Ware & Kay Solicitors Ltd ('Ware & Kay')

General Data Protection Regulation ('GDPR') Privacy Policy

1. Privacy Policy

At Ware & Kay, we're committed to protecting and respecting your privacy.

This Policy explains when and why we collect personal data about our clients ('You'), how we use it, the limited conditions under which we may have to disclose it to others and how we keep it secure.

We may change this Policy from time to time but access to an up to date version will be provided whenever you instruct us to act for you. By using our services, you are also agreeing to be bound by this Policy.

Any questions regarding this Policy and our privacy practices should be sent to us using the contact details supplied at the end of this Policy.

2. Who are we?

Ware & Kay is a firm of solicitors with offices in York, Wetherby and Malton.  

Ware & Kay is the 'Controller' of the personal data you provide to us.  There are six available lawful bases for processing the information you provide to us. These are:

• Consent
• Performance of a contract
• Compliance with a legal obligation
• Your vital interests
• Public interest
• Ware & Kay's legitimate interests

The bases upon which we rely are highlighted within this document.

3. How do we collect information from you?

We obtain information about you from you when you instruct us to act.  We may already have some information on our systems from when we previously acted for you but we will ask you to provide information whenever you instruct us as it is an opportunity to check that the information we already hold is accurate, appropriate and up to date.

We may collect this information by telephone or email, during the initial interview or by way of completion of one of our standard information forms.  This is normally done at the outset of the transaction but we may ask for additional information as your case progresses.

4. What type of information is collected from you?

The personal data we collect will include your name (and any former name), address, email address, contact telephone number(s), and date of birth. We will also ask for your national insurance number when your case requires it.  We also scan or copy photo-identification documents such as your passport or driving licence and residence confirming documents such as utility or credit card bills for compliance with money laundering regulations.  We will also request your bank account details if you ask us to transmit funds to you electronically.

We collect this information in order to perform the contract made between us.  In other words, to enable us to provide the services you have instructed us to provide and in order to comply with regulatory requirements we need to collect this information.

If you make a debit or credit card payment to us via telephone or in person your card information is not retained by us once the transaction has been processed.  If you make a payment via our website your card details are not held by us, it is collected by our third party payment processors, who specialise in the secure online capture and processing of credit/debit card transactions, as explained below.  We never exchange debit or credit card details via email.

5. How is your information used?

We may use your information to:

• provide the services you have instructed us to provide
• carry out our obligations arising from any contracts entered into by us on your behalf
• process debit and credit card payments
• carry out money laundering and identity checks
• seek your views or comments on the services we provide
• add entries into the quarterly draw in relation to our client feedback surveys
• notify you of changes to our services
• send you communications you have requested
• send you legal updates of interest to you, if you have consented to receive them which will require a separate signed consent
• send you direct marketing about our services, if you have consented to receive them which will require a separate signed consent
• transmit funds to you electronically if requested to do so
• store Deeds, Wills, Powers of Attorney and other documents which you have asked us to keep on your behalf

6. Retention Periods / Right of Erasure (right to be forgotten)

We are legally required to hold some types of information to fulfil our statutory or legal obligations but we will only hold your personal data on our systems for as long as is necessary for the relevant activity, or as long as is set out in any relevant contract you hold with us.

7. Who has access to your information?

Third Party Service Providers working on our behalf:

We may pass your information to our third party service providers, agents subcontractors and other associated organisations for the purposes of completing tasks and providing services to you on our behalf or for compliance with our legal obligations (for example to carry out money laundering checks). However, when we use third party service providers, we disclose only the personal data that is necessary to deliver the service and we have contracts in place that require them to keep your information secure and not to use it for any other purpose including their own direct marketing purposes.

We will not sell or rent your information to third parties.

We will not share your information with third parties for marketing purposes.

We will not disclose your information in any other circumstance unless we are required to do so by law, for example, by a court order or for the purposes of prevention of fraud or other crime.

The third party providers which we use are:

SmartSearch: for money laundering checks.  SmartSearch retain the client data for 5 years from the date the checks are made, or 5 years from the date that monitoring is turned off.  Monitoring is turned off when we cease to be instructed. The data is then deleted.  This is for compliance with the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017.

Barristers: instructed by us on your behalf to advise you and to represent you as a specialist advocate for your case.

Experts: instructed by us on your behalf in order to obtain expert and specialist advice or information for your case.

Costs Draftsmen: Instructed by us a part of the assessment of costs (usually in litigation cases only) to provide a third party assessment of costs being claimed against an opponent in litigation which is put before the court for an order for costs to be made.

Paperwise: A secure storage facility employed by us to store all documents and archived files.

Debit and Credit Card Payment Processors: When you make any debit or credit card payment at our offices, by telephone or via our website, your payment is processed by a third party payment processor, who specialises in the secure online capture and processing of credit/debit card transactions. If you have any questions regarding secure transactions, please contact us.

Reservation for our Legitimate Interests: We may transfer your personal data to a third party as part of a sale of some or all of our business and assets to a third party or as part of a business restructuring or reorganisation or to enforce or apply our terms of use or to protect our rights, property or safety. However, we will take steps to ensure that your individual rights under GDPR continue to be protected.

Where these providers are based outside the UK we require that your information is processed securely to a standard equivalent to that expected under the prevailing laws and regulations in England, including those relating to the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).

8. Direct Marketing - Your choices

We may contact you for direct marketing purposes by email, post, phone or text where permitted under GDPR regulations.

You can change your marketing preferences at any time by contacting us. Please see contact details at the end of this Policy.

9. How you can access and update your information

The accuracy of your information is important to us. We're working on ways to make it easier for you to review and correct the information that we hold about you. In the meantime, if you change email address, or if any of the other information we hold is inaccurate or out of date, please contact us using the contact details supplied at the end of this Policy.

You have the right to ask for a copy of the information we hold about you.

10. Security precautions in place to protect the loss, misuse or alteration of your information

When you give us personal data, we take steps to ensure that it is stored securely and confidentially.

Emails: Your email address and the contents of any emails passing between us are transmitted normally over the Internet, and this can never be guaranteed to be 100% secure. As a result, while we strive to protect your personal data, we cannot guarantee the security of any information you transmit to us, and you do so at your own risk. Once we receive such information, we store it securely and confidentially on our systems.

11. Profiling

We may use your information for profiling purposes to receive direct marketing information.  Profiling is where your personal data is used to create a profile so that we can contact you with information relevant to you.

12. Use of 'cookies'

Like many other websites, the Ware & Kay and the Pearsons & Ward websites (www.warekay.co.uk and www.pearslaw.co.uk) use cookies. 'Cookies' are small pieces of information sent by an organisation to your computer and stored on your hard drive to allow that website to recognise you when you visit. They collect statistical data about your browsing actions and patterns and do not identify you as an individual. For example, we use cookies to store your country preference. This helps us to improve our websites and deliver a better more personalised service.

It is possible to switch off cookies by setting your browser preferences. For more information on how to switch off cookies on your computer, see clause 8 Cookies in our Legal Disclaimer on one of our websites. Turning cookies off may result in a loss of functionality when using our websites.

13. Links to other websites

Our website may contain links to other websites run by other organisations. This Privacy Policy applies only to our websites' so we encourage you to read the privacy statements on the other websites you visit. We are not responsible for the privacy policies and practices of other sites even if you access them using links from our websites.

In addition, if you linked to our websites from a third party site, we are not responsible for the privacy policies and practices of the owners and operators of that third party site and recommend that you check the policy of that third party site.

14. Children - aged 16 or Under

We do not accept instructions from children aged 16 or under. Any personal data concerning children aged 16 or under will have been provided by the child's parent or guardian.

15. What are your rights?

The GDPR provides the following rights for individuals:

• The right to be informed
• The right of access
• The right to rectification
• The right to erasure
• The right to restrict processing
• The right to data portability
• The right to object
• Rights in relation to automated decision making and profiling.

For further information please visit the Information Commissioner's Office website.

If you would like to exercise any of the above rights please contact us at any time.  Contact details can be found below.

16.  Call Recording

Please be aware that we record all of our telephone calls for training, quality assurance, and compliance purposes. If you do not wish your call to be recorded please advise the member of staff and an alternative method of communication will be offered.

17. Complaints

If you wish to raise a complaint on how we have handled your personal data, you can contact our Client Services Director on johanne.spittle@warekay.co.uk or write to her using the address provided at the end of this Policy who will investigate the matter.

If you are not satisfied with our response or believe we are processing your personal data not in accordance with the law you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).

18. How to contact us

For any information regarding this Policy and to submit any requests please write to us:

• Email: dataprotection@warekay.co.uk
• Post: Ware & Kay Solicitors Ltd, Sentinel House, Peasholme Green York, YO1 7PP.

Reference: Data Protection.

19. Review of this Policy

We keep this Policy under regular review. This Policy was last updated in December 2021.

Last updated: 26 March 2024.