This website is operated by Parents And Children Together (PACT)
We take your privacy very seriously and we ask that you read this privacy statement carefully as it contains important information on:
- the personal information we collect about you,
- what we do with your information, and
- who your information might be shared with.
Who are we?
Parents And Children Together is a ‘data controller’ for the purposes of the Data Protection Act 1998. PACT is a Voluntary Adoption Agency, registered with OFSTED to provide adoption services and adoption support services. PACT gathers information as part of this service and therefore acts as a data controller: this means it decides how your personal data is processed and for what purposes.
Personal data PACT collects
Personal data is any information that can be used to identify you. PACT only collects personal data relevant to the involvement you have with us. For example, if you request a Hub login, complete a survey, or contact us by telephone, email, social media, post or text message, we may collect and process the personal information you have provided. When collecting your personal data we will explain to you what data is needed and why we need it.
Sensitive personal data PACT collects
Data Protection Law recognises that some categories of personal information are more sensitive. Sensitive personal data can include information about ethnic origin, sexual orientation and religious beliefs. We will only collect your sensitive personal data with your explicit consent.
What does PACT do with your personal data?
The data we gather is held in accordance with Data Protection Law, including the EU General Data Protection Regulation (the ‘GDPR’) and the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) 2003. PACT complies with its obligations under GDPR by keeping personal data up to date; by storing and destroying it securely; by not collecting or retaining excessive amounts of data; by protecting personal data from loss, misuse, unauthorised access and disclosure and by ensuring that appropriate technical measures are in place to protect personal data.
What information do we collect?
Personal information provided by you
We collect and hold personal information about you (such as your name, the city you live in and email address) when you register with us.
Personal information provided by third parties
If you are not a PACT adopter, our partners may share information with us in order to set up an account for you.
Personal information about other individuals
If you give us information on behalf of someone else, you confirm that the other person has appointed you to act on his/her behalf and has agreed that you can give consent on his/her behalf to the processing of his/her personal data.
The legal basis for processing your data
PACT processes data in line with Article 6 of the General Data Protection Regulations:
- the data subject has given consent to the processing of his or her personal data for one or more specific purposes;
- processing is necessary for the performance of a contract to which the data subject is party or in order to take steps at the request of the data subject prior to entering into a contract;
- processing is necessary for the purposes of the legitimate interests pursued by the controller or by a third party, except where such interests are overridden by the interests or fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject which require protection of personal data, in particular where the data subject is a child.
Use of cookies
A cookie is a small text file which is placed onto your computer (or other electronic device) when you use our website. We use cookies on our website.
For example, we may monitor how many times you visit the website, which pages you go to, traffic data, location data and the originating domain name of a user’s internet service provider. This information helps us to build a profile of our users. Some of this data will be aggregated or statistical, which means that we will not be able to identify you individually.
You can set your browser not to accept cookies and the websites below tell you how to remove cookies from your browser. However, some of our website features may not function as a result.
For further information on our use of cookies, [including a detailed list of your information which we and others may collect through cookies] please see our Website cookie policy.
For further information on cookies generally visit AboutCookies.org. or www.allaboutcookies.org.
How will we use the information about you?
We collect information about you so that we can:
- Manage your CATCH account.
- Manage any concerns that arise relating to safeguarding, confidentiality, behaviour or usage of CATCH.
- Conduct research, statistical analysis and behavioural analysis.
- If you agree, let you know about other services that may be of interest to you—see ‘Marketing’ section below.
- Share usage and access data with the agency that is funding your access to CATCH (if applicable).
- Notify you of any changes to our website or to our services that may affect you.
- Improve our services..
Marketing
You can opt-in to email newsletters to hear about upcoming events such as webinars, new resources or other new content on CATCH. You can opt out at any time.
We do not pass your details to any other business or third party for marketing purposes.
Who might your information be shared with?
We will only share your data with parties outside of the organisation with your consent or where we are obliged to do so for legal reasons. We share usage data of the accounts that our partners are funding with them.
Keeping your data secure
We will use technical and organisational measures to safeguard your personal data, for example:
- access to your account is controlled by a password and username that are unique to you;
- we store your personal data on secure servers.
While we will use all reasonable efforts to safeguard your personal data, you acknowledge that the use of the internet is not entirely secure and for this reason we cannot guarantee the security or integrity of any personal data that are transferred from you or to you via the internet. If you have any particular concerns about your information, please contact us (see ‘How can you contact us?’ below).
Transfers outside of the UK and European Union
We store all personal data we are responsible for within the UK and European Economic Area and do not transfer your personal data to other countries where data protection laws may not be as strong.
Retention of information
PACT will retain your personal information for the period of time you are accessing, CATCH (formerly The Adopter Hub) as a funded user or paying user and for a period of up to 12 months after your funded/ paid for access has concluded. This is for the purpose of monitoring and reporting or to offer the opportunity to renew or resubscribe individually. After this point your personal data will be removed from our databases.
If you wish for us to delete your data/ personal information as soon as your ‘contract’/ funded access concludes please contact us at catch@pactcharity.org
What rights do you have?
Unless subject to an exemption (under the GDPR), you will have the following rights with respect to your personal data:
- The right to be informed about the personal data which PACT holds about you, which is what this privacy notice is for.
- The right to request a copy of your personal data which PACT holds about you.
- The right to request that PACT corrects any personal data if it is found to be inaccurate or out of date.
- The right to request your personal data is erased where it is no longer necessary or legally required for PACT to retain such data.
- The right to request that the data controller provide the data subject with his/her personal data and where possible, to transmit that data directly to another data controller (the right to data portability), where applicable.
- The right to understand how you are affected by automated decision-making or profiling if your personal data is used for these purposes. We do not use your personal data in this way.
- The right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office.
How can you contact us?
To exercise all relevant rights, queries or complaints please in the first instance contact the Data Protection Lead – IT Operations Manager, if you have any questions about the privacy notice or the information we hold about you.
If you wish to contact us, please send an email to info@pactcharity.org or write to us at PACT Head Office, 7 Southern Court, South Street, Reading RG1 4QS or telephone 0300 456 4800
You can contact the Information Commissioners Office on 0303 123 1113, through their online contact form or at the address Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF.
Changes to the privacy notice
We may change this privacy policy from time to time. You should check this statement occasionally to ensure you are aware of the most recent version that will apply each time you access this website.
Do you need any extra help?
If you would like this policy in another format (for example: audio, large print, braille) please contact us (see ‘How can you contact us? above)