Spotcap privacy & cookies policy

Spotcap UK Ltd (referred to as ‘we’, ‘our’, ‘us’) is bound by the Data Protection Act 1998 (‘Data Protection Act’) and recognises the importance of ensuring the confidentiality and security of your personal information.

All third parties (including customers, suppliers, sub-contractors, or agents) that have access to or use personal information collected and held by us must abide by this Policy.

Copies of this Policy are available free of charge by contacting our Privacy Officer or can be downloaded from our website www.spotcap.co.uk.

In this Policy:

• “Disclosing” information means providing information to persons outside of us;
• “Personal information” means information or an opinion relating to an individual, which can be used to identify that individual;
• “Privacy Officer” means the contact person for questions or complaints regarding our handling of personal information;
• “Sensitive information” is personal information that includes information relating to a person’s racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religion, trade union or other professional or trade association membership, sexual preferences and criminal record, and also includes health information; and
• “Use” of information means our use of information.

We may collect and hold a range of information about you that is reasonably necessary for, or directly related to, one or more of our functions or activities, including:

• non-public, personal information you knowingly choose to disclose, which is collected on an individual basis via internet, fax, phone, or mail;
• website use information collected on an aggregate basis as you and others users our website. If you choose to correspond through e-mail, we may retain the content of your e-mail messages together with your e-mail address and all responses sent through our website;
• information from credit bureaus;
• details about your activity on selected online webpages;
• information we obtain to verify representations made by you, such as your passport, bank account details, as well as organisation details;
• information about you and your organisation from public sources and other third party affiliated and non-affilated sources;
• details about specific transactions conducted in the course of your business.

We generally collect personal information directly from you. For example, personal information will be collected through our application processes, forms and other interactions with you in the course of providing you with our products and services, including when you visit our website, call us or send us correspondence.

We may also collect personal information about you from a third party, including, but not limited to, banks and non-bank financial institutions, credit agencies, governmental agencies, marketing agencies. If so, we will take reasonable steps to ensure that you are made aware of this Policy. We may also use third parties to analyse traffic at our website, which may involve the use of cookies. Information collected through such analysis is anonymous.

We will not collect sensitive information about you without your consent unless an exemption in the Data Protection Act applies. These exceptions include if the collection is required or authorised by law or necessary to take appropriate action in relation to suspected unlawful activity or serious misconduct.

If you do not provide us with the personal information we request, we may not be able to provide you with our products or services, or meet your needs appropriately or we may decide to provide our services on terms that are less favourable to you.

We do not give you the option of dealing with us anonymously, or using a pseudonym. This is because, due to anti-money-laundering provisions, it is illegal for us to deal with individuals who are not identified.

We may receive unsolicited personal information about you. We destroy or de-identify all unsolicited personal information we receive, unless it is relevant to our purposes for collecting personal information. We may retain additional information we receive about you if it is combined with other information we are required or entitled to collect. If we do this, we will retain the information in the same way we hold your other personal information.

The personal information we may collect and hold includes (but is not limited to) personal information about the following individuals:

• customers;
• potential customers;
• visitors to our website; and
• service providers or suppliers.

We collect and hold personal information about you so that we may:

• provide you with our products and services;
• review and meet your ongoing needs;
• provide you with information we believe may be relevant or of interest to you;
• let you know about other products or services we offer, send you information about special offers or invite you to events;
• consider any concerns or complaints you may have;
• comply with relevant laws, regulations and other legal obligations; and
• help us improve the products and services offered to our customers and enhance our overall business.

We may use and disclose your personal information for any of these purposes. We may also use and disclose your personal information for secondary purposes which are related to the primary purposes set out above, or in other circumstances authorised by the Data Protection Act.

Sensitive information will be used and disclosed only for the purpose for which it was provided (or a directly related secondary purpose), unless you agree otherwise or an exemption in the Data Protection Act applies.

Unless expressly specified with regard to specific information that we collect from your, we may disclose personal information to:

• a related entity of us;
• an agent, professional advisor or service provider we engage to carry out our functions and activities (such as, but not limited to, lawyers, accountants, IT contractors, marketing companies;
• organisations involved in a transfer or sale of our assets or business;
• financial institutions involved in managing our payments, such as banks;
• regulatory bodies, government agencies, law enforcement bodies and courts;
• anyone whom you authorise us to disclose it; and

If we disclose your personal information to service providers that perform business activities for us, they may only use your personal information for the specific purpose for which we supply it. We will ensure that all contractual arrangements with third parties adequately address privacy issues and will make third parties aware of this Policy.

We collect, hold and use, information related to your commercial and consumer creditworthiness from Equifax Limited, a credit reporting body, for all purposes permitted by law. We also disclose information to them. This activity is conducted for the purpose of assessing your credit capacity, eligibility or history in connection with an application, collecting payments from you, and managing our credit relationship. Creditworthiness information includes information that is both positive (like payment information) and negative (like defaults or serious credit infringements that we may disclose to credit reporting bodies if you fail to pay us).

GENERAL

• Before and why we provide services, goods or financing to you, we undertake checks for the purposes of preventing fraud and money laundering, and to verify your identity. These checks require us to process personal data about you.
• The personal data you have provided, we have collected from you, or we have received from third parties will be will be used to prevent fraud and money laundering, and to verify your identity.
• Details of the personal information that will be processed, for example: name, address, date of birth, address, contact details, financial information, employment details, device identifers including IP address and vehicle details.
• We and fraud prevention agencies may also enable law enforcement agencies to access and use your personal data to detect, investigate and prevent crime.
• We process your personal data on the basis that we have a legitimate interest in preventing fraud and money laundering, and to verify identity, in order to protect our business and to comply with laws that apply to us. Such processing is also a contractual requirement of the services or financing you have requested.
• Fraud prevention agencies can hold your personal data for different periods of time, and if you are considered to pose a fraud or money laundering risk, your data can be held for up to six years.

AUTOMATED DECISIONS

• As part of the processing of your personal data, decisions may be made by automated means. This means we may automatically decide that you pose a fraud or money laundering risk or if our processing reveals your behaviour to be consistent with that of known fraudsters or money launderers; or is inconsistent with your previous submissions; or you appear to have deliberately hidden your true identity. You have rights in relation to automated decision making: if you want to know more please contact us using the details provided.

CONSEQUENCES OF PROCESSING

• If we, or a fraud prevention agency, determine that you pose a fraud or money laundering risk, we may refuse to provide the services and financing you have requested, or to employ you, or we may stop providing existing services to you.
• A record of any fraud or money laundering risk will be retained by the fraud prevention agencies, and may result in others refusing to provide services, financing or employment to you. If you have any questions about this, please contact us on the details provided.

DATA TRANSFERS

• Whenever fraud prevention agencies transfer your personal data outside of the European Economic Area, they impose contractual obligations on the recipients of that data to protect your personal data to the standard required in the European Economic Area. They may also require the recipient to subscribe to ‘international frameworks’ intended to enable secure data sharing.

YOUR RIGHTS

• Your personal data is protected by legal rights, which include your rights to object to our processing of your personal data; request that your personal data is erased or corrected; request access to your personal data.
• For more information or to exercise your data protection rights, please contact us using the contact details above.
• You also have a right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office which regulates the processing of personal data.

We recognise the importance of securing the personal information of our customers. We will take steps to ensure your personal information is protected from misuse, interference or loss, and unauthorised access, modification or disclosure.

Your personal information is generally stored in our computer database. Any paper files are stored in secure areas. In relation to information that is held on our computer database, we apply the following guidelines:

• passwords are required to access the system and passwords are routinely checked;
• data ownership is clearly defined;
• we change employees’ access capabilities when they are assigned to a new position;
• employees have restricted access to certain sections of the system;
• the system automatically logs and reviews all unauthorised access attempts;
• unauthorised employees are barred from updating and editing personal information;
• all computers which contain personal information are secured both physically and electronically;
• data is encrypted during transmission over the network; and
• print reporting of data containing personal information is limited.

We may only use personal information we collect from you for the purposes of direct marketing without your consent if:

• the personal information does not include sensitive information; and
• you would reasonably expect us to use or disclose the information for the purpose of direct marketing; and
• we provide a simple way of opting out of direct marketing; and
• you have not requested to opt out of receiving direct marketing from us.

If we collect personal information about you from a third party, we will only use that information for the purposes of direct marketing if you have consented (or it is impracticable to obtain your consent), and we will provide a simple means by which you can easily request not to receive direct marketing communications from us. We will draw your attention to the fact you may make such a request in our direct marketing communications.

You have the right to request us not to use or disclose your personal information for the purposes of direct marketing, or for the purposes of facilitating direct marketing by other organisations. We must give effect to the request within a reasonable period of time. You may also request that we provide you with the source of their information. If such a request is made, we must notify you of the source of the information free of charge within a reasonable period of time.

We are committed to ensuring that the personal information we collect, hold, use and disclose is relevant, accurate, complete and up-to-date.

We encourage you to contact us if any personal information we hold about you needs to be updated. If we correct information that has previously been disclosed to another entity, we will notify the other entity of the correction within a reasonable period. Where we are satisfied information is inaccurate, we will take reasonable steps to correct the information within 30 days, unless you agree otherwise. We will not charge you for correcting your personal information.

Subject to exceptions in the Data Protection Act, you can access the personal information that we hold about you by contacting the Privacy Officer. We will generally provide access within 30 days of your request. If we refuse to provide you with access to the information, we will provide reasons for the refusal.

We will require identity verification and specification of what information is required. An administrative fee for search and photocopying costs may be charged.

This Policy will be reviewed from time to time to take account of new laws and technology, and changes to our operations and the business environment.

It is the responsibility of management to inform employees and other relevant third parties about this Policy. Management must ensure that employees and other relevant third parties are advised of any changes to this Policy. All new employees are to be provided with timely and appropriate access to this Policy, and all employees are provided with training in relation to appropriate handling of personal information. Employees or other relevant third parties that do not comply with this Policy may be subject to disciplinary action.

Cookies help us collect important business and technical statistics which enable us to serve you better. The information in the cookies lets us track the various paths followed by users of our website as they move from one page to another while on our website. Web server logs allow us assess site visits and site visit capacity. These methods are not used to capture individual e-mail address or any personally identifying information about you.

We not knowingly solicit data from nor knowingly market to individuals under the age of 18. Concerned parents can use readily available software packages to prevent children from accessing websites they deem as inappropriate.

If you have any questions about this Policy, or wish to make a complaint about how we have handled your personal information, you can lodge a complaint with us by:

• telephone – 0203 308 9188
• writing – 4 Devonshire Street, London, W1W 5DT, United Kingdom.
• email – [email protected]