Read our privacy statement

1. Purpose of this notice

This notice describes how we collect and use personal data about you, in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the Data Protection Act 2018 and any other national implementing laws, regulations and secondary legislation, as amended or updated from time to time, in the UK (‘Data Protection Legislation’).

Please read the following carefully to understand our practices regarding your personal data and how we will treat it.

2. About us

Websters is the data controller within the meaning of the GDPR and we process personal data. Websters, a trading name of Websters Cambridge Limited, is a tax, legal, and accountancy firm. It is registered in England and Wales as a limited liability company, under number 10353661 and our registered office is at 10 Wellington Street, Cambridge, CB1 1HW.

The Websters group also includes the following entities:

Andrew Webster Limited (registered in England & Wales, number 04460609)
Websters Financial Planning Limited (registered in England & Wales, number 06749599)
Websters Sydney PTY Limited (registered in Australia, ABN: 31 612 052 909)
Websters Group Holdings Limited (registered in England & Wales, number 10491675)
Any subsidiaries which may be formed from time to time

For the purpose of the Data Protection Legislation and this notice, we are the ‘data controller’. This means that we are responsible for deciding how we hold and use personal data about you. We are required under the Data Protection Legislation to notify you of the information contained in this privacy notice.

Where we act as a data processor on behalf of a data controller (for example, when processing payroll), we provide an additional schedule setting out required information as part of that agreement. That additional schedule should be read in conjunction with this privacy notice.

We have appointed a Data Protection Point of Contact who is responsible for assisting with enquiries in relation to this privacy notice or our treatment of your personal data. Should you wish to contact our Data Protection Point of Contact you can do so using the contact details noted at paragraph 12 (Contact Us), below.

3. How we may collect your personal data

We obtain personal data about you, for example, when:

you request a proposal from us in respect of the services we provide;
you or your employer or our clients engage us to provide our services and also during the provision of those services;
you contact us by email, telephone, post (for example when you have a query about our services); or
you use our website or submit information to us via our website forms. In addition we collect some limited personal data via the use of cookies on our website – see our Cookies Policy for further information.
from third parties and/or publicly available resources (for example, from Companies House).

4. The kind of information we hold about you

The information we hold about you may include the following:

your personal details (such as your name and/or address);
your financial details (such as bank account, salary and other income)
details of contact we have had with you in relation to the provision, or the proposed provision, of our services;
details of any services you have received from us;
our correspondence and communications with you;
information about any complaints and enquiries you make to us;
information from research, surveys, and marketing activities;
Information we receive from other sources, such as information from Fraud prevention agencies, for example court records of debt judgements and bankruptcies Information from other publicly available sources as well as information on any associates you may have, which related to the service(s) being provided.
Personal data about other individuals (i.e. spouse or company secretary/director), you must have their authority to provide their personal data to us and share this data protection statement with them beforehand, together with details of what you have agreed on their behalf.
For users of our website:
information about your computer and about your visits to and use of this website (including your IP address, geographical location, browser type and version, operating system, referral source, length of visit, page views and website navigation paths);
information that you provide to us when registering with our website (including your email address);
information that you provide when completing your profile on our website (including your name, profile pictures, gender, date of birth, relationship status, interests and hobbies, educational details and employment details);
information that you provide to us for the purpose of subscribing to our email notifications and/or newsletters (including your name and email address);
information that you provide to us when using the services on our website, or that is generated in the course of the use of those services (including the timing, frequency and pattern of service use);
information relating to any purchases you make of our services or any other transactions that you enter into through our website (including your name, address, telephone number, and email address);
information that you post to our website for publication on the internet (including your user name, your profile pictures and the content of your posts);
information contained in or relating to any communication that you send to us or send through our website (including the communication content and metadata associated with the communication); and
any other personal information that you choose to send to us.

5. How we use personal data we hold about you

We may process your personal data for purposes necessary for the performance of our contract with you.

We may process your personal data for the purposes necessary for the performance of our contract with your employer or our clients. This may include processing your personal data where you are an employee, subcontractor, supplier or customer of our client.

We may process your personal data for the purposes of our own legitimate interests provided that those interests do not override any of your own interests, rights and freedoms which require the protection of personal data. This includes processing for marketing, business development, statistical and management purposes.

We may process your personal data to comply with a legal obligation, for example:

When you exercise your rights under data protection law and make requests;
For compliance with legal and regulatory requirements and related disclosures;
For activities relating to the prevention, detection and investigation of crime;
To verify your identity, fraud prevention and anti-money laundering checks.

We may process your personal data for certain additional purposes with your consent, for example when you request us to disclose your personal data to other people or organisations. In these limited circumstances where your consent is required for the processing of your personal data, then you have the right to withdraw your consent to processing for such specific purposes.

If you submit personal information for publication on our website, we will publish and otherwise use that information in accordance with the licence you grant to us. Also your privacy settings can be used to limit the publication of your information on our website, and can be adjusted using privacy controls on the website.

Please note that we may process your personal data for more than one lawful basis depending on the specific purpose for which we are using your data.

Situations in which we will use your personal data

We may use your personal data in order to:

carry out our obligations arising from any agreements entered into between you and us (which will most usually be for the provision of our services);
carry out our obligations arising from any agreements entered into between your employer or our clients and us (which will most usually be for the provision of our services) where you may be an employee, subcontractor, supplier or customer of our client;
provide you with information related to our services and our events and activities that you request from us, or which we feel may interest you, provided you have consented to be contacted for such purposes;
seek your thoughts and opinions on the services we provide; and
notify you about any changes to our services.
administer our website, including:
personalise our website for you;
enable your use of the services available on our website;
supply to you services purchased through our website;
deal with enquiries and complaints made by or about you relating to our website;
keep our website secure and prevent fraud; and
verify compliance with the terms and conditions governing the use of our website

In some circumstances we may anonymise or pseudonymise the personal data so that it can no longer be associated with you, in which case we may use it without further notice to you.

If you refuse to provide us with certain information when requested, we may not be able to perform the contract we have entered into with you. Alternatively, we may be unable to comply with our legal or regulatory obligations.

We may also process your personal data without your knowledge or consent, in accordance with this notice, where we are legally required or permitted to do so.

Data retention

We will only retain your personal data for as long as is necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it is collected.

When assessing what retention period is appropriate for your personal data, we take into consideration:

the requirements of our business and the services provided;
any statutory or legal obligations;
the purposes for which we originally collected the personal data;
the lawful grounds on which we based our processing;
the types of personal data we have collected;
the amount and categories of your personal data; and
whether the purpose of the processing could reasonably be fulfilled by other means.

You are responsible for retaining information that we send to you (including details of capital gains base costs and claims and elections submitted) and this will be supplied in the form agreed between us. Documents and records relevant to your tax affairs are required by law to be retained by you as follows:

Individuals, trustees and partnerships

with trading or rental income: five years and 10 months after the end of the tax year;
otherwise: 22 months after the end of the tax year.

Companies, LLPs and other corporate entities

six years from the end of the accounting period.

Change of purpose

Where we need to use your personal data for another reason, other than for the purpose for which we collected it, we will only use your personal data where that reason is compatible with the original purpose.

Should it be necessary to use your personal data for a new purpose, we will notify you and communicate the legal basis which allows us to do so before starting any new processing.

6. Data sharing

Why might you share my personal data with third parties?

We will share your personal data with third parties where we are required by law, where it is necessary to administer the relationship between us or where we have another legitimate interest in doing so.

Which third-party service providers process my personal data?

“Third parties” includes third-party service providers and other entities within the Websters group. All of our third-party service providers are required to take commercially reasonable and appropriate security measures to protect your personal data. We only permit our third-party service providers to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.

Third parties may include the following:

The Websters group of companies and associated companies;
Subcontractors and other persons who help us to provide our services, such as IT and cloud service providers;
Our legal and other professional advisors;
Professional Indemnity insurers;
Banking services;
Marketing services;
Fraud prevention agencies, credit reference agencies, debt collection agencies;
Government bodies and agencies in the UK and overseas (e.g. HM Revenue and Customers (“HMRC”), Inland Revenue Service (“IRS”) who may in turn share it with relevant authorities and regulators);
Our professional bodies (such as ACCA, ICAEW, CIOT, The Law Society) and/or the Office of Professional Body Anti-Money Laundering Supervisors (OPBAS) in relation to practice assurance and/or the requirements of MLR 2017 (or any similar legislation);
To protect the security or integrity of our business operations;
To other parties connected with the services we provide;
If we restructure or sell our business or its assets;
Anyone else where we have your consent.

If the law allows or requires us to do so, we may also share your personal data with:

the police and law enforcement agencies
courts and tribunals
the Information Commissioner’s Office (“ICO”)

We may need to share your personal data with the third parties identified above in order to comply with our legal obligations, including our legal obligations to you. If you ask us not to share your personal data with such third parties we may need to cease to act.

Third party websites

Our website includes hyperlinks to, and details of, third party websites.
We have no control over, and are not responsible for, the privacy policies and practices of third parties.

7. Transferring personal data outside the European Economic Area (EEA)

Your personal data may be transferred outside the UK and the European Economic Area, such as Australia and the USA. While some countries have adequate protections for personal data under applicable laws, in other countries we will take steps to make sure the right security measures are taken so that your privacy rights continue to be protected as outlined in this statement. By submitting your personal data, you’re agreeing to this transfer, storing or processing.

8. Data security

We have put in place commercially reasonable and 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.

All transmission of sensitive information through our website will be protected by SSL encryption technology. You are responsible for keeping the password you use for accessing our website confidential; we will not ask you for your password (except when you log in to our website).

We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected data security breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected breach where we are legally required to do so.

Should you require further information about these protective measures, please contact our Data Protection Point of Contact using the contact details noted at paragraph 12 (Contact Us), below.

9. Rights of access, correction, erasure, and restriction

Your duty to inform us of changes

It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Should your personal information change, please notify us of any changes of which we need to be made aware by contacting us, using the contact details noted at paragraph 12 (Contact Us), below.

Your rights in connection with personal data

Under certain circumstances, by law you have the right to:

Request access to your personal data – such requests are known as ‘subject access requests’ (“SARs”). This enables you to receive details of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are processing it lawfully.
Request correction of the personal data that we hold about you.
Request erasure of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal data where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have exercised your right to object to processing (see below).
Object to processing of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this basis. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal information for direct marketing purposes.
Request the restriction of processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of personal data about you, for example if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it.
Request the transfer of your personal data to you or another data controller if the processing is based on consent, carried out by automated means and this is technically feasible.

If you want to exercise any of the above rights, please contact our Data Protection Point of Contact using the contact details noted at paragraph 12 (Contact Us), below. DPA 2018 requires that we comply with a SAR promptly and in any event within one month of receipt. There are, however, some circumstances in which the law allows us to refuse to provide access to personal data in response to a SAR (e.g. if you have previously made a similar request and there has been little or no change to the data since we complied with the original request).

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 for access is clearly unfounded or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with the request in such circumstances.

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access the information (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is another appropriate security measure to ensure that personal information is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. For example, you should tell us:

your date of birth
previous or other name(s) you have used
your previous addresses in the past five years
personal reference number(s) that we may have given you, for example your national insurance number, your tax reference number or your VAT registration number
what type of information you want to know

If you do not have a national insurance number, you must send a copy of:

the back page of your passport or a copy of your driving licence; and
a recent utility bill.

10. Right to withdraw consent

In the limited circumstances where you may have provided your consent to the collection, processing and transfer of your personal data for a specific purpose (for example, in relation to direct marketing that you have indicated you would like to receive from us), you have the right to withdraw your consent for that specific processing at any time. To withdraw your consent, please contact our Data Protection Point of Contact using the contact details noted at paragraph 12 (Contact Us), below.

Once we have received notification that you have withdrawn your consent, we will no longer process your personal information (personal data) for the purpose or purposes you originally agreed to, unless we have another legitimate basis for doing so in law.

Please note:

the withdrawal of consent does not affect the lawfulness of earlier processing
if you withdraw your consent, we may not be able to continue to provide services to you
even if you withdraw your consent, it may remain lawful for us to process your data on another legal basis (e.g. because we have a legal obligation to continue to process your data)

11. Changes to this notice

Any changes we may make to our privacy notice in the future will be updated on our website at: privacy statement | websters. This privacy notice was last updated on May 24, 2018.

12. Contact us

If you have any questions regarding this notice or if you would like to speak to us about the manner in which we process your personal data, please email privacy@tax.uk.com or telephone 01223 507080 and ask for our Data Protection Point of Contact.

You also have the right to make a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues, at any time. The ICO’s contact details are as follows:

Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF

Telephone – 0303 123 1113 (local rate) or 01625 545 745

Website – www.ico.org.uk/concerns