At The Abbeyfield North Downs Society Ltd, we’re committed to protecting and respecting our Residents' privacy.

The Abbeyfield North Downs Society is a registered Society (no. 23568R) and Registered with the Social Housing Regulator (no. H3370) and with The Care Quality Commission. The registered address The Abbeyfield North Downs Society, David Gresham House, 2 Oak Close, Hurst Green, Oxted, Surrey, RH8 0BA.

Abbeyfield collects information from you via a variety of sources, including when you apply for one of our properties or services, complete one of our forms, when you call, write, e-mail or meet with us or respond to a survey. We may collect information when you use our social media sites or website.

We operate a CCTV system at Abbeyfield premises for the detection and prevention of crime on entrance and external exits. It operates continuously and recordings are held for one month.

We may also take photographs at our events, at our property and in our communities to use for general marketing and publicity. However, photographs of individuals will only be used for those purposes with your consent.

We may receive information about you from third parties including:

Your council or benefits office relating to your home.

• Prior landlords and credit agencies when you apply for your home.
• Welfare or support organisations dealing with you.
• Councillors, MPs or other representatives acting on your behalf/instruction.
• Financial institutions when you apply for our services.
• Dr, District nurses and other medical professionals.
• Local Authority – Social Services

The information we may require from you, the Resident, tenant(s) or leaseholder(s), includes:

• Full name (and proof of your identity / photo ID).
• Date of birth
• National Insurance number (your unique identifier).
• Contact details (phone, e-mail or correspondence address).
• Details of anyone authorised to act on your behalf if applicable.
• Basic details (name and DOB) of all Residents.
• Banking details if you pay your rent by Direct Debit.
• Any interest or equity in other property.
• Other personal information that will vary on a case by case basis to help us resolve breach of tenancy, alleged anti-social behaviour or fraud.
• Disabilities or vulnerabilities. We use this information to tailor our service to better meet your particular circumstances and needs. We may use this information for safeguarding of staff.
• Financial information. We may use this to help resolve arrears payments and optionally to provide welfare, benefits and debt advice as a free service to help you budget and pay your bills. We may use this to apply for funding on your behalf.
• Health and medical information. We may use this information to tailor our service to better meet your particular circumstances or needs. We may use this information for safeguarding of staff.

If you do not provide the information we need then we may not be able to provide all our services to you, and ultimately you may not be able to hold a tenancy.

The information we require from you is used to manage your tenancy or other contract between you and Abbeyfield. Please read your contract carefully for specific details as ‘performance of a contract’ is usually the legal basis for Abbeyfield processing your information and carrying out our activities.

The processing activities we conduct can be summarised as:

• Managing your account charges and payments, including arrears.
• Managing the repairs, maintenance and adaptations of our properties.
• Ensuring tenancy (or contract) conditions are complied with, such as dealing with anti-social behaviour or fraud.
• Complying with relevant legislation and regulation.

Abbeyfield conducts surveys and ancillary research regularly and periodically relating to our services in order to gauge satisfaction and make improvements based on feedback.

Abbeyfield operates a range of information and communications systems and technologies for efficient operation of the business. Personal information is stored and managed within those systems which are maintained to achieve a high level of confidentiality, ontegrity and availability including following best practice cyber security standards.

We hold information in IT systems which may be copied for testing, backup, archiving and disaster recovery purposes. All data is held within the UK.

Abbeyfield has a number of volunteers who may assist with the running of our home or provide assistance to residents. Where your personal information is needed by the volunteer(s), we will always notify you about the voluntary offering being provided.

Much of the data we use relates to our properties and their maintenance and repair. We do not consider property information used in conjunction with the property address to be your personal information. For example, the age of the kitchen, results from an asbestos survey, planning to replace windows or a repair to a tap.

We are usually happy to provide you with answers to questions you may have about the home you are living in and work done to it.

As soon as your name, contact details or other personal information is used in conjunction with property information, such as to complete a property repair visit, then this is treated as personal information.

Abbeyfield needs to communicate with our residents and this will usually be in person, in writing or by telephone, but is more commonly becoming electronic and paperless.

Our Residents receive our newsletter and Entertainment programme with information about what is going on within Abbeyfield. We are required by our regulator to keep our residents informed and to offer opportunities for involvement, but you may opt-out of receiving this by contacting Registered Manager/Activities Co Ordinator .

Abbeyfield operates an opt-in mechanism for receiving direct marketing. You may remove your consent to receive direct marketing or object about direct marketing to Registered Manager.

We will only discuss or communicate your tenancy or lease details with those named on the agreement or those authorised (temporarily or permanently) by you. You can authorise someone temporarily verbally over the phone or permanently in writing.

Abbeyfield shares limited personal data with our contractors who are carrying out services on our behalf. Our contractors are required to comply with the law and our own Data Processing Agreement to ensure data is managed appropriately and for specified purposes to complete emergency, responsive or planned property repairs.

Abbeyfield may need to share personal information with government departments and agencies, with our regulator and auditors, with medical professionals, utility companies or with other organisations and agencies where we are legally allowed to do so.

Information relating to a tenancy or lease agreement will be kept for as long as the agreement is active or where money is owed on the account, and for a period not exceeding six years afterwards. The basic history of who held a tenancy at which property and when will be held indefinitely.

We will not send you unsolicited marketing material. We will not sell your personal data on to third parties.

We will not pass on your personal data to unrelated third parties unless we are allowed or required to do so by law or we have your explicit permission to do that.

We will not transfer or store your personal data outside of Europe (the European Economic Area) outside of the control of the UK / European regulations.

You have the right to request a copy of the data we hold about you. If you wish to request access to any of your personal data please complete a Subject Access Request form. We will respond within a month of making a request.

It will always help if you can be as specific about what personal data you want to see, what it relates to and within what timeframe, as that will assist our search.

You have the right to correct information that we hold. Please advise us of any changes or corrections by contacting our Registered Manager. You may withdraw your consent to use any information that was previously provided with your consent. Please advise us if you wish to withdraw any consent previously given to our Registered Manager.

You also have other rights which can be seen by visiting the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) website and reading about Data Protection law at https://ico.org.uk/.

You have the right to complain about any matter relating to our service, including how we use your personal data. In the first instance please refer to our complaints policy, which is available in our home.

If you wish to complain about our use of your personal data you may complain to the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at https://ico.org.uk/.

Abbeyfield produces a number of different leaflets designed to inform you about our services and other useful topics. There are leaflets on ‘Compliments and Complaints’ available from your home.

For further information about Abbeyfield, please see our website at www.davidgreshamhouse.co.uk (including website terms & conditions and information about website cookies).

Our Privacy Notice is regularly kept up to date and this version was updated on May 2018. The latest full version is always available from our website.