Make a complaint

Purpose and legal basis for processing

Our purpose is to investigate and take regulatory action in line with our statutory duties.

The legal basis we rely on to process your personal data may depend on your relationship to the website, with us and the nature of the complaint, and may be either:

• article 6(1)(a) of the GDPR, which allows us to process personal data where you have provided consent for one or more specific purpose, or;
• article 6(1)(b) of the GDPR, which allows us to process personal data when this is necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are a party to the contract, or;
• article 6(1)(c) of the GDPR, which allows us to process personal data when this is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation, or;
• article 6(1)(d) of the GDPR, which allows us to process personal data when this is necessary for the purposes of the legitimate interests pursued by the controller, or;
• article 6(1)(f) of the GDPR, which allows us to process personal data when this is necessary in order to protect the vital interests of the data subject or of another natural person.

What we need

We need information from you to investigate your complaint properly, so our complaint forms are designed to prompt you to give us everything we need to understand the circumstances around your complaint.

When we receive a complaint from you, we'll set up a case file. This normally includes your contact details and any other information you have given us about the other parties in your complaint.

Why we need it

We need to know the details of your complaint so we can investigate it and fulfil our function as provider of this website.

What we do with it

We will use your personal information to investigate your complaint and check on our level of service.

No third parties have access to your personal information unless the law allows them to do so. However, if you have made a complaint about an organisation (including trading partners, suppliers etc), we usually have to disclose your identity to them. This is so we can clearly explain to them what you think has gone wrong and if necessary advise them how to put it right. This also means we may receive information about you from them.

If you don't want information that identifies you to be shared with the organisation you want to complain about, we'll try to respect that. However, it is not always possible to handle a complaint on an anonymous basis so we'll contact you to discuss this.

If you are acting on behalf of someone making a complaint, we'll ask for information to satisfy us of your identity and if relevant, ask for information to show you have authority to act on someone else's behalf.

How long we keep it

This depends on the personal data and the necessary action(s) taken, we are currently finalising a retention schedule to make it clearer.

What are your rights?

We are acting in our official capacity to investigate your complaint, so you have the right to object to our processing of your personal data. There are legitimate reasons why we may refuse your objection, which depend on why we are processing it.

For more information on your rights, please see Your data protection rights https://ico.org.uk/global/privacy-notice/your-data-protection-rights/ ˜Your rights as an individual on the ICO website.

Do we use any data processors?

No.