Privacy Policy
Privacy & Cookie Notice
This notice was updated in February 2021
We aim to make things as easy as possible for our customers and that includes being clear and open about how and why we use your personal information. We have written this privacy policy in plain English to make it simple and easy to read. If you have any questions or concerns regarding this policy, please feel free to contact us at the details provided below.
Please read this policy carefully as you should only submit personal information to us through our site/ app if you agree we may use it in accordance with this policy.
We may make amendments to our policy to reflect changes to our business, website or any changes in data protection laws at any time. We therefore ask that you revisit this policy on a regular basis to ensure you are familiar with it.
This website is provided by Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust. This policy only applies to our website; it does not cover any links to external websites. When following any links to external sites we would therefore encourage you to read their privacy notice.
This policy explains how Home Electronic Solutions (part of Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust) uses your personal data. We are committed to protecting your privacy and will be clear and open with you about why we collect your personal information and how we use it. Where you have choices or rights, we'll explain them to you.
Information we collect
We collect information about you:
- When you register on our site.
- When you obtain a quotation via our website.
- When you submit an order via our website.
- Direct from other organisations, such as your employer to verify details.
- By means of 'cookies' when you use our site.
- Telephone calls may be recorded for training and monitoring purposes.
In general, we will collect the information we need to provide you with the service to which the form relates. Without such information we are unable to provide you with our services/ products.
Types of information we collect include, Personal details (name, address, etc) we also collect some, employment details (including salary).
Information we get from external companies
We may receive information from other companies about you. These include your employing organisation, for the purposes of your contract and verifying employment details.
How and why we use your personal information
We use the information we hold about you in a range of different ways:
- In order to provide you with the products or services you have requested
- To meet legal or regulatory obligations
- To enable us to run our business effectively and efficiently, and
- To effectively market to you.
Providing our products and services
There are certain things we have to do in order to be able to provide you with our products and services. We use your information to enable you to use our site/ app, to set up your account, obtain quotes from us, and enter into agreements for products and services.
Like most organisations, to provide our products and services we share your information with external organisations. More information on information sharing can be found in our Sharing your Information section of this policy.
The information collected is necessary for contractual purposes or for the steps before entering a contract (quotes). This purpose covers everything that is essential in order for us to provide you with the service/ product you have requested. If you do not want your data used in this way your option is to not use our services or create an account with us.
Legal and Regulatory Requirements
We need to comply with a range of legal and regulatory requirements, some of which involve the use of personal information. There are also set timescales for which we need to keep your information. Where you have a contract with us, your information will be retained for the length of that contract plus 6 years from when it ends. Personal information is then removed.
We are also subject to laws and regulations relating to other aspects of our business, such as payment processing or complaint handing.
As part of our products/ service we are also required to share some information about you as part of your contract. This may include providing your information to relevant government bodies, e.g. HMRC.
This purpose covers activities we are obliged to do in order to provide our products and services lawfully. We are unable to provide you with our products and services without carrying out these activities. If you do not wish for your data to be used in this way, your option is to not use our services.
Running our business effectively and efficiently
Use of your information also helps us operate as a commercial organisation. We have a legitimate interest in carrying out these activities. We ensure we take all steps to minimise any impact on your privacy. Data Protection laws give you the right to object where we use your information in our legitimate interests, if your right to privacy outweighs our legitimate business interests. You always have the right to exercise this right, but this may not always be possible. For example activities that are central to our business. If this is the case you will usually need to close any account you have with us (provided you do not have a current contract).
Information Security
Only authorised personnel and contractors have access to your information. We ensure that all your information is secure by taking appropriate technical and organisational measures against unauthorised or unlawful processing and against accidental loss, disclosure, destruction or damage.
How long do we keep your information?
We will hold all information provided by you for the period of the contract you have with us to provide any services/ Products plus 6 years from the date the agreement ends. This ensures we meet our legal and regulatory obligations and allows us to resolve disputes and enforce our agreements. After which all personal identifiable information is removed.
If you have provided us with information for the purposes of obtaining a quote but have not entered into a formal agreement with us, we will hold your information for as long as your account is active. If you have not accessed your account within a 12 month period, your account will be removed.
Sharing your Information
As part of providing products and services we need to be able to share your information with other companies. This is necessary to obtain your quotations and contractual obligations. When we share your information:
- In order to provide the Home Electronics service, we need to disclose some of your information to third parties, this includes your name and contact details, including your email where electronic gift cards are requested. This is necessary for our supplier (Dixons Carphone plc) to send you a voucher in order to complete your transaction, no sensitive or financial information is provided to them. For details on how our supplier keeps your information safe please visit their privacy notice, that can be found here;
- Suppliers who process information on our behalf, such as our IT service;
- We may disclose your information to law enforcement or regulatory bodies if required to do so by them;
- We may also disclose your information to a third party in relation to legal proceedings or if otherwise required to do so by law.
- The information you provide will also be shared with your employing organisation in order for employment details to be verified. This is also required in order to set up your repayments as part of your contract.
Your information will not be disclosed or shared with any third party exempt as specified above. As the above information sharing is core to our business activities if you do not wish us to share information as specified above, we are unable to provide any products or services.
For those companies we share your information with, we ensure that all appropriate steps to safeguard your information have been taken such as formal agreements are in place.
We will not share any of your information outside of the EU. If there is a need for this, we will always seek your consent and ensure appropriate safeguards for the secure transfer is in place.
Market Research
We will occasionally invite you to give feedback on the products and services we provide, that you have used, or to take part in customer surveys. We will contact you directly. Taking part is always voluntary. It is important for any business to find out what its customers think. If you do not wish to take part you are able to decline these. There is no adverse impact on your privacy.
Marketing
We aim to provide the most helpful service possible to you. We may therefore from time to time provide you with details of products and services we provide that you may be interested in.
We will send you offers and information that you may be interested in as part of our legitimate interests as a business. We will only send you marketing information similar to those which you have originally requested that you may be interested in. We use the information you originally provide in order to receive a quote to do this. We will never share your data with companies outside of our organisation for them to use for their own marketing.
You can unsubscribe to receiving marketing at any time and we have made this as easy as possible for you. If you wish to unsubscribe please contact Home Electronic Solutions directly. You are also able to unsubscribe to marketing at each time we send you information and can do so at any time from within your account. You will also be given the option to unsubscribe when you create your account. Please be assured that we do not use any 'sensitive' (special category) data for marketing related purposes.
Your rights
Data Protection laws allows you to find out what information is held about you, on computer and in certain manual records. This is known as "right of subject access", and applies to your information held by Home Electronic Solutions.
If you want to see or receive a copy of your records speak to a member of the information governance team on the details provided below. In certain circumstances access to your records may be limited. Where this is the case we will advise you of the reasons.
Under Data Protection laws, you may also have additional rights in relation to your information. For example:
- You also have the right to request any decisions taken by automated decision making with regards to your information;
- The right to have any inaccuracies in your personal information corrected;
- You may have the right to erasure of your personal information held by us, in certain circumstances;
- Right to data portability.
You have the right to withdraw consent at any time, where consent has been given.
If you wish to exercise any of your rights under data protection laws, please contact us on the details provided below. We will aim to respond to all queries within a reasonable time, ensuring that any statutory deadlines are met.
Cookies
When we provide services, we want to make them easy, useful and reliable. Where services are delivered on the internet, this sometimes involves placing small amounts of information on your device, for example, computer or mobile phone. These include small files known as cookies. They cannot be used to identify you personally.
Use of Cookies
Cookies are small text files that are stored on your computer’s hard drive by websites you visit to enable the site to ’remember’ who you are. In general, cookies are only visible to the site that serves them, not to other websites. ‘Serves’ means places on your computer’s hard drive.
The Cookies we use
We use the cookies on this website to help you navigate our website efficiently, perform certain functions and to collect site statistics. These cookies do not store any personal information that would, on its own, allow us to identify individual users of this service without your permission.
The Northumbria Healthcare NHS Trust use a number of suppliers (3rd Party) who also set cookies this websites on our behalf in order to deliver the services that they are providing. If you would like more information about the cookies used by these suppliers, as well as information on how to opt-out, please see the information in the tables provided below.
Please be aware that restricting cookies may impact on the functionality of the Northumbria Healthcare NHS Trust website and could mean that key features do not work properly. We strongly recommend allowing cookies from this website so that we can provide you with a full service.
To help you make an informed decision, we have categorised the cookies used on this site into two categories;
- Necessary cookies – these cookies are fundamental to ensure the site works correctly.
- Optional cookies – These cookies could help us track how you use the website so that we can improve the information and experience provided to you. They may also provide additional features by 3rd party providers to allow you to socially share content or comment on this website.
The cookies used on this site are explained in the tables below.
|
Provider |
Cookie |
Expires |
Description / Purpose |
|
Northumbria Healthcare NHS Trust |
ASP.NET_SessionId |
End of session |
This session cookie is used to store anonymous details about the pages visited by you on this website and is required to provide this functionality to you. If you do not allow this cookie this website will not work correctly. |
|
Northumbria Healthcare NHS Trust |
AcceptCookies |
Never |
This cookie that tells us that you have accepted cookies from this site and allows us to stop showing you the same message each time you visit the site. |
Optional cookies
|
Provider |
Description / Purpose |
|
|
Google Analytics |
These cookies are used to collect information about how visitors use our site. We use the information to compile reports and to help us improve the site. The cookies collect information in an anonymous form, including the number of visitors to the site, where visitors have come to the site from and the pages they visited. We use this Plug-in to allow us to provide a better user experience to you and only use it on the basis that Google adheres to its own Privacy Policy.
The Google Privacy policy |
How to control and remove cookies
The Northumbria Healthcare NHS Trust will not use cookies to collect personally identifiable information about you unless you willing provide it. However, if you wish to restrict or block the cookies which are set by this website, or indeed any other website, you can do this through your browser settings. The Help function within your browser should tell you how.
Alternatively, you may wish to visit www.aboutcookies.org which contains comprehensive information on how to do this on a wide variety of browsers. You will also find details on how to delete cookies from your computer as well as more general information about cookies.
For information on how to do this on the browser of your mobile phone you will need to refer to your handset manual.
We do not use ’spyware’, that is web bugs or hidden identifiers or other similar devices to gain access to information, store hidden information or to trace your activities.
Traffic data
We keep a record of traffic data which is logged automatically by the server. This includes your IP address, the website address you visited before ours, the website address you visit after leaving our site and which pages you visit on our site. We do not store or analyse this traffic data in a way that identifies any individual. We also use Google Analytics for site statistics – see 'Cookies’ above for details of how this works.
Further Information
If you would like to know more about how we use your information or if, for any reason you do not wish to have your information used in any of the ways described in this leaflet, please contact a member of the Home Electronic Solutions team. If you do not feel comfortable doing this you can also find out more by contacting the Information Governance Department or the designated Data Protection Officer using the below contact information. Further guidance about data protection can be obtained at www.ico.org.uk. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioners Office.
Contact Information
|
Information Governance Team igofficer@northumbria-healthcare.nhs.uk |
Data Protection Officer tracey.best@northumbria-healthcare.nhs.uk |