Privacy policy

Privacy Notice

This privacy notice tells you how Research Quality Association (RQA) promises to look after your personal information, including:

• What you tell us about yourself
• What we learn about you.

This notice explains how we protect your information and tells you about your privacy rights and how the law protects you.

Our Privacy Promise

We promise:

• To keep your data safe and private
• Not to sell your data
• To give you ways to manage and review your marketing choices at any time

Data Protection law changed on the 25th May 2018

This privacy notice sets out most of your rights under the new laws. We will update it regularly when changes come into effect.

How the law protects you

As well as our Privacy Promise, your privacy is protected by law; this section explains how that works.

Data Protection law says that we are allowed to use personal information only if we have a proper reason to do so. This includes sharing it outside RQA. The law says we must have one or more of these reasons:

• To fulfil a contract, we have with you
• When it is our legal duty
• When it is in our legitimate interest
• When you consent to it.

A legitimate interest is when we have a business or commercial reason to use your information. But even then, it must not unfairly go against what is right and best for you.

Here is a list of all the ways that we may use your personal information, and which of the reasons we rely on to do so. This is also where we tell you what our legitimate interests are.

 

Groups of Personal Information

We use many different kinds of personal information and group them like this.

Types of personal information	Description
Contact	Contact details we have, and how to contact you.
Transactional	Details about payments.
Contractual	Details about the products or services we provide to you.
Locational	Data we get about where you are, such as may come from your mobile phone or the address where you connect a computer to the internet.
Behavioural	Details about how you use our products and services.
Technical	Details on the devices and technology you use.
Communications	What we learn about you from letters, emails, and conversations between us.
Open Data and Public Records	Information about you that is openly available on the internet.
Usage Data	Other data about how you use our products and services.
Consents	Any permissions, consents, or preferences that you give us. This includes things like how you want us to contact you.

Where we collect personal information from

We may collect personal information about you from these sources:

Data you give to us:

• When you buy our products and services
• When you talk to us on the phone
• When you use our websites, mobile device apps, or web chat
• In emails and letters
• In customer surveys
• When you take part in our competitions or promotions.

Data we collect when you use our services. This includes the amount, frequency, type, location, origin and recipients:

• Payment and transaction data. We use Opayo - a leader in online payment processing and security. Opayo offers the highest level of card data security (PCI DSS Level 1 compliant) so customers can book with peace of mind knowing they are protected against fraud. Your online payment is made directly with Opayo. Card details entered as part of the booking process, are input directly into a Opayoform presented on our web page. Your card details never enter or get stored in any of our systems. Upon successful authorisation of your payment, Opayo send us an authorisation "token" in place of the card details, which we store on our system. This let's us know that the payment has transacted correctly. They also provide us with the last 4 digits of your card and your expiry date (to allow us to advise on your account which card you used for payment). 
• Profile and usage data. This includes the profile you create to identify yourself when you connect to our internet, mobile and telephone services. It also includes other data about how you use those services. We gather this data from devices you use to connect to those services, such as computers and mobile phones, using cookies and other internet tracking software.

Data from third parties we work with:

• Companies that introduce you to us
• Social networks
• Market researchers
• Government and law enforcement agencies.

Who we share your personal information with

• HM Revenue & Customs, regulators and other authorities
• Companies and individuals that we introduce you to, such as course tutors
• Market researchers.

We may need to share your personal information with other organisations to provide you with the product or service you have chosen:

• If you use direct debits, we will share your data with the Direct Debit scheme.
• If you have registered for a training course, we will share your data with the course tutors.

How we use your information to make automated decisions

We sometimes use systems to make automated decisions based on personal information we have – or are allowed to collect from others – about you. This helps us to make sure our decisions are quick, fair, efficient and correct, based on what we know. These automated decisions can affect the products, services or features we may offer you now or in the future, or the price that we charge you for them.

Here are the types of automated decision we make:

Pricing

• We may decide what to charge for some products and services based on what we know.

Tailoring products and services

• We may place you in groups with similar customers. These are called customer segments. We use these to study and learn about our customers’ needs and to make decisions based on what we learn. This helps us to design products and services for different customer segments and to manage our relationships with them.

Sending data outside of the EEA

We will only send your data outside of the European Economic Area (‘EEA’) to:

• Follow your instructions
• Comply with a legal duty
• Work with our agents and collaborators.

If we do transfer information outside of the EEA, we will make sure that it is protected in the same way as if it was being used in the EEA.

We’ll use one of these safeguards:

• Transfer it to a non-EEA country with privacy laws that give the same protection as the EEA. Learn more on the European Commission Justice website
• Put in place a contract with the recipient that means they must protect it to the same standards as the EEA. Read more about this here on the European Commission Justice website
• Transfer it to organisations that are part of Privacy Shield. This is a framework that sets privacy standards for data sent between the US and EU countries. It makes sure those standards are similar to what is used within the EEA. You can find out more about data protection on the European Commission Justice website.

If you choose not to give personal information

We may need to collect personal information by law, or under the terms of a contract, we have with you.

If you choose not to give us this personal information, it may delay or prevent us from meeting our obligations. It may also mean that we cannot perform some services. It could mean that we cancel a product or service you have with us.

Any data collection that is optional would be made clear at the point of collection.

Marketing

We may use your personal information to tell you about relevant products and offers. This is what we mean when we talk about ‘marketing’.

The personal information we have for you is made up of what you tell us, and data we collect when you use our services, or from third parties, we work with.

We study this to form a view on what we think you may want or need, or what may be of interest to you. This is how we decide which products, services and offers may be relevant for you.

We can only use your personal information to send you marketing messages if we have either your consent or a ‘legitimate interest’. That is when we have a business or commercial reason to use your information. It must not unfairly go against what is right and best for you.

You can ask us to stop sending you marketing messages by changing your preferences on our website or contacting us.

We may ask you to confirm or update your choices if you purchase any products or services from us in future. We will also ask you to do this if there are changes in the law, regulation, or the structure of our business.

If you change your mind, you can update your choices at any time by changing your preferences on our website or by contacting us.

How long we keep your personal information

We may keep your data for up to 10 years for one of these reasons:

• To respond to any questions or complaints.
• To show that we treated you fairly.
• To maintain records according to rules that apply to us, such as VAT or tax.

We may keep your data for longer than 10 years if we cannot delete it for legal, regulatory or technical reasons. If we do, we will make sure that your privacy is protected and we only use it for those purposes.

How to get a copy of your personal information

You can access your personal information we hold by writing to us at this address:

RQA

3 Wherry Lane

Ipswich

Suffolk

IP4 1LG

info@therqa.com

When you want to share your data with outside companies

You also have the right to get certain personal information from us as a digital file, so you can keep and use it yourself, and give it to other organisations if you choose to.

If you wish, we will provide it to you in an electronic format that can be easily re-used, or you can ask us to pass it on to other organisations for you. If you want to do this, please contact us via email or write to us.

Letting us know if your personal information is incorrect

You have the right to question any information we have about you that you think is wrong or incomplete.

Please contact us if you want to do this.

If you do, we will take reasonable steps to check its accuracy and correct it.

What if you want us to stop using your personal information?

You have the right to object to our use of your personal information, or to ask us to delete, remove, or stop using your personal information if there is no need for us to keep it. This is known as the ‘right to object’ and ‘right to erasure’, or the ‘right to be forgotten’.

There may be legal or other official reasons why we need to keep or use your data. But please tell us if you think that we should not be using it.

We may sometimes be able to restrict the use of your data. This means that it can only be used for certain things, such as legal obligations. In this situation, we would not use or share your information in other ways while it is restricted.

You can ask us to restrict the use of your personal information if:

• It is not accurate
• It has been used unlawfully, but you don’t want us to delete it
• It not relevant anymore, but you want us to keep it for use in legal claims
• You have already asked us to stop using your data, but you are waiting for us to tell you if we are allowed to keep on using it.

If you want to object to how we use your data or ask us to delete it or restrict how we use it or, please contact us.

How to withdraw your consent

You can withdraw your consent at any time. Please contact us if you want to do so.

How to complain

If you withdraw your consent, we may not be able to provide specific products or services to you. If this is so, we will tell you.

Please let us know if you are unhappy with how we have used your personal information. You can contact us using our website.

You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office. Find out on their website how to report a concern.

Cookies

RQA is committed to protecting you and any data (anonymous or otherwise) that we collect about you online. This section tells you how we use cookies, why, and how this allows us to improve our service. It also shows you how you can manage what cookies are stored on your device. We call it our "Cookies Policy".

By using our websites (through any device) you agree that this Cookies Policy applies to that use in addition to any other terms and conditions which may apply.

We reserve the right to make changes to our Cookie Policy. Any such changes shall appear here and become effective immediately. Your continued use of our websites is taken as meaning that you agree to any such changes. 

Cookies are files containing small amounts of information which are downloaded to the device you use when you visit a website. Cookies are then sent back to the originating website on each subsequent visit, or to another website that recognises that cookie. Cookies do lots of different and useful jobs, such as remembering your preferences and generally improving your online experience.

There are different types of cookies. They all work in the same way, but have minor differences:

Session cookies

Session cookies last only for the duration of your visit and are deleted when you close your browser. These facilitate various tasks such as allowing a website to identify that a user of a particular device is navigating from page to page, supporting website security or basic functionality.

Many of the cookies we use are session cookies. For example, they help us to ensure the security of your booking session, and can also keep you logged in to our website while you move between pages.

Persistent cookies

Persistent cookies last after you have closed your browser, and allow a website to remember your actions and preferences. Sometimes persistent cookies are used by websites to provide targeted advertising based upon the browsing history of the device.

RQA uses persistent cookies in a few ways, for example, to remember your username for log in so you don’t have to.  We also use persistent cookies to allow us to analyse visits to our site. These cookies help us to understand how visitors arrive at and use our site so we can improve our services.

First and third party cookies

Whether a cookie is a first or third party cookie depends on which website the cookie comes from. First party cookies are those set by, or on behalf of, the website visited. All other cookies are third party cookies. We use both first party and third party cookies.

Strictly necessary cookies

These cookies are essential to enable you to move around the website and use its features and ensuring the security of your experience. Without these cookies services you have asked for, such as applying for products and managing your accounts, cannot be provided. These cookies don’t gather information about you for marketing purposes.

Performance cookies

These cookies collect information about how visitors use a website, for instance, which pages visitors go to most often, and if they get error messages from web pages. These cookies don't collect information that identifies a visitor although they may obtain the IP address of the device used to access the site. All information these cookies collect is anonymous and is only used to improve how a website works, the user experience and to optimise our advertising. By using our websites, you agree that we can place these types of cookies on your device. However, you can block these cookies using your browser settings.

Functionality cookies

These cookies allow the website to remember choices you make (such as your username). The information these cookies collect is anonymised (i.e. it does not contain your name, address etc.) and they do not track your browsing activity across other websites. By using our websites, you agree that we can place these types of cookies on your device. However, you can block these cookies using your browser settings.

Targeting cookies

These cookies collect several pieces of information about your browsing habits. They are usually placed by advertising networks. They remember that you have visited a website and this information is shared with other organisations such as media publishers. These organisations do this to provide you with targeted adverts more relevant to you and your interests. This type of advertising is called online behavioural advertising and place an icon in the top right-hand corner of an advert. This icon when clicked will take you through to the website Your Online Choices where there is more help and guidance for you to Opt-out of this type of advertising. You can block these cookies using your browser settings. By using our websites, you agree that we can place these types of cookies on your device.

If you wish to restrict or block the cookies which are set by any website - including RQA websites, you should do this through the web browser settings for each web browser you use, on each device you use to access the Internet.

Please be aware that some of our services, will not function if your web browser does not accept cookies. However, you can allow cookies from specific websites by making them "trusted websites" in your web browser.

Alternatively, you may wish to visit www.allaboutcookies.org which contains comprehensive information on how to do this on a wider range of browsers.

Research Quality Association, Registered in England and Wales No. 3320040.

Registered Office: 3 Wherry Lane, Ipswich, Suffolk, IP4 1LG, England.

Privacy Notice v: 9 May 2018