Privacy policy

We may process your information outside the UK or European Union. Where this is the case, we will not transfer your information to other countries outside the EEA unless it is unavoidable to allow us to deliver our products and services. If we do, we take care to ensure the same level of privacy and security as the UK.

Once we have received your personal data, we will use recognized industry standard procedures and security features to try to prevent any unauthorized access, misuse, disclosure and breach towards confidentiality, integrity and availability. Your personal data will be under the control and use of My Consumer Choices. It will be held on our computer systems and servers. When we print your personal data, this will be in the possession and control of our employees at all times and will be securely disposed of when it is considered to be of no further use.

Your data must be processed by us using one of the valid legal bases defined by the Regulations. The two we use are;

Consent

In short, this is where you consent to a specific organisation, to contact you by a communication channel or channels which you have agreed to, for specific reasons, which in the context of our processing will be for marketing purposes. When we ask for your consent for a specific organisation, we will do so by allowing you to tick a box online or answer a question on the phone.

You can, of course, withdraw your consent at any time or request a change to your marketing preferences as per the instructions already outlined within this privacy policy.

Legitimate Interest

Data may be processed in pursuance of legitimate interests. This includes using your data for postal and telephone marketing for ourselves or others but in either case, communications will be in relation to products or services which we believe may be of interest to you based upon information which you have provided us. An example of this could be where you request a call from a named energy provider about saving money on your energy bills. We may share your details under legitimate interest with other energy providers to give you a wider choice of companies to choose from. In this instance, we will have conducted an LIA (Legitimate Interest Assessment) as required by law.

It also includes processing your data for ID protection and tracing purposes such as Credit Reference and Fraud Prevention. This is in relation to appropriate agencies which we have listed in the privacy policy which could help protect your identity and prevent fraud. As with all of your data you can also object to us processing your data in this way.

The information we collect includes your name and contact information that you volunteer such as your telephone number, email address, mobile number and postal address. We may also ask you for your date of birth and during the course of our surveys by telephone or online, details about your preferences likes and dislikes. We will never collect information about your bank account or credit card details and nor will we collect sensitive information such as your medical history, religious or political beliefs.

Groups of recipients within specific industry sectors listed below; Automotive, Charity, Gaming, Leisure, Financial Products, Insurance, Health/Mobility, Home Improvements, Wills, Funeral Plans, Warranty, Mail Order, Market Research, Media, Retail, Telecoms, Car Finance Claims,  Housing Disrepair Claims, Travel and Utilities. From time to time we also supply data to these sectors via agencies/brokers; we ensure that these agencies/brokers are reputable firms and adhere to all regulatory requirements and where we have conducted a full due diligence check on those companies.

Marketing Service Providers are companies who collect data from Data Controllers, such as ourselves and help their clients tailor products and services which best suit your needs. They may also use your data for fraud prevention. The Marketing Services Providers we work with are strictly limited to only those organisations who we have completed checks on and who will process your data in strict compliance with all laws, regulations and guidance with regard to Data Protection. We will share your data under strict licence terms with the Marketing Services Providers listed above, who like us, will use it to create products and services to help organisations better understand the likely characteristics of their customers; communicate with them more effectively; and find others like them across a range of marketing channels. This may mean that you receive advertising from organisations within the industry sectors listed above, that is more relevant to you via direct mail or when you visit a website, mobile app or watch TV. The Marketing Services Providers will not, however, advertise their own products or services to you.

Credit Reference and Other Agencies We collect your data and will share it with third parties. These organisations will contact you where they have a lawful reason, which may include these organisations own legitimate interest. Use includes tracing of individuals, verification and/or validation of the identity of individuals for the purposes of, but not limited to, anti-money laundering regulations, national security, crime prevention and detection, anti-fraud processes, asset recovery and asset reunification. You have the right to object to this processing at any time by contacting us at [email protected].

We use some of the information you provide to identify lookalikes so our clients can target you with offers of goods and services tailored to you. We will never profile you on the basis of ethnicity, religion, politics or health as these are not valid reasons for which you should be targeted for marketing purposes and nor do we collect this information. We also do not make automated decisions about you which may have a negative impact on your rights. Marketing Services Providers we share your data with may also use profiling to target you for marketing purposes. Once again you can ask us to stop using your data in this way at any time.

Right to withdraw consent at any time where relevant – You have the right to withdraw your consent to the processing of your information at any time and we must provide you with the information to need to do so, at the time we collect your data and each time we contact you.

We will only keep your personal details for as long as is necessary or as long as you want. The law does not put a time limit on the amount of time we should hold your personal details for but as long as you are happy to hear from us we will continue to contact you. As we explain in the section marked what are my rights? You can withdraw your consent to us at any time.

Occasionally we collect personal information from third parties but when we do we check that they have your consent to share your information with us.

On rare occasions, we may be asked to share your information for the prevention of fraud or with regulatory bodies who are investigating a complaint made by a consumer.