/driving licence details Electronic contact details, e.g. your email address and mobile phone number Information relating to the matter in which we are instructed to advise or represent Information gathered through correspondence with us (for example, in relation to parties and/or third parties to a claim) Your financial details so far as relevant to our instructions, e.g. the source of your funds if you are instructing us on a purchase transaction
|
Your National Insurance and tax details
Your bank and/or building society details Details of your professional online presence, e.g. LinkedIn profile Information to enable us to undertake a credit or other financial checks on you Details of your spouse/partners and dependants or other family members, e.g. if instructed to act in connection with a family matter or a will Your employment status and details including salary and benefits, e.g. if instructed on a matter related to employment or in which employment status or income is relevant Details of your pension arrangements, e.g. if instructed on a matter in relation to financial arrangements following the breakdown of a relationship Your employment records including, where relevant, records relating to sickness and attendance, performance, disciplinary processes, conduct and grievances (including relevant special category personal data), e.g. if instructed on matter related to employment or in which employment records are relevant Your racial or ethnic origin, gender and sexual orientation, religious or similar beliefs, e.g. if instructed on a discrimination claim Your trade union membership, e.g. if instructed on a discrimination claim or the matter is funded by a trade union Personal identifying information, such as your eye colour, your parents’ names or your telephone number, for example if you instruct us to incorporate a company for you (which requires these online security details). Your medical records, e.g. if we are acting in connection with an employment claim Policy number Claim number and claim details |
This personal data is required to enable us to provide legal services.. If you do not provide personal data we ask for, it may delay or prevent us from providing those services.
We collect personal information from a number of sources including (but not limited to) the following:
You have the following rights, which you can exercise free of charge:
| Access | The right to be provided with a copy of your personal data (the right of access) |
| Rectification | The right to require us to correct any mistakes in your personal data |
| To be forgotten | The right to require us to delete your personal data—in certain situations |
| Restriction of processing | The right to require us to restrict processing of your personal data—in certain circumstances, e.g. if you contest the accuracy of the data |
| Data portability | The right to receive the personal data you provided to us, in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format and/or transmit that data to a third party—in certain situations |
| To object | The right to object:
—at any time to your personal data being processed for direct marketing (including profiling); —in certain other situations to our continued processing of your personal data, e.g. processing carried out for the purpose of our legitimate interests. |
| Not to be subject to automated individual decision-making | The right not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing (including profiling) that produces legal effects concerning you or similarly significantly affects you |
For further information on each of those rights, including the circumstances in which they apply, please contact us or see the Guidance from the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) on individuals’ rights under the General Data Protection Regulation.
If you would like to exercise any of those rights, please:
Under data protection law, we can only use your personal data if we have a proper reason for doing so, e.g.:
A legitimate interest is when we have a business or commercial reason to use your information, so long as this is not overridden by your own rights and interests.
The table below explains what we use (process) your personal data for and our reasons for doing so (including but not limited to):
| What we use your personal data for | Our reasons |
| To provide legal services to our clients | For the performance of our contract with our client or to take steps at our client’s request before entering into a contract |
| Conducting ID checks to identify our clients and verify their identity and where relevant to verify source of funds
Screening for financial and other sanctions or embargoes Other processing necessary to comply with our professional, legal and regulatory obligations that apply to our business, e.g. under health and safety regulation or rules issued by our professional regulator |
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations including (but not limited to) for the purposes of preventing money laundering or terrorist financing unless such processing is permitted by law or the client consents to any alternative use of the data.
|
| Gathering and providing information required by or relating to audits, enquiries or investigations by regulatory bodies | To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
| Ensuring business policies are adhered to, e.g. policies covering security and internet use | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party, i.e. to make sure we are following our own internal procedures so we can deliver the best service to you |
| Operational reasons, such as improving efficiency, training and quality control | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party, i.e. to be as efficient as we can so we can deliver the best service for you at the best price |
| Ensuring the confidentiality of commercially sensitive information | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party.
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
| Statistical analysis to help us manage our practice, e.g. in relation to our financial performance, client base, work type or other efficiency measures | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party, i.e. to be as efficient as we can so we can deliver the best service for you at the best price |
| Preventing unauthorised access and modifications to systems | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party, e.g. to prevent and detect criminal activity that could be damaging for us and for you
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
| Updating and enhancing client records | For the performance of our contract with you or to take steps at your request before entering into a contract
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations For our legitimate interests or those of a third party, e.g. making sure that we can keep in touch with our clients about existing and new services |
| Statutory returns | To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
| Ensuring safe working practices, staff administration and assessments | To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
For our legitimate interests or those of a third party, e.g. to make sure we are following our own internal procedures and working efficiently so we can deliver the best service to you |
| Marketing our services to:
—existing and former clients; and/or —third parties who have previously expressed an interest in our services |
For our legitimate interests ie to promote our business to existing and former clients
|
| Credit reference checks via external credit reference agencies | For our legitimate interests e.g. for credit control and to ensure our clients are likely to be able to pay for our services |
| External audits and quality checks, e.g. for Lexcel, ISO, or Investors in People accreditation and the audit of our accounts | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party, to maintain our accreditations so we can demonstrate we operate at the highest standards
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
Under data protection law, we can only use special category personal data where:
There are ten potential grounds for using special category personal data under data protection law. Generally, where we use special category personal data, we will do so on the ground that this is necessary for establishing, exercising or defending legal claims. This includes using special category personal data, where necessary, for:
Where this does not apply, we will seek explicit consent to process special category personal data.
We may use your personal data to send you updates (by email, telephone or post) about legal developments that might be of interest to you and/or information about our services including exclusive offers, promotions or new services.
We have a legitimate interest in processing your personal data for promotional purposes (see above ‘How and why we use your personal data’). This means we do not usually need your consent to send you promotional communications. However, where consent is needed, we will ask for this consent separately and clearly.
We will always treat your personal data with the utmost respect and never sell it with other organisations for marketing purposes.
You have the right to opt out of receiving promotional communications at any time by:
We may ask you to confirm or update your marketing preferences if you instruct us to provide further services in the future, or if there are changes in the law, regulation, or the structure of our business.
We may share your personal data with:
We only allow our service providers to handle your personal data if we are satisfied they take appropriate measures to protect your personal data. We also impose contractual obligations on service providers to ensure they can only use your personal data to provide services to us and to our clients.
We may disclose and exchange information with law enforcement agencies and regulatory bodies to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations.
We may also need to share some personal data with other parties, such as potential buyers of some or all of our business or during a re-structuring. Usually, information will be anonymised but this may not always be possible. The recipient of the information will be bound by confidentiality obligations.
Information may be held at our offices at 89 Station Parade, Harrogate and any service providers, representatives and agents as described above (see ‘Who we share your personal data with’).
Some of these third parties may be based outside the European Economic Area. For more information, including on how we safeguard your personal data when this occurs, see below: ‘Transferring your personal data out of the EEA’.
We will keep your personal data after we have finished advising or acting for our client. We will do so for one of these reasons:
We will not retain your data for longer than necessary for the purposes set out in this policy.
Unless there is any legal, regulatory, or business reason to retain personal information beyond that timescale, all client matter files will usually be destroyed seven years after the matter has been closed, with the exception of:
We may also anonymise your personal data so that it can no longer be associated with you, allowing us to keep and use the anonymous data for legitimate business purposes.
To deliver our legal services, it may sometimes be necessary for us to share your personal data outside the UK, e.g.:
These transfers are subject to special rules under UK data protection law.
This means we can only transfer your personal information to a country or international organisation outside the UK where:
These are explained below.
The UK government has the power to determine whether a country or international organisation provides an adequate level of protection for personal information and, if it does, to issue an ‘adequacy regulation’ further to Article 45 of the UK GDPR. The effect of such a decision is that personal information can flow from the UK to that country without any further safeguards being necessary. A list of countries the UK currently has adequacy regulations in relation to is available here.
We may transfer your data to a third country or international organisation on this ground where we are satisfied the transfer complies with data protection law, appropriate safeguards are in place, and enforceable rights and effective legal remedies are available for data subjects. The safeguards will usually include using standard data protection contract clauses approved by the European Commission or where no longer applicable, approved by the UK regulator.
In the absence of an adequacy decision or appropriate safeguards, we may transfer personal information to a third country or international organisation where an exception applies under relevant data protection law, eg:
We may also transfer information for the purpose of our compelling legitimate interests, so long as those interests are not overridden by your interests, rights and freedoms. Specific conditions apply to such transfers and we will provide relevant information if and when we seek to transfer your personal information on this ground.
If you would like further information about data transferred outside the UK, please contact our Data Protection Champion (see ‘How to contact us’ below).
We have appropriate security measures to prevent personal data from being accidentally lost, or used or accessed unlawfully. We limit access to your personal data to those who have a genuine business need to access 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 any suspected data security breach. We will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected data security breach where we are legally required to do so.
We hope that we can resolve any query or concern you may raise about our use of your information.
You have a right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority, in particular in the European Union (or European Economic Area) state where you work, normally live or where any alleged infringement of data protection laws occurred. The supervisory authority in the UK is the Information Commissioner who may be contacted at https://ico.org.uk/concerns or telephone: 0303 123 1113.
This privacy policy was published and updated in April 2022
We may change this privacy policy from time to time. Please check the website for the most up to date version.
Please contact us by post, email or telephone if you have any questions about this privacy policy or the information we hold about you.
Our contact details are shown below:
| Our contact details |
| Raworths LLP, Eton House, 89 Station Parade, Harrogate, HG1 1HF, addressed to the Data Protection Champion; Harjeet Nangla
Email: data@raworths.co.uk; or Telephone: 01423 566666 and ask for the Data Protection Champion |
