PRIVACY POLICY

Here at Action for A-T, we’re committed to protecting and respecting your privacy.

This Privacy Policy explains when and why we collect personal information about people who visit our website or our online events portal, how we use it, the conditions under which we may disclose it to others and how we keep it secure.

We may change this Privacy Policy from time to time so please check this page occasionally to ensure that you’re happy with any changes. By using our website or events portal, you’re agreeing to be bound by this Policy.

Any questions regarding this Privacy Policy and our privacy practices should be sent by email to info@actionforAT.org or by writing to Action for A-T, Aruna House, 2 Kings Road, Haslemere, GU27 2QA. Alternatively, you can telephone 01428 853313.

Who are we?

We are Action for A-T, the only UK based charity solely dedicated to funding research into the rare condition known as Ataxia Telangiectasia (A-T). Action for A-T is a registered charity (no. 1145303). The registered address is Action for A-T, Aruna House, 2 Kings Road, Haslemere, GU27 2QA.

How do we collect information from you?

We obtain information about you when you use our website or events portal, for example, when you contact us about products and services, to make a donation, to sign up for events or activities or if you register to receive our monthly e-newsletter.

What type of information is collected from you?

The personal information we collect might include your name, address, email address, IP address, and information regarding what pages are accessed and when. If you make a donation online or purchase a product from us, your card information is not held by us, it is collected by our third party payment processors, who specialise in the secure online capture and processing of credit/debit card transactions, as explained below.

How is your information used?

We may use your information to:

  • process a donation that you have made;
  • process orders that you have submitted;
  • to carry out our obligations arising from any contracts entered into by you and us;
  • dealing with entries into a competition;
  • seek your views or comments on the services we provide;
  • notify you of changes to our services;
  • send you communications which you have requested and that may be of interest to you. These may include information about our research projects, campaigns, appeals and other fundraising activities, promotions of associated companies’ goods and services;
  • process a grant or job application.

We review our retention periods for personal information on a regular basis. We are legally required to hold some types of information to fulfil our statutory obligations (for example the collection of Gift Aid). We will hold your personal information on our systems for as long as is necessary for the relevant activity, or as long as is set out in any relevant contract you hold with us.

How long do we keep your data?

We only ever retain personal information for as long as is necessary and we have strict review and retention policies in place to meet these obligations. If you have taken part in an event, auction or another of our services, we will keep your data for a minimum of 3 years for accounting purposes.

Where you have consented to us using your details for direct marketing, we will keep such data until you notify us otherwise and/or withdraw your consent.

Who has access to your information?

Action for A-T employees, contractors and some volunteers will have access to your data. We will not sell or rent your information to any third parties. We will not share your information with third parties for marketing purposes.

Third Party Service Providers working on our behalf

We may pass your information to our third-party service providers, agents, subcontractors and other associated organisations for the purposes of completing tasks and providing services to you on our behalf (for example to process donations, sign you up for events and send you mailings). However, when we use third party service providers, we disclose only the personal information that is necessary to deliver the service and we have a contract in place that requires them to keep your information secure and not to use it for their own direct marketing purposes. Please be reassured that we will not release your information to third parties to use for their own direct marketing purposes, unless you have requested us to do so, or we are required to do so by law, for example, by a court order or for the purposes of prevention of fraud or other crime.

When you are using our secure online donation pages, your donation is processed by a third party payment processor, who specialises in the secure online capture and processing of credit/debit card transactions. If you have any questions regarding secure transactions, please contact us.

We may transfer your personal information to a third party such as one of our researchers if you have told us that you or your family are willing to take part in one of our studies, or if we’re under a duty to disclose or share your personal data in order to comply with any legal obligation or to enforce or apply our terms of use or to protect the rights, property or safety of our supporters and customers. However, we will take steps with the aim of ensuring that your privacy rights continue to be protected.

Your choices

You have a choice about whether or not you wish to receive information from us. If you do not want to receive direct marketing communications from us about our research work or fundraising activities, then you can select your choices by ticking the relevant boxes situated on the form on which we collect your information.

We will not contact you for marketing purposes by email, phone or text message unless you have given your prior consent. We will not contact you for marketing purposes by post if you have indicated that you do not wish to be contacted. You can change your marketing preferences at any time by clicking on our communication preferences link, contacting us by email: info@actionforAT.org or by calling on 01428 853313.

How you can access and update your information

The accuracy of your information is important to us. We’re working on ways to make it easier for you to review and correct the information that we hold about you. In the meantime, if you change email address, or any of the other information we hold is inaccurate or out of date, please email us at: info@actionforAT.org  or by write to Action for A-T, Aruna House, 2 Kings Road, Haslemere, GU27 2QA. Alternatively, you can telephone 01428 853313.

You have the right to ask for a copy of the information Action for A-T hold about you (we may charge £10 for information requests) to cover our costs in providing you with details of the information we hold about you.

Security precautions in place to protect the loss, misuse or alteration of your information

When you give us personal information, we take steps to ensure that it’s treated securely. Any sensitive information (such as credit or debit card details) is encrypted and protected with the following software 128 Bit encryption on SSL and we do not store any of your card details within our CRM system. When you are on a secure page, a lock icon will appear on the bottom of web browsers such as Google or Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Non-sensitive details (your email address etc.) are transmitted normally over the Internet, and this can never be guaranteed to be 100% secure. As a result, while we strive to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of any information you transmit to us, and you do so at your own risk. Once we receive your information, we make our best effort to ensure its security on our systems. Where we have given (or where you have chosen) a password which enables you to access certain parts of our websites, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share your password with anyone.

Profiling

We may analyse your personal information to create a profile of your interests and preferences so that we can contact you with information which is relevant to you. We may make use of additional information about you when it is available from external sources to help us do this effectively. We may also use your personal information to detect and reduce fraud and credit risk.

Use of ‘cookies’

Like many other websites, the Action for A-T website uses cookies. ‘Cookies’ are small pieces of information sent by an organisation to your computer and stored on your hard drive to allow that website to recognise you when you visit. They collect statistical data about your browsing actions and patterns and do not identify you as an individual. For example, we use cookies to store your country preference. This helps us to improve our website and deliver a better more personalised service.

It is possible to switch off cookies by setting your browser preferences but this may result in a loss of functionality when using our website.

Links to other websites

Our website may contain links to other websites run by other organisations. This privacy policy applies only to our website‚ so we encourage you to read the privacy statements on the other websites you visit. We cannot be responsible for the privacy policies and practices of other sites even if you access them using links from our website.

In addition, if you linked to our website from a third party site, we cannot be responsible for the privacy policies and practices of the owners and operators of that third party site and recommend that you check the policy of that third party site.

16 or Under

If you are aged 16 or under‚ please get your parent/guardian’s permission beforehand whenever you provide us with personal information.

Transferring your information outside of Europe

As part of the services offered to you through this website, the information which you provide to us may be transferred to countries outside the European Union (“EU”). By way of example, this may happen if any of our servers are from time to time located in a country outside of the EU. These countries may not have similar data protection laws to the UK. By submitting your personal data, you’re agreeing to this transfer, storing or processing. If we transfer your information outside of the EU in this way, we will take steps to ensure that appropriate security measures are taken with the aim of ensuring that your privacy rights continue to be protected as outlined in this Policy.

If you use our services while you are outside the EU, your information may be transferred outside the EU in order to provide you with those services.

Website recording

We do not use any website recording services to track your mouse clicks etc.

How we use cookies

A cookie is a small file which asks permission to be placed on your computer’s hard drive. Once you agree, the file is added and the cookie helps analyse web traffic or lets you know when you visit a particular site. Cookies allow web applications to respond to you as an individual. The web application can tailor its operations to your needs, likes and dislikes by gathering and remembering information about your preferences.

We use traffic log cookies to identify which pages are being used. This helps us analyse data about web page traffic and improve our website in order to tailor it to customer needs. We only use this information for statistical analysis purposes and then the data is removed from the system.

Overall, cookies help us provide you with a better website, by enabling us to monitor which pages you find useful and which you do not. A cookie in no way gives us access to your computer or any information about you, other than the data you choose to share with us.

You can choose to accept or decline cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can usually modify your browser setting to decline cookies if you prefer. This may prevent you from taking full advantage of the website.

Google Analytics

Our website also uses Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc. (“Google”). Google Analytics uses cookies. The information generated by the Google Analytic cookie about your use of the website (including your IP address) will be transmitted to and stored by Google on servers in the United States of America. Google will use this information for the purpose of evaluating your use of the website, compiling reports on website activity for website operators and providing other services relating to website activity and internet usage. 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. By using our website, you consent to the processing of data about you by Google in the manner and for the purposes set out above. You can read Google’s privacy policy here for further information https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/

The information collected is used to improve our website usability and is stored and used for aggregated and statistical reporting.

Review of this Policy

We keep this Privacy Policy under regular review. This Privacy Policy was last updated in March 2022.