Privacy Policy

Dwyers Solicitors takes the privacy of its clients seriously. Any personal information that we may collect or which is provided by you is subject to this policy.

Dwyers Solicitors is authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA number 00049081).  We are a data controller within the meaning of the GDPR and we process personal data.  Our Data Protection Officer is Michael Allweis.

Our contact details are as follows:

176 Stamford Street, Ashton-under-Lyne, Lancashire, OL6 7LR.  Telephone: 0161 308 3928.

We may amend this privacy notice from time to time. If we do so, we will make available to you a copy of the amended privacy notice.

 

Types of Personal Data

[1]        Personal Data.  This is the general information that you would supply in relation to yourself, for example, your name, address, date of birth, contact details and financial information.

[2]        Sensitive Personal Data.  This may include details of your religion, political opinion, sexual orientation and health information.

Most personal data will relate only to basic information that we require to complete identification checks.  In certain circumstances, some of the work that we do may require us to ask you for sensitive personal data.

 

Changes To The Privacy Policy And Your Duty To Inform Us Of Changes

We keep our Privacy Policy under regular review.  It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current.  Please keep us informed if your personal data changes during your relationship with us.

 

How We May Use Your Details:-

We intend to process personal data for the following purposes to:

• Provide professional services to yourself.
• Promote the services we provide and obtain new business.
• Comply with relevant regulations in force.
• Comply with our own professional obligations.
• Respond to any complaint or allegation of negligence.
• Invoice you for our services.
• Contact you about other services we provide which may be of interest to you.
• Prevent fraud.
• Verify your identity.
• Process your legal transaction.
• Verify your source of funding.
• Obtain insurance policies in relation to your transaction.

The above are non-exhaustive examples of the purposes for which we may use your information.

 

Legal Bases for our Intended Processing of Personal Data

• When you instructed us to act, you gave consent to our processing your personal data for the purposes listed above.
• For the performance of our contract with you.
• For compliance with legal obligations to which we are subject.
• For the purposes of legitimate interests which we pursue on your behalf.

It is a requirement of our contract with you that you provide us with the personal data that we request. If you do not provide the information that we request, we may not be able to provide professional services to you. If this is the case, we will not be able to commence acting or will need to cease to act.

 

Sources of Personal Data Collected

Information in relation to yourself may be obtained from various sources, for example:-

[1]        Information volunteered by yourself.

[2]        Information provided by you in relation to a third party on the basis that you have authority to provide the same.

[3]        Third party information passed to ourselves on your behalf, for example, your lender or medical or financial institution who may provide your personal records and financial data.

 

Persons/Organisations to Whom We May Give Access to Your Personal Data

We will ensure the effective and secure processing of your personal data.

We may share your personal data with:

• HMRC
• HM Land Registry
• Other Solicitors
• Counsel
• External auditors
• Insurance Companies
• Identity verification companies
• Any third parties with whom you require or permit us to correspond
• Subcontractors
• Professional indemnity insurers, brokers, auditors
• Our regulator the SRA, Law Society and OPBAS
• Other parties involved in your matter

If the law allows or requires us to do so, we may share your personal data with:

• The Police and Law Enforcement Agencies.
• Courts and Tribunals.
• The Information Commissioner’s Office (“ICO”).

We may need to share your personal data with the third parties identified above in order to comply with our legal obligations, including our legal obligations to you. If you ask us not to share your personal data with such third parties we may need to cease to act.

If any data is shared with the above third parties we will ensure that they comply with our instructions and do not use personal data for their own purposes without your explicit consent.  If specific consent is required we will request this from you in writing.

 

Protection of your Personal Data

Your personal information is valuable and sensitive and we take all reasonable steps to protect it.  We use computer safeguards and enforce physical access to our buildings and files to keep your data safe.  We have a high threshold in relation to our confidentiality obligations and will ensure that all personal data is handled and processed in a confidential and protective manner.  We limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know.  They will only process your personal data on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.  We have put in place, procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator, of a breach, where we are legally required to do so.

 

Marketing Data

Personal data collected from yourself may be used to contact you for the purpose of direct marketing to advise you of our products or services which we feel would be relevant to yourself.  In this respect, we may use social media channels, email or post.  For the avoidance of doubt, we would not pass on or sell your details to any third party, nor telephone you without your specific consent.

 

Sources for Collection of Personal Data

Data may be collected as a result of you submitting an on-line enquiry or asking us a question via email or leaving an on-line review.  This is not an exhaustive list.

In relation to data collected, should we wish to make marketing communications, you would be provided with an opportunity to opt in.

 

Protection of your Personal Information

We will only ever use non-sensitive personal information to target clients with any marketing materials.  We will never use sensitive information as part of that process.  If you do not wish us to contact you in this way, you may either follow any unsubscribed instructions or contact us by email with your full name and your details will be immediately removed.  However, you would still receive emails relating to your transaction whilst your legal case was live.

 

Time Period for Retention of Data

Your personal information will be retained for as long as required in relation to the purposes for which the information was collected or as required by law or in relation to any contract held with ourselves.

When acting as a data controller and in accordance with Law Society practice guidance we will retain all of our records relating to you as follows:

• It is our policy to retain information for a minimum of 6 years from the date the business relationship ceased but we reserve the right to vary this as and when necessary.
• Information or matters may be retained for longer periods, particularly in relation to commercial transactions or probate matters. Wills are often retained indefinitely.
• Deeds in relation to unregistered property may be retained indefinitely.
• Personal Injury claims involving a lifetime award or where there is a trust may be retained indefinitely.
• Personal Injury claims involving children will be retained for a minimum period of 6 years from the 18^th

You are responsible for retaining information that we send to you and this will be supplied in the form agreed between us.

 

Requesting Personal Data We Hold About You.

You have a right to request access to your personal data that we hold. Such requests are known as ‘subject access requests’ (“SARs”).

If you wish to make a request for your personal data, please do so in writing, addressed to our Data Protection Officer or the Fee Earner dealing with your transaction.

To help us provide the information you want and deal with your request more quickly, you should include enough details to enable us to verify your identity and locate the relevant information.

We are required to comply with a request for data promptly and in any event within one month of receipt. There are, however, some circumstances in which the law allows us to refuse to provide access to personal data in response to a SAR (e.g. if you have previously made a similar request and there has been little or no change to the data since we complied with the original request).

We will not charge you for dealing with a SAR.

 

Request Correction

You may 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

You may 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

You may object to the 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

You may request the 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:

• If you want us to establish the data’s accuracy.
• Where our use of the data is unlawful but you do not want us to erase it.
• 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.
• You have objected to our use of your data but we need to verify whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to use it.

 

Request The Transfer

You may 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.

 

Withdraw Consent At Any Time

You may withdraw your 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.

 

Complaints

If you have a complaint in relation to our handling of your personal data, please initially contact our Data Protection Officer, who will investigate your complaint.

If you remain dissatisfied with our response, you can complain to the Information Commissioners Office (www.ico.org.uk).