Privacy and Cookie Policy
About this policy
Who should read this policy: Everyone who accesses our website at www.patelconsulting.co.uk (Website) including customers of our business, prospective customers, or if you are an alternative business contact, such as a supplier or service provider to our business.
What is covered: This policy sets out what information we collect about you, what we use it for and who we share it with. It also explains your rights and what to do if you have any concerns about your personal data.
Who to contact about this notice: If you have any questions about this privacy policy, how we handle your personal data or you are looking to exercise one of your rights, please contact: [email protected].
Latest updates: This policy was last updated on 17 January 2023. We may sometimes need to update this policy to reflect changes to the way we provide our services or to comply with updates to data protection law. Where possible, we will notify you of any substantive changes but please check back regularly to see whether any changes have occurred.
Who checks this policy is enforced: The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is the UK regulator and is responsible for checking that businesses comply with UK Data Protection Law.
1. About us
We are Patel Consulting (Tech) Limited, registered in England and Wales with company number 09286554 whose registered address is 5 Churchill Court Ground Floor, 58 Station Road, North Harrow, Middlesex, United Kingdom, HA2 7SA (we / us /our).
If you visit our Website or contact us about our services we are the controller of your information (which means we decide what information we collect and how it is used). We are registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK regulator for data protection matters, under number ZB292027.
If you have any questions about this privacy notice or the way that we use information, please get in touch using the following details:
Email address: [email protected]
Postal address: 5 Churchill Court Ground Floor, 58 Station Road, North Harrow, Middlesex, United Kingdom, HA2 7SA
If you are a website visitor or a key contact working for an existing or prospective Patel Consulting customer, Patel Consulting is the controller for your information (which means we decide what information we collect and how it is used). Key contacts are individuals that we identify as a decision maker within the customer organisation, including the person who initially contacts us.
If we have access to your information while we are providing services to a customer, Patel Consulting is a processor of your information and our customer is the controller (which means we must follow the instructions they give us).
2. Information we collect about you
Personal data means any information which does (or could be used to) identify a living person. We have grouped together the types of personal data that we collect and where we receive it from below:
Who should read this policy: Everyone who accesses our website at www.patelconsulting.co.uk (Website) including customers of our business, prospective customers, or if you are an alternative business contact, such as a supplier or service provider to our business.
What is covered: This policy sets out what information we collect about you, what we use it for and who we share it with. It also explains your rights and what to do if you have any concerns about your personal data.
Who to contact about this notice: If you have any questions about this privacy policy, how we handle your personal data or you are looking to exercise one of your rights, please contact: [email protected].
Latest updates: This policy was last updated on 17 January 2023. We may sometimes need to update this policy to reflect changes to the way we provide our services or to comply with updates to data protection law. Where possible, we will notify you of any substantive changes but please check back regularly to see whether any changes have occurred.
Who checks this policy is enforced: The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is the UK regulator and is responsible for checking that businesses comply with UK Data Protection Law.
1. About us
We are Patel Consulting (Tech) Limited, registered in England and Wales with company number 09286554 whose registered address is 5 Churchill Court Ground Floor, 58 Station Road, North Harrow, Middlesex, United Kingdom, HA2 7SA (we / us /our).
If you visit our Website or contact us about our services we are the controller of your information (which means we decide what information we collect and how it is used). We are registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK regulator for data protection matters, under number ZB292027.
If you have any questions about this privacy notice or the way that we use information, please get in touch using the following details:
Email address: [email protected]
Postal address: 5 Churchill Court Ground Floor, 58 Station Road, North Harrow, Middlesex, United Kingdom, HA2 7SA
If you are a website visitor or a key contact working for an existing or prospective Patel Consulting customer, Patel Consulting is the controller for your information (which means we decide what information we collect and how it is used). Key contacts are individuals that we identify as a decision maker within the customer organisation, including the person who initially contacts us.
If we have access to your information while we are providing services to a customer, Patel Consulting is a processor of your information and our customer is the controller (which means we must follow the instructions they give us).
2. Information we collect about you
Personal data means any information which does (or could be used to) identify a living person. We have grouped together the types of personal data that we collect and where we receive it from below:
| Types of Personal Data | Received from |
|---|---|
| Identity Data – your first and last name or title. | You |
| Contact Data – your email address, telephone numbers | You |
| Customer Data – any information about you on our customers’ systems, if they have provided us with admin or super-admin access rights in order to provide our services to them | Our customers |
| Feedback – information and responses you provide when completing surveys and questionnaires | You |
| Technical Data - internet protocol (IP) address, browser type and version, time zone setting and generic location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform on the devices you use to access our systems | You (via cookies and other similar technologies) |
| Usage Data - information about how you use our systems | You (via cookies and other similar technologies) |
3. How we use your information
Under UK data protection law, we need a legal reason (known as a lawful basis) for holding, collecting and using your personal data. There are 6 main legal reasons which organisations can rely on. The most relevant are:
- to enter into and perform our contract with you;
- pursue our legitimate interests (our justifiable business aims) but only if those interests are not outweighed by your other rights and freedoms (e.g. your right to privacy);
- to comply with a legal obligation that we have;
- where you have consented to us using your personal data a certain way.
The following table sets out when we rely on each lawful basis.
Under UK data protection law, we need a legal reason (known as a lawful basis) for holding, collecting and using your personal data. There are 6 main legal reasons which organisations can rely on. The most relevant are:
- to enter into and perform our contract with you;
- pursue our legitimate interests (our justifiable business aims) but only if those interests are not outweighed by your other rights and freedoms (e.g. your right to privacy);
- to comply with a legal obligation that we have;
- where you have consented to us using your personal data a certain way.
The following table sets out when we rely on each lawful basis.
| Lawful Basis | Purpose for using your personal data |
|---|---|
| Legitimate Interests | Where using your information is necessary to pursue our legitimate business interests to: • take steps to enter into a contract with our customer; • to fulfil the terms of the contract between us and our customer; • improve and optimise our Website; • monitor and make improvements to our Website to enhance security and prevent fraud; • to protect our business and defend ourselves against legal claims. Where we use your information for our legitimate interests, we have assessed whether such use is necessary and that such use will not infringe on your other rights and freedoms. |
| Legal Obligation | • Where we send you information to comply with a legal obligations (e.g. where we send you information about your legal rights). • Where we retain information to enable us to bring or defend legal claims. |
| Consent | • Where you have provided your consent to providing us with information or allowing us to use or share your information. |
Where we need to collect your personal data (for example, in order to fulfil a contract we have with you), failure to provide us with your personal data may mean that we are not able to provide you with the services. Where we do not have the information required about you to fulfil an order, we may have to cancel the service ordered.
4. When we send you marketing messages
If you have consented to receiving marketing messages from us, you can opt out of these at any time. Just let us know at [email protected].
Opting out of marketing will not affect our processing of your personal data in relation to any order you have with us and where we required to use your personal data to fulfil that order or provide you with certain information.
5. Who we share your information with
We may share your personal data with:
• Our personnel: our employees (or other types of workers) who have contracts containing confidentiality and data protection obligations in order to provide our services.
• Our supply chain: other organisations that help us provide our services. We ensure these organisations only have access to the information required to provide the support we use them for and have a contract with them that contains confidentiality and data protection obligations.
• Our website hosting provider: the company who provides website hosting services to us may have access to some information (e.g. information from cookies and tracking technologies) to ensure that the Website is working correctly.
• Our cloud service provider: which we use to store information about our customers and which enables us to deal with enquiries and provide our services.
• Regulatory authorities: such as HM Revenue & Customs.
• Our professional advisers: such as our accountants or legal advisors where we require specialist advice to help us conduct our business.
• Any actual or potential buyer of our business.
If we were asked to provide personal data in response to a court order or legal request (e.g. from the police), we would seek legal advice before disclosing any information and carefully consider the impact on your rights when providing a response.
6. Where your information is located or transferred to
We store company information (including your personal data) on a Microsoft cloud platform located in the United Kingdom.
Otherwise, we will only transfer information outside of the UK where we have a valid legal mechanism in place (e.g. by using contracts approved by the European Commission or UK Secretary of State).
7. How we keep your information safe
We have put in place appropriate security and safety measures to prevent your personal data from being lost or illegally accessed by those who do not have permission. Where we are data processors on behalf of our clients, we only store data on the Microsoft Cloud Platform.
In the event that there is an event or incident affecting your personal data, we will keep you informed. We may also need to notify the regulator (where required under data protection law) and if we make decisions about personal data about your data jointly with another party (for example, if a third party marketing provider), we may need to notify them.
8. How long we keep your information
Where we are responsible for making decisions about how to collect and use your personal data, we will only keep your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for or as long as required to fulfil our legal obligations.
When we consider how long to keep your personal data, we will consider whether it is still necessary to keep it for the purpose which we collected it or whether the same purpose could be achieved by holding less personal data. We will also consider the volume, nature, and sensitivity of the personal data and the potential harm to you if there was an incident affecting your personal data.
We may keep Identity Data, Contact Data and certain other data (specifically, any exchanges between us by email or any other means) for up to seven years after the end of our contractual relationship with our customer.
If you browse our Website, we keep personal data collected through our analytics tools for only as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for (see our cookie policy below for further information).
9. Your legal rights
You have specific legal rights in relation to your personal data.
It is usually free for you exercise your rights and we aim to respond within one month (although we may ask you if we can extend this deadline up to a maximum of two months if your request is particularly complex or we receive multiple requests at once).
We can decide not to take any action in relation to a request where we have been unable to confirm your identity (this is one of our security processes to make sure we keep information safe) or if we feel the request is unfounded or excessive. We may charge a fee where we decide to proceed with a request that we believe is unfounded or excessive. If this happens we will always inform you in writing.
Your legal rights are as follows:
Access: You must be told if your personal data is being used and you can ask for a copy of your personal data as well as information about how we are using it to make sure we are abiding by the law.
Correction: You can ask us to correct your personal data if it is inaccurate or incomplete. We might need to verify the new information before we make any changes.
Deletion: You can ask us to delete or remove your personal data if there is no good reason for us to continuing holding it or if you have asked us to stop using it. If we think there is a good reason to keep the information you have asked us to delete (e.g. to comply with regulatory requirements), we will let you know and explain our decision.
Restriction: You can ask us to restrict how we use your personal data and temporarily limit the way we use it (e.g. whilst you check that the personal data we hold for you is correct).
Objection: You can object to us using your personal data if you want us to stop using it. We always comply with your request if you ask us to stop sending you marketing communications but in other cases, we decide whether we will continue. If we think there is a good reason for us to keep using the information, we will let you know and explain our decision.
Portability: You can ask us to send you or another organisation an electronic copy of your personal data.
Complaints: If you are unhappy with the way we collect and use your personal data, you can complain to the Information Commissioner or another relevant supervisory body, but we hope that we can respond to your concerns before it reaches that stage. Please contact us at [email protected].
If you would like to exercise any of your legal rights, please contact: [email protected].
10. Our cookie policy
Our Website uses cookies and similar technologies.
Cookies are small text files that are downloaded to your device. Cookies contain uniquely generated references which are used to distinguish you from other users. They allow information gathered on one webpage to be stored until it is needed for use on another, allowing our Website to provide you with a personalised experience (like remembering your favourites) and provide us with statistics about how you interact with our Website.
Cookies are not harmful to your devices (like a virus or malicious code) but some individuals prefer not to share their information (for example, to avoid targeted advertising).
Different types of cookies
Session vs. persistent cookies: cookies have a limited lifespan. Cookies which only last a short time or end when you close your browser are called session cookies. Cookies which remain on your device for longer are called persistent cookies (these are the type of cookies allow websites to remember your details when you log back onto them).
First party vs third party cookies: cookies placed on your device by the website owner are called first party cookies. When the website owner uses other businesses’ technology to help them manage and monitor their website, the cookies added by the other business are called third party cookies.
Categories of cookies: cookies can be grouped by what they help the website or website owner do (the Purpose).
• Necessary cookies are cookies which help the Website to run properly (when they are strictly necessary cookies it means their only function is to help the website work).
• Performance cookies help a Website owner understand and analyse how Website visitors use their website.
• Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the Website. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, etc.
• Marketing cookies tailor online adverts to reflect the content you have previously browse and help inform companies about your interests so they can show you relevant adverts.
What do we use cookies for?
We use cookies to:
• to track how visitors use our Website
• to record whether you have seen specific messages we display on our Website
• to keep you signed into our Website
• where we post content and links to content, we use cookies to capture and analyse information such as number of views and shares
The cookies we use are:
4. When we send you marketing messages
If you have consented to receiving marketing messages from us, you can opt out of these at any time. Just let us know at [email protected].
Opting out of marketing will not affect our processing of your personal data in relation to any order you have with us and where we required to use your personal data to fulfil that order or provide you with certain information.
5. Who we share your information with
We may share your personal data with:
• Our personnel: our employees (or other types of workers) who have contracts containing confidentiality and data protection obligations in order to provide our services.
• Our supply chain: other organisations that help us provide our services. We ensure these organisations only have access to the information required to provide the support we use them for and have a contract with them that contains confidentiality and data protection obligations.
• Our website hosting provider: the company who provides website hosting services to us may have access to some information (e.g. information from cookies and tracking technologies) to ensure that the Website is working correctly.
• Our cloud service provider: which we use to store information about our customers and which enables us to deal with enquiries and provide our services.
• Regulatory authorities: such as HM Revenue & Customs.
• Our professional advisers: such as our accountants or legal advisors where we require specialist advice to help us conduct our business.
• Any actual or potential buyer of our business.
If we were asked to provide personal data in response to a court order or legal request (e.g. from the police), we would seek legal advice before disclosing any information and carefully consider the impact on your rights when providing a response.
6. Where your information is located or transferred to
We store company information (including your personal data) on a Microsoft cloud platform located in the United Kingdom.
Otherwise, we will only transfer information outside of the UK where we have a valid legal mechanism in place (e.g. by using contracts approved by the European Commission or UK Secretary of State).
7. How we keep your information safe
We have put in place appropriate security and safety measures to prevent your personal data from being lost or illegally accessed by those who do not have permission. Where we are data processors on behalf of our clients, we only store data on the Microsoft Cloud Platform.
In the event that there is an event or incident affecting your personal data, we will keep you informed. We may also need to notify the regulator (where required under data protection law) and if we make decisions about personal data about your data jointly with another party (for example, if a third party marketing provider), we may need to notify them.
8. How long we keep your information
Where we are responsible for making decisions about how to collect and use your personal data, we will only keep your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for or as long as required to fulfil our legal obligations.
When we consider how long to keep your personal data, we will consider whether it is still necessary to keep it for the purpose which we collected it or whether the same purpose could be achieved by holding less personal data. We will also consider the volume, nature, and sensitivity of the personal data and the potential harm to you if there was an incident affecting your personal data.
We may keep Identity Data, Contact Data and certain other data (specifically, any exchanges between us by email or any other means) for up to seven years after the end of our contractual relationship with our customer.
If you browse our Website, we keep personal data collected through our analytics tools for only as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for (see our cookie policy below for further information).
9. Your legal rights
You have specific legal rights in relation to your personal data.
It is usually free for you exercise your rights and we aim to respond within one month (although we may ask you if we can extend this deadline up to a maximum of two months if your request is particularly complex or we receive multiple requests at once).
We can decide not to take any action in relation to a request where we have been unable to confirm your identity (this is one of our security processes to make sure we keep information safe) or if we feel the request is unfounded or excessive. We may charge a fee where we decide to proceed with a request that we believe is unfounded or excessive. If this happens we will always inform you in writing.
Your legal rights are as follows:
Access: You must be told if your personal data is being used and you can ask for a copy of your personal data as well as information about how we are using it to make sure we are abiding by the law.
Correction: You can ask us to correct your personal data if it is inaccurate or incomplete. We might need to verify the new information before we make any changes.
Deletion: You can ask us to delete or remove your personal data if there is no good reason for us to continuing holding it or if you have asked us to stop using it. If we think there is a good reason to keep the information you have asked us to delete (e.g. to comply with regulatory requirements), we will let you know and explain our decision.
Restriction: You can ask us to restrict how we use your personal data and temporarily limit the way we use it (e.g. whilst you check that the personal data we hold for you is correct).
Objection: You can object to us using your personal data if you want us to stop using it. We always comply with your request if you ask us to stop sending you marketing communications but in other cases, we decide whether we will continue. If we think there is a good reason for us to keep using the information, we will let you know and explain our decision.
Portability: You can ask us to send you or another organisation an electronic copy of your personal data.
Complaints: If you are unhappy with the way we collect and use your personal data, you can complain to the Information Commissioner or another relevant supervisory body, but we hope that we can respond to your concerns before it reaches that stage. Please contact us at [email protected].
If you would like to exercise any of your legal rights, please contact: [email protected].
10. Our cookie policy
Our Website uses cookies and similar technologies.
Cookies are small text files that are downloaded to your device. Cookies contain uniquely generated references which are used to distinguish you from other users. They allow information gathered on one webpage to be stored until it is needed for use on another, allowing our Website to provide you with a personalised experience (like remembering your favourites) and provide us with statistics about how you interact with our Website.
Cookies are not harmful to your devices (like a virus or malicious code) but some individuals prefer not to share their information (for example, to avoid targeted advertising).
Different types of cookies
Session vs. persistent cookies: cookies have a limited lifespan. Cookies which only last a short time or end when you close your browser are called session cookies. Cookies which remain on your device for longer are called persistent cookies (these are the type of cookies allow websites to remember your details when you log back onto them).
First party vs third party cookies: cookies placed on your device by the website owner are called first party cookies. When the website owner uses other businesses’ technology to help them manage and monitor their website, the cookies added by the other business are called third party cookies.
Categories of cookies: cookies can be grouped by what they help the website or website owner do (the Purpose).
• Necessary cookies are cookies which help the Website to run properly (when they are strictly necessary cookies it means their only function is to help the website work).
• Performance cookies help a Website owner understand and analyse how Website visitors use their website.
• Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the Website. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, etc.
• Marketing cookies tailor online adverts to reflect the content you have previously browse and help inform companies about your interests so they can show you relevant adverts.
What do we use cookies for?
We use cookies to:
• to track how visitors use our Website
• to record whether you have seen specific messages we display on our Website
• to keep you signed into our Website
• where we post content and links to content, we use cookies to capture and analyse information such as number of views and shares
The cookies we use are:
| Cookie | Purpose | What it does | How long it lasts |
|---|---|---|---|
| sp | Analytical | This cookie registers statistical data on users’ behaviour on the site. It is used for internal analytics by the website operator. | 1 year |
| sp_root_domain_test_# | Analytical | Audience measurement cookies help website owners, by collecting and reporting information anonymously, to understand how visitors interact with websites | Session |
| language | Necessary | This is a functional cookie, used to store the language preference of the user. | 14 days |
| _snow_ses.# | Analytical | This cookie is used by Snowplow Analytics to track how users are browsing and engaging with a site. | 30 minutes |
| _snow_id.# | Analytical | This cookie is used by Snowplow Analytics to track how users are browsing and engaging with a site. | 2 years |
| snowplowOutQueue_snowday__wn_post2 | Marketing | This cookie collects statistical data related to the user's website visits, such as the number of visits, average time spent on the website and what pages have been loaded. The purpose is to segment the website's users according to factors such as demographics and geographical location, in order to enable media and marketing agencies to structure and understand their target groups to enable customised online advertising. | Persistent |
| sto-id-designer | Performance | Used by the load balancers to pin a user/session to a given server | Session |
| is_mobile | Necessary | This cookie is used to identify whether the visitor is using a mobile for browsing. It helps to enable mobile view of the website. | Session |
| sto-id-editor | Necessary | This cookie is set by the provider Weebly. It stores the user state across page requests. | Session |
| CookieConsent | Performance | This cookie stores the user’s cookie consent state for the current domain. | 1 year |
| collect | Marketing | This cookie is used to send data to Google Analytics about the user’s device and behaviour. It tracks the user across devices and marketing channels. | Session |
| _ga | Analytical | This cookie registers a unique ID that is used to generate statistical data on how the user uses the site. | 2 years |
| _gat | Analytical | This cookie is used by Google Analytics to throttle request rate. | 1 day |
| _gid | Analytical | This cookie registers a unique ID that is used to generate statistical data on how the user uses the site. | 1 day |
We can only use cookies with your permission (you will be prompted by a message when you first visit our Website, also known as a cookie banner, where you can choose to accept or decline our cookies).
You can update your cookie settings on our Website by using our cookie banner, which you can access using the icon in the bottom left corner of each page.
You can choose to decline cookies but if you turn off necessary cookies, some pages and functions on our Website may not work properly. You can also manage cookies through your browser settings or device settings (your user manual should contain additional information).
You can also delete cookies directly with the relevant third parties (for example, you can disable Google Analytics on their website).
You can update your cookie settings on our Website by using our cookie banner, which you can access using the icon in the bottom left corner of each page.
You can choose to decline cookies but if you turn off necessary cookies, some pages and functions on our Website may not work properly. You can also manage cookies through your browser settings or device settings (your user manual should contain additional information).
You can also delete cookies directly with the relevant third parties (for example, you can disable Google Analytics on their website).
