• Privacy Policy

    Privacy Notice:  Durham County Council, Regeneration, Economy and Growth, Business Durham Team

    This Privacy Notice tells you about what information we collect about you, how we use that information and who we share it with. 

    1. Who we are and what we do

    Business Durham engage with the business community across County Durham.   This means we respond to enquiries for business support as well as proactively engage with businesses through organised events. We use personal information to respond to requests for business support and to monitor attendance at events.

    Business Durham also organises and delivers a wide range of business events, including enterprise awareness activities with school groups, postgraduates and pre-start organisations. 

    For further information on the services provided please visit www.businessdurham.co.uk

    For the purposes of Data Protection, Durham County Council is the Data Controller for your information.

    1. What type of personal information do we collect and how do we collect it?

    We collect the following personal information about you:

    • Name
    • Contact details relating to your company or organisation, including email and phone contacts
    • Job title
    • Organisation and Address

    How You collect Personal Information

    We collect the above personal information from you in the following ways:

    • Online enquiry form
    • Online application form
    • Telephone enquiry
    • Email
    • Face to face meetings
    • Business cards
    • Online & in person, registration
    1. What is our lawful basis to obtain and use your personal information?

    When we collect and use your personal information we rely on one of the following;

    • Processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller
    • Legitimate Interests – the processing is necessary for the purpose of legitimate interests
    1. What is your personal information used for?

    We collect and process information about you for the following purposes:

    • To provide a response to your enquiry
    • To carry out assessment of grant applications
    • To continue to engage with you and your organisation to support your business
    • To statistically monitor performance of Business Durham
    • To manage events
    1. Will your personal information be shared?

    We do not share any personal information with any other organisations outside of Durham County Council without your expressed consent.

    We may legally be required to disclose your details if required to by the police or for regulatory reasons. We will only ever share your data in other circumstances if we have your consent to do so.

    1. How do we keep your information secure?

    The security of your personal information is important to us. The records we keep about you are secure and are confidential within the Council.  The Council have a range of procedures, polices and systems to ensure that access to your records are controlled appropriately.

    Anyone who receives information from us is also under a legal duty to only use the information for the purposes agreed and keep the information secure and confidential.

    • Controlling access to systems and networks allows us to stop people who are not allowed to view your personal information from getting access to it
    • Training for our staff allows us to make them aware of how to handle information and how and when to report when something goes wrong
    • Regular testing of our technology and ways of working including keeping up to date on the latest security updates (commonly called patches)
    1. How long will we keep your personal information?

    After we deliver a service to you, we have to keep your information as a business record of what was delivered.  The type of service you receive will determine how long we have to keep your information.   

    Our corporate retention guidelines (http://www.durham.gov.uk/dataprivacy) show how long we keep it for different services. 

    The retention period for this service is 3 years after the last known interaction with you and 7 years for any financially related documentation such as grant applications, claims and payments.

    1. Personal information processed outside of the European Union (EU)?

    We do process some of your information outside of the EU, as event registrations are processed using Eventbrite, with Mailshots and mass communications being processed by MailChimp which are both based outside of the UK.

    We are making a restricted transfer of personal data outside the EU.

    • Eventbrite and Mailchimp have signed up to Standard Contractual Clauses which meet GDPR requirements
    1. Marketing

    Here at DCC we take your privacy seriously and will only user your personal information to deliver our service and to provide products and services you have requested from us.

    At no time will your information be passed to organisations external to us and our partners for marketing or sales purposes or for any commercial use without your prior express consent.

    However, from time to time we may like to contact you with details of other services or information we provide.   In these cases we will ask you for your consent.

    1. What are your information rights?

    Your Information Rights are set out in the law. Subject to some legal exceptions, you have the right to:

    • request a copy of the personal information the council holds about you
    • have any inaccuracies corrected;
    • have your personal data erased;
    • place a restriction on our processing of your data;
    • object to processing;

    To exercise your rights, you can apply on line or download an application form from the DCC website or you can contact the data protection team at inforights@durham.gov.uk

    To learn more about these rights please see the ICO website.

    1. Further Information

    Our Data Protection Officer (DPO) provides help and guidance to make sure we apply the best standards to protecting your personal information.  If something goes wrong with your personal information, or you have questions about how we process your data, please contact our Data Protection Officer at DPO@durham.gov.uk or write to:

    DPO

    Floor 4 Room 143-148,

    Durham County Council

    County Hall,

    Durham County Council

    DH1 5UF

    If we have not been able to deal with your query, you can also contact the Information Commissioner’s Office:

    Information Commissioner’s Office

    Wycliffe House

    Water Lane Wilmslow

    Cheshire

    SK9 5AF

    Telephone:  0303 123 1113 (local rate) or 01625 545 745