PETER HERON PRIVACY POLICY
At Peter Heron, our aim is to provide our valued customers and clients with a service which is both safe and secure. At all times, we remain fully committed in protecting and respecting your privacy and data you entrust to us.
Who are we and how can you contact us?
For the purpose of the Data Protection Act 2018 Regulations (the Act) and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), Peter Heron Ltd: (“Peter Heron”, “We” or “Us”) is the Data Controller of the personal data collected by Peter Heron via or in connection with peterheron.co.uk or when you visit our branches.
You can contact us about issues relating to personal data, including the contents of this policy, by the methods set out below:
- Post: Data Protection Officer, Peter Heron Ltd, 20 Fawcett Street, Sunderland, SR1 1RH
- Email: [email protected]
- Telephone: 0191 510 3323
2. What do we use personal data for?
When using the personal information you share with us; it is purely and only for the purpose of tailoring our services to your requirements, and ensuring the best possible user experience on our company website www.peterheron.co.uk (hereafter “website”)
By using our website you are deemed to have accepted our terms of use; and you should read through this document thoroughly. However, if at any point you think our policy falls short of your expectations or that we are failing to abide by our policy, do please tell us or leave our website immediately.
3. What personal data do we collect?
When you participate in, interact with Peter Heron services, activities or online content, such as our website, social media, marketing messages, telephone, text or online registration systems, we may receive personal data about you, such as your name and contact details depending on the activity. This valuable data about your current circumstances and preferences enable us to offer you the best customer service experience possible.
Personal data about you may be collected when you provide it to us directly (including when you visit our branches) and through your use of our website and will be processed in a number of ways:
- Information that you provide by registering for property alerts on our Website, booking valuation and viewing appointments and performing functions when using the Website e.g. saving properties and specifying property criteria;
- Information collected automatically including but not limited to Cookies, third party Cookies and third party Google Analytics Cookies.
- Information collected when filling in forms on our Website, third party websites and portals which send information to us.
- Information collected via telephone calls (which are recorded for training and monitoring and to protect both parties during contractual discussions. We have the ability to pause call recording if consent is not given. We can make call recordings available to the individual party if ever requested. We also have the ability to delete individual calls if required to do so under GDPR.) emails, and social media;
- Information collected can include, but is not limited to, personal information (name, address, email address and telephone number), financial or employment status that you disclose when registering as an applicant with ourselves or entering into a transactional relationship;
- Information required about you to help ensure that our staff are safe when attending external appointments such as market appraisals and viewings. Examples of this would be the contact details of the client or customer, including a UK residential address and proof of Identification;
- Information collected in order to comply with various legislations such as the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (information on the payer) Regulations 2017 (more commonly referred to as The Money Laundering Regulations 2017) if you are buying or selling a property through us.
- Information will be collected about you in order to assist us in tailoring our marketing and communication with you, based on your preferences, such as the type of service you require, the location of your search area, your spend budget (hereafter “Requirements”)
- We may also ask you to complete surveys. This may be on our own website or through a third party provider and we will utilise the results for research purposes. We must emphasise that you are not obliged to respond to these.
4. How do we use your personal data?
Personal data we collect from you will be used for identification purposes and to create a profile with the information needed to provide you with the most relevant products or services. We use this information for the following purposes below:
- Provide Customer Support: we will use personal information such as your phone number, email address and residential address as well as your contact history to provide you with the best possible service and to deal with your requests and enquiries.
- Processing Your Transaction: we use personal information (including your name, address and financial details) to enable us to complete a transaction with you such as buying, selling, renting or lettings a property through us. This information may require to be passed onto third parties including solicitors, surveyors, financial advisors etc.
- Marketing: when you sign up to receive our newsletters, register as an applicant, enter into a transaction with us, provide feedback or use our website, we will use your personal information to create a profile based on the information we hold. This is necessary for the purposes of our legitimate interest in ensuring we have accurate information about you in one place. We create your profile in accordance
with your preferences in order to provide you with the best personalised experience to send you personalised marketing messages and newsletters and for opinion research purposes.
- To analyse and improve the services offered by our website
- Preventing Fraud: we will also use your personal information to assess your creditworthiness (in the case of buying or renting a property) and to prevent fraud. For this purpose, we may need to share your personal information with our referencing providers and/or solicitors
5. Who do we share your personal data with?
Third party service providers
We may share personal information you provide when you register or enter into a transaction with us, as necessary and only for the purposes and on the lawful grounds described above with third parties who process your personal information on our behalf such as:
Sales – including but not limited to solicitors, conveyancers, surveyors, financial advisors, contractors, property maintenance services, software and system providers;
Lettings – including but not limited to tenant referencing agencies, landlords, contractors and property maintenance companies, utility companies and insurance providers and software and system providers;
We might use a third party mailing broadcasting service in order to send you marketing emails if you have agreed to receive them;
We might use a printing company to produce and send personalised direct mail;
Our database of personal data may be held by third parties on our behalf.
Our website is managed by Way Fresh who manage our property alert system and may view your information for troubleshooting purposes only. Their privacy policy can be viewed on their own website.
These service providers will not be allowed to use your information for their own purposes or on behalf of other organisations.
6. How long do we retain your personal data?
Your data is stored within electronic systems accessed by employees of Peter Heron Ltd.
Access to your data by employees of Peter Heron Ltd is on a restricted basis with personally identifiable information excluded where possible.
Limited access to your data is also given to third parties where you have said that we can share your data with them.
All electronically accessible information is stored in the UK on secure and encrypted (password and protected) servers.
All data transmissions between your device and our website will be encrypted using industry standard SSL (Secure Socket Layer) technology; and our website has a SSL certificate.
Paper copies of your data may also be stored securely and accessed by employees of Peter Heron Ltd.
All paper based information is securely stored in the UK.
The length of time we hold your personal data for will vary depending on lawful basis for collection and processing the data.
Data supplied with consent, such as a client or customer registering an interest to buy, sell, let or rent a property through us will be held for a period of two years. However if it is deemed dormant we may delete the record and all personal information held against it. We will consider an account dormant if it has not been accessed for more than 6 months, if you have not responded to any correspondence or in the event we receive email delivery failure notifications.
Where a transaction has been entered into and there is a contractual necessity to do so, or there is a requirement to comply with legal obligations (for example in order to comply with the requirement of the TPO Code of Practice, both for Sales and Lettings, to maintain clear and full written records of transactions for a period of 6 years and to comply with the Money Laundering Regulations 2017 to hold records for a period of 5 years).
7. Where in the world is your personal data kept and sent?
Within Europe
We are based in the United Kingdom and will normally access and use your data from here.
8. Children
Peterheron.co.uk is not intended or designed to be used by children under the age of 16. No personal data is knowingly collected from children under 16.
9. Cookies
We use cookies and other similar tracking technologies to provide specific functionality to Peterheron.co.uk, to understand and measure its performance, and to deliver targeted advertising. These cookies do not contain or pass any personal, confidential or financial information or any other information that could be used to identify individual visitors. Please note that you are free to refuse cookies.
For more information on deleting or controlling cookies we recommend www.AboutCookies.org.
10. Links to third party sites
Our website may contain links to third party operated websites. If you click on these links, you will leave our website and your personal data will be processed in accordance with privacy practices belonging to those third party websites. In relation to downloadable information such as documents, files images, video files etc. on our Website; we take all reasonable precautions to ensure that such files are free of viruses but we recommend that you always use anti-virus software as a precaution. We cannot accept any responsibility for downloads and media provided by external third party websites and we highly recommend that you read the privacy policies of these individual websites.
11. What are your protection rights?
You have certain rights in respect of your personal data. You have the right to access, amend or correct and make a request for us to delete your personal data. You also have the right to ask us not to process your personal data for certain purposes, such as marketing, to alter your preferences for the type of marketing content your receive (such as properties for sale etc.) or to alter the methods via which you receive marketing correspondence from us (e.g. via email, text, post or phone call). We will inform you before collecting your data if we intend to use your data for such purposes or if we intend to disclose your information to any third party for such purposes.
You can also exercise the right to prevent such processing of your data at any time by contacting us at [email protected]
If you would like to know what personal information we hold about you, you may make a written request for copies of this information to: The Data Controller, Peter Heron Ltd, 20 Fawcett Street, Sunderland, SR1 1RH. Please note proof of identity will be requested before processing any such request. I.e. Photographic driving licence or Passport, together with proof of residency such as a utility bill no older than 3 months containing your current and up to date contact details.
In addition you may write to us at any time requesting amendments to certain personal information that you consider to be incorrect or irrelevant or to request that we block, erase or otherwise remove your personal information (The Right to Erase/The Right to be Forgotten)
12. Personal information of another person
Before you disclose personal information of another person you must obtain that persons consent to both the disclosure and the processing of that personal information in accordance with the terms of this privacy policy.
13. Legal and law enforcement
Personal data will be disclosed where required by law or legal process, for the administration of justice, to protect your vital interest, for investigations by law enforcement or regulatory bodies, to protect and defend Peter Heron property and legal rights, to protect the personal safety of our website users or by order of a valid injunction for a court or law enforcement agency.
14. Business interests
In the event that we sell or buy any business or assets, we may disclose your personal data to the prospective seller or buyer of such business or assets. If Peter Heron is or all of its assets are acquired by a third party, personal data held by us about our customers will be one of the transferred assets.
15. Who can you complain to if you are unhappy with the way we’re handling your personal data?
We have a strong ethos on customer service and always strive to ensure that we deliver at the best level, but if you’re not happy with how we’re doing, you should make contact so that we can investigate your concerns. Please contact us using these details:
- Post: Data Protection Officer, Peter Heron Ltd, 20 Fawcett Street, Sunderland, SR1 1RH
- Email: [email protected]
- Telephone: 0191 510 3323
You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), which is the body that regulates the handling of personal data in the United Kingdom. You can do this online through the ICO’s website at: www.ico.org.uk, by telephone on 0303 123 1113, or by writing to them at: Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe, Water Lane, Wilmslow, SK8 5AF.