Privacy Policy

Carter Corson Ltd

Website Privacy Policy

1. Important information

At Carter Corson we are committed to ensuring your privacy is protected and to protecting and respecting your personal information.  This privacy policy explains what, when and why we collect personal information about users who visit and interact with our website (“Website”), how we use that personal information, how long we keep it for, the conditions under which we may disclose it to others, and how we keep it secure. It also explains your rights in respect of your personal data.

It is important that you read this privacy policy together with any other privacy policy or fair processing policy we may provide on specific occasions when we are collecting or processing personal data about you so that you are fully aware of how and why we are using your data.

1. About us

The Website is owned and operated by Carter Corson Ltd (known as ”Carter Corson”, “we”, “us”, or “our”. ).  Carter Corson is the controller and responsible for the personal information we process in relation to your use of the Website.

If you have any questions about this privacy policy or about your personal data, please email us at hello@cartercorson.co.uk, or write to us at the following address:

Hazel Showell

Carter Corson Ltd 

25 King Street, Knutsford, Cheshire, WA16 6DW

1. Changes to the privacy policy and your duty to inform us

We keep our privacy policy under regular review. You should check this page each time you use the Website, to ensure that you are happy with any changes. This policy is effective from March 2023.  

It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal data changes during your relationship with us.

1. Links to other websites

Our Website may contain links to other websites of interest. However, once you have used these links to leave our Website, you should note that we do not have any control over that other website. Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting such sites and such sites are not governed by this privacy policy. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website in question.

1. What personal data we collect and how we collect it

Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data).

We may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together as follows:

• Identity Data includes name, username or similar identifier.
• Contact Data includes email address and telephone numbers.
• Technical Data includes internet protocol (IP) address, your login data, browser type and version, time zone setting and location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform, and other technology on the devices you use to access the Website. 
• Profile Data includes your username and password, your interests, preferences, feedback and survey responses.  
• Usage Data includes information about how you use our website.
• Marketing and Communications Data includes your preferences in receiving marketing from us and our third parties and your communication preferences.

Certain types of information are always collected when you use our Website.  Other information we obtain will depend upon your use of the Website (for example when you fill out the online contact form).

Personal data we always collect

We obtain information about you when you use our Website. We may automatically collect the following information about your visit. This is primarily to help us better understand how users use our digital platforms to enable us to create better content and more tailored communications:

• how you have reached our digital platform and the internet protocol (IP) address you have used;
• your browser type, versions and plug-ins, and your operating system;
• your journey through our digital platforms, including which links you clicked on and any searches you made, how long you stayed on a page, and other page interaction information;
• what content you like or share’
• information collected in any forms you complete.

When you complete the online contact form we will collect the following information:

• Name
• Title
• Email address
• Your company details and other contact addresses
• Contact telephone number(s)

We may supplement the information that you provide on our Website with other information that we obtain from our dealings with you.  We may monitor or record telephone calls for security purposes and to improve the quality of services that we provide to our clients.

We also collect, use and share aggregated data such as statistical or demographic data for any purpose. Aggregated data could be derived from your personal data but is not considered personal data in law as this data will not directly or indirectly reveal your identity. For example, we may aggregate your usage data to calculate the percentage of users accessing a specific website feature. However, if we combine or connect aggregated data with your personal data so that it can directly or indirectly identify you, we treat the combined data as personal data which will be used in accordance with this privacy policy.

We do not collect any special categories of personal data about you (this includes details about your race or ethnicity, religious or philosophical beliefs, sex life, sexual orientation, political opinions, trade union membership, information about your health, and genetic and biometric data). Nor do we collect any information about criminal convictions and offences.

1. How we use your personal data

We will only use your personal data where the law allows us to.  Most commonly, we will use your personal data in the following circumstances:

• Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you or your organisation.
• Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests.
• Where we need to comply with a legal obligation.

Generally, we do not rely on consent as a legal basis for processing your personal data although we will get your consent before sending third party communications to you via email or text message.  You have the right to withdraw consent to marketing at any time by contacting us.

How we use ‘cookies’

A cookie is a small file which asks permission to be placed on your device (e.g. computer, smartphone or other device) when you use our Website. Once you agree, the file is added and the cookie helps analyse web traffic or lets you know when you visit a particular site. Cookies allow web applications to respond to you as an individual. The web application can tailor its operations to your needs, likes and dislikes, by gathering and remembering information about your preferences.

We use traffic log cookies to identify which pages are being used. This helps us analyse data about web page traffic and improve our Website in order to tailor it to customer needs. We only use this information for statistical analysis purposes, and then the data is removed from the system.

Overall, cookies help us provide you with a better website, by enabling us to monitor which pages you find useful and which you do not. A cookie in no way gives us access to your computer, or any information about you, other than the data you choose to share with us.

You can choose to accept or decline cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can usually modify your browser setting to decline cookies if you prefer. This may prevent you from taking full advantage of the Website.

1. What we do with your personal data

We have set out below, in a table format, a description of all the ways we plan to use your personal data, and which of the legal bases we rely on to do so. We have also identified what our legitimate interests are where appropriate.

Note that we may process your personal data for more than one lawful ground depending on the specific purpose for which we are using your data. Please contact us if you need details about the specific legal ground we are relying on to process your personal data where more than one ground has been set out in the table below.

Purpose/Activity	Type of data	Lawful basis for processing including basis of legitimate interest
To track your activity on our Website and administer and protect our business and Website (including troubleshooting, data analysis, testing, system maintenance, support, reporting and hosting of data)	Identity Data and Contact Data (Name, email address) Technical Data and Usage Data	Necessary for our legitimate interests (for running our business, provision of administration and IT services, network security, to detect and prevent fraud and in the context of a business reorganisation or group restructuring exercise) Necessary to comply with a legal obligation
To carry out market research so that we can improve the products and services we offer including asking you to leave a review or take a survey	Identity Data and Contact Data (Name, email address)	Necessary for our legitimate interests (to develop our products/services and grow our business)
To personalise and improve your experience on our digital platforms and to personalise and/ tailor any communications that we may send you	Identity Data and Contact Data (Name, email address) Technical Data and Usage Data	Necessary for our legitimate interests (to study how customers use our products/services, to develop them, to grow our business and to inform our marketing strategy)
For profiling purposes to enable us to personalise and/or tailor any marketing communications that you may consent to receive from us	Identity Data, Contact Data and Profile Data (Name, email address, user name and password, preferences) Marketing and Communications Data	Necessary for our legitimate interests (to study how customers use our products/services, to develop them, to grow our business and to inform our marketing strategy)
For research or evaluation purposes.	Identity Data, Contact Data  Marketing and Communications Data	We may contact you by email, phone or mail. You will be asked in advance if you want to opt-in to this. We may use the information provided to customise the Website according to your interests

Disclosure of your information

In order to provide the Website, we may need to share your personal data with third parties who assist us with the development and hosting of the Website.  We only allow those organisations to have your personal data if we are satisfied they take appropriate measures to protect your personal data.

We will not share your personal data with any other third parties, or permit its transfer outside the UK, without prior consent, and we will ensure that your personal data is appropriately protected if, after your consent, we do so.

1. Data security and retention 

How we ensure the security of your personal data

Your details are provided to us by you in order for us to provide you with further details of our services. We will hold your details in strictest confidence and on the agreed understanding that we will not disclose any details to any third party without your specific consent, with an explanation of what is being shared and why.

We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed.  When you submit your personal data to us, we use industry standard Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption technology to guard your information.  In addition, we have security procedures in place to protect our paper-based systems and computerised databases from loss and misuse, and only allow access to them when it is absolutely necessary to do so, and then under strict guidelines as to what use may be made of the personal data contained within them.  Our security complies with Cyber Essentials Plus certification requirements. 

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

Data retention

We will only retain your personal data for as long as reasonably necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or reporting requirements.  

1. Your Rights: controlling your personal information

Under certain circumstances, you have rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data. You have the right to:

• Request access to your personal data (commonly known as a “data subject access request”). This enables you to receive a copy of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.

• Request correction of the personal data that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate data we hold about you corrected, though we may need to verify the accuracy of the new data you provide to us.

• Request erasure of your personal data.This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal data where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have successfully exercised your right to object to processing (see below), where we may have processed your information unlawfully or where we are required to erase your personal data to comply with local law. Note, however, that we may not always be able to comply with your request of erasure for specific legal reasons which will be notified to you, if applicable, at the time of your request. 

• Object to processing of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this ground as you feel it impacts on your fundamental rights and freedoms. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal data for direct marketing purposes. In some cases, we may demonstrate that we have compelling legitimate grounds to process your information which override your rights and freedoms.

• Request restriction of processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of your personal data in the following scenarios:
  • If you want us to establish the data’s accuracy.
  • Where our use of the data is unlawful but you do not want us to erase it.
  • Where you need us to hold the data even if we no longer require it as you need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims. 
  • You have objected to our use of your data but we need to verify whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to use it. 

• Request the transfer of your personal data to you or to a third party. We will provide to you, or a third party you have chosen, your personal data in a structured, commonly used, machine-readable format. Note that this right only applies to automated information which you initially provided consent for us to use or where we used the information to perform a contract with you. 

• Withdraw consent at any time where we are relying on consent to process your personal data. However, this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdraw your consent. If you withdraw your consent, we may not be able to provide certain products or services to you. We will advise you if this is the case at the time you withdraw your consent.

No fee usually required

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we could refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.

What we may need from you

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. We may also contact you to ask you for further information in relation to your request to speed up our response.

Time limit to respond

We try to respond to all legitimate requests within one month. Occasionally it could take us longer than a month if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests. In this case, we will notify you and keep you updated.

1. Questions and Complaints

If you have any questions about this privacy policy or our privacy practices, please contact us at the postal or email addresses shown in section 2 above.  

You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues at the following address:

Information Commissioner’s Office

Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF.

You can also contact the Information Commissioner’s Office via their website at www.ico.org.uk.  We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with any concerns before you approach the ICO so please contact us in the first instance.