Privacy Policy

Personal Information

Personal information can be anything that identifies and relates to a living person.  This can include information that when put together with other information can then identify a person.  For example, this could be your name and contact details.

How we use your information

This privacy notice tells you what to expect when Castle Point Borough Council (CPBC) collects personal information as the accountable body on behalf of the

• South Essex Housing Group (SEHG)
• Essex Developers Group (EDG)

Your rights

If we are holding your personal information you have a number of rights.  You have the right:

• to be informed about how and why we process your personal information and how long we retain it for as well how you can complain
• of access which includes confirmation that your personal information is being processed and access to your personal information
• to rectification so that if you identify any of the personal information we hold about you is incorrect you can write to us asking us to correct it
• to erasure otherwise known as the right to be forgotten so that you may unless we require it to continue to provide a service to you request the deletion or remove of personal information
• to restrict processing which enables you to block or suppress is processing your personal information
• to data portability which allows you to obtain and reuse your personal information for your own purposes across different services
• to object to us processing your information based on legitimate interest or performance of a task in the public interest of official authority, direct marketing and for scientific/historical research and statistics
• related to the automated decision making and profiling which safeguards you against the risk that a potentially damaging decision is taken without human intervention

Google Analytics

Our website uses Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc. (“Google”). Google Analytics uses cookies, which are text files placed on your computer, to help the website analyse how users use the site. For information on what a cookie is, please see below in this policy.

Google Analytics is set to collect data anonymously, with the IP anonymisation configuration setting activate and will not record the full IP address.

Google may also transfer this information to third parties where required to do so by law, or where such third parties process the information on Google’s behalf. Google will not associate your IP address with any other data held by Google.

You may refuse the use of cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser, please note if you do this you may not be able to use the functionality of this website. By using this website, you consent to the processing of data about you by Google in the manner and for the purposes set out above.

Use of cookies

What is a ‘cookie’? When you enter a site, your computer will automatically be issued with a cookie. Cookies are text files that identify your computer to our server. Cookies in themselves do not contain any personal identifying information about a visitor or their location. They just identify the computer used. Many sites do this whenever a user visits their site in order to track traffic flows and patterns of behaviour of site visitors.

You can see a schedule of the cookies we use in Schedule A.

Search engine

Our website search will be powered by WordPress. Search queries and results are logged anonymously to help us improve our website and search functionality.  No user-specific data is collected by either CPBC or any third party.

Security and performance

We will use a third party service to help maintain the security and performance of the Housing Essex website.  To deliver this service it processes the IP addresses of visitors to the website.

People who email us

CPBC is part of the GSI network.  Any email sent to us, including any attachments, may be monitored and used by use for reasons of security and for monitoring compliance with office policy.  Email monitoring or blocking software may also be used.  Please be aware that you have a responsibility to ensure that any email you send to us is within the bounds of the law.

People who make a complaint to us

When we receive a complaint from a person we record it on our complaints database containing the details of the complaint.  This normally contains the identity of the complainant and any other individuals involved in the complaint.

We will only use the personal information we collect to process the complaint and to check on the level of service we provide.

Complaints or queries

CPBC tries to meet the highest standards when collecting and using personal information.  For this reason, we take any complaints we receive about this very seriously.  We encourage people to bring it to our attention if they think that our collection or use of information is unfair, misleading or inappropriate.  We would also welcome any suggestions for improving our procedures.

This privacy notice was drafted with brevity and clarity in mind.  It does not provide exhaustive detail of all aspects of CPBC’s collection and use of personal information.  However, we are happy to provide any additional information or explanation needed.  Any requests for this should be sent to the address below.  Please also see the webpages for our specific services.

Should you not be satisfied with our explanation or wish to complain about how we have handled your personal information you may complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office whose details are below.

Access to personal information

CPBC tries to be as open as it can be in terms of giving people access to their personal information.  Individuals can find out if we hold any personal information by making a “subject access request” under the Data Protection Act 2018.  If we do hold information about you we will:

• Give you a description of it;
• Tell you why we are holding it;
• Tell you who it could be disclosed to; and
• Let you have a copy of the information in an intelligible form

To make a request to CPBC for any personal information we may hold you need to put the request in writing addressing it to Information Officer, Civic Governance and Law or writing to the address provided below.

We shall also require 2 items as proof of identification one of which must have a photograph of you with your name (eg drivers licence, passport) and the other with your name and address (eg utilities bill, bank or credit card statement).

If we do hold information about you, you can ask us to correct any mistakes by, once again, contacting the Information Officer, Civic Governance and Law in writing to confirm the corrections necessary.

Disclosure of personal information

In many circumstances we will not disclose personal data without consent.  However when we investigate a complaint, for example, we may need to share personal information with any organisations involved or with other relevant bodies.

We may also need to share your personal information without your consent:

• with contractors or organisations carrying out services on our behalf eg maintenance works to housing stock
• to prevent and detect crime

Links to other websites

This privacy notice does not cover the links within this site linking to other websites.  We encourage you to read the privacy statements on the other websites you visit.

Service pages on CPBC’s website and the new Housing Essex website

We encourage you to read the privacy statements on service pages on our website as these provide further information relating to the personal information that we hold in relation to specific services provided by CPBC to you.  These privacy statements set out the following information:

• the purpose for processing your personal information
• the legal basis for processing your personal information
• any recipient or categories of recipients of your personal information
• retention period for holding your personal information
• the right to withdraw consent at any time where relevant
• whether the provision of personal data is part of a statutory or contractual requirement or obligation and possible consequences of failing to provide the personal data
• the existence of automated decision making, including profiling and information about how decisions are made, the significance and the consequences

Changes to this private notice

We keep our privacy notice under regular review.  This privacy notice was last updated 22 May 2018.

How to contact us

If you want to request information about our privacy policy you can email us: legal@castlepoint.gov.uk or write to us at:

Civic Governance & Law
Castle Point Borough Council
Council Offices
Kiln Road, Thundersley
Benfleet
Essex SS7 1TF

CPBC’s Data Protection Officer

CPBC’s Data Protection Office is Andrew Roby Smith and he may be contacted at the above address.

Information Commissioner’s Office

If you want to any further information about your privacy rights or to make a complaint you can contact the Information Commissioner’s Office at the address below:

Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
Sk9 5AF

Email: https://ico.org.uk/global/contact-us/
Website: www.ico.org.uk

Schedule A – Cookies