Data Privacy Policy

 

Welcome to Blossoming Mind’s privacy policy. Blossoming Minds (a business partnership between Dr Michelle Blundy and Mr Ben Blundy) take the privacy rights of all our clients seriously and adopt a high standard of compliance and confidentiality when dealing with your data.  We want you to understand that this is a safe place for you to discuss your feelings and concerns.  This privacy policy explains why we keep your information, where we keep it, how we keep it safe, and what your rights are.

 

Who we are/Controller

• Blossoming Minds is the data controller and we are responsible for your personal data.

• We are registered with the Information Commissioners Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (ICO) and we have appointed a data protection officer (DPO) who is responsible for overseeing questions in relation to this privacy policy.  If you have any questions about this privacy policy, including any requests to exercise your legal rights, please contact the DPO using the details se out below.

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Contact details

•  If you have any questions about this privacy policy or our privacy practices, please contact our DPO in the following ways:

 

Full name:                   Dr Michelle Blundy

Email address:            michelle@blossomingminds.org.uk

Postal address:           1 Bridge Court, Kingsmill Road, Saltash PL12 6LS

Telephone number:    07841 532901

 

• You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the ICO (www.ico.org.uk) phone 0303 123 1113.  We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO so please contact us in the first instance.

 

Changes to the privacy policy and your duty to inform us of changes 

• We keep our privacy policy under regular review. This version was last updated in January 2022.  

• 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. 

 

The data we collect about you

• Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data).

 

• We may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together as follows:

 

• Identity Data includes first name, last name, username or similar identifier, marital status, title, date of birth and gender.

• Contact Data includes billing address, delivery address, email address and telephone numbers.

• Financial Data includes bank account and payment card details.

• Transaction Data includes details about payments to and from you and other details of products and services you have purchased from us.   

• Marketing and Communications Data includes your preferences in receiving marketing from us and our third parties and your communication preferences.

• Sensitive Data includes information about your health, including information about your existing and previous medical conditions, medication details, psychiatric and social history and any other relevant health information to enable us to carry out our services to you. 

 

•  We require your explicit consent for processing sensitive data, so when you submit your details, we will send you a further communication asking for you to confirm your consent to this processing. 

 

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 (for example, to provide you with services or goods). In this case, we may have to cancel a service or product you have with us but we will notify you if this is the case at the time. 

 

How is your personal data collected?

•  We use different methods to collect data from and about you including through:

 

• Direct interactions. You may give us your Identity, Contact and Financial Data by filling in forms before or during an appointment, verbally during discussions at our practice, or by corresponding with us by post, phone, email or otherwise.

• Website interactions.  As you interact with our website, we may automatically collect technical data.  We collect this personal data using cookies (please see our website terms and conditions and cookie policy).

• Identity and Contact Data from publicly available sources such as Companies House and the Electoral Register based inside the EU.

 

Why we keep information:

•  The professional registration of our practitioners requires us to keep information about our clients and the work that we do. We cannot offer you services unless you allow us to keep data about you and our work together.

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The legal basis:

•  We have what is known as a legitimate interest for being a data controller. We follow the rules set down by the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC), and the British Psychological Society (BPS).

•  We have set out below, in a table format, a description of all the ways we plan to use your personal data, and which of the legal bases we rely on to do so. We have also identified what our legitimate interests are where appropriate. 

•  Note that we may process your personal data for more than one lawful ground depending on the specific purpose for which we are using your data. Please contact us if you need details about the specific legal ground we are relying on to process your personal data where more than one ground has been set out in the table below.

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Marketing  

•  Our lawful ground of processing your personal data to send you marketing communications is either your consent or our legitimate interests (namely to grow our business).  

•  Under the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations, we may send you marketing communications from us if (i) you made a purchase or asked for information from us about our goods or services or (ii) you agreed to receive marketing communications and in each case you have not opted out of receiving such communications since. 

 

Promotional offers from us  

•  We may use your Identity, Contact, Technical, Usage and Profile Data to form a view on what we think you may want or need, or what may be of interest to you. This is how we decide which products, services and offers may be relevant for you (we call this marketing).  

•  You will receive marketing communications from us if you have requested information from us or purchased goods or services from us and you have not opted out of receiving that marketing. 

 

Opting out 

•  You can ask us to stop sending you marketing messages at any time by contacting us. 

 

Change of purpose  

•  We will only use your personal data for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If you wish to get an explanation as to how the processing for the new purpose is compatible with the original purpose, please contact us.  

If we need to use your personal data for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis which allows us to do so. 

•  Please note that we may process your personal data without your knowledge or consent, in compliance with the above rules, where this is required or permitted by law. 

 

What we do with the information:

•  We use the data we collect for four reasons: (1) to provide you with services, (2) for billing and processing payments , (3) to help prevent serious harm, and (4) for service audit and improvement.

•  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.

• 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. 

• Where we need to comply with a legal obligation. 

 

•  Generally, we do not rely on consent as a legal basis for processing your personal data although we will get your consent when collecting sensitive data (such as health information). 

 

How we keep data safe:

• We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data for being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, 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. 

• All data received, generated and processed as part of the service we provide is stored securely.

  • We use Tresorit, an end-to-end encrypted file storage cloud. Only we can decrypt the data: even the people at Tresorit can’t read it. Our account is locked with a strong password and two-step verification.

  • Our laptops are encrypted using a protected password.  McAfee Internet firewall to prevent others gaining access to our computers.

  • Paper notes are stored in a locked cabinet in a locked office.

  • Our mobile phones are encrypted and, each time we use them, must be opened with a password of more than 8 characters or our fingerprint.

  • Our email systems are secured with a password and two-step verification. You can email us to discuss business but please bear in mind that unless you use an encrypted service, email is not a totally secure system.

  • If we agree that we will send you an email following a meeting we will be happy to encrypt it before sending it from ProtonMail - our encrypted email service.  Before we do so we will need to agree an encryption password. Alternatively, you can set up your own ProtonMail account and given us your address since mail sent between ProtonMail accounts is automatically encrypted. To set up a ProtonMail account go to: www.protonmail.com .If you are concerned about email security then you can contact us to discuss.

 

Electronic and online services:

• For online meetings we use Zoom (an end-to-end encrypted video calling service) and Microsoft Teams (a proprietary business communication platform developed by Microsoft).

• Zoom is free to download from the web (Zoom) or from your device app store; you can read more about how Zoom protects its users here: www.zoom.us/docs/enus/privacy-and-security.html. You can read more about Microsoft Teams Privacy here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/teams-privacy.

 

How and why we might share data: 

• We may share your personal data with the parties set out below for the purposes set out in the table ‘Purposes for which we will use your personal data’ above. 

 

• Service providers, acting as processors who provide IT and system administration services. 

• Professional advisers, acting as processors or joint controllers, including healthcare professionals, lawyers, bankers, auditors and insurers who provide consultancy, banking, legal, insurance and accounting services. 

• HM Revenue & Customs, regulators and other authorities, acting as processors or joint controllers, based who require reporting of processing activities in certain circumstances. 

• Any Associate we might have dealings with under the umbrella of providing our service;  data will be shared and the associate will be the data controller subject to their own registration.

• In the interests of wellbeing / safeguarding with relevant authorities.

• Relevant schools and youth teams if involved in the service we are providing and who are acting as processors, joint controllers and with whom we have a data sharing agreement.  

• 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 privacy policy.  

 

• 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. 

 

International transfers 

• We may transfer your data outside the European Economic Area (EEA). 

• Many of our external third parties are based outside the EEA so their processing of your personal data will involve a transfer of data outside the EEA. 

• Whenever we transfer your personal data out of the EEA, we ensure a similar degree of protection is afforded to it by ensuring at least one of the following safeguards is implemented:  

  • We will only transfer your personal data to countries that have been deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data by the European Commission. For further details, see European Commission: Adequacy of the protection of personal data in non-EU countries. 

  • Where we use certain service providers, we may use specific contracts approved by the European Commission which give personal data the same protection it has in Europe.  

• Please contact us if you want further information on the specific mechanism used by us when transferring your personal data out of the EEA.  

 

How long will you use my personal data for?

• 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.

• By law we have to keep basic information about our customers (including Contact, Identity, Financial and Transaction Data) for six years after they cease being customers for tax purposes.

• For therapy clients aged 18 and over, the retention period is 7 years after the work has ended. For therapy clients aged under 18 after the work has ended, the retention period is 7 years after the client’s 18th birthday. For people enquiring about therapy (who do not become clients) the data retention period is 90 days.

• All data is deleted after the ‘retention period’, and no later than the first working Monday of the January following it.

• In some circumstances you can ask us to delete your data: see your legal rights below for further information.

• In some circumstances we will anonymise your personal data (so that it can no longer be associated with you) for research or statistical purposes, in which case we may use this information indefinitely without further notice to you

 

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:  

    • 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 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.  

 

• No fee usually required. 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. 

• What we may need from you. 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. 

• Time limit to respond. 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.  

 

Last revised:  January 2022