This is the privacy policy of PCS Legal. Throughout this privacy policy ‘we’, ‘us’ and ‘our’ refers to PCS Legal.

Our head office is based at 5 The Capricorn Centre, Cranes Farm Road, Basildon, Essex, SS14 3JA.

We are regulated by the Council for Licensed Conveyancers, offering conveyancing (buying, selling, re mortgaging and transfer of equity of properties) and probate (administration of a deceased person’s estate) services to national and international clients.

To provide these services and to comply with the law, we collect and manage information from our clients’ correspondence and the internet which can include non-clients in some cases. In doing so, we observe the current and any future UK data protection legislation and are committed to being transparent with you and protecting and respecting our clients and non-clients privacy and rights. That makes us a “Data Controller” in respect of the information gathered and processed via our website.

We are committed to safeguarding the privacy of all visitors to our websites. We are registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). Please read the following notice to understand how we will collect and use your information and the rights you have in relation to your information. References in this notice to “your information” are also to personal information that you provide to us. This notice may vary from time to time so please check it regularly. Any significant changes to this notice will be clearly indicated on our home page.

PERSONAL INFORMATION

You are not required to provide any personal information on the public areas of this website, however, you may choose to do so by completing the application forms on various sections of our websites, including our contact us page.

We also obtain personal information from your IP address, operating system and web browser that you use to access our website. Please see section ‘Collection of Additional Information’ below for more details about this. You may also provide us with personal information if you contact us by email, telephone or letter.

We reserve the right to change this statement at any time by posting revisions on the site. This privacy policy is not intended to, and does not, create any contractual or other legal rights.

COLLECTION OF ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Occasionally, when you connect to our website we may use “cookie” technology and IP addresses to automatically collect certain technical, non-personally identifiable information. This might include your type of Internet Browser or computer, the domain name of your Internet Service Provider, number of page visits and the character and duration of such visits. We also track the number of visitors to our website in an aggregate form. Personally identifiable information is not extracted in this process. This information helps us keep our website fresh and interesting to our visitors and tailor content to a visitor’s interests. You may set your computer browser to disable cookies or to alert you when cookies are being sent. If you disable cookies, we may be unable to optimise your visit to our website and certain features may not be available. For more information regarding cookies please refer to our cookie policy.

If you visit our office, we have 24 hour video surveillance and we record our customer and staff interactions in the common area, therefore any information captured via this medium will automatically be stored for training, monitoring and security purposes.

HOW WE USE YOUR INFORMATION

We will only use the information you provide to us on these sections of the website in order to process the relevant application form. Other information we gather is normally collected directly from you by telephone, email, letter, fax or personal visit to one of our offices. This information, known as your ‘personal data’,  includes your name, home address, email address, telephone number, other contact details, financial information and date of birth.

We may also use your personal information to:

• Establish a business relationship with you

• Provide legal services and respond to enquiries

• Conduct administrative or operational processes within our business

• Process applications for employment

• Marketing communications about our services you may be interested in

• Ensure the billing of any procured services and obtain payment

• Process and respond to any complaints

• Monitor and analyse our business and website

• Form a view of you as an individual and to identify, develop or improve our services and/or products that may be of interest to you and to carry out market research

• Enable us to meet our regulators and insurers requirements

For more details about how we use your information for marketing purposes, please see section below ‘Using Your Information for Marketing Purposes’.

USING YOUR INFORMATION FOR MARKETING PURPOSES

We may ask whether you wish to receive marketing communications from us. We will seek explicit consent prior to sending any individuals marketing content in line with their preferences. We will not send you marketing material if you ask us not to. If you have agreed to receive marketing but then later change your mind and no longer wish to receive this, please let us know so we can remove you from our distribution lists. You can contact us on news@pcslegal.co.uk or the contact details below, to be removed.

HOW AND WHY WE SHARE YOUR INFORMATION

Please note that we may on occasion be required to share your information with other PCS Legal branches and any third parties who provide services on our behalf should this be needed. However, we have taken steps to ensure that all such entities keep your personal information confidential and secure and only use it for the purposes that we have specified and have informed you about. In relation to any other third parties, we will only disclose your information where you have given your consent or where we are required to do so by law, or where it is necessary for the purpose of, or in connection with legal proceedings, or the performance of our contract.

We may use a third party data processor called ‘Trustpilot’ who are an online feedback company. Trustpilot may be in contact after the service has been completed for you to leave your genuine feedback on how we were throughout the transaction on our behalf. They will only contact you once and your information will remain secure with them while they use it to contact you and then it will be automatically removed.

When obtaining payments for any procured services we collect and store this data, the legal basis for processing this data is to meet the requirements of the contract, this information may be shared with the Government VAT, tax inspectors, external and internal auditors. We have to share this information to show the money coming in and to make sure we are paying the right amount of tax.

To ensure the information we store for all our offices is secure, we use a closed circuit television (CCTV) service. This is to meet the requirements of a security contract and the information is only shared with our CCTV service providers who ensure that all the information they have is kept secure at all times.

We monitor the usage of our website to make sure that we remain up to date and current. We obtain this information through website cookies that collect non personal data of yours, the information collected (what pages you have been on and for how long the visit was) is used to improve our website and services. This information is only shared with our analytics system ‘Google Analytics’ which is used by most websites.

HOW LONG WE WILL RETAIN INFORMATION FOR

PCS Legal will retain information from a Sale for a minimum of 6 years and a Purchase for a minimum of 15 years. This is due to regulations imposed on us by the Council of Licensed Conveyancers (CLC) and to ensure our business records are adequate, to maintain the requisite levels of insurance.

Overseas Transfers

None of the information that we collect, process or store will be transferred outside of the European Economic Area (EEA).

SECURITY

We use up-to-date data storage and security techniques to protect your personal information from unauthorised access, improper use or disclosure, unauthorised modification or unlawful destruction or accidental loss. All our employees and any third parties we engage to process your personal information are obliged to respect the confidentiality of your information. However, the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure. Although we will do our best to try and protect your information, we cannot guarantee the security of your information transmitted to our website; any transmission is at your own risk.

OTHER SITES

This Site may contain links to other web sites that we do not own or operate. We do not control, recommend or endorse and are not responsible for these sites or their content, products, services or privacy policies. Downloading material from certain sites may risk infringing intellectual property rights or introducing viruses into your system. You should note, when you leave this Site, and read the privacy policies and terms of these other sites. You should also independently assess the authenticity of any website which appears or claims that it is one of our sites (including those linked to through an email).

YOUR RIGHTS

Right to Be Informed

This privacy notice fulfils our obligation to tell you about the ways in which we use your information as a result of you using this website.

Right to Access

You have the right to apply for a copy of the information we hold about you free of charge. This is called a data subject access request. We will send you a copy of the information within 30 days of your request. We may require further information from you in order to verify your identity before disclosing any personal information to you.

To make subject access request, please write to our partner, Stuart Forsdike at 5 The Capricorn Centre, Cranes Farm Road, Basildon, Essex, SS14 3JA.

Right to Rectification

You also have the right to have any inaccurate information about you corrected. We want to make sure that your information is accurate and up to date. You may ask us to correct or remove any information that you think is no longer up to date. If any of the information that we hold about you is inaccurate, you can either:

• Contact us on 01268 590003

• Write to our partner, Stuart Forsdike, PCS Legal, 5 The Capricorn Centre, Cranes Farm Road, Basildon, SS14 3JA.

Right to Be Forgotten

From 25thMay 2018, you can ask that we erase all personal information that we hold about you. Where it is appropriate that we comply, your request will be fully actioned within 30 days. For further information, you can either:

• Contact us on 01268 590003

• Write to our partner, Stuart Forsdike, PCS Legal, 5 The Capricorn Centre, Cranes Farm Road, Basildon, SS14 3JA.

Certain information may have to be stored to meet the requirements of our regulators and cannot be erased.

Right to Object

You have the right to object to:

• The continued use of your data for any marketing and communications purpose for which consent is identified as the lawful basis for processing i.e. you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time.

• The continued use of your data for any marketing and communications purpose for which the lawful basis of processing is that it has been deemed legitimate.

Right to Restrict Processing

If you wish us to restrict the use of your data because

(i)         You think it is inaccurate but this will take time to validate,

(ii)         You believe our data processing is unlawful but you do not want your data erased,

(iii)        You want us to retain your data in order to establish, exercise or defend a legal claim, or

(iv)       You wish to object to the processing of your data, but we have yet to determine whether this is            appropriate, please contact our Data Protection Officer at PCS Legal – Alistair Gibbins compliance@pcslegal.co.uk/ 01268 590003.

Right to Data Portability

If you would like to move, copy or transfer the electronic personal data that we hold about you to another organisation, please contact Stuart Forsdike at PCS Legal, 5 The Capricorn Centre, Cranes Farm Road, Basildon, Essex, SS14 3JA.

CONTACT INFORMATION

Questions and comments regarding this Privacy Notice are welcomed, and should be sent to our Data Protection Officer – Alistair Gibbins or our Partner – Stuart Forsdike:

Address: 5 The Capricorn Centre, Cranes Farm Road, Basildon, Essex, SS14 3JA

Telephone: 01268 590003

Fax: 01268 590103

Email: compliance@pcslegal.co.uk

You can also contact our Data Protection Officer if you have any concerns or complaints about the ways in which your personal data has been handled as a result of you using this website.

Alternatively, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) who can be contacted at Wcyliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, SK9 5AF or www.ico.org.uk.