Introduction
Burtons Solicitors Limited (trading as Burtons Solicitors) is a company registered in England and Wales (with registered number 09337829). Our registered office at Tyled House, 23A High Street, Pembury, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, TN2 4PH, which is also our main trading address.
Burtons Solicitors Limited is authorised and regulated (under numbers 625445, 627306 & 648131) by the Solicitors Regulatory Authority. It has notified the Information Commissioners Office that it processes personal data (under number ZA161577)
In this privacy notice and for the purposes of the Data Protection Act 2018 the data controller is Burtons Solicitors Limited (trading as Burtons Solicitors) of Tyled House, 23A High Street, Pembury, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, TN2 4PH.
We are committed to safeguarding the privacy of all parties who provide us with information, such as:
(a) Website visitors;
(b) Clients;
(c) Job applicants;
(d) Suppliers;
(e) Contacts;
(f) Office visitors;
(g) Individuals who contact us; and
(h) Other individuals.
1.2 In this policy we explain how we will treat your personal information, whether received from you or a third party. You do not need to reveal any personal information in order to view the general information included on our website; however, where you register your details on this website you consent under the terms of this policy to the collection, transfer and use of your information.
1.3 You may also have provided us with certain information about you for the purposes of allowing us to provide you with professional services, you may have met a member of our staff in person or entered information into our conveyancing quote generator. In these cases, the personal information provided is for our legitimate business interests.
1.4 A legitimate business interest is the interests of us in conducting and managing our business and providing you with the best possible service and securing that information to improve your experience.
1.5 Certain legitimate interests do not require your consent, such as marketing our services to you; such as providing you with occasional legal updates, a newsletter or information on our services that may prove to be relevant to you.
1.6 If consent is required, then we will always ask for consent; this will be made clear to you and separately from this policy.
1.7 Any personal information that we collect may be shared with third parties in connection with providing you with professional services, for which we will advise you of the need to do so, but will never be sold or shared with any third party or organisation for marketing purposes.
1.8 You have the right to object to the processing of your information, if you do not wish to be contacted in the future or change your mind at any point you can contact us at pembury@burtons-solicitors.com. For more information, please see the remainder of this policy.
1.9 When personal information is processed, we must weigh up the positive and negative effects of the outcome on you and consider your rights under data protection legislation. We will never use your information in circumstances where our interest will be greater than your own (unless required or permitted to by law or with your express consent).
1.10 We may collect information about how you use our website as well as information from any messages sent to us via the website, quotes obtained via our website link or emails and letters you send to us.
Collecting Personal Information
2.1 We may collect, store and use the following kinds of personal information:
(a) information about your computer and about your visits to and use of this website (including your IP address, geographical location, browser type and version, operating system, referral source, length of visit, page views and website navigation paths);
(b) information that you provide to us when using the services on our website, or that is generated in the course of the use of our professional services; this can include your name, contact details and other personal information necessary for providing you with our professional services;
(c) information contained in or relating to any communication that you send to us or send through our website (including the communication content and metadata associated with the communication);
(C1) Information to enable us to check and verify your identify, which can include full name, date of birth and personal documentation such as passports;
(C2) Details of your gender, assets, financial position as well as billing information, transaction and card payment information; and
(d) any other personal information that you choose to send to us, whether via email, letter or imparted to us in a telephone conversation for which we make a note.
2.2 In order that we may provide you with our professional services and act on your behalf we will need to obtain, record and maintain certain information about you. This may include personal details. This personal information may be stored in an electronic form or a hard copy and will only include the necessary details for us to enter into a contract with you and to satisfy any legal, regulatory or other requirements; further details below.
2.3 Before you disclose to us the personal information of another person, you must obtain that person’s consent to both the disclosure and the processing of that personal information in accordance with this policy.
2.4 We may additionally be provided with information on you by third parties, whether sought from them or not:
(a) Companies House;
(b) HM Land Registry;
(c) Estate Agents;
(d) Claims Management Companies;
(e) Due diligence provides;
(f) Bank / Building Society;
(g) Publicly accessible sources; and
(h) Third parties with your consent.
Using Personal Information
3.1 Personal information provided to us, whether for the provision of professional services or in connection with your use of our website will be used for the purposes specified in this policy.
3.2 We may use your personal information to:
(a) Administer our website and business;
(b) Personalise our website for you;
(c) Enable your use of the services available on our website;
(d) Send you non-marketing commercial communications;
(e) Send you email notifications that you have specifically requested;
(f) Send you marketing communications relating to our business which we think may be of interest to you, by post or, where you have specifically agreed to this, by email or similar technology (you can inform us at any time if you no longer require marketing communications);
(g) Provide third parties with statistical information about our users (but those third parties will not be able to identify any individual user from that information);
(h) Deal with enquiries and complaints made by or about you relating to our website;
(i) Keep our website secure;
(j) Fraud prevention;
(k) Verify compliance with the terms and conditions governing the use of our website;
(l) Update and amend our client records;
(m) Used for complying with statutory returns;
(n) Complying with anti-money laundering regulations;
(o) Complying with our legal obligations, at any given time;
(p) Complying with our regulatory obligations, at any given time;
(q) Preventing unauthorised access and modifications to our systems; and
(r) Analysis to help manage or practice.
3.3 If you submit personal information for publication on our website, we will publish and otherwise use that information in accordance with the licence you grant to us.
3.4 We will not, without your express consent, supply your personal information to any third party for the purpose of their or any other third party’s direct marketing.
Disclosing Personal Information
4.1 We may disclose your personal information to any of our employees, officers, insurers, professional advisers, agents, suppliers or subcontractors insofar as reasonably necessary for the purposes set out in this policy.
4.2 When your personal information is disclosed to a third party it will be in connection with fulfilling our professional obligations and we will require such third parties to adopt appropriate security measures, both organisational and technical, as is necessary to ensure they process your personal information as is necessary to carry out their instructions by us and for no other purpose.
Examples of such third parties are:
(a) Professional Advisers (including but not limited to Accountants, Barristers, Doctors, Experts)
(b) Our Banks
(c) Credit Reference Agencies
(d) Our Insurers
(e) External auditors (including but not limited to regulatory auditors and accreditation auditors)
(f) Government agencies (including but not limited to Companies House and HM Land Registry)
(g) Banking providers (including but not limited to Mortgage Companies, Loan Providers, your Financial Adviser)
(h) External Service Providers (including but not limited to typing services, copying services, electronic scanning and document destruction)
4.3 We may disclose your personal information to any member of our group of companies (this means our subsidiaries, our ultimate holding company and all its subsidiaries) insofar as reasonably necessary for the purposes set out in this policy.
4.4 We may disclose your personal information:
(a) to the extent that we are required to do so by law;
(b) in connection with any ongoing or prospective legal proceedings;
(c) in order to establish, exercise or defend our legal rights (including providing information to others for the purposes of fraud prevention and reducing credit risk);
(d) to the purchaser (or prospective purchaser) of any business or asset that we are (or are contemplating) selling; and
(e) to any person who we reasonably believe may apply to a court or other competent authority for disclosure of that personal information where, in our reasonable opinion, such court or authority would be reasonably likely to order disclosure of that personal information.
4.5 Except as provided in this policy, we will not provide your personal information to third parties.
International data transfers
5.1 Information that we collect may be stored and processed in and transferred between any of the countries in which we operate in order to enable us to use the information in accordance with this policy.
5.2 Information that we collect may be transferred to the following countries which do not have data protection laws equivalent to those in force in the European Economic Area: the United States of America, Russia, Japan, China and India.
5.3 Personal information that you publish on our website or submit for publication on our website may be available, via the internet, around the world. We cannot prevent the use or misuse of such information by others.
5.4 You expressly agree to the transfers of personal information described in this Section 5.
Retaining personal information
6.1 This Section 6 sets out our data retention policies and procedure, which are designed to help ensure that we comply with our legal obligations in relation to the retention and deletion of personal information.
6.2 Personal information that we process for any purpose or purposes shall not be kept for longer than is necessary for that purpose or those purposes.
6.3 Notwithstanding the other provisions of this Section 6, we will retain documents (including electronic documents) containing personal data:
(a) to the extent that we are required to do so by law;
(b) if we believe that the documents may be relevant to any ongoing or prospective legal proceedings; and
(c) in order to establish, exercise or defend our legal rights (including providing information to others for the purposes of fraud prevention and reducing credit risk).
Security of personal information
7.1 We will take reasonable technical and organisational precautions to prevent the loss, misuse or alteration of your personal information.
7.2 We will store all the personal information you provide on our secure password-protected servers.
7.4 You acknowledge that the transmission of information over the internet is inherently insecure, and we cannot guarantee the security of data sent over the internet.
7.5 You are responsible for keeping the password you use for accessing our website confidential; we will not ask you for your password (except when you log in to our website).
Amendments
8.1 We may update this policy from time to time by publishing a new version on our website.
8.2 You should check this page occasionally to ensure you are happy with any changes to this policy.
Your rights
9.1 You may instruct us to provide you with any personal information we hold about you; provision of such information will be subject to:
(a) the payment of a fee (currently fixed at GBP 10); and
(b) the supply of appropriate evidence of your identity (for this purpose, we will usually accept a photocopy of your passport certified by a solicitor or bank plus an original copy of a utility bill showing your current address).
9.2 We may withhold personal information that you request to the extent permitted by law.
9.3 You may instruct us at any time not to process your personal information for marketing purposes.
9.4 In practice, you will usually either expressly agree in advance to our use of your personal information for marketing purposes, or we will provide you with an opportunity to opt out of the use of your personal information for marketing purposes.
9.5 For further information about how long we will store or how we process your personal information, please direct your enquiry to the Compliance Officer for Legal Practice at the address above or email pembury@burtons-solicitors.com.
9.6 You are entitled to request full details of the personal information which we hold about you. If you would like a copy of some or all of your information or you believe that any of the details which we hold are incorrect, please contact pembury@burtons-solicitors.com.
9.7 If you ask us to stop sending direct marketing communications to you, we will keep the minimum amount of information (e.g. name, address or email address) to ensure we adhere with such requests.
9.8 You may also seek advice relating to how this firm has processed your personal data from the Information Commissioners Office. They can be contacted on live chat via www.ico.org.uk or by telephone on 0303 123 1113.
Third party websites
10.1 Our website includes hyperlinks to, and details of, third party websites.
10.2 We have no control over, and are not responsible for, the privacy policies and practices of third parties and you should familiarise yourself with their policies before proceeding.
Other Information Uses
11.1 In the interests of security we may use closed circuit television (CCTV) at any of our premises; this can include the monitoring and collecting of visual images and/or sound. Please note that all recordings will remain our sole property and will only be shared with third parties for the process of maintaining security and crime prevention.
Updating information
12.1 Please let us know if the personal information that we hold about you needs to be corrected or updated.
Changes to Privacy Policy
13.1 Any future changes to our privacy policy will be posted to our website on this page, where appropriate we may also update you via email.
