Introduction

 

Chorley Vets are committed to safeguarding our clients’ data. Our Privacy Policy explains in detail the types of personal information we may collect about you. It explains how we keep, store and handle personal information to keep it safe.

Who are Chorley Vets?

Chorley Vets are an independent, family run business.  We do not have any other branch surgeries and all data is held at one site.

How do we collect personal information?

We will collect personal information by various channels of communication including –

• When you register your details as a new client.
• When you complete an online form requesting to be contacted for appointments.
• When you sign up to our Pet health Plan.
• When your pet needs to be referred by a vet to a specialist.
• When you visit our website.
• When you communicate with us via social media. 
• When you contact us to ask questions, raise an issue or make an enquiry.
• When you ask a member of staff to email you information about a service, product or treatment.
• When you have your pet micro-chipped with us.
• When you give feedback, comment, or review our services. Any individual may access personal information related to them, including opinions.
• When you complete any forms. This includes if we have a visiting specialist to treat your pet or we refer your’ pet to an external specialist or alternative service ie) hydrotherapy.
• When you have given a third-party permission to share the personal information they hold about you with us, ie) transfer of history to another practice.
• When you access the surgery via CCTV systems operating for the security of both customers and staff and for the prevention of crime. These systems may record your image during your visit.  
• We also collect your personal information when our suppliers and partners share information with us about the service, product or treatment you have purchased.
  
  

Why we need to collect personal information?

We will ask for some essential patient and client contact information to allow us to provide veterinary treatments and services to your pet.  This information is essential to carry out general tasks such as book appointments, send out reminders, notify changes to services, process payments, assist in the prevention of fraud and allow debt recovery if required. 

Information that is automatically collected

When you visit our website or social media, we may collect certain information automatically from your device. We use this information for internal analytics purposes, to improve the quality and relevance of our website.

Third party information

We may send or receive your information from other Veterinary surgeries should the transfer of history be required. We will ensure suitable consent has been obtained. We will also liaise with debt collection agencies where outstanding balances have remained unpaid.

Who do we share your personal information with?

We may disclose your personal information to the following categories of recipients:

• Specialist referral centres or specialist veterinary hospitals when we refer your pet for specialist diagnosis or treatment.
• Other veterinary professionals upon requests such as transferring between practices.
• Insurance companies with whom you have insured your pet.
• Laboratories and other suppliers who you have agreed we may provide your details to and who require them in order to provide services in relation to your pet.
• Other members who provide data processing services to us, or who otherwise process personal information for purposes that are described in this Privacy Policy or notified to you when we collect your personal information. Examples of the kind of third parties we work with are –
• IT companies who support our website and other business systems.
• Direct marketing companies or other third parties who help us manage electronic communications.
• Google, Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms.
• Data insight and data analysis companies (to provide us with tools to analyse the data which we hold).
• Customer review companies (so you can leave feedback and we can improve our service to you)
• Any competent law enforcement body, regulatory, government agency, court or other third party where we believe disclosure is necessary in the matter of applicable law or regulation, in order to exercise, establish or defend our legal rights
• Any other person with your consent to the disclosure.

Where we share your personal information with third party service providers and partners we apply a policy to ensure your personal information is safe and in order to protect your privacy.  Our policy requires:

• We provide only the information they need to perform their specific services.  
• They may only use your data for the exact purposes we specify in our contract with them. 
• We work closely with them to ensure that your privacy is respected and protected.  
• If we stop using their services, any of your personal information held by them will either be deleted or rendered anonymous (subject to applicable law).  
• If you have any questions about the third parties, we share your personal information with, please contact us.
  
  

How do we keep your personal information secure?

We use appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect the personal information that we collect and process about you.  The measures we use are designed to provide a level of security appropriate to the risk of processing your personal information. Specific measures we use include:

• Encrypting your personal information. 
• Keeping your information up-to-date and accurate. Please note that, to do this, we require you to tell us if any details change.
• Having in place strict security procedures for the storage and disclosure of your information to prevent unauthorised access.

Unfortunately, the transmission of information via the Internet is not completely secure. Although we will do our best to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of your data transmitted to and/or through our Websites and Apps; any transmission is at your own risk. Once we have received your information, we will use strict procedures and security features to try to prevent unauthorised access.

To ensure that your credit, debit or charge card is not being used without your consent, we will validate name, address and other personal information supplied by you during the order process against appropriate third-party databases. By accepting our Terms and Conditions you consent to these checks being made. In performing these checks personal information provided by you may be disclosed to a registered Credit Reference Agency which may keep a record of that information. You can rest assured that this is done only to confirm your identity, that a credit check is not performed and that your credit rating will be unaffected. All information provided by you will be treated securely and strictly in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

Data retention

We retain personal information we collect from you where we have an ongoing legitimate business need to do so (for example, to provide you with a service you have requested or to comply with applicable legal, tax or accounting requirements).  

When we have no ongoing legitimate business need to process your personal information, we will either delete or anonymise it or, if this is not possible (for example, because your personal information has been stored in backup archives), then we will securely store your personal information and isolate it from any further processing until deletion is possible.

Your data protection rights

• If you wish to access, correct, update or request deletion of your personal information, you can do so at any time by contacting the practice your pet is registered with.  
• You have the right to opt-out of marketing communications we send you at any time.  If you wish to opt out of these communications, please contact the practice directly.
• Similarly, if we have collected and process your personal information with your consent, then you can withdraw your consent at any time. Withdrawing your consent will not affect the lawfulness of any processing we conducted prior to your withdrawal, nor will it affect processing of your personal information conducted in reliance on lawful processing grounds other than consent.
• You have the right to complain to a data protection authority about our collection and use of your personal information.  For more information and contact details see below.
• We respond to all requests we receive from individuals wishing to exercise their data protection rights in accordance with applicable data protection laws.
  
  

Contacting the regulator

If you feel that your personal information has not been handled correctly, or you are unhappy with our response to any requests you have made to us regarding the use of your personal information, you have the right to raise a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office.  You can contact them by calling 0303 123 1113 or go online to www.ico.org.uk/concerns(please note we cannot be responsible for the content of external websites).