How we collect personal information
We collect personal information in a variety of ways:
- Via paper or online forms
- By telephone or in face to face meetings
- By email & letters
- Via digital media e.g. through our Facebook page
- By taking photographs or recording people
This information may have been provided:
- Directly by you or your child
- By your representative e.g. another family member
- A member of our staff
- By another organisation where there is a legal reason for them to share your information with us
How we use personal information
The information provided to us will be used to help us look after your child & meet his/her needs. We will use the information you provide to:
- Deliver an effective service to you & your child
- Ensure we fulfil our legal obligations e.g. to Ofsted & the local authority
- Maintain & update your child’s records & contact details
- Contact you when we need to
- Provide you with information & updates about our service
- Obtain your opinion & feedback about the services we provide
Sharing your information
Where necessary, we may share your information with other organisations & partners that provide services on our behalf such as:
- The local authority if your child is receiving Funded Early Learning (FEL)
- Ofsted if your child has a serious accident in our setting
- Other early years providers or schools that your child attends or will attend in the future
- Other local early help services such as health visitors, family centres, MAST teams, EY Inclusion Team
- Children’s social care services or the police if we think that you or your child may be at risk of harm
In such cases we will only share the minimum information necessary to enable these organisations to provide services to you or to meet their legal requirements. These organisations are required to retain your information in a secure manner & only use it for the purpose for which it was shared or to meet other legal requirements.
Personal information about you may also be provided to other Early Years providers or schools e.g. if your child has moved to another setting & it needs confirmation of the services your child was receiving at our setting.
We will only share your personal information with third parties who are legally entitled to it.
How long we keep information for
This varies depending on the type of information, as well as the legal requirements & reason we are keeping the information. In some instances, the law sets out the length of time information has to be kept. We have a data retention plan that sets out how long we need to keep different types of information & how it will be safely disposed of.
Your legal rights
When we collect personal data from you, we will tell you how we are going to use your data. Where we record or share your information, you have a number of rights under Data Protection law.
The right to be informed
You have the right to be told how your personal information will be processed. This right applies whether or not you supply your information to us, or whether we obtain your information from a third party. We have produced this Privacy Notice to explain what we do with your personal information & why.
The right of access to your personal data
You have the right to ask for access to the personal information held about you & your child. This is also known as making a ‘Subject Access Request’.
The right of rectification of your personal data
If you notice that your personal information is inaccurate or incomplete, you have the right to ask for this to be corrected. We will always comply with a request for rectification unless there is a legal reason why we can’t e.g. if the information is held for evidential purposes & was accurate at the time of collection. Where we can’t rectify your information, we will provide an explanation why.
The right to have your personal data erased
You have the right to ask for any information held about you or your child to be erased. We must legally erase any information where there is no compelling reason for us to retain it. Where we can’t comply with a request to erase your information we will explain this to you.
The right to restrict the processing of your personal data
You have the right to ask for the processing of your personal information to be blocked or suppressed. This means we can continue to hold your personal information but can’t process it in any other way. Where we cannot comply with a request for restriction of processing because there is a legal reason not to, we will explain this to you.
The right to object to certain types of processing
You have the right to object to certain types of processing of your personal information. If there is a legal reason why we cannot comply, we will explain this to you.
The right to ask for your data to be sent to another organisation (data portability)
There are some limited circumstances where you have the right to ask us to transfer our personal data to another organisation. We do not believe that any type of processing we carry out falls within these criteria, however we will always comply with requests from you to transfer your data where possible.
The right to object to automated decision making
Automated decision making is something that is done by a computer system with no human interaction e.g. when applying for credit; a computer system may decide that you are not eligible to be accepted for that credit. We do not currently carry out automated decisions without any human intervention but we will tell you if this changes in the future.
Exercising your rights
If you’d like to exercise your rights in any of the above areas your request should be placed in writing to the setting’s Data Champion for consideration. If circumstances dictate that we are unable to comply with your request the Data Champion will explain this to you & provide the reasons why.
If you have a concern regarding the management of your personal data, please place it in writing to the setting’s Data Champion who will attempt to resolve your issue.