Privacy Notice

Who is this privacy notice for

This Privacy Notice applies to information we collect about you as a business owner or representative when you interact with HR Consulting Kent Ltd, whether that be engaging our services, taking part in training events, or signing up to receive our newsletter. It explains what personal information may be collected and how we use it.

Who we are

HR Consulting Kent Ltd is a company registered in England (company number 16350307). A UK-based HR specialist consultancy with over 20 years’ experience in the sector offering tailored HR services to local and national businesses. We are committed to protecting data shared with us and complying with data protection law to its fullest extent. This Privacy Notice explains how we use and protect personal information, to show that we are adhering to the DPA 2018 and UK GDPR, and the Privacy and E-Communications Regulations in respect of marketing compliance.

The DPA 2018 and UK GDPR requires every organisation that processes personal information to be registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). Our registration number is ZC038398 and you can find us on the Information Commissioner’s register and search for us by using our registration number.

How to contact us

If you have any questions about how your personal information is used, please contact our director: Lyndsey Moore by emailing: info@hrconsultingkent.co.uk

Our registered business address is: The Business Terrace, King Street, Maidstone, Kent, ME15 6JQ

What Personal Information do we collect about you and how can we use this lawfully

The following sections explain the types of data we collect and the legal basis, under current data protection legislation, on which this data is processed. Most of the information we process is provided to us directly by you for one of the following reasons:

• A Service Enquiry including providing proposals and quotes for services
• Event participation
• Administering your account with us
• Invoicing and financial transactions
• Collecting client reviews to evaluate and promote our services
• Receiving relevant and proportionate marketing content
• Limited analytics on our web traffic
• Legal compliance and financial audit purposes.

Services enquiry – If you enquire about our services, we will collect your name, email address, postal address, and telephone number.

This will be collected either via the website, email, or telephone depending on your preferred contact method. As it is necessary for us to collect that data to enable us to respond to your enquiry in the way you would expect, we have a legitimate interest in processing that data. You can request for your information to be deleted at any time; however, we might not be able to provide you with our services or a reply if you request deletion of your information.

Services commission and provision – If you commission our services, we will be entering into a contractual relationship with you, and this is our legal basis for processing your information. We will collect your details as above to enable us to fulfil our contractual obligations towards you. We also will process limited financial details for the purpose of invoicing and financial transactions.

When acting as an outsourced HR department for our clients, we process the personal data of their staff on their behalf and in accordance with their instructions. In this context, we act as a data processor and do not determine the purposes or means of processing. Our role is limited to providing HR services under a written agreement that sets out our responsibilities and obligations, including compliance with data protection law.

As a data processor, we provide the following services which may mean we access our clients’ staff data in respect of:

• Recruitment and onboarding of new staff (including CVs)
• Providing advice and guidance
• Compliance and employee relations, including performance monitoring, health related issues and right to work in the UK
• Managing casework in respect of disciplinary and grievance cases, and redundancy
• Benefit reviews
• Providing referrals in respect of pensions advice and guidance.

After engaging our services, we may send you a short feedback form. The information you provide will only be used to improve our services and, where you have agreed, to promote our products and services to potential clients via our website and social media channels.

Training – where we provide training services, the lawful basis for processing client data is typically performance of a contract, as the data is necessary to deliver the agreed training. If you have attended one of our events, we may send you marketing related to similar services. We may rely on the soft opt-in under PECR, provided your details were obtained during the sale or negotiation of the training sign-up or purchase, the marketing relates to similar services, and a clear opportunity to opt out is offered at the point of data collection and in every communication. This approach ensures compliance while supporting our legitimate business development.

Website traffic analytics – We use Google Analytics to monitor website traffic. This helps us understand how you interact with our website, measure the effectiveness of our website, and improve user experience. When you accept cookies on our website, you are consenting to the cookie being deployed. We consider it is our legitimate interest to understand the nature of your engagement if you accept cookies. For more details on the cookies we use please see our cookie consent management product which details the cookies deployed and allows you to manage your preferences.

Types of information

The types of information that we may collect or hold about you are:

• Where you have contracted our services, we will hold your contact details including your name, email address, and phone number (mobile and occasionally landline)
• Where it differs from the billing address, we may hold the service delivery address
• For service enquiries, we will simply hold your name, email address, and phone number
• For marketing purposes we may hold your name, contact details including email, and communication preferences
• We cannot identify individuals from our web analytics data, although Google Analytics captures such aspects as date and time of visits, pages visited and scrolled, and outbound clicks and Google may use this data for their own targeted marketing or remarketing.

Sources of information

Your information may be sourced directly from you when you contact us. This information will be captured from enquiries and requests for services details.

Legal basis for communications

Where we send marketing emails, we will only contact you:
(a) where you are an existing customer, or have expressed an interest in our services, and our communications may be of specific relevance to you (Legitimate Interest); or
(b) where you have signed up to receiving our newsletter from us (Consent)

You may unsubscribe at any time via the link at the bottom of any marketing email from us, or by contacting us at info@hrconsultingkent.co.uk

Who may we share your information with

We, like many businesses, work in partnership with a number of third-party suppliers:

Mailchimp privacy notice here, Freeagent privacy notice here, On the Spot privacy notice here.

Outside of our contracted suppliers we will only share your information where we may be legally required to do so.

How long do we keep your data?

We take the principles of data minimisation seriously and ensure that we only ever ask for the minimum amount of data for the associated purpose and delete that data once it is no longer required.

• Where we send you marketing information, we will keep you on our marketing database (Mailchimp) indefinitely. If you unsubscribe, we will retain your information as a suppressed contact to ensure you receive no further marketing from us.
• We have long-term relationships with many of our customers, who often return to us on a repeat basis. We therefore maintain customer details on our database for the life of a contract with us plus seven years, to provide the best possible customer experience to our customers.
• Where we act as a data processor to a client, the client sets retention periods for us to abide by.

Security

We ensure that your contact information is kept safe and secure and appropriate technical and organisational security measures are in place to protect the limited amount of identifiable data that we do hold. This includes (but is not limited to): robust password protection and MFA (multi-factor authentication) for access to devices, anti-malware and anti-spam filters.

Where we outsource data processing, we ensure that robust and appropriate contracts are in place and of course, we excel at exacting rigorous due diligence on our suppliers.

Rights you have over your data

You have a number of rights under UK data protection law. These are listed below, along with our contact details, should you wish to make a request.

• Informed: You have the right to be informed about how we handle your personal data.  This privacy statement is one of the ways we do this.
• Access: You have the right to ask for a copy of the personal data we hold about you and the purposes for which we are using it. ‘Personal data’ is any information which can directly, or indirectly, identify you.
• Rectification: You have the right to ask us to change any details that we hold which are incorrect, inaccurate or need updating.
• Erasure (known as the ‘right to be forgotten’): You have the right to ask us to delete your personal details under certain circumstances. We will assess any deletion request on a case-by-case basis. If you subscribe to our email list, we can quickly fulfil your request, but in other circumstances there may be reasons why we need to keep information about you.
• Object: You have the absolute right to object to receiving direct marketing from us.  You also have the right to raise an objection about how we are handling your personal information.
• Restriction: You have the right to ask us to restrict or suppress your personal information. This would mean we’d store it but not use it.
• Portability: You have the right to obtain and reuse your personal data for your own purposes across different services.  Due to the nature of our organisation, we do not believe this right is likely to apply.

Please note: where we act as a data processor to a client and you wish to enact a data protection right, please direct your request to your employer’s data protection lead and not HR Consulting Kent. We are unable to engage directly without the explicit agreement of your employer.

You also have the right to make a complaint if you believe we have not handled your information appropriately. We would prefer that you contact us in the first instance so we can discuss your concerns and put things right, but you also have the right to escalate your concerns at any time to the UK Regulator (The Information Commissioner’s Office) by contacting them here

If you would like to access the rights listed above, or any other legal rights you have over your data under current legislation, please get in touch with us by emailing at: info@hrconsultingkent.co.uk

Marketing

E-mail and marketing campaigns

HR Consulting Kent Ltd issues periodic offers to customers who have engaged with us or expressed an interest in our products or services. You may unsubscribe at any time by simply hitting the unsubscribe link in the email.

Social Media Advertising

HR Consulting Kent Ltd does not undertake paid advertising on social media platforms. You may come across us naturally, however, in your newsfeed as we post regularly about our products and services.

Cookies

Our site uses very few cookies, but we do utilise Google Analytics to track engagement with our websites. We will always ask for your Consent before deploying non-essential cookies to your devices via our Cookie Management Platform – CookieYes.

Our promise to you

• We will keep your information secure and confidential.
• We do not spam you with marketing although we do send marketing emails from time to time – you are in control of how we communicate with you – you can opt in or out or change your preferences at any time through the ‘unsubscribe’ link at the bottom of any marketing email received.
• We will not sell your data to a third party.
• We will not share your data with a third party save for our contracted.
• We know how to manage your information appropriately and in line with legal and regulatory requirements.