Introduction
Kesar & Co Solicitors is committed to the principals of the Data Protection Act. This Privacy Notice explains how we collect, use, share and protect your personal data.
It is important that you read this Privacy Notice so that you are aware of how and why we are using your personal data.
This Privacy Notice is provided in a layered format so you can click through to the specific areas set out below:
- Who we are
- Data Protection Officer
- What is personal data?
- Data protection principles
- How we use your personal data
- The personal data we collect from you
- When and how we share your personal data with others
- Transfer of your personal data to other countries
- The security of your personal data
- Our storage and retention of your personal data
- Your rights as a data subject
- Changes to this privacy notice
1. Who we are
Kesar & Co Solicitors is a “data controller”. This means that we are responsible for deciding how we hold and use personal information about you. Where we act as a data controller, we are required under data protection legislation to notify anyone who provides personal data to us, either directly or through a third party, of the information contained in this Privacy Notice.
Kesar & Co Solicitors is the trading name for Kesar & Co Ltd. (company number 8235271 and registered address at 27 London Road, Bromley, BR1 1DG) so when we mention “Kesar”, “we”, “us” or “our” in this Privacy Notice, we are referring to this company which is responsible for processing your data.
2. Data Protection Officer
The firm has not appointed a Data Protection Officer (DPO). It is not required to do so since it is not a public authority and its core activities do not require large scale, regular or systematic monitoring of individuals, nor large scale processing of special categories of data relating to criminal convictions or offences. The firm considers that any tasks that might have been usefully performed by a DPO would be adequately carried out by the Director or otherwise. The Director who is responsible for Data Protection issues can be contacted as below:
Contact details
Name of Contact: Mladen Kesar
Email address: mkesar@kesarco.co.uk
Postal address: 27 London Road, Bromley, BR1 1DG
You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO so please contact us in the first instance.
3. What is personal data?
Personal data is any information about an individual from which that individual can be identified.
Your name, address, phone number and bank account number are examples of personal data. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data).
4. Data protection principles
We will comply with data protection law. This says that the personal information we hold about you must be:
• Used lawfully, fairly and in a transparent way.
• Collected only for valid purposes that we have clearly explained to you and not used in any way that is incompatible with those purposes.
• Relevant to the purposes we have told you about and limited only to those purposes.
• Accurate and kept up to date.
• Kept only as long as necessary for the purposes we have told you about.
• Kept securely.
5. How we use your personal data
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 a contract we have entered into with you.
• Where we need to comply with a legal obligation.
• Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and yourinterests and fundamental rights do not override those interests.
We may also use your personal data in the following situations, which are likely to be less common:
• Where we need to protect your vital interests (or someone else’s interests).
• Where it is needed in the public interest (for example, Legal Aid auditing) or for official
purposes.
6. The personal data we collect from you
Enquiries
When you request information or make enquiries about legal representation or job opportunities(including volunteering), we may use the personal data you provide in order to fulfil your request or respond to your enquiry. It is in our legitimate interests to use your personal data in this way so that you receive the information you have requested.
Legal Representations – New Instructions
If you contact us to request legal representation, we may collect the following categories of personal data about you:
• Personal contact details such as name, title, addresses, telephone numbers, and personal
email addresses.
• Date of birth.
• Gender.
• Sexuality
• Nationality and country of residence.
• Funding information for the purposes of ascertaining eligibility for Legal Aid.
• Conviction(s)
• Immigration status
• Health
This information will be used by us to perform the contract we have entered into with you.
Marketing
We do not undertake marketing other than to update clients with changes in the law that may be of interest to them.
Clients may at any time request they not be sent this information by contacting the Data Protection Officer.
Automated technologies or interactions
As you interact with our website, we may automatically collect technical data about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns. We collect this personal data by using cookies and other similar technologies. Please see our cookie policy on our website for further details.
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).
In this case, we may have to cancel a product or service you have with us but we will notify you if
this is the case at the time.
7. When and how we share your personal data with others
We may share your personal data with third parties where required by law, where it is necessary to perform a contract or where we have a legitimate interest in doing so. Such third parties may include the following:
• Legal Aid Agency: We are legally required to provide your personal data to the Legal Aid Agency where you apply for and are granted Legal Aid. This information is necessary for the purposes of providing you with legal representation and must be provided to the Legal Aid Agency upon request. The information is provided using secure methods both electronically and in paper format so as to limit the possibility of interception.
• Official Regulators: We may share your personal data with official regulators such as the Solicitors Regulatory Authority or the Information Commissioners Office. This is usually only provided where a complaint has been raised by yourself.
• Government agencies: We may share your personal data with government agencies where we are legally obliged to do so such as HMRC, the police, security services, etc.
• Others: We may share your personal information with other third parties that we believe are necessary for the fulfillment of our obligation to you in your legal matter. This will include barristers, experts, the courts, defendants, etc. We will not always seek your consent prior to disclosure of your information due to the nature of the request. Any concerns regarding the circumstances under which we will not seek to obtain your consent should be addressed to the Data Protection Officer.
8. Transfer of your personal data to other countries
During your case it may be necessary to instruct experts who are not based within the UK or EU. This will only be done where we cannot locate appropriate experts within the UK or EU. In such circumstances your personal information will be provided to the extent that it is required by the expert in order to provide their opinion in support of your case.
Where it is necessary to provide your personal information to an expert outside of the EU, we will take every step to ensure your information is kept secure by the expert.
9. The security of your personal data
We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal information to those individuals who have a legitimate need to know. They are subject to a duty of confidentiality.
We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected data security breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected breach where we are legally required to do so.
10. Our storage and retention of your personal data
We will only retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collectedit for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting or reporting requirements. 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 requirements. Please contact us using the contact details in this Privacy Notice if you would like more information.
It is important that the personal information we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal information changes during your working relationship with us.
In some circumstances we may anonymise your personal data so that it can no longer be associated with you, in which case we may use such information without further notice to you.
11. Your rights as a data subject
Under certain circumtances, by law 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 that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate information we hold about you corrected.
• 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 exercised your right to object to processing (see below).
• 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. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal information for direct marketing purposes.
• Request the restriction of processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of personal data about you, for example if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it.
• Request the transfer of your personal data to another party.
If you want to review, verify, correct or request erasure of your personal data, object to the processing of your personal data, or request that we transfer a copy of your personal information to another party, please contact us using the contact details in this Privacy Notice.
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 for access is clearly unfounded or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with the request in such 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 the information (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is another appropriate security measure to ensure that personal information is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it.
Your right to withdraw consent
In circumstances where you may have provided your consent to the collection, processing and transfer of your personal data for a specific purpose, you have the right to withdraw your consent for that specific processing at any time. To withdraw your consent, please contact us using the contact details in this Privacy Notice. Once we have received notification that you have withdrawn your consent, we will no longer process your information for the purpose or purposes you originally agreed to, unless we have another legitimate basis for doing so in law.
12. Changes to this Privacy Notice
We reserve the right to update this Privacy Notice at any time, and we will provide you with a new Privacy Notice when we make any substantial updates. We may also notify you in other ways from time to time about the processing of your personal information.
