Who is covered by this Policy?
All staff, volunteers, and service users (“you”) of Pregnancy Sickness Support, a UK registered charity. (“we or us”)
What is covered by this policy?
This privacy policy sets out how we use and protect any information that you give us when you use this website or request our services.
The Purpose
We are committed to ensuring that your privacy is protected. Should we ask you to provide certain information by which you can be identified when using this website, then you can be assured that it will only be used in accordance with this privacy statement.
The Policy
Personal information submitted through this website is collected by Pregnancy Sickness Support. Pregnancy Sickness Support is the data controller who determines the purpose and means of processing personal data.
The Data Protection Officer can be contacted by email: office@pregnancysicknesssupport.org.uk
The information we collect
Staff/Candidates
- Contact details
- Financial details
- Health data
- Employment data – including a reference/checking data, training data, employment/qualification experience, performance assessments, grievances and disciplinary data
Website Users
We may collect all or some of the following information:
- Contact Details
- Details that you share with us
- Computer’s IP address
Volunteers
- Contact details
- Training details
- Volunteer reason and relevant skills
- Two referee contact details
Beneficiaries/Peer Support Service Users
- Contact details
- Emergency contact details
- Health data
- Other data that you share with us
How we store personal data
‘Personal data’ means any information relating to an individual who can be identified, directly or indirectly by the information. Personal data that is received by either a beneficiary, or information that is given to us on behalf of a beneficiary is held on our private internal database in the United Kingdom. This is so our team can tailor information and support services to meet individual needs and communicate effectively. If we have multiple contacts with you, we will update your current record accordingly so we can continue to give the accurate support that is required.
Most of the personal information we process is provided to us directly by you, for one of the following reasons:
- Asking for information and support
- Utilising our peer support service
- Registering for the forum
- Registering for our healthcare professional training
- Becoming a volunteer for the charity
- Donating or fundraising for us
- Collaborating with us for media awareness
- Requesting leaflets and hospital packs
- Purchasing items available from our shop
Your information is securely stored on laptops and email used by the staff. If you use our peer support service, your information will be stored on the mobile phones of the staff and the volunteer(s) supporting you. Phones and laptops are password protected.
Why we collect this information?
We will not use any of the information that we collect from you, or about you, for any purpose other than those listed in this document. If we would like to use your personal data in any other way, we will seek your permission. We require this information to understand your needs and provide you with a better service, and in particular for the following reasons:
- To be able to respond to your contact and provide you with the specific information you need
- To follow up with you and see how you are progressing
- Keeping you up to date with the latest news at the charity via an email newsletter. You can unsubscribe at any time
- To match with a volunteer for peer support
- To reach out to your emergency contact if an emergency occurs to which you can’t give consent
- As per our Safeguarding Policy we will share your location and contact information if there is an immediate concern that an adult of child is suffering significant harm or is likely to do so and we need to report this immediately to the emergency services.
- Enable us to send out your purchased goods. We may share your details with a supplier in order for items to be sent directly to your home such as t shirts, hoodies etc As a charity we never sell personal data/information to any other organisation.
Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the lawful bases we rely on for processing this information are:
- Staff – contract/legitimate intent/UK legal obligations/occupational health
- Volunteers – consent/legitimate intent
- Service users – consent/legitimate intent/activities and exceptionally vital interest
Where our processing is based on consent, you have the right to withdraw your consent.
How long do we keep this information?
We retain your information until we have responded to your contact and for internal record keeping for the following amount of time:
Staff – 7 years after left employment.
Volunteers – whilst active and for 3 years after.
Beneficiaries – a period of no longer than 5 years.
Data may be kept longer if there is a valid legal basis.
Your rights
We will not sell, distribute, or lease your personal information to third parties unless we have your permission or are required by law.
You have several specific rights with regards to your personal information. You may choose to restrict the collection or use of your personal information in the following ways:
Right of access – if you want to know if we are storing or processing any personal data about you, you can contact us to find out. The Data Protection Officer can be contacted by email: office@pregnancysicknesssupport.org.uk
Right to correction – if you believe that any information we are holding on you is incorrect or incomplete, please contact us as soon as possible. We will promptly correct any information found to be incorrect.
Right to erasure – if you want to remove your personal data from our records, you can request this by contacting us. We will remove the data as far as it is practically within our power, and where we are not legally obliged to retain it.
Right to object – if you no longer want us to process your data you can request this by contacting us.
Right to restrict processing – if you have previously supplied personal data and/or you have previously agreed to us processing your personal information.
Right to complain – if you are unhappy with how we are managing your personal data please contact our Data Protection Officer on office@pregnancysicknesssupport.org.uk
If this does not resolve your complaint to your satisfaction, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioners Office on 03031231113 or via email https://ico.org.uk/global/contact-us/email/ or at the Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF, England.
Information Security
Where we have given you (or where you have chosen) a password, which enables you to access certain parts of our website you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share a password with anyone. We place a great importance on the security of all personally identifiable information associated with our service users. This includes policies, procedures and security features to ensure that information about you is treated securely and protected from unauthorised and unlawful access and used in accordance with this privacy policy. We have security measures in place to attempt to protect against the loss, misuse and alteration of personal data under our control. While we cannot guarantee that loss, misuse or alteration of data will not occur while it is under our control or being transferred, we use our best efforts to try to prevent this.
Cookies
A cookie is a small file which asks permission to be placed on your computer’s hard drive. Cookies help us see understand visitors to our website by tracking how you use our website, in a way that does not ever identify you personally. Cookies also allow web applications to respond to you as an individual, by allowing you to log in or add items to a shopping cart. The website can tailor its operations to your needs, likes and dislikes by gathering and remembering information about your preferences.
How do we use Cookies?
As most of the online services, our website uses cookies first party and third-party cookies for a number of purposes. The first-party cookies are mostly necessary for the website to function the right way, and they do not collect any of your personally identifiable data. The third-party cookies used on our websites are used mainly for understanding how the website performs, how you interact with our website, keeping our services secure, providing advertisements that are relevant to you, and overall providing you with a better and improved user experience and help speed up your future interactions with our website.
What types of Cookies do we use?
Essential: Some cookies are essential for you to be able to experience the full functionality of our site. They allow us to maintain user sessions and prevent any security threats. They do not collect or store any personal information.
Statistics: These cookies store information like the number of visitors to the website, the number of unique visitors, which pages of the website have been visited, the source of the visit etc. These data help us understand and analyse how well the website performs and where it needs improvement.
Marketing: Our website displays advertisements which are our own only.
Functional: These are the cookies that help certain non-essential functionalities on our website. These functionalities include embedding content like videos or sharing contents on the website on social media platforms.
Preferences: These cookies help us store your settings and browsing preferences like language preferences so that you have a better and efficient experience on future visits to the website.
You can choose to accept all cookies or chose your preferences.
Links to other websites
Our website may contain links to other websites of interest. However, once you have used these links to leave our site, you should note that we do not have any control over any other websites. Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting such sites and such sites are not governed by this privacy statement. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website you are visiting.
Third party
We use MailChimp to send newsletters via email. Read MailChimp’s privacy policy for more information. If you wish to unsubscribe, please email us at office@pregnancysicknesssupport.org.uk with the subject heading ‘Unsubscribe’.
We use a live web chat software on our website, this is provided by Click4Assistance, a third party UK based software company. Our support staff are focused on delivering information and responses to live chats.
Your data may also be available to our website provider, Iteracy, to enable us and them to deliver their service to us, carry out analysis and research on demographics, interests and behaviour of our users and supporters to help us gain a better understanding of them to enable us to improve our services. This may include connecting data we receive from you on the website to data available from other sources. Your personally identifiable data will only be used where it is necessary for the analysis required, and where your interests for privacy are not deemed to outweigh their legitimate interests in developing new services for us. In the case of this activity the following will apply:
- Your data will be made available to our website provider
- The data that may be available to them include any of the data we collect as described in this policy.
- Our website provider will not transfer your data to any other third party or transfer your data outside of the EEA.
- They will store your data for a maximum of 7 years.
- This processing does not affect your rights as detailed in this privacy policy.
Automated decision making
We do not use any form of automated decision making or profiling in our charity.
Social Media
Some individuals provide us with personal accounts of their experiences and/or feedback from the use of our services. We will ask if we can share these on our social media accounts and we will never share anything without prior consent. You have the right to say no or ask that we anonymise the post. Once this information has been shared on these digital platforms, whether to raise awareness, to advertise the charity or for funding purposes, it is impossible for this data to be recalled fully. There are always a chance people may have screenshot or downloaded the information.
Contact from outside the UK
We are a UK based charity and unfortunately only funded and insured to give information and support to those in the UK. We do not offer services to individuals residing outside of the UK.
We may change this policy from time to time by updating this page.
Last update 31/01/2023