General Privacy Notice

Privacy

Privacy is important to us. We have a data protection policy in place in which we commit to taking care of personal information.

To deliver our services, we need to collect, use, store, share and dispose of personal information. This is known as data processing.

The Data Protection Act encourages organisations to strike a balance between the privacy of individuals and delivering services for the public.

Privacy notice

When we collect personal information from you, we must tell you why we need it, what we will do with it and how long we will keep it. This is called a privacy notice.

The information on theses page is our privacy notice to explain how we process your personal information. We are currently working on more privacy notices in each of our service areas, which will be published as soon as possible.

In most cases Boston Borough Council is the data controller. We determine how your personal information will be processed and have to comply with data protection law. We are registered with the Information Commissioner as a data controller.  In some cases we are data controllers in common with other organisations  such as Lincolnshire County Council. Our Electoral Services has a different data controller - the Returning Officer.

As part of the strategic alliance between Boston Borough and East Lindsey District Councils your information may be processed by teams from either Council in order to provide the most effective service to you. For any queries about your personal data please contact the relevant data protection officer for the area in which you live data.protection@e-lindsey.gov.uk or data.protection@boston.gov.uk

We collect personal information about you in many ways. In most cases, we will collect it directly from you. That may be in person, by telephone, on a paper or online form, by email or letter, or on CCTV. There will be cases when we receive information about you from someone else, or from one of our partners.

We collect different categories of personal information, depending on the service we provide to you. In most cases, we will need your name and contact details. Our service-specific privacy notices give further detail on what kind of information is collected about you.

When we collect information from you, we will ensure we comply with the data protection principles:

• We will only collect information that we need.
• We won't keep your information for longer than we need it.
• We will tell you why we need your information and what we will do with it.
• We will keep your personal information secure.
• We will keep your information up-to-date.
• We will not use the information for a different purpose than the one we told you about (unless we have to do so by law).

In most cases Boston Borough Council is the data controller. We determine how your personal information will be processed and have to comply with data protection law. We are registered with the Information Commissioner as a data controller.  In some cases we are data controllers in common with other organisations  such as Lincolnshire County Council. Our Electoral Services has a different data controller - the Returning Officer.

As part of the strategic alliance between Boston Borough and East Lindsey District Councils your information may be processed by teams from either Council in order to provide the most effective service to you. For any queries about your personal data please contact the relevant data protection officer for the area in which you live data.protection@e-lindsey.gov.uk or data.protection@boston.gov.uk

We need to process personal information about you to enable us provide services and meet our legal obligations, such as collecting Council Tax, paying benefits and grants, and dealing with planning and licensing applications.

It will sometimes be necessary to process personal information to protect individuals from harm or injury, to prevent and detect crime, to comply with legal orders and duties, and to provide information in accordance with a person's rights.

We may need to keep your personal information within the Council's records for evidential and historical reasons, or use it for research and statistical purposes.

We will only process your personal information when there is a lawful reason to do so:

• It is required by law.
• It is necessary to provide a Council service.
• It is necessary as part of a contract.
• It is necessary to protect someone's life.
• We have a legitimate interest to do so.
• You have given us permission to do so.

To provide you with efficient services, we will sometimes share your personal information between teams within the Council, and with external partners and agencies involved in delivering services on our behalf, or alongside us. We may also provide personal information to third parties, but only where it is necessary to comply with the law or where it is allowed by data protection law.

We have a duty to protect public funds. We may check your information within the Council for verification purposes and/or for the prevention of fraud. We may share your information with other organisations where we are required to do so for the purposes of the prevention or detection of crime.

By way of example, we may share your information with:

• NHS Lincolnshire
• Lincolnshire Police
• Department for Work and Pensions
• HMRC
• Voluntary organisations and care providers

This council is required by law to participate in the National Fraud Initiative data matching exercises. Housing benefit, council tax and council tax support information may be provided to the Cabinet Office for NFI purposes and will be used for cross-system and cross-authority comparison for the prevention and detection of fraud.

We may pass the information to other agencies or organisations such as the Department of Work and Pensions and HM Revenues and Customs as allowed by law. We may check information you have provided or information about you that someone else has provided with other information we hold. We may also get information about you from certain third parties or give them information to ensure the information is accurate and to prevent/detect crime and protect public funds.

Our service-specific privacy notices give further information about the organisations with whom we may share personal information.

We will only share information with partners or contractors who agree to protect your information. Their duties will be set out in contracts or information sharing agreements.

Your information will normally be stored and processed in premises in the Council area or on servers based in the UK. While it may sometimes be necessary to transfer personal information overseas, any transfers will be in compliance with data protection law.  Information available on our website, such as media or publications which may have your personal information in may be accessible from outside the UK.

We will not keep your information for any longer than it is needed, and will dispose of paper and electronic information in a secure way. The length of time we need to keep information will depend on the purpose for which it is collected. Our service-specific privacy notices give further information on how long we keep your information.

Under the Data Protection Act 2018 , you have rights as an individual which you can exercise in relation to the information we hold about you, not all rights will apply it will depend on the legal basis for processing your data.

 The right to be Informed - Individuals have the right to be informed about the collection and use of their personal data. This is a key transparency requirement under the GDPR

 The right of Access - you are entitled to request access to and a copy of, information we hold about you

The right to Rectification - you have the right to ask to have your information corrected.

 The right to Erasure - this is not an absolute right and will depend on the reason for processing your personal information

The right to Data Portability - This only applies to data processing that is carried out by automated means

The right to Restrict processing may apply - you may request that we stop processing your personal data however, this may delay or prevent us delivering a service to you. We will seek to comply with your request but may be required to hold or process information to comply with our legal duties.

The right to Object - this is not an absolute right and will depend on the reason for processing your personal information.

In some cases the Council is using information to meet a lawful obligation placed upon the Council by a series of Laws. 

In this case the Council may need to withhold some of the 'subject's rights'

Boston Borough Council takes information security seriously and adheres to the highest standards when collecting and using personal information. For this reason, we take any complaints we receive about this diligently.  We encourage people to bring to our attention if they believe that our collection or use of information is unfair, misleading or inappropriate.

This general privacy notice does not provide exhaustive detail of all aspects of our collection and use of personal information. However we are happy to provide any additional information or explanation needed. Any requests for this should be sent to the address below:

How do I contact the Council's data protection officer?

The Council has appointed a data protection officer to make sure it is complying with data protection law. You can contact the data protection officer at:

Data Protection Officer
Municipal Buildings
West Street
Boston
PE21 8QR

data.protection@boston.gov.uk

Do I have a right to complain about the way information has been used?

If you have a concern about the way we are collecting or using your personal data, please let us know and we will try to resolve this. If you are still concerned, you can contact the Information Commissioner:

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

0303 123 1113 (local rate) or 01625 545 745 if you prefer to use a national rate number

casework@ico.org.uk

Our key Data Processor is Public Sector Partnership Services Ltd (formerly Compass Point Business Service (East Coast) Ltd) who process data on our behalf in relation to Revenues and Benefits, Finance, Human Resources, Information Technology and Customer Service under a contract.