Privacy Policy

Privacy Policy

This privacy policy is designed to give you information as to how we collect and use personal information about you in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). As a ‘data controller’ we are responsible for deciding how we hold and use personal data about you.

What types of data do we process?

We process personal data about various different categories of people including our clients, our staff and third parties who interact with us.Personal data we process may include such information as:

1.  Name, address, date of birth, email address and telephone number
2.  Financial information including bank details and other payment related information.
3. Identification documents such as passports, driving licence and proof of address
4. Any other information relating to you that you may provide to us
5. Special category data such as race, ethnic origin, health, genetic or biometric data.

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How do we collect your data?

We may collect information from you directly, from our clients, from third parties involved in matters we act on in the course of providing legal services or from publicly available information. We may also collect data from recruitment channels or from your use of our website and any associated communications sent to us. 

How will we process your data?

The GDPR regulations permit us to process your personal information only if we have a lawful basis for doing so. This could be one or more of the following:

1. The processing is necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are party or in order to take steps at your request prior to entering a contract
2. The processing is necessary for compliance with our legal obligations
3. The processing is necessary for pursuing our legitimate interests
4.  In some circumstances we may process personal data on the basis that you have given your consent, for example where you have instructed us on a matter.

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How will we use your data? 

We process personal data for the purpose of providing legal services to our clients and also for our own general business purposes.

1. To provide any information requested by you
2. To carry out anti-money laundering checks and for fraud and crime prevention
3. To carry out conflict checks to ensure we are able to act for you
4. To ensure the safety and security of our people and premises
5. To promote our services and market research purposes including sending you direct marketing communications
6. To provide and improve our services to our clients and to enhance the client experience
7. For the purposes of recruitment
8. Administering any accounts and processing financial transactions
9. To fulfil our legal and regulatory obligations including our auditors and insurers.

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Who may we pass your data to

Whilst providing legal service to our clients and complying with legal and regulatory obligations we may share personal data that we have obtained about you insofar that we are permitted by law to do so with the following third parties:

1. Third parties involved in any matter including experts, courts and tribunals, barristers, health care professionals and any other third party involved in a matter
2. Service providers and suppliers used by us in providing us with a service such as IT providers, postal services and data management
3. Financial organisations, debt collection, credit reference and tracing agencies.
4. Our auditors, our own legal and other professional advisers our insurers and insurance brokers
5. Government agencies, regulators and other authorities
6. Our and your trade associations, professional bodies and business associates

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Data Retention Policy

Data will be kept secure. Files are confidential and are stored in locked filing cabinets and only authorised staff have access to them. Files held electronically are stored confidentially by means of password protection, encryption and coding and again, only authorised employees have access to them. The Firm is entitled to keep all of your papers and documents while there is money owing for its charges and expenses.After completing the work and upon full payment of charges and expenses, the Firm will keep your file except for any papers returned to you. The Firm is under no obligation to store the file for any longer than 6 years and will destroy it no later than 7 years after the date of the last dealing on the file. In respect of Wills we will keep until such time as we are notified of the death of the client.The Firm will not destroy any documents that we have agreed to store for safekeeping.  The Firm will often receive large bundles of pre-registration title deeds and documents on completion of a purchase which no longer have any relevance following the Land Registration Acts and the Firm reserves the right to dispose of those items which are no longer of any use unless you specifically tell us before completion that you want to retain those items. These documents must be collected from the Firm within 14 days of completion. After this date the documents will be destroyed.There is no charge for retrieving papers or documents from storage for continuing or new instructions concerning your affairs. However, there will be a time-based charge for:

• Producing stored papers and documents to you or another on your request; or
• Reading, correspondence or other work necessary to comply with the instructions given by you or on your behalf.
  The minimum fee in any event will be £25 plus vat.

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Your rights in respect of your personal data

You have the right, on request, to receive a copy of the personal information that the Firm holds about you and to demand that any inaccurate data be corrected or removed.  You have the right on request: -to be told by the Firm whether and for what purpose personal data about you is being processedto, be given a description of the data and the recipients to whom it may be disclosedto have communicated in an intelligible form the personal data concerned, and any information available as to the source of the data. Upon request, the Firm will provide you with a statement regarding the personal data held about you. This will state all the types of personal data the Firm holds and processes about you and the reasons for which they are processed. If you wish to access a copy of any personal data being held about you, you must make a written request for this. The Firm will respond to this request within one month.If you wish to make a complaint that these rules are not being followed in respect of personal data the Firm holds about you, you should follow the Complaints procedure as detailed in our Terms and conditions of business available on request. If however you are dissatisfied with our complaints procedure, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner in respect of our processing of your personal data. Information can be found at www.ICO.org.uk.

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Your use of our  website:

We collect information about our users in three ways: directly from the user, from our Web server logs and through cookies. We use the information primarily to provide you with a personalized Internet experience that delivers the information, resources, and services that are most relevant and helpful to you. We don’t share any of the information you provide with others, unless we say so in this Privacy Policy, or when we believe in good faith that the law requires it.User-supplied information: If you fill out the contact form on this website, we will ask you to provide some personal information (such as e-mail address, name, phone number and state). We only require that you provide an e-mail address on the contact form. Further, if chat is available through this site, you may be asked to provide information if you participate in an online chat. Please do not submit any confidential, proprietary or sensitive personally identifiable information (e.g. Social Security Number; date of birth; drivers license number; or credit card, bank account or other financial information) (collectively, “Sensitive Information”). If you submit any Sensitive Information, you do so at your own risk and we will not be liable to you or responsible for consequences of your submission.Information that you provide to us through the contact form or an online chat will be used so that we may respond to your inquiry. We may also use information you provide to us to communicate with you in the future. If you do not wish to receive such communications, you may opt out (unsubscribe) as described below.Web server logs: When you visit our website, we may track information about your visit and store that information in web server logs, which are records of the activities on our sites. The servers automatically capture and save the information electronically. Examples of the information we may collect include:

1. 1. your unique Internet protocol address;
   2. the name of your unique Internet service provider;
   3. the town/city, county/state and country from which you access our website;
   4. the kind of browser or computer you use;
   5. the number of links you click within the site;
   6. the date and time of your visit;
   7. the web page from which you arrived to our site;
   8. the pages you viewed on the site; and
   9. certain searches/queries that you conducted via our website(s).

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The information we collect in web server logs helps us administer the site, analyze its usage, protect the website and its content from inappropriate use and improve the user’s experience.Cookies: In order to offer and provide a customized and personal service, our websites and applications may use cookies to store and help track information about you. Cookies are simply small pieces of data that are sent to your browser from a Web server and stored on your computer’s hard drive. We use cookies to help remind us who you are and to help you navigate our sites during your visits. Cookies allow us to save passwords and preferences for you so you won’t have to re-enter them each time you visit.The use of cookies is relatively standard. Most browsers are initially set up to accept cookies. However, if you prefer, you can set your browser to either notify you when you receive a cookie, or to refuse to accept cookies. You should understand that some features of many sites may not function properly if you don’t accept cookies.

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Who we are

Our site www.cromptonhalliwell.co.uk is owned and operated by Crompton Halliwell Solicitors, a partnership, with its address at 4-6 St Mary’s Place, Bury, BL9 0EA.