PRIVACY NOTICE

Introduction

Simply Conveyancing is the collective name of a group of companies comprising:

• Simply Conveyancing Property Lawyers Limited
• Simply Conveyancing Panel Management Limited
• Simply Green Energy Services Limited
• Simply Conveyancing Property Lawyers (East) Limited

All of the above entities are registered with the UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office as separate controllers of personal data and we describe below the types of processing that may be undertaken by each (see section (6)). All of the companies in our Group share the common intention to treat your personal data with care and to respect your privacy and rights as a data subject.

In this Notice we explain how we collect your personal data and for what purpose, as well as other forms of processing we might apply to your personal data – such as using, storing, sharing, monitoring and analysing.

It is important that you read this notice carefully. This notice was published 8th July 2023 when it was updated to provide more detailed clarification about our processing practices. Previous notices are available on request.

1. What is personal data?

Personal data is generally accepted to mean information relating to natural living persons who can be identified or are identifiable directly from the information or from the information in combination with other information. This is the definition we have adopted for the purpose of this notice.

2. The data we collect about you

We may collect and process:

• Identity Data which will include first name, maiden name, last name, username or similar identifier, marital status, title, date of birth and gender, national insurance number, passport number, driving licence number (or other official document identification number). Identity Data may also include reference to the company you work for, your job role and your relationship to another individual or entity.
• Contact Data includes your residential addresses – due to the nature of our services, this could include your past, current and future residential address. Contact Data will also include a your email address(es) and telephone number(s).
• Financial Data is information relating to your payment and banking methods and will typically include your billing address, bank details (including statements and account numbers) and the identity of any joint account holders.
• Transaction Data includes details about payments to and from you and other details of products and services you have purchased from us.
• Profile and Usage Data includes internet protocol (IP) address, your login data and profile information (including passwords), your browser type and version, time zone setting and location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform, and other technology on the devices you use to access our website and software. We may also process information about how you use our website and software solutions (desktop and application) including the services you viewed or searched for, the length and frequency of your visits, how you interacted with a page and details of any content you downloaded. For further information about the automated way in which we collect this sort of personal data, you should refer to our Cookies Notice..
• Marketing and Communications Data includes your communication preferences as well as any explicit consents you have given for marketing purposes.
• Documentary Data includes details about you stored in documents of different formats, or copies of them.
• Attendance Data includes information relating to any visits you have made to our locations or any instances we might have visited you. Typically this will include your name and signature in our sign-in books along with the time and date of your visit and the details of any car you have parked in our car park.
• Aggregated Data includes statistical or demographic data for any purpose. Aggregated Data could be derived from your personal data but is not considered personal data as this data will not directly or indirectly reveal your identity. For example, we may aggregate your Profile and Usage Data to calculate the percentage of users accessing a specific website feature. However, if we combine or connect Aggregated Data with your personal data so that it can directly or indirectly identify you, we treat the combined data as personal data which will be used in accordance with this notice.

Sensitive personal data is information revealing racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade-union membership, genetic data, biometric data processed solely to identify a human being, health-related data, and data concerning a person's sex life or sexual orientation. This is not a category of personal data we routinely collect or require.

Our services are not intended for children and we do not routinely collect or process personal data relating to children.

If you think you have disclosed sensitive personal data or personal data relating to children to us by mistake please let us know immediately.

You should be aware that we may record our telephone calls or video conferences with you. These may be recorded without prior notice in order to record evidence of an exchange, to review quality standard, to ensure compliance with regulations, to prevent / detect a crime, or to investigate the misuse of our telecommunications system. Where we do make recordings we will process information about your imagery and voice, which are both forms of personal data. We may also include samples of your signature or handwriting where you have signed documentation or completed forms. You should be aware that our calls made be recorded without.

3. How we collect your personal data:

We will collect personal data from a number of different sources and in a number of different ways including:

• Direct interactions with you where you contact us to seek legal advice or use any of our services. These interactions may also include any instance you request marketing material to be sent to you or you create a profile on a software solution provided by us.
• Automated technologies or interactions such as when you interact with our website, we will automatically collect Profile and Usage Data and Transactional Data.

We may also receive your personal data from third parties or publicly available sources. For example, we will typically (although not exclusively) receive your Contact Data and Identity Data from our referral partners to whom you have given your consent to share your personal data with us (estate agent referrals). Third party sources will also include the provider of our anti-money laundering screening solution provider from whom we will receive your Identity Data. Further we will receive Profile and Usage data from our analytics providers including Google Analytics and Twitter.

Publicly available sources will include public repositories and data bases (such as Companies House) as well as social media platforms (such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram).

Finally, we may receive your Contact Data, Financial Data and Transaction Data from providers of technical, payment and delivery services such as Banks and Building Societies, and card processing companies.

4. If you fail to provide personal data:

Where we need to collect personal data by law or under the terms of a contract we have with you, and you fail to provide that data when requested, we may not be able to perform the contract we have or are trying to enter into with you. In this case, we may have to cancel a product or service you have with us but we will notify you if this is the case at the time.

5. How we use your personal data

We will only use your personal data when the law allows us to. Most commonly, we will use your personal data in the following circumstances:

Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you.

This will include providing you with a quote for our services and incepting you as a client. It will also include administration of your personal data in order to process your payments, billing and collection.

Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests.

This will include the internal tasks we need to undertake to manage our relationship with you and administer our business such as:

• Adhering to our accounting and auditing requirements;

• Analysing your real and digital interactions with us in order to improve our services and communications, and to detect and prevent security threats against our systems (including fraud) and to monitor our compliance with our legal and regulatory obligations;
• To send you marketing materials about products or services we believe would be of interest to you because they relate to our previous interactions with you; and
• For satisfy the requirements of our insurers and regulators, and to exercise or defend our legal rights or comply with court orders.

Where we need to comply with a legal obligation.

The Simply Conveyancing Group is a group of limited companies some of which are regulated for the provision of legal services. The companies within the Group have a collective responsibility to maintain records of processing and including records of breaches, data flows and consents given.

The companies who are regulated for the provision of legal services are obliged to initiate and process background checks for anti-money laundering purposes. We use Equifax and Thirdfort to administer our anti-money laundering checks which necessitates a mutual sharing of personal data between Simply Conveyancing Property Lawyers Limited / Simply Conveyancing Property Lawyers (East) Limited and Thirdfort. You can find details about how Thirdfort process your personal data at:

https://www.thirdfort.com/privacy/

https://www.equifax.co.uk/About-us/Privacy_policy.html

Consent

We do not rely on your consent to process your personal data for any instance other than for sharing it with a third party who intends to send you marketing material of their own. If you have previously consented to your personal data being shared for this reason and now wish to withdraw that consent, please contact us using the details listed below.

6. How each company within the Simply Conveyancing Group processes personal data

Each company within the Group will process personal data in a slightly different way. Even so, each company will still adhere to the terms of this Privacy Notice.

Simply Conveyancing Property Lawyers Limited | Simply Conveyancing Property Lawyers (East) Limited

These companies are both regulated by the Council for Licensed Conveyancing for the provision of conveyancing services in England and Wales. Personal data will be processed for the purpose of a conveyancing transaction and this will include sharing milestones of a transaction with Simply Conveyancing Panel Management Limited, estate agents, mortgage providers and authorities including HM Land Registry and HMRC. These companies may also share your personal data with Simply Green Energy Services Limited for the production of an Energy Performance Certificate.

These companies will receive personal data from Simply Conveyancing Panel Management Limited, from direct interactions or via estate agent referrals as described above.

Simply Conveyancing Panel Management Limited

This company acts as the sales and technical support function of the Simply Conveyancing Group. It owns and operates our online portals (such as eConvey) which it licences to the other companies within the Group. It also helps the regulated companies and Simply Green Energy Services Limited to manage their customer relationships by providing quotations for work, guides for clients and up-dates on transactional milestones. This company will collect personal data from direct interactions or estate agent referrals or automated technologies or interactions and third parties or publicly available sources as described above.

Simply Green Energy Services Limited

This company provides Energy Performance Certificates in relation to residential properties in England and Wales. It will receive personal data from Simply Conveyancing Panel Management Limited, Simply Conveyancing Property Lawyers Limited, Simply Conveyancing Property Lawyers (East) Limited, from direct interactions or via estate agent referrals as described above. It will share personal data with assessors with whom our Group has partnered with for the provision of an Energy Performance Certificate and may also share information (such as milestones of your transaction) with other companies within the Simply Conveyancing Group.

7. Sharing your personal data

We may also share your personal data:

• With services providers we have retained for the provision (to us) of legal services, insurance brokering services, accountancy services, and IT and system administration services; or

• With service providers who are assisting us in hosting an event;
• With HM Revenue & Customs, regulatory supervisory authorities and our insurance providers; or
• With third parties to whom we may choose to sell, transfer or merge parts of our business or our assets. Alternatively, we may seek to acquire other businesses or merge with them. If a change happens to our business, then the new owners may use your personal data in the same way as set out in this notice.

We require all third parties to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We do not allow our third-party service providers to use your personal data for their own purposes and only permit them to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.

8. Marketing

We take our obligation to use your personal data respectfully very seriously and we will only send you marketing material about products or services that we think are of interest to you. In order to do this, we use your Identity Data, Contact Data, Usage and Profile data and your Transactional Data to decide what material to send to you and how frequently.

We rely on “soft opt-in” to send you marketing material by email or text message. This will not apply if you have specifically opted out of receiving marketing from us. You have the right to request that you are not marketed to at any time by contacting us:

9. International transfers of personal data

We may transfer your personal data outside of the United Kingdom. This is known as an international transfer or a restricted transfer. We transfer personal data collected through our cookie consent tool on our websites to Ireland, and personal data collected through Google Analytics to the United States of America. Ireland is considered “adequate” by the United Kingdom’s Information Commissioner which means the personal data is considered as safe and secure in Ireland as it would be in the United Kingdom.

The United States is not considered “adequate” meaning we require your consent to process personal data collected through Google Analytics. You will have given or declined to give consent immediately upon accessing our website(s). To opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites, visit http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout

10. Data Retention

We will only retain your personal data for as long as reasonably necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or reporting requirements. We may retain your personal data for a longer period in the event of a complaint or if we reasonably believe there is a prospect of litigation in respect to our relationship with you.

To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, we consider the amount, nature and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which we process your personal data and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or other requirements.

We are required to keep your personal information for up to 15 years in order to satisfy the legal and regulatory obligations that apply to our business. Where we are required to keep your personal information for this length of time we will redact the personal data to the absolute minimum and ensure your privacy is protected and only use it for those purposes.

11. Your legal rights

Under certain circumstances, you have rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data. You have the right to:

• Request access to your personal data (commonly known as a "data subject access request"). This enables you to receive a copy of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.
• Request correction of the personal data that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate data we hold about you corrected, though we may need to verify the accuracy of the new data you provide to us.
• Request erasure of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal data where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have successfully exercised your right to object to processing (see below), where we may have processed your information unlawfully or where we are required to erase your personal data to comply with local law. Note, however, that we may not always be able to comply with your request of erasure for specific legal reasons which will be notified to you, if applicable, at the time of your request.
• Object to processing of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this ground as you feel it impacts on your fundamental rights and freedoms. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal data for direct marketing purposes. In some cases, we may demonstrate that we have compelling legitimate grounds to process your information which override your rights and freedoms.
• Request restriction of processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of your personal data in the following scenarios:
• o If you want us to establish the data's accuracy.
• o Where our use of the data is unlawful but you do not want us to erase it.
• o Where you need us to hold the data even if we no longer require it as you need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.
• Request the transfer of your personal data to you or to a third party. We will provide to you, or a third party you have chosen, your personal data in a structured, commonly used, machine-readable format. Note that this right only applies to automated information which you initially provided consent for us to use or where we used the information to perform a contract with you.
• Withdraw consent at any time where we are relying on consent to process your personal data. However, this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdraw your consent. If you withdraw your consent, we may not be able to provide certain products or services to you. We will advise you if this is the case at the time you withdraw your consent.

If you wish to exercise any of the rights set out above, please contact us via email dpo@simplyconveyancing.co.uk or by writing to us at Data Protection Department, Simply Conveyancing Property Lawyers, 3 Caxton Close, Daventry, Northants, NN11 8RT

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we could refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. We may also contact you to ask you for further information in relation to your request to speed up our response.

We try to respond to all legitimate requests within one month. Occasionally it could take us longer than a month if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests. In this case, we will notify you and keep you updated.

You should be aware that we may redact or remove personal data or information from documentation disclosed to you as part of a data subject request. When considering our response to a data subject request, we will assess whether there are any exemptions to fulfilling the request or whether full disclosure would constitute a breach of our duty of confidentiality to our clients.

Complaints about how we handle your personal data

If you have any comments, concerns or complaints about how we are handling your personal data, we hope that you feel comfortable enough to raise them with us in the first instance. You should contact:

Ultimately, you may complain directly to the Information Commissioner’s Office whose details can be found online at: https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/

You can contact them by calling 0303 123 1113.