Privacy Policy
Link Bookkeeping respects your privacy and is committed to protecting your personal data. This privacy notice will inform you as to how we look after your personal data when you visit our website (regardless of where you visit it from) and tell you about your privacy rights and how the law protects you.
Important information and who we are
Purpose of this privacy notice
This privacy notice aims to give you information on how Link Bookkeeping collects and processes your personal data through your use of this website, including any data you may provide through this website.
This website is not intended for children and we do not knowingly collect data relating to children.
It is important that you read this privacy notice so that you are fully aware of how and why we are using your data.
Controller
Link Bookkeeping is the controller and responsible for your personal data (collectively referred to as Link Bookkeeping, 'we', 'us' or 'our' in this privacy notice).
You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO so please contact us in the first instance.
Changes to the privacy notice and your duty to inform us of changes
It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal data changes during your relationship with us.
Third-party links
This website may include links to third-party websites, plug-ins and applications. Clicking on those links or enabling those connections may allow third parties to collect or share data about you. We do not control these third-party websites and are not responsible for their privacy statements. When you leave our website, we encourage you to read the privacy notice of every website you visit.
The data we collect about you
Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data).
We may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together as follows:
Identity Data: Includes first name, maiden name, last name, username or similar identifier, marital status, title, date of birth and gender.
Contact Data: Includes company address, email address and telephone numbers.
Transaction Data: Includes details about payments to and from you and other details of the services you use from us.
Technical Data: Includes internet protocol (IP) address, your login data, browser type and version, time zone setting and location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform and other technology on the devices you use to access this website.
Profile Data: Includes your username and password, preferences, feedback and survey responses.
Usage Data: Includes information about how you use our website, products and services.
Marketing and Communications Data: Includes your preferences in receiving marketing from us and our third parties and your communication preferences.
We do not collect any Special Categories of Personal Data about you (this includes details about your race or ethnicity, religious or philosophical beliefs, sex life, sexual orientation, political opinions, trade union membership, information about your health and genetic and biometric data). Nor do we collect any information about criminal convictions and offences.
If you fail to provide personal data
Where we need to collect personal data by law, or under the terms of a contract we have with you and you fail to provide that data when requested, we may not be able to perform the contract we have or are trying to enter into with you. In this case, we may have to cancel the agreement you have with us but we will notify you if this is the case at the time.
How is your personal data collected?
We use different methods to collect data from and about you including through:
Direct interactions: You may give us your Identity / Contact data by filling in forms or by corresponding with us by post, phone, email or otherwise. This includes personal data you provide when you:
apply for our products or services
subscribe to our service or publications
request marketing to be sent to you
enter a survey
apply for employment or to provide us with services
give us some feedback.
Automated technologies or interactions: As you interact with our website, we may automatically collect Technical Data about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns. We collect this personal data by using cookies, server logs and other similar technologies. Please see our cookie policy for further details.
Third parties or publicly available sources: We may receive personal data about you from various third parties, including technical data from the following parties:
analytics providers [such as Google based outside the EU]
advertising networks [such as Google based outside the EU]
search information providers [such as Google based outside the EU]
How we use your personal data
We will only use your personal data when the law allows us to. Most commonly, we will use your personal data in the following circumstances:
Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you.
Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests.
Where we need to comply with a legal or regulatory obligation.
Generally we do not rely on consent as a legal basis for processing your personal data other than in relation to sending third party direct marketing communications to you via email or text message. You have the right to withdraw consent to marketing at any time by contacting us.
Purposes for which we will use your personal data
We intend to use your personal data on legal grounds on which we will process such data. We may process your personal data for more than one lawful ground, depending on the specific purpose for which we are using your data.
To register you as a new customer
To process and deliver our service including:
(a) Manage payments, fees and charges
(b) Collect and recover money owed to us
3. To manage our relationship with you which will include:
(a) Notifying you about changes to our terms or privacy policy
(b) Asking you to leave a review or take a survey
4. To manage a legitimate interest while in the recruitment process for job applicants and new employees.
5. To administer and protect our business and our site (including troubleshooting, data analysis, testing, system maintenance, support, reporting and hosting of data)
6. To deliver relevant content and advertisements to you and measure and understand the effectiveness of our advertising
7. To use data analytics to improve our website, products/services, marketing, customer relationships and experiences
8. To make suggestions and recommendations to you about goods or services that may be of interest to you
Marketing
We strive to provide you with choices regarding certain personal data uses, particularly around marketing and advertising.
Promotional offers from us
We may use your Identity, Contact, Technical, Usage and Profile Data to form a view on what we think you may want or need, or what may be of interest to you. This is how we decide which products, services and offers may be relevant for you (we call this marketing).
You will receive marketing communications from us if you have requested information from us or purchased services from us and, in each case, you have not opted out of receiving that marketing.
Third-party marketing
We will get your express opt-in consent before we share your personal data with any company outside Link Bookkeeping for marketing purposes.
Opting out
You can ask us or third parties to stop sending you marketing messages at any time by following the opt-out links on any marketing message sent to you or by contacting us at any time.
Where you opt out of receiving these marketing messages, this will not apply to personal data provided to us as a result of a service purchase or other transactions.
Change of purpose
We will only use your personal data for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If you wish to get an explanation as to how the processing for the new purpose is compatible with the original purpose, please contact us.
If we need to use your personal data for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis which allows us to do so.
Please note that we may process your personal data without your knowledge or consent, in compliance with the above rules, where this is required or permitted by law.
Disclosures of your personal data
We may have to share your personal data with the parties set out below for the purposes set out in the table in ' How we use your personal data':
Internal Third Parties as set out in the Glossary.
External Third Parties as set out in the Glossary.
Third parties to whom we may choose to sell, transfer, or merge parts of our business or our assets. Alternatively, we may seek to acquire other businesses or merge with them. If a change happens to our business, then the new owners may use your personal data in the same way as set out in this privacy notice.
We require all third parties to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We do not allow our third-party service providers to use your personal data for their own purposes and only permit them to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.
INTERNATIONAL TRANSFERS
Countries outside of the European Economic Area (EEA) do not always offer the same levels of protection to your personal data, so European law has prohibited transfers of personal data outside of the EEA unless the transfer meets certain criteria.
Some of our third parties service providers are based outside the European Economic Area (EEA) so their processing of your personal data will involve a transfer of data outside the EEA.
Whenever we transfer your personal data out of the EEA, we do our best to ensure a similar degree of security of data by ensuring at least one of the following safeguards is implemented:
We will only transfer your personal data to countries that have been deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data by the European Commission; or
Where we use certain service providers, we may use specific contracts or codes of conduct or certification mechanisms approved by the European Commission which give personal data the same protection it has in Europe; or
Where we use providers based in the United States, we may transfer data to them if they are part of the EU-US Privacy Shield which requires them to provide similar protection to personal data shared between the Europe and the US.
If none of the above safeguards is available, we may request your explicit consent to the specific transfer. You will have the right to withdraw this consent at any time.
Data security
We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know. They will only process your personal data on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.
We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a breach where we are legally required to do so.
DATA RETENTION
We will only retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements.
To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, we consider the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which we process your personal data and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal requirements.
By law we have to keep basic information about our customers (including Contact, Identity, Financial and Transaction Data) for six years after they cease being customers for tax purposes.
In some circumstances you can ask us to delete your data: see below for further information.
In some circumstances we may anonymise your personal data (so that it can no longer be associated with you) for research or statistical purposes in which case we may use this information indefinitely without further notice to you.
YOUR LEGAL RIGHTS
As a data subject, you have a number of rights. You can:
access and obtain a copy of your data on request;
require us to change incorrect or incomplete data;
require us to delete or stop processing your data, for example where the data is no longer necessary for the purposes of processing; and
object to the processing of your data where we are relying on our legitimate interests as the legal ground for processing.
If you would like to exercise any of these rights, please contact us. If you believe that we have not complied with your data protection rights, you can complain to the Information Commissioner. More information is available at https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr/individual-rights/
You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.
We try to respond to all legitimate requests within one month. Occasionally it may take us longer than a month if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests. In this case, we will notify you and keep you updated.
Cookies
This website uses cookies. A cookie is a small text file stored in your computer containing text data. We use cookies for certain functions to improve the usability of the website. However, enabling cookies in your web browser is necessary if you wish your selections to be remembered for future visits on the same computer. You can set your browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when websites set or access cookies. For more information about cookies and instructions on how to adjust your browser settings to restrict or disable cookies, see www.allaboutcookies.org. If you disable or refuse cookies, please note that some parts of this website may become inaccessible or not function properly.
Glossary
Lawful basis
Legitimate Interest: Means the interest of our business in conducting and managing our business to enable us to give you the best service/product and the best and most secure experience. We make sure we consider and balance any potential impact on you (both positive and negative) and your rights before we process your personal data for our legitimate interests. We do not use your personal data for activities where our interests are overridden by the impact on you (unless we have your consent or are otherwise required or permitted to by law). You can obtain further information about how we assess our legitimate interests against any potential impact on you in respect of specific activities by contacting us.
Performance of Contract: Means processing your data where it is necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are a party or to take steps at your request before entering into such a contract.
Comply with a legal or regulatory obligation: Means processing your personal data where it is necessary for compliance with a legal or regulatory obligation that we are subject to.
Third parties
Internal third parties
Your data may be shared internally within Link Bookkeeping.
External third parties
Service providers [acting as processors] based in the United Kingdom who provide IT and system administration services.
Professional advisers [acting as processors or joint controllers] including lawyers, bankers, auditors and insurers based in the United Kingdom who provide consultancy, banking, legal, insurance and accounting services.
HM Revenue & Customs, regulators and other authorities [acting as processors or joint controllers] based in the United Kingdom who require reporting of processing activities in certain circumstances.