Privacy Statement

The Living Room (TLR) is committed to protecting the privacy and security of your personal information. This privacy notice describes how we collect and use personal information about you during and after your working relationship with us, in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). It applies to all employees, workers, contractors, volunteers and donors.  

Personal information includes any information that identifies a person, such as name, address, email address, or telephone number.

The Charity recognises that your privacy is very important and so we want you to be confident with the way we handle your personal information. We have outlined in our Policy how the Charity collects, uses, discloses, and protects this information. Your data is protected under the Data Protection Act 1998.

Privacy Notice

Our privacy notice tells you what to expect when The Living Room collects personal information. Information we collect comes from these sources:

  1. Visitors to our website
  2. People who use our services
  3. People who donate to us, fundraise for us or support our events
  4. Current, prospective or former staff (including volunteers)

 We will comply with data protection law. This says that the personal information we hold about you must be:

  1. Used lawfully, fairly and in a transparent way.
  2. Collected only for valid purposes that we have clearly explained to you and not used in any way that is incompatible with those purposes.
  3. Relevant to the purposes we have told you about and limited only to those purposes.
  4. Accurate and kept up to date.
  5. Kept only as long as necessary for the purposes we have told you about.
  6. Kept securely.

How We Collect Information

The Charity receives and stores personal information provided by clients, employees, volunteers and donors supplied to us in writing, via email, via the telephone or via visits to our website, when making a job or volunteer application, enquiring or registering for help, or when donating money to The Living Room.

Anyone who emails us, via our website or another method may be monitored and used by us for reasons of security for monitoring compliance with office policy. Monitoring or blocking software may be used. Emails sent to us must comply with law and this is the sender’s responsibility.

We may also receive information about you from third parties, for example, a GP, a Welfare Officer, another charity, agency or other third party organisation who refers you to us.

How We Use Information

We may use the information we collect from you in any of the following ways:

  • We principally collect personal information so that we can provide you with the services, products or information you have requested, or to fulfil individual employment contracts with our employees or agreements with volunteers and to further our charitable aims, including for fundraising activities.
  • We may also use personal information such as your address, email address and telephone/mobile phone number to communicate with you, for example to provide information relating to our work or new developments or for customer satisfaction queries.
  • Contact details, including National Insurance numbers, will be used for security reasons so that we can verify your identity, where appropriate – for example for employment or for a volunteering role.
  • We may also use your personal information for internal administration, analyses and operational/service reviews.
  • If you have reason to complain, the file is shared with the investigating person and other specific individuals, only as appropriate. Only if you request anonymity will your investigation into the complaint be non-identifiable. We do not share who complained, but what the nature of the complaint is, may be shared with third parties as per contract terms and conditions.
  • If you have given us explicit permission to publish your details and images electronically or in printed publicity materials, our Marketing Manager may use these in the following ways:
  • Stories on our website
  • Social Media links, for example, Facebook and Twitter
  • Reports, including the Impact Report
  • Newsletters
  • Posters
  • Banners
  • Magazines
  • Written reports
  • Leaflets
  • Calendars
  • Flyers

Disclosure of Information

The Charity may share personal information, as necessary, with our service providers, agents or other relevant third parties so that we can provide the services you have asked for or to process your donations or to carry out any other obligations arising from any contract or agreement entered into between you and the Charity.

The Charity may also disclose personal information to other employees and/or volunteers including the Charity Trustees. The Charity does not permit these parties to use such information for any other purpose than to perform the services they have been instructed to provide by us.

We may also need to disclose your information if required to do so by law.

Disclosure of Information to Public Health England

The Charity may share information about our treatment programme with Public Health England (PHE), which works to protect and improve the health and well being of people across England, and to promote equal health outcomes for all.

As part of your drug or alcohol treatment you will be asked questions about you, your recovery so far, and whether you agree to some of this information being shared with PHE.

The information about your treatment which is shared with PHE is used to help understand more about which treatments work best. It is also used to help improve the way treatment services are provided in your local area.

*No information about you is ever shared with PHE without your permission and PHE will never share any information which could be used to identify you.

*If you would like to know more please visit www.ndtms.org.uk/info or speak to your treatment provider. You may ask PHE to remove any information it holds about you at any time.

Use of Cookies

We may on occasion gather information regarding your computer whilst you are on our website. This enables us to improve our services and to provide statistical information regarding the use of our website to our funders where appropriate.

Such information will not identify you personally it is statistical data about our visitors and their use of our site. This statistical data does not identify any personal details whatsoever.

Similarly to the above, we may gather information about your general internet use by using a cookie file.  Where used, these cookies are downloaded to your computer automatically. This cookie file is stored on the hard drive of your computer as cookies contain information that is transferred to your computer's hard drive. They help us to improve our website and the service that we provide to you.

All computers have the ability to decline cookies. This can be done by activating the setting on your browser which enables you to decline the cookies. Please note that should you choose to decline cookies, you may be unable to access particular parts of our website.

Your Consent

By providing us with your personal data, including sensitive personal data, such as information on your health, you consent to the collection and use of any information you provide in accordance with the above purposes and this privacy statement. Where we offer you services either directly or through a third party supplier, we will ask you for permission to use and/or share your information before we proceed.

Storage and Security of Personal Information

The Charity will use all reasonable endeavours to ensure that you provide personal information in a secure and confidential environment and when the information is no longer needed it will be destroyed or permanently rendered anonymous.

The information you have provided is for The Living Room Hertfordshire to deliver treatment services. Part of our statutory responsibility in providing drugs and alcohol treatment services is to comply with Public Health England national statistics collection where semi-anonymised data is gathered and submitted to the national drugs treatment monitoring service (NDTMS). 

Change of purpose

We will only use your personal information for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If we need to use your personal information for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis which allows us to do so.

How we use particularly sensitive personal information

"Special categories" of particularly sensitive personal information require higher levels of protection. We need to have further justification for collecting, storing and using this type of personal information. We may process special categories of personal information in the following circumstances:

1. In limited circumstances, with your explicit written consent.

2. Where we need to carry out our legal obligations and in line with our data protection policy.

3. Where it is needed in the public interest, such as for equal opportunities monitoring [or in relation to our occupational pension scheme], and in line with our [data protection policy.]

4. Where it is needed to assess your working capacity on health grounds, subject to appropriate confidentiality safeguards.

 

Less commonly, we may process this type of information where it is needed in relation to legal claims or where it is needed to protect your interests (or someone else's interests) and you are not capable of giving your consent, or where you have already made the information public. [We may also process such information about members or former members in the course of legitimate business activities with the appropriate safeguards.]

Right to withdraw consent

In the limited circumstances where you may have provided your consent to the collection, processing and transfer of your personal information for a specific purpose, you have the right to withdraw your consent for that specific processing at any time. To withdraw your consent, please contact the Data Protection Officer. Once we have received notification that you have withdrawn your consent, we will no longer process your information for the purpose or purposes you originally agreed to, unless we have another legitimate basis for doing so in law.

Data Protection Officer

We have appointed a data protection officer (DPO) to oversee compliance with this privacy notice. If you have any questions about this privacy notice or how we handle your personal information, please contact the DPO. You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues.

Controlling Your Personal Information

We only use your personal information for direct marketing purposes if we are allowed to do this by law, or if we have your consent. If you have previously agreed to us using your personal information for direct marketing purposes, you may change your mind at any time by writing to:

The Data Protection Officer, 8-10 The Glebe, Chells Way, Stevenage SG2 0DJ, or by emailing us at [email protected]

You may request details of personal information which we hold about you under the Data Protection Act 1998. If you would like a copy of the information held on you, please write to The Data Protection Officer as above.

If you believe that any information we are holding on you is incorrect or incomplete, please write to or email us as soon as possible, at the above address. We will promptly amend any information found to be incorrect.

Our Commitment to Data Security

To prevent unauthorised access, maintain data accuracy, and ensure the correct use of information, we have put in place appropriate physical, electronic, and managerial procedures to safeguard and secure the information we collect and store.

Examples: Our employees have defined responsibilities to manage personal data in our organisation. Our personal data recording systems are compliant and are reviewed regularly to ensure they maintain compliance. We use client numbers to pseudonymise records. We have robust systems around the collection and processing of children’s data.

Changes to this privacy notice

We reserve the right to update this privacy notice at any time, and we will provide you with a new privacy notice when we make any substantial updates. We may also notify you in other ways from time to time about the processing of your personal information.

If you have any questions about this privacy notice, please contact the Data Protection Officer, Susan Hudson.