Privacy and Data Protection Statement

Sheffield Royal Society for the Blind (SRSB) which also incorporates Cairn Home and Rotherham Sight & Sound (RSS), is committed to protecting your privacy. This policy explains how we collect and use the personal information you provide to us whether face to face, via phone, mobile, email, letter, online or any other method.

By accessing any of our services, providing us with any personal information or using our website we will assume you are agreeing to your information being used and disclosed in the ways described in this policy.

1. Who we are

SRSB is a UK registered charity (No. 1047257) which supports people with sight loss in Sheffield and sensory loss (sight and/or hearing loss) in Rotherham. We are registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office, Registration No: Z5026419

Our mission is to provide opportunity, support, friendship and services to blind and partially sighted people in Sheffield as well as people in Rotherham with a sensory impairment, helping them to achieve whatever they wish to do and whatever they aspire to be. We currently support over 4,000 local people with a range of visual/hearing impairments and work closely in partnership with local authorities, other local charities and a variety of support groups to provide the most appropriate support to suit each individual’s specific needs

2. Data Protection Act

In carrying out our day to day activities we process and store personal information relating to our service users, supporters, staff, volunteers and other contacts so we are therefore required to adhere to the Data Protection Act 1998. We take our responsibilities under this act very seriously and we ensure the personal information we obtain is held, used, transferred and otherwise processed in accordance with that Act and all other applicable data protection laws and regulations including, but not limited to, the Privacy and Electronic Communication Regulations.

3. What personal information do we collect?

Personal information is information that can be used to identify you. It can include your name, date of birth, email address, postal address, telephone number, mobile telephone number, bank account details, credit/debit card details etc. We collect personal information about you when you access any of our services, purchase products, ask about our activities, register with us (for example, to receive our email newsletters or for a publication), make a donation to us, register for an event, engage with our social media, or otherwise give us personal information.

We only collect “sensitive personal information” about you where there is a clear reason for doing so, such as providing services to our clients, where it is relevant for staff and volunteers and participation in an event where we need this information to ensure we provide appropriate facilities for you; however, we will make it clear to you when collecting this information as to what we are collecting and why.

If you do nothing other than read pages or download information from our website, we may gather information about this use, such as which pages are most visited and which events or activities are of most interest. This information can be used to help us improve our website and services and ensure we provide the best service.  Wherever possible, the information we use for this purpose will be aggregated or anonymised i.e. it will not identify you as an individual visitor to our website. 

4. Why do we collect and how do we use your information?

We may collect your personal information for a number of reasons, such as:

• to provide you with the services, products or information you have requested;
• to provide you with information about our work or our activities, that you have asked to receive;
• to send you the items you have ordered through our shop;
• to process any donation(s) we may receive from you;
• to ask you to help us raise money or donate money to our charity;
• to invite you to participate in surveys or research;
• for administration purposes e.g. we may contact you about a donation you have made or event you have expressed an interest in or registered for;
• for internal record keeping, such as the management of feedback or complaints;
• to analyse and improve the services we offer;
• the use of IP addresses to block disruptive use, to record website traffic or to personalise the way our information is presented to you to identify your approximate location;
• where it is required or authorised by law; and

We may contact you for marketing purposes by mail, e-mail, telephone, mobile telephone, text or social messaging; in some cases, this will require getting your permission. We may also send you service communications via e-mail, text or social posting, for example where you place an order for goods or services, or if you have made a donation by text.

It is your choice on the type of communications and information you receive about our charity and the ways in which you can get involved. You can change your mind at any time by contacting us.

5. The accuracy of your information

We aim to ensure that all information we hold about you is accurate and, where necessary, kept up to date. If any of the information we hold about you is inaccurate and either you advise us or we become otherwise aware, we will ensure it is amended and updated as soon as practical.

6. Under 16s

If you are aged 16 or under, and would like to access our services, participate in an event, make a donation or get involved with us in any way, please make sure that you have your parent/guardian’s permission before giving us your personal information. When we collect information about a child or young person, we will make it clear to the parent/guardian as to the reasons for collecting this information and how it will be used.

7. Credit, Debit card payment information

If you use your credit or debit card to make a payment to us for any reason we will ensure that this is done securely and in accordance with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard. Find out more information about PCI DSS standards by visiting the PCI website

We do not store your credit or debit card details at all, following the completion of your transaction. All card details and validation codes are securely destroyed once the payment or donation has been processed. Only those staff authorised to process payments will be able to see your card details. To process card payments we use third parties called Worldpay or Paypal. They may use, retain and disclose your personal information and credit card details for this purpose, including transferring your data outside of the European Economic Area (EEA). We would encourage you to study Worldpay’s and Paypal’s own privacy policies at the Worldpay website or the PayPal website

8. Our websites

Our websites use cookies to help them work well and to track information about how people are using them. More information on cookies can be found below.

For all areas of our website which collect personal information, we use a secure server. Although we cannot 100 per cent guarantee the security of any information you transmit to us, we enforce strict procedures and security features to protect your information and prevent unauthorised access.

Our website contains links to other websites belonging to third parties and we sometimes choose to participate in social networking sites including but not limited to Twitter and Facebook. We may also include content from sites such as these on our website; however, we must advise you that we do not have any control over the privacy practices of these other sites. You should make sure when you leave our site that you have read and understood that site’s privacy policy in addition to our own.

9. Cookies

SRSB uses “cookies” to help track the success of our online presence and monitor the usage of our website. We use Google Analytics for our web analytics.

With cookies the information we collect and share is anonymous and does not personally identify you. It does not contain your name, address, telephone number, or email address.

What is a cookie? A cookie is a small file of letters and numbers that may be put on your computer or mobile device when you access our website.  These cookies allow us to distinguish you from other users of the website helping us to provide you with a good experience when you browse our website and also allow us to improve our site. For example, they will tell us whether you have visited our site before or whether you are a new visitor.

To find out more about cookies and how you can disable them please have a look at All About Cookies

10. Information sharing and disclosure

We will not sell or swap your information with any third party.

We may share any relevant information with our data processors. These are trusted partner organisations that work with us in connection with our charitable purposes (subject to your communication preferences and our internal policies and procedures). All our trusted partners are required to comply with data protection laws and our high standards and are only allowed to process your information in strict compliance with our instructions. We will always make sure appropriate contracts and controls are in place and we regularly monitor all our partners to ensure their compliance.

We may disclose your personal information to third parties if we are required to do so through a contractual or legal obligation (for example to the police or a government body); to enable us to enforce or apply our terms and conditions or rights under an agreement; or to protect us, for example, in the case of suspected fraud or defamation.

We do not share your information for any other purposes.

11. Storing your information

We will keep your information for as long as required to enable us to operate our services but we will not keep your information for any longer than is necessary. We will take into consideration our legal obligations and tax and accounting rules when determining how long we should retain your information. When we no longer need to retain your information we will ensure it is securely disposed of, at the appropriate time.

Although most of the information we store and process stays within the UK, some information may be transferred to countries outside the EU area. This may occur if, for example, one of our trusted partner’s servers are located in a country outside the EU. These countries may not have similar data protection laws to the UK however, we will take steps with the aim of ensuring your privacy continues to be protected as outlined in this privacy policy.

12. Changes to the policy

This policy replaces all previous versions and is correct as of April 2018. We will regularly review and update this Privacy and Data Protection Statement and will update, modify, add or remove sections at our discretion.  Any changes will be notified to you either via e-mail or through an announcement on our website and your continued use of our website, any of our services and/or the continued provision of personal information after we have posted the changes to these terms will be taken to mean you are in agreement with those changes.

13. Your rights

You have the right to:

• request a copy of the information we hold about you;
• update or amend the information we hold about you if it is wrong;
• change your communication preferences at any time;
• ask us to remove your personal information from our records;
• object to the processing of your information for marketing purposes; or
• raise a concern or complaint about the way in which your information is being used.

If you wish to find out more about these rights, or obtain a copy of the information we hold about you, please contact us at:

Privacy Information Request
SRSB
5 Mappin Street
Sheffield
S1 4DT

Tel: 0114 272 2757

Email: privacy@srsb.org.uk

14. Privacy queries

If you have any questions or queries about this Privacy and Data Protection Statement, please contact our lead person for Data Protection using the above address and contact details.